The Croods

On 4/27/13, my family and I went to the movies. We watched the Croods, a movie fun for all ages. We went a little late so we had to sit in the front rows and we weren’t sitting together. Either way, it was a great movie and one that I will remember for some time!

Eep is a girl in a family of  Cavemen living and hunting in pre-historic times, talking about how her family is one of the few to survive nearby, mainly due to the strict rules of her overprotective father, Grug . When in their cave home, Grug tells a story to the rest of the family which includes his wife Ugga, his daughter Sandy, his son Thunk, and his mother-in-law Gran with a character that mirrors Eep’s curious nature. He uses this story to warn the family that exploration and new things pose a threat to their survival, and says to never not be afraid. This irritates the bored and adventurous Eep, and when the family falls asleep after dark, she ignores her father’s advice and leaves the cave when she sees a light moving outside the cave.

Seeking the light’s source, she meets Guy, an intelligent caveboy. She becomes fascinated with the fire he manages to create and  is eager to learn more. He tells her about his theory that the world is reaching its ‘end’ and asks her to join him. She refuses and Guy leaves, but not before giving her a noise-making shell to call him if she feels the need for help. Shortly afterwards, Eep is then caught by Grug, who had been frantically searching for her. Grug brings Eep back home, planning to keep her in the cave for the rest of her life. He is joined by the rest of the family, who Eep then tells them about Guy and shows them  the shell given to her, only for them to destroy it in fear of ‘new things’. An earthquake then occurs, sending everyone running for the cave, only to be stopped by Grug moments before the cave is destroyed by falling rocks. When they climb over the wreckage, they discover a land with lush vegetation, much different from their usual surroundings of rocky terrain. Grug takes his family into the deep forest to find a new cave.

While becoming aware of their new surroundings, the family are chased by a “Macawnivore” (a large, macaw-colored machairodont later called ‘Chunky’) and attacked by a swarm of “Piranhakeets” (deadly red-furred, piranha-like birds). In an act of panic, Eep sounds a horn similar to that which Guy gave her. Guy hears this and rushes to her. Thinking quickly, he creates a torch of fire, which scares the birds away. The rest of the family are then captivated by the fire, having never seen it before. After feeling impressed with Guy’s intelligence and mind of ‘ideas’, Grug bottles him in a hollow log to carry him in, then suggests that they take solitude in the cave of a nearby mountain mentioned by Guy. Guy is forcibly persuaded to lead the way, and soon begins to learn of the Croods way of living, which he thinks of as unusual.

Having captured something afterwards, the family greedily devours everything they caught. Guy and Eep are more sparing. The others realize their greediness and stop eating. Grug then tells another of his morale-lowering tales, this time mirroring the events of their day, mentioning a girl Grug and Ugga had before Eep was born who did venture away from her cave and died. Guy then tells a story of his own about a paradise he nicknames “Tomorrow”.

The next day, the family reaches a path coated in spiked rocks. A freed Guy then presents one of his various inventions called shoes. He makes some out of all the resources he can find, for each family member. This gains him some respect from the others except for Grug, who starts to feel jealous of Guy’s cleverness. Ugga, Gran, and Sandy have their first idea to get past carnivorous plants, Thunk encounters a crocodile-like dog who he calls Douglas, Eep and Guy grow closer together, while Grug is stranded in a ravine forcing Ugga to go back for him. They all reach a tree to stop for another night except for Grug, who feels distraught by his family abandoning his traditions of ‘Yesterday’ for Guy’s traditions of ‘Tomorrow.’ The next day, a ‘desperate’ and left-out Grug shows the others some of his ideas which all end up failing and humiliating himself. They soon reach the mountain, where Grug is unable to convince the family that settling in nearby cave is a better option, reaches to full anger, and proceeds to attack Guy. The two become stuck in tar and Guy reveals his family died drowning in it and their last words inspired his traditions of “Tomorrow.” Grug has a change of heart towards Guy.

As they are about to reach their destiny, an earthquake opens a deep ravine in their path. Grug throws each of them across the gap and reconciles with Eep, but is left behind. Will they make it to Tomorrow? Watch the movie to find out!

 

At the Nelson

Today I went to the Nelson to look at the 江山行旅, Journey through the Rivers and Mountains. This weekend is the last day they are showing it. After this weekend they will put everything back so that it won’t be damaged by the light and temperature, things like that. The next time I see this stuff will probably be in 10 or 20 years!

My favorite was the paintings. I couldn’t believe that such detail could be produced by brushes! I already went there for a school field trip last quarter. It meant much more when I knew more from our field trip. I could look at things more in detail. The other things like ceramics and pottery were amazing too. They didn’t have tools like we have today yet they managed to make beautiful works of art! I got to see so much of our culture, I am proud to be Chinese!

 

Egypt Journal-Day One-Cairo

Cairo, Day 1

I’m finally in Cairo! The plane was really boring, though the food wasn’t that bad… I was actually really surprised that Cairo wasn’t as hot as I expected. The airport was really nice and organized; much better than New York’s JFK airport. A travel guide from Trafalgar, the company that we are following, met us as we exited the airport. Imead, our guide, pronounced (Ee-me-ad), told us some very interesting things about Cairo. Cairo is quite noisy and very busy, like China except all the signs are in Arabic. The time it takes to get in and out of downtown ranges between 18 min and 2 days. Our hotel, Fairmount, is very nice and has many trees and lush greenery. We slept off the time difference and took a walk around Cairo. When we got back, we ate at a Lebanon restaurant inside the hotel. The bread was wonderful and so was the flavorful chicken. The shrimp, fish, and lamb wasn’t as good, but it was still tasty.  We then went back to our hotel room, where we are at now.

 

5K COLOR RUN!

On 4/13/2013, Blue Spinel and I attended the ‘Color-Me-Rad Fundraiser Race’. It is a race that you can attend that raises money for the Special Olympics. This race is national, so it’s not very often you can go to it. Basically what it was in short was a 5,000 meter race where you got sprayed with paint every Kilometer.

Blue Spinel and I were at thefront of the starting line, while the DJ was throwing pink and purple powder at the upcoming runners. We were the ten o’ clock racers. Before I knew it, the DJ was doing a starting count down to begin the race.

During the first thirsty seconds of the race, Blue Spinel and I  were at the front of the crawling mob of people. There were groups I categorized them in: the fast athletic ones, the pace yourself ones, the joggers, the walkers, and the leisurely ones. Blue spinel and I were in the joggers and pace your self group. We occasionally sprinted, then jogged, walked, fast walked, jogged, sprinted, and so on. This running tactic was really cold for conserving energy.

The first color point one the race was pink. There were bucketfuls of pink pigmenting powder that was thrown at uperson person had a dry spray hose that made Blue Spinel and I look like walking dolls. In the middle of the color point, volunteers were handing out color bombs. I caught two of them, blue and purple. Color bombs (copyrighted) are Justin two by three plastic packets of pigmenting powder.

The next color was yellow, and I was almost out of breath.  But Blue Spinel and I managed to run through the yellow. Volunteers were sprathey yellow paint every where and I got two nice thick stripes across my back. Next was the purple powder, and Blue Spinel and I had agreed to Gangnam Style through it. Coincidently, there was someone playing it on their phone. I was sprinkled in purple over my shorts, and the. I pushed Blue Spinel forward to get colorful.

The final color was orange, which was powder. I got excited and ran faster because i could hear the DJ yell through his megaphone. At the finish line, I picked up some abandoned color bombs with Blue Spinel, and we threw them at her mom and Park Ranger.

This was the funnest Running event in my life and I one hundred percent recommend it to anyone who is willingly to get messy. I hope the color run comes back to Kansas soon!

Egypt Journal-Day One-New York

I’m in NY right now, in the New York Palace hotel. This journal entry is just a huge list of what I did today, so this is what I did today : 1) I went to a huge church that was intricately decorated with white marble and stained glass windows. It’s basically your average church with way more details and statues trimmed with gold. The interior was filled with tons of candles and it was known as St. Patrick’s Church. Not the most creative name but it was beautiful. 2) We went to the Rockfeller Center and saw a huge gold statue in a fountain in front of a huge ice skating rink that held about two people, but its maximum occupancy was about 250 people. 3) We looked around Legoland. There was a dragon, a replica of a statue in Rockfeller Center, a big red apple, and other things that were made entirely out of Legos. My estimate on how many Legos used and how much time it took? About 2500 Legos and some 12 hours with multiple Lego experts working on it. The statues were huge! One wall was lined with depressions that held some 2 million Legos (that’s an estimate). The whole wall, floor to ceiling, held small depressions, about one inch apart, filled with different types of Legos. There must’ve been about 200 types in all! 4) We looked around the Metropolitan Museum of Art shop and saw some really awesome glass birds. We also saw these glass magnets that had flowers and butterflies in them. They were beautiful. I read a book on optical illusions and the encyclopedia to immaturity. They had a few pretty good tips on how to disrupt classes and other crazy things. 5) By the time we got out of that shop, it was raining. We ate at a Chinese restaurant, thinking that in Egypt we wouldn’t be able to eat Chinese food. The things my mom ordered were pretty good, but half of them were spicy, and if you know me, then you should realize that I DON’T EAT SPICY FOOD. That being said, I tried the two spicy dishes and started on the fried rice. Nom nom nom. It was good food. 6) When we were rushing back to our hotel, it was raining, raining, raining. My coat got all wet. Humph. 7) I’m back at the hotel about to go to bed, so good night!