Vlog!

Here's a video blog of From Baghdad, With Love! Hope you enjoy. Sorry I look kind of gross, I had just gotten home from track practice!

Picture Blog

Rescue dogs were used all the time in Baghdad because they had a  great sense of smell and could detect danger such as bombs and people way earlier than the actual soldiers.

This picture.. well it is just too cute for words. Stray puppies were found all over Baghdad and Iraq and I don't know how they weren't all allowed to live. 

With the great amount of stray dogs and the dangers they brought to soldiers either through diseases they carried or their behavior, many were killed. 

Lava finally made it home to the United States, and Kopelman was thrilled to have made a difference in at least saving one life, even though he wasn't human.

When they first found Lava as a puppy they fed him MRE's (meals ready to eat). None of the soldiers wanted to eat them, and Lava gobbled them up. It turned into a win-win situation.

Lava and Kopelman now live in La Jolla California where they have a family, and are living happily.

This is a picture of when Kopelman had newly discovered Lava and was still stationed in Kallujah.

Stray dogs were everywhere in Iraq, most were killed, but some people had too big of a heart to kill them, and did there best to help them.

Fallujah was the first place Kopelman was stationed and  a very dangerous one too. Bombings and shootings happened everywhere, your life was constantly in danger. 

Once Kopelman was transferred to Baghdad he was put in the Green Zone. It was protected on all sides, and contained the Baghdad Airport. It was dangerous to get in and out, because it was surrounded by the Red Zone, which almost always meant death.

Dogs in Baghdad

Lieutenant Colonel Jay Kopelman's rescue of his beloved dog Lava isn't the only rescue story of animals in Iraq. Each story although quite similar, is unique in the way that the animal and it's owner met, bonded, and lived. Their story contains their own heartwarming, and heart wrenching parts that make you wish you could just fly over there and rescue the dog yourself to save everyone the trouble and worry. But rescue stories aren't always successful, and many dogs end up being killed in the streets. Below I have listed different articles that I found when researching my book and the topic of "dogs in Baghdad." They mostly contain articles about the immense killing of stray dogs, and can be hard to read, especially if you love dogs like me.

•   www.dailymail.co.uk/.../Baghdad-cull-million-stray-dogs-rogue-cani
• www.huffingtonpost.com/.../baghdad-stray-dogs-proble_n_641783
• hsus.typepad.com/wayne/2010/07/iraq-dogs.html
• www.youtube.com/watch?v=vLIzyAM5qrQ
• www.strategypage.com/htmw/htlead/20111225.aspx

The above websites were fairly depressing with the numbers of dogs they talked about being killed, and unloved, but don't give up hope! There are people out there trying to save them and this website and Operation is one of the most successful! 

barbarabarth.hubpages.com › ... › Animal Rescue › Dog Rescue

Lava's Adventure

As I mentioned earlier, Lava was only a puppy when Lieutenant Colonel Jay Kopelman found him. He surprised him and started messing around with him, biting his ankles and shoes. Kopelman brought the puppy back to camp, and introduced him to all the other soldiers. They loved having something to take care of and to entertain them. They all took turns feeding him, and playing with him. The soldiers gave him the name Lava after the Lava Rescue Dogs they had that were used to find bombs, people, and were used for their keener sense of smell and sight. However, since Lava was not licensed and a Rescue dog, he was a violation of General Order 1-A which prohibited pets on camps because it was a distraction and a health risk due to diseases he could carry. Stray and unlicensed dogs on camps were killed, and as the bond between Kopelman and Lava grew stronger, Kopelman would not let that happen.

Kopelman decided he was going to get Lava back to the United States, and began talking to his good friend who was a reporter in Baghdad at the time; Anne. When he was sent from Fallujah to Baghdad he had Lava stay with her. Kopelman began sending emails to everyone he could think of to help out with his situation with Lava, but everyone was turning him down due to the General Order. He was finally able to get paperwork for Lava although the source may not have been legit, it still looked that way. After finally getting someone to help him out, he is somewhat relieved, but now the transporting must begin.

Kopelman talks to Anne's assistant Sam on getting Lava from the Red Zone to the Green Zone in Baghdad. While this is going on he is corresponding with Ken Licklider, the owner of Vohne Liche Kennels who is a big contributor in helping Lava get to the states. In the mean time while Lava is being transported all over Iraq, Kopelman is stuck in the states at Camp Pendleton waiting to hear back on how things are going with Lava.

Things end up well, Lava made it through to the United States and Kopelman moved to La Jolla, California and Kopelman met and married his wife who had a son. They all live happily with many pets who get along great. Because of Lava Helen Woodward Animal center was able to start Home 4 the Holidays  drive which helped transport many orphaned animals that year.

Music Blog

For my music blog, I chose American Soldier by Toby Keith. This song talks about a soldier's want to start a family like Lieutenant Colonel Jay Kopelman wanted with Lava. It also relates to Kopelman when Toby Keith sings about not being a soldier for the money or glory, but because he wants to. This is what Kopelman talked about in his book. He had left the army for a brief period of time, but knew it was what he wanted to do being there. His love for his country kept him fighting and risking his life, especially after he met and fell in love with Lava. I really like Toby Keith's songs and I find this one to be really inspiring and I enjoyed it, hope you do too!

4th Quarter Blog Intro

     

  It is now the final quarter of my junior year! It seems like this school year has gone so fast, and we are on our last set of blogs. I think that every quarter my blogs have become more creative and have improved. Hopefully this trend continues with my last set. This quarter I am reading From Baghdad, With Love by Lieutenant Colonel Jay Kopelman and Melinda Roth. I have not gotten very far in this book yet but so far it is about a troop of Marines who discovered a tiny puppy when entering an abandoned house in Fallujah, Iraq.
          They brought the puppy back to their camp even though it was against regulations, and everybody fell in love with him. They de-flea, de-worm, and give him food with their Meals Ready to Eat. The puppy eats these meals like they were the best food on earth, and the men are glad, none of them would ever eat them. Jay Kopelman falls in love with the dog and takes him to stay with him and Anne a journalist who acts like one of the guys. They talk about the life they wish they could have more of with a wife and kids. They talk about how it will happen someday. Meanwhile, Lava the puppy is keeping them entertained making them forget the horrors of where they are for at least a few moments. I haven't gotten very far in the book, but so far it feels like it is a good read, and I love the pictures they have inside the book. They are of different puppies and dogs who help out in finding people and bombs in the rubble and deserted towns in Iraq. They also bring smiles to your face just looking at the way they make the people around them feel. I am looking forward to finishing this book and learning more about what happens and how the dogs are helping.

End of 3rd Quarter Blogging!

Well we are down three quarters, and one more to go! We have done a lot this quarter with blogging and posting on other people's blogs. We have become friends with people on the Ning and have even skyped with their class. We are looking to be skyping a lot more this up coming quarter and I can't wait to complete Read for a Lifetime. Five Flavors of Dumb was a good book, and I enjoyed getting to read it this quarter. This curriculum for English has definitely been new, and I can tell you coming into the year I was not expecting it, but I have liked it a lot. It is a great alternative to writing essays, and takes a more modern vibe with the adding of pictures, links, and videos. As the year has progressed we have been given more freedom to do what we wish with respect to our blog themes.

In the beginning of the year every week we were given a blog prompt to complete. This was during first quarter. In the second quarter we were given a list of about 15 blog prompts and could pick and choose as we saw fit for our book. Now in third quarter we had complete freedom so I tried to challenge myself by creating my own topics. I am interested to see what Mrs. Hayes has in store for us fourth quarter, and I am excited to complete my final book. Well I have now finished my blogs for awhile, but I will be back soon!

Dumb Picture Blog

Dumb is a local high school garage band, who plays in front of their school to try and build a fan base. It is a group of people who don't mesh well together in real life, but all share a great love for rock music.
Piper's USS Immoveable. Her 1987 chevy caprice classic brougham is what gets her everywhere. It sucks gas, bound to breakdown at any moment, and drives her crazy, yet she still can't imagine not having it.
Piper and her younger sister Grace are both deaf, and with their family not having much money, getting the most up to date equipment for the both of them is impossible. Her parents decided to spend Piper's college fund on getting a Cochlear implant for her little sister, which has caused a lot of family tension.
Dumb wants a gig, and Piper is working her butt off to get them one. She finally gets them a oppurtunity to record with man named Baz. Thier first recording does not go very well, but eventually they can begin to pull together.
When the band first plays together and finishes their first recording studio it does not go very well, and they are all down in morale. They need to pull everything together and need to do it fast in order to pull a gig together.

Piper manages to land Dumb's fist gig on a soft rock radio channel. It is not what they normally play, but it is a paying gig, so they try it out. It does not go great and Kallie begins to appear as the band's "face" bringing new tension.



Piper and her little brother Finn are complete opposites. Piper is a straight A student and overacheiver where as Finn always gets in trouble and doesn't care about school. As the band evolves and Finn begins to help out they develop a bond that makes them inseperable.
Someone is emailing Piper random musicians from a screen name of ZARKINFIB who sends her on a chase to Kurt Cobain's house to experience a bit about his life and how he grew up.
Jimi Hendrix is another famous musician who ZARKINFIB sends Piper on a  mission to find out more about. She begins to realize more about the love for music they had, and it builds emotionally in her. It makes her a greater musician and she begins to discover her own inner rock star.
 Dumb is finally coming together. Their sound has greatly improved and thier gigs getting bigger and better. Dumb is no longer the small garage band who played on the front steps of thier high school just to get their sound across. They came a long way, suffered through a lot, but all their work and dedication payed off in the end.

Being deaf in a hearing world.

What is it like to be deaf in a hearing world?

Being deaf in a hearing world would be extremely difficult, and I can't even begin to think about how hard that would be to cope. Reading Five Flavors of Dumb gives a bit of insight into a world where the main character Piper is a manger of the band Dumb, and has one of the greatest obstacles. She is deaf. Some of the things she has to go through are heart breaking, her struggle following people's conversations and her parents spending of her college fund to buy cochelar implants for her baby sister. Something she has wanted, but her parents never had the money to get for her. I decided to look further into what it is like to be deaf and came across this website:
http://library.thinkquest.org/15390/sstart.htm,
this website gives a lot of good information on many different questions you may have.
       
The website I linked gives you basic information, reasons for losing your hearing, sign language tutorials, and frequently asked questions. It is a great resource and I learned a lot. It shows how tough and strong you must be if one of your six senses does not work properly. In the book I am reading Piper shows she is strong, persistant, and is unstoppable as a manager even with a slight drawback. Her life isn't always easy, but she keeps going, and proves she can do anything she wants, and nothing can stop her.

Music Blog

      For my music blog I chose the song Eye of the Tiger by Survivor. It is a hard rock song so it's genre matches the band Dumb. It's lyrics also have a huge similarity to Dumb's attitudes. It talks about never giving up, putting in time and determination to get where you want and not stopping with a "will to survive." They are willing to go through thick and thin to make their dream of becoming known as a hard rock band. Starting from almost scratch they built their band, adding new members such as Ed, and Kallie. They also had to work on playing together a tough task to accomplish with their mix of attitudes.
     They have Kallie, who is the look of the band. Tash who has the attitude of the band, is hard to get along with. Ed, the new and understanding drum player who really helps pull the band's rhythm together. Then there is Josh who is the head of the band, and has a crush on Kallie. Last but not least there is Will; the bass guitarist who is more quiet, but is extremely humble. However, later on there are some big changes and the band starts to fall apart, but like in the song, they "get back on their feet.. and don't lose their grip on their dreams of the past."

Hard Rock vs. Soft Rock

Piper becomes the manager of her school band. The band is a hard rock band, but in order to get a recording made to be played on the radio, Piper had her band perform a soft rock song. Complete opposites! Piper realizes her band is not made for soft rock, so she plans to have them re-debut their hard rock side, and it makes them famous. Here is a bit of back ground on both types of music...

Hard Rock:
                                         
        Hard rock had its earliest roots in the 1960s and it is usually played by the electric and bass guitars, drums, vocals, and sometimes a piano or keyboard. It is a loud, and aggressive form of rock music, with guitar emphasised and often distorted. Drumming is done with strong rhythms, and works with the bass guitar. The vocals are often a growl or raspy. Usually involves a kind of screaming. Some famous bands that were hard rock bands are Led Zeppelin, Aerosmith, AC/DC, Bon Jovi, and Guns N' Roses to name few. This is the kind of music that appealed to the high school where Dumb was enrolled as well as the members of the band.

Soft Rock:

         Soft rock also had its earliest roots in the 1960s. It's typical instruments are electrical, bass and acoustic guitar, with drums, and a piano. It uses the techniques of rock music and combines them with folk rock and pop for a more toned down sound. They focus on love, everyday life, and relationships in their themes. The electric guitars are not as prominent and are more high pitched. The acoustic guitars, pianos, and synthesizers are more heavily used. Major bands and songwriters in the soft rock genre are Cat Stevens, Journey, Billy Joel, Chicago, and James Taylor. This is what the band turned into for a radio debut, but it was a disaster.

Here is a bit about hard rock and soft rock. If you ever read Five Flavors of Dumb it really will help, and I hope you found it informative and interesting!

3rd Quarter Blog Reflection

  We are now in our 3rd quarter of school, and we all know what that means. A new read for a lifetime book, and more blogging! Last quarter I read Sarah Dessen's What Happened to Goodbye. It was a good read, and blogging to that book was fairly easy. I worked hard on last quarters blog and my grade definitely proved it. Although I did not get 100%, it was considerably better than 1st quarter's. I was more thorough with my blogs, and I enjoyed getting to pick the blogs I got to do from the list Mrs. Hayes gave our class. We are already a couple weeks in, and I have picked out my new book. This quarter I am reading Five Flavors of Dumb by Antony John.
   It is a book about a eighteen year old girl, Piper, who because of her big mouth, landed the job as her high school's new rock band manager. The different personalities in the band make it a difficult task, but she reaches out to her friends such as Ed, who help her overcome her disability (being deaf) and the school discovers he has a hidden talent that lands him a spot in the band. As manager Piper tries to land her band gigs, and discovers they have a lot of work to do, along the way. I think this book will be really interesting and I can't wait to see how it plays out. The challenge of being a band manager while being deaf, must be extremely difficult, but her persistence and determination is something to be admired. I will keep you updated on how the book goes, and will continue to blog. I wish we had more of a structured list of topics to blog about, but that is just me. Coming up with creative and unique blog ideas will be a challenge, so 3rd quarter... bring it on!