Jimi Hendrix

I have lived next to Jimi Hendrix’s grave for majority of my life. Going to the gas station I would pass his house, you couldn’t miss it, it was the one with the blue tarp draping over it. Never have I realized that he had a big impact on the country with his playing of the National Anthem. He understood that music can have just as much power was words do. He knew by playing the National Anthem in a way no one else could would say more words then one could express.

I knew that Hendrix was famous for his guitar-playing skills, but I never knew that he was able to compare his music playing to some of the great activist during the black power movement. Hendrix was able to take his music to the next level and be remembered by greatness and not trash-talk that we encounter in our generation today. Its admirable that Jimi Hendrix was able to see that he could do so much more with music then JUST play the guitar. I never realized how much of an honor it is to be able to go to his grave or live in the same area as he once did. I never was able to see the importance he made by playing the National Anthem in a way nobody could.

“There’s no way of knowing”

So many unanswered questions by the end of the book. Ruth has to remember that her time is now and Nao’s time was in the past. Ruth got so caught up in trying to find the unknown answers that it was making her mad. I think that we all get too caught up in finding the unknown that we look for it and worry about it too much. Ruth tries to find out what would have happened if…  Oliver tells her “if World War II wouldn’t have happened then you and I would never have meet.” I always believe that everything happens for a reason. She found that book for a reason, being able to tell Nao’s story to many other people and being able to connect to a teenager that had many horrible things happen to her. She was able to read Nao’s grandmothers stories. We as readers were able to learn more information but in a fictional stand point.

Communication

Communication is a huge theme in this book. The communication between Nao to Ruth is the whole idea of A Tale For the Time Being. This book is able to communicate two characters of two didn’t times and bring them together by a diary and a Hello Kity lunch box. The author demonstrates how we don’t necessarily have to be in the same time being to communicate to another human and to care for them.

In small groups we were talking about the different communications that we have today like texting, emailing, Skype, Facebook, and Twitter. We are reminded by this book that a simple letter is able to tell you so much about a person. You are able smell their smell, and see how they write. Texting we aren’t able to so. We get mad when someone doesn’t text us back right away or doesn’t respond but when a letter you were able to wait for it and be patient. Communication has changed. Today all we want is quick and fast.

Environment

In the book it discusses how bullying was a huge problem for Nao. She was getting bullied in her school and no one ever did anything about it. When Ruth reads the about Nao’s death and how the video went online and people were wondering how could teachers or anyone participate. Then Oliver says “We live in a bully culture, Politicians, corporations, the banks, the military. All bullies and crooks. They steal, they torture people, they make these insane rules and set the tone” (121).

When I read Nao’s parts I think  ”Oh wow, this is terrible” but never realized how bad teenagers treated peers in the United States. I know that when I was growing up I would try to fit in and sometimes miss treat the people that I actually didn’t mind because we are taught that “normal” is the only way. In reality we are scared because we don’t know what normal really is.

The quote is valid. We do live in a society where if you aren’t “normal” then you will get mistreated. Don’t ask Don’t tell was a great example of not being able to be express yourself truthfully and being able to get kicked out of the military because you weren’t “normal. I truthfully didn’t realized how much bullying is an issue not only with teenagers but as a society. We are just so used to overlooking the situations that we never understand how bad things really are.

Someone in the class said that this movie was powerful because of the mixed relationships between African American and Indian American. I have to agree. In a lot of movies relationships contain same race relationships or a mixed relationship with a white woman/man. Throughout the movie it made us think about how these two race groups of brown skin should stick together but easily gave up on each other.

It was also said in class that their really wasn’t any violence. We often see in movies with minorities that I was sure that something bad was  going to happen. I thought something was going to happen to the brother because it seemed like he was caught in with the wrong groups, “always on the street corner.” It was actually relieving to see that violence didn’t have to take place to have a powerful movie.

A lot of points were talked about when we talked about the film. We talked about the dysfunctional relationships between same race couples to mixed race couples. Of course their was dysfunction between Demetrius and Mina because of their families not wanting them to be together but it wasn’t because of them not loving each other. It was shown that just because you are the same race doesn’t mean that you won’t have problems in your marriage.

I have grown up around R&B, Soul, and Hip-Hop. Today we hear Rap and hear all the negativity like the harsh cuss words or talking trash about women. We have all heard the bad things that the media has said about Kanye West, Lil Wayne and many more rappers but what we don’t hear in the media is how Hip Hop became an escape. From Kung Fu to Hip Hop the book explains how Hip Hop was able to turn the tables from being a place of violence to a place of social consciousness.

I think that rappers today play into the media and how they are stereotyped. I also think that the media also loves to keep this stereotype going. Look at all the stores buying these records, and radio stations playing these songs.  There has been talk about how Macklemore isn’t really a rapper because he talks about real life struggles and how the hip hop nation shouldn’t support him because of his skin color, white. Hip Hop has been stereotyped into this music category for people living and coming from the ghetto. I think that when rappers get big they start to conform themselves into what the media whats them to be. I think that the book is right by saying that a hip hop has become a reform.

“Don’t think, feel”

I have never seen any of Bruce Lee’s movies. I have heard the name, and knew that he was amazing at Kung Fu but never cared to watch any of his movies. I enjoyed watching and reading about Bruce Lee. Reading the book really makes you understand the deeper meaning of the movie.

Lee is told that his sister was killed by Han’s men you could tell that he was motivated to enter the Kung Fu tournament even more.  He told a young boy in the beginning of the movie not to show emotion like anger but to feel. When Lee and Han are fighting you couldn’t tell if he was fighting for his sister or fighting because he is a bad man overall. You couldn’t tell any expression on his face but you just knew that Han couldn’t handle Lee’s moves. In the book From Hung Fu To Hip Hop its says “The flashback of the scene of Su-Lin’s suicide overlays with ‘Lee’s’ unusually calm facial expression” (120). Even though it is just a movie I would get to emotional. I guess its because Kung Fu teaches you how to react in situations and not get emotional when you have a job to do.

As we discussed in class on Friday life and time have so much to do with A Tale For The Time Being. On page 86 Ruth talks about suicide. In the United States most people fear the word suicide. We think that ending your own life is not acceptable. Many that believe in God would say that committing suicide is a sin, she even mentions that in the book. “Harry” teaches me that suicide in Japan isn’t really a bad thing. Which looking at it I can see why people might believe that it is your life and you have to choose how to live it. Now I ask myself why do we think someone is out of their mind crazy when they decide living isn’t what they want to do anymore? Everybody dies but when you are living to die, are you really living?

Time… As we discussed not only does the title have time in it but in the first part of this book time is a word that is consistently used. Rather thats for expressing time on a watch or time throughout ones life. On page 30 she quotes a man that says, “time itself is being, and being is time… In essence, everything in the entire universe is intimately linked with each other as moments in time, continuous and separate. I think that the author keeps expressing this quote without even mentioning it. She expresses throughout the book how time links us together. On page 85 she mentions how the watch had many similar watches that were manufactured by Seiko Company in WWII. She explains how they were manufactured in large numbers, but many didn’t survive. By linking time and the watch together it sounds like soldiers in the War. Many were trained to fight and battle but only a few remain today. She gives us history lessons without explaining the entire history. She gives us meaning to life even if its only caught with time linked to a watch. She expresses how time is so important but also so easily lost.