Coming Home Again

In traditional fashion, she was the house accountant, the maid, the launderer, the disciplinarian, the drive, the secretary, and of course the cook. She was also my first basketball coach

“Coming Home Again” is an essay written by Chang-rae Lee expressing his grief for leaving home and his bliss while returning home again. This essay briefly shows his intimacy with his mother for which he remembers his home for. While describing his mother, the writer says, “In traditional fashion, she was the house accountant, the maid, the launderer, the disciplinarian, the dive, the secretary, and of course the cook. She was also my first basketball coach”(125).

Mother he presents her in essay has a typical characteristic of traditional Asian house wife who puts her family before her in any condition. She has multi talented while handling household activities. She takes care of financial activities of whole house even though his father is the one who makes money. She is in charge of cleaning house and doing laundry for whole family. She disciplines her children’s and drive them around and last but not the least, she was a chief for the entire family. She was not just the keeper of house she was much more than that, she also used to be athletic on her school days and she was the reason for the writer to learn basketball. It is her who has held the family together and strengthens the relation between everyone in the family. She was also very forgiving and scarifying person as she hides her love for the writer and sends him to boarding school. Although she had hard time sending her beloved son away, she was sure that it will help the writer to become better person. In this quote, the author has magnificently and utterly painted her mother’s portrait and this portrait completely describes her.

Chapter 3: Making Global Revision

This chapter talks about the revision of our work for mistakes and correcting it. It discuss about global revision, editing sentence and proofreading the final draft. Readers generally pay their attention on global matter of the essay such as focus, purpose, organization, content and overall strategy first rather than sentence structure, word choice, grammar, punctuation which comes later. While making global revision we have to think big. It is after revision we alter our sentence, paragraph or thesis according to its requirement. Global revision is also a difficult task and many of us tend to avoid it, as it is difficult to find our own mistakes form reader’s perspective. For that we have to wait for a while before we revise and then ask the questions that an audience would ask while making correction. While making revision we will be focusing on effectiveness and while editing we will be focusing on correctness. However, there is one spot where mistakes are obvious; these mistakes are typos and other small undetectable mistakes for which proofreading are necessary. Although proofreading is slow and dull it is very important because these small mistakes are hard to find even while revising because we read what we intend to write not what is actually written.

Proofreading is the main part where I will be focusing while revising my essay. I will first read my essay and make required adjustment for sentence, paragraph and thesis. Then I will focus on typographical mistake and small undetected mistake which are difficult to find by slowly reading the essay again.

Chapter 2: Rough out an initial draft

Gathering writing material, diagrams, outlines, free writing, etc are the main preparation we need to do before writing rough draft. While writing Initial draft we should focus our attention on ideas and organization and we can deal with the sentence structure and word choice later. Drafting help us to write fluently because here we just think of putting down ideas and ignore mistakes so there is no writer’s block.

Introduction is the hardest part in draft as we try to draw the attention of the readers. It is the most liable area to get stuck. Introduction is usually 50 to 150 words with one or two paragraph. Here we declare our main point of the draft and try to hook the reader. To hook the reader to the essay we can use a startling statistic or an unusual fact, a vivid example, a description, a paradoxical statement, a quotation or a bit of dialogue, a question, an analogy and an anecdote. What it means is, introduction should spark curiosity and offer readers a reason to continue reading. The purpose and main point of the writing is summarized in one sentence called thesis. There should be a thesis in every essay except the one strictly informative writing which is difficult to summarize in one sentence. Thesis should contain the main idea and support essay. Thesis should be made less obvious, not too broad, not too narrow and not too vague. After introduction, comes the body which contains the points that support the thesis. Therefore, it is compulsory to at least have tentative thesis before we start writing. Finally there is a conclusion where we remind readers of the essay’s main idea once again. Conclusion paragraph should be short as reader has already understood the main point of the essay.

First thing I will try to do while writing rough draft is, to create a thesis statement. Then I will continuously keep writing the introduction paragraph so that I can take it to next paragraph without getting stuck. I will try to make my thesis statement strong and interesting. In body I will describe the facts that support thesis statement in detail. Finally in conclusion I will summarize the purpose of whole draft in short paragraph.

The Ways We Lie

Do people have to lie in order to "lubricate the daily machinery of living"?

Exaggeration, minimizing the matter, avoiding confrontation, sparing people’s feeling, conveniently forgetting, keeping secret, justify lying to the big institutions  are the common type of lies that most of us deal with every day in our life. We lie most of the time, thinking it does not hurt to lie a little and it does not hurt anyone. In fact a little lie can keep us away from the serious consequences which we might suffer if we are true all the time.

In this essay, writer Stephanie Ericsson has divided the kind of lies into ten different ways. Some lies are not as harmful as other, actually those lies could save us from unnecessary conflicts. Some lies which we usually tackle to lubricate the daily machinery of living are; the white lie, telling little harmless lie to avoid distressing effect if truth is revealed, are the common type of lie we learn since our childhood. Deflecting, keeping your real self inside and showing the fake self is another way to avoid the confrontation.

However, there are some lies which we should be really cautious of in order to make the situation worst. Some lies like façades which is making one look like other or putting on deceptive face is self-destructive. Ignoring the plain fact is another disparaging lie which can cause more harmful effect if not resolve in time. Omission is another major lie which involves only erasing little fact but it changes the whole story and this type of lie should be omitted in our daily life. Stereotypes and cliché s is another harmful lie that we should avoid. Delusion is another powerful lie we seem to face, and it filters the real picture out of our mind form what we what to think and it means to lie yourself which is really want to stay away from.

Essay 1 Rough Draft

 

“There are three kinds of suns in Missouri: Sunshines, sunflowers, and sons-of-b****." This dialog of Clint Eastwood form the movie “Josey Wales,” always makes me chuckle and it also bring back memories, memories of my late uncle, Dr. Tirtha Man Maskey. Whenever I come across this picture it reminds me of my favorite heroes, Clint himself on the movies and my uncle in my real life, and the inspiration I got form both of them. My uncle is the only reason I am here in United States studying and trying to graduate. If it was not for him, I would have been like couple of my friends who are unemployed because they do not have degree and they spends all their time drinking and getting into some senseless argument all day at the bar. To be honest my uncle saved me, saved me from the path of self-destruction.

My uncle studied in United States for eight years. He got his Masters Degree from University of Michigan and his PhD. Degree in forestry from University of Florida. He was totally dedicated to wild life conservation of Nepal and has done immense research on Gangetic crocodiles. When he used to visit us in Nepal for holidays, he used to bring lots of toys, clothes and movies. I still remember the first toy I got; it was LEGO from which I could make chopper, racing car and a crain. However, the most memorable one was the movie “The Good, The Bad and The Ugly”. I was in seventh grade when I watched this movie, instantly after that I fell in love with those kinds of movies, with the entire Wild West scenario, tall, rough and tough man smoking cigar who speaks less and does more damage to the bad guys and all those gun fights. I could barely understand what they were talking in the move since my English was not so good at the time but I could see all the actions.

During his second visit, uncle brought me more movies of Clint like Josey Wales, Fist Full of Dollars, For a Few Dollars More, Pale Riders, Magnum Force etc. He used to bring more stuffs to me than other children in the families because he used to love as I was very shy kind of child. I used to ask him how United States looks like, does it really look like the one in the movie, with deserts and horses and cowboys. Does El Paso really look like the one in the movie For a Few Dollars More? After hearing my numerous questions about United States he used to say that I will find out one day when I will go there to study like him. At that time I was really upset because I used to be below average student, I was having hard time in studies particularly in English language and with all those below average scores I was sure that I will not make it to States. So whenever studying to States comes in my mind I used to be demotivated.  When he found that I was too depress to go on, he gave me the incentive that I need the most at that time. He told me that he use to be below average student like me in fact worse than me in studies and he learnt how to speak and write English in his tenth grade. However, later when I was old enough, I found out that he used to be an excellent student and even though he started English language in tenth grade he had already started learning English in his home school way before and he was really good at it.

After finishing his studies he came back to Nepal and worked for Royal Chitwan National Park. He was exceptionally dedicated to his work and worked hard all the way to the top. Finally after twenty years of hard working he got promoted to Director General of the Department of Forest and Wildlife Conservation of Nepal. As a result of his numerous contributions to the wild life he won many prestigious awards like Order of the Golden Ark from late Prince Bernhard of the Netherlands in 2004 and Duke of Edinburgh Conservation Media Award in 2005 from Britain's Prince Philip. He was an honorable man and my inspiration. He helped me with all the official processes to study in States. He always used to tell me that education is the best way to secure your career and earn respect. Due to his inspiration I tried my best and finished my high school but after that I stopped studying. I started to feel that his inspirations are fading away until he won those glorious awards. After receiving those awards he spoke to me about his belief of secured future and earning respect which he claimed to be complete then.

When I googled for the facts and news about my uncle, Dr Thritha Man Maskey, there were more than 2000 results which was all about him but when I googled myself there were more than 3000 results but only two results were actually that too was  Facebook and Myspace. I felt pity to myself at that time. Even at the age of twenty seven I have not started my career in fact I haven’t even finished my studies yet. Clint has numerous Google search results, uncle has plentiful search results then why not me. This makes me feel awful most of the time when I think about it but the fact is I am still trying and I am close to my goal. I am not giving up when I am so close and I know my uncle’s motivations will help me to pass through my tough times. Even though his words are little vague in my memories, his inspirations are clear as crystal.

Chapter 1: The Writing Process

Chapter 1 is about “The Writing Process.” Writing is the process of figuring out what we think; it is not just recording already developed thoughts. It is not possible to record all our thoughts so we have to follow four main steps before we write a first draft. First step is to “Assess the writing situation.” We have to observe the writing situation first, these writing situation includes subject, sources of information, purpose and audience, length and document design, reviewers and deadlines. We can narrow down a subject to topic by subdividing the subject, then restricting the purpose, restricting the audience and considering the information available to us. Second step is to “Experiment with ways to explore the subject.” Before writing first draft we can experiment with one or more techniques like talking and listening to the matters that are related to subject, annotating texts and taking notes out or written resources, clustering, freewriting, asking the journalist’s questions and keeping a journal. Third step is to “Formulate a tentative thesis.” We have to figure out the main idea of the subject we are writing then generate a thesis statement that answers the question about our topics. Thesis sentence is usually found in the opening paragraph of the essay. Final step is to “Sketch a plan.” In this step we will write and outline for the facts that supports our thesis statement. It is a tentative structure of our ideas for essay. First we can write informal outline then later to figure out if the outline supports the essay, we have to write formal outline.

In my writing will for sure use these four steps. These steps look really helpful. Usually when I start writing essay I start to write as I read, for an hour or two I just waste my time trying to figure out where to start. Now I know that first I have to generate ideas and sketch the plan. The most time I will be spending will be on assessing the writing situation, which includes subject, source information, purpose and audience and length and document designs. Then I will follow the rest of the steps.

“Writing is something beyond Indians”

Sherman Alexie believes that, success these days are only viable through proper education. He puts more emphasis on education within the Native American culture in this plot. In these modern days not only in America but all over the world education is playing the vital role. Education can save people, save them from poverty and unemployment; it generates an opportunity to be able to take care of one’s family. Alexie saved himself from failure and he wants to save the youth of reservation through education.
In the quote “Writing is something beyond Indians”, Alexie put forward the popular trend of Native Americans to think themselves as non competitive in changing world. They feel that they are expected to fail in the non-Indian world. Even in the school the weak one who feels that they have already been defeated sits in the back seat ignoring the education.Alexie however did not believe in this trend and transformed himself into educated and competitive to the changing world. He taught himself to read and was always interested in the books. According to Alexie, most of the Native Americans keeps themselves away from education thinking it’s beyond their reach but what they should realize is, enthusiasm and practice will make them pass through this stereotype thinking. Alexie is the perfect example for the youth in the reservation as he gave a new direction for this kind of stereotypical thoughts.