I got the inspiration for the name from "Wii Came, Wii Conquered" which was on the cover of an issue of the Nintendo Power magazine (it's an old edition, from a year or two ago).

I'm not talking about the Wii this time, though. The "we" I'm referring to is the eighth graders this year - in particular, my village. (Just in case you weren't aware, each grade at my school is divided into villages. Each village has teachers for the four core subjects - history, language arts, math, and science - for PE or your elective, your village doesn't matter.) We were having a fundraiser in the Week of Giving. The money would go to research for Duchenne Muscular Distrophy, a muscular problem that can be inherited (particularly in the X chromosome). 1 in every 3500 boys is affected by it. Females are less likely to get Duchenne because they have two X chromosomes, whereas males only have one (and of course, X is superior to Y. Hahahaha!).

I first heard of Duchenne when my school played a trailer for a movie called Darius Goes West. The trailer didn't really show how serious it was because it was busy saying things like "Buy a DVD - $17 goes to Duchenne research, $3 to making more movies" and "This is not a trailer, this is a vehicle". The movie was pretty funny too, but it was also deep. Darius is a boy (15 at the time of the movie, I'm not sure exactly how old he is now but he has graduated from high school) who has Duchenne. He was going to travel from his hometown of Athens, Georgia to Los Angeles (a.k.a. Hollywood), California to ask the show Pimp My Ride to make improvements to his wheelchair. Since many people watch MTV, he and his friends figured it would be a good chance to raise awareness of Duchenne and also get his wheelchair brought up to speed (it actually broke on the trip).

Duchenne makes your muscles degenerate, and it eventually affects your heart. Duchenne is fatal every time; you're lucky if you can even live to 25. Darius's brother, who also had Duchenne, died at the age of 19. Darius's brother had always tried to be strong and smiling, and Darius found his brother to be an inspiration, so he does his best to be optimistic himself. I was talking to an old teacher of mine and she said she was surprised by how Darius can laugh and enjoy himself and seemingly not be upset by the fact that he will probably die within a few years. I agree; I think I'd be devastated if I knew I would die young and there was no hope of saving me. But maybe different people deal with things differently.

I was kind of surprised that I didn't even know about Duchenne, despite the fact that so many people have it (in fact, who knows, I might carry the gene for it and not even know it. It wouldn't affect me as long as I have one good X chromosome). It makes me think that I really live a sheltered life. I live in a community where most people are middle class (and some make quite a lot of $$$; my mom has a friend who is already retired even though she is about the same age as my mother, and she and her husband are currently building a new house in Palo Alto), or at least you don't see many people living out on the streets, which is pretty good. One time at school we were being shown a video to promote our sense of charity, and there were pictures of people sleeping in cardboard boxes. Some of the students - I think they were boys - laughed. My teacher said, "I don't know if you think it was staged or something, but people really do live in cardboard boxes. They live in places like San Francisco, which are COLD in the winter. When my son is cold, I can have him put on more layers of clothing and turn on the heater and he won't be cold anymore. But a lot of people don't have that luxury." So I guess I am doing pretty well if I don't have to live off of Whole Foods cheese samples (and there aren't much of those nowadays anyhow).

I've never even met anyone who was disabled. I mean, I've seen people in wheelchairs but I've never really talked to someone who lacks the fine motor skills many of us have... The closed thing to that is my science teacher. She was injured in the 1989 earthquake (gives you an idea of how old she is! XD) and for a while she couldn't walk. She can walk now, but I think there isn't cartilage in her knees anymore or something like that. So when she goes hiking, she has to have someone stand in front of her, because she can't walk downhill without falling over.

Oh, my, I've gotten awfully sidetracked. Back to the fundraiser. My language arts teacher came up with an ingenious plan to best the 6th graders, who usually win the fundraisers since they are young and restless. She stashed bills in a box and didn't turn in much money so it would seem like us 8th graders were being lazy as usual. Then, on the last day, she donated all the money, and we won! In fact, by a big chunk, like $500 or so. It was amazing. This is the first time I have ever seen the 8th graders actually come out on top. I feel proud for having donated (even if it was only some dirty coins I dug out of my robot bank) and having been a part of this landmark achievement.

Labels: cardboard box, charity, cold, darius goes west, death, disability, duchenne muscular distrophy, earthquake, eighth grade, fundraiser, homeless, optimism, pimp my ride, trailer, village, x chromosome

That bond is a very important one, one that many people have. The bond differs from person to person...I have read or heard about pretty close bonds, and I wanted to share them.

My dad watched a movie called District 9, about aliens who landed on Earth, in fact, near Johannesburg, South Africa, I think. I was pretty freaked out by the movie since the main character had something happen to his arm and started turning into an alien little by little or something... We call the main character the "sweety man" because in fact, in the movie, he had tried to tempt out an alien child by saying "It's the sweety man!". So now we're addicted to saying "sweety man". But anyways, the point is, that even the aliens cared a lot about their children. It was the sweety man's job to move the aliens to a new camp outside of Johannesburg, so then he tried threatening to take away an alien's child unless they moved to the new camp. The alien, who was previously calm, then became very worked up and upset.

And then there are cats and their kittens. My dad's friend is getting a cat soon, from a "cat club" that was set up at my dad's workplace, what with lots of stray cats hanging around Cisco's buildings. Apparently someone who helps take care of the cats came up to my dad and said he was very worried about the mother of the cat that was getting adopted. He said the mother was fretting and stressed because she didn't know where her child had gotten off to suddenly. My mom thought the solution would be for my dad's friend to adopt the mother and its child (but I doubt their family was planning to get two cats). Either way, I hope that the mother cat can see her child again. If she did, then she would know her child was safe (and hopefully happy and well taken care of) and then she wouldn't have to worry.

Guardians aren't always in the form of parents. Sometimes grandparents serve as the parental figures. I started reading a book, and when the mother of the main character's friend mentioned that not doing something would be like child abuse, then the grandmother of the main character allowed the main character to do something that she'd forbidden until then. The grandmother was always concerned about someone taking her granddaughter away from her, because they might think she was too old to take care of a child, or something. So hearing "child abuse", even if the person only meant it figuratively and not literally, probably made alarm bells go off in her head.

But sometimes the relationship between parents and their children are...less than perfect. A good example is Alice and Kev (yep, that's a link, click on it!), a story about a homeless girl and her father, created with the Sims 3. Unfortunately there isn't really an ending to the story. But it's pretty cool, seeing a video game being used to tell a compelling story.

Labels: alice and kev, aliens, bond, cat, child cruelty, children, cisco systems, club, district 9, grandmother, homeless, parents, relationship, sims 3, sweety man

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