...Culture The Land of the Howling... Culture is the totality of people’s lifestyles and life stories. It summarizes one’s place’s history and reflects its civilization. It is an identity. There is no place without culture; there is no society without culture. Without it, there is no existence; no stories to share to future generations. Catanduanes, a small kidney-shaped island in the Pacific, abounds with a conglomeration of folkways and mores which constitute its rich culture. Some of these stories are commendable while others are dishonourable to some extent. Catanduanes has been known as the “Land of the Howling Winds” because of the many strong tropical cyclones that visit it every year and leave it devastated and desolated like a lover forsaken by a beloved. But aside from this epithet affixed to our province which implies its geographical condition and location, are there still other words we can attach to the phrase “Land of the Howling...” which in one way or another will help other people imagine and understand what our province really is? Well, maybe we just need to try. Land of the Howling Pigs and Drunkards Percy Bysshe Shelley in his “Ode to the West Wind” wrote, “O trumpet of the Prophecy, If winter comes, can spring be far behind?’. Cirilo Bautista, that celebrated Filipino poet, wrote in one of his essays, “If summer comes, can teacher seminars be far behind?”. I, on the other hand ask, “If summer comes, can fiestas be far behind?” This is the summer...
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...Because Chaucer included such a wide array of pilgrims in the Prologue of The Canterbury Tales, it is difficult to make a general statement that applies to every single person. It is, however, possible to note a couple of traits that apply to most of the pilgrims, even if there are a few exceptions. First and foremost, it is clear that the vast majority of the religious pilgrims are either corrupt or lack true religious convictions. The Pardoner, for example, takes advantage of poor parish priests through "double talk and tricks," convincing them to buy religious relics of extremely questionable origin. The Monk, similarly, uses his position enrich himself, exchanging religious services for money or gifts. The Monk, the narrator notes, "was an easy man in giving shrift, when sure of getting a substantial gift." With few exceptions (the notes at the end of the chapter notes that the Knight, Parson, and Ploughman are the only exemplary pilgrims), the pilgrims are generally unlikeable and immoral. While the speaker gives long descriptions of many of his fellow pilgrims, he does not spend much time speaking about himself. When he remarks that he is describing the other pilgrims "as they appear to him," he is doing a couple of things. First, he is informing the reader that his observations include personal biases; the descriptions are not absolute truth coming from an omniscient narrator but rather are filtered through the lens of a character in the story. Second, the narrator is...
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...likes to antagonize others, everyone seems to recognize that particular person and his faults. Well in Chaucer’s The Canterbury Tales that role is filled by the Miller. He is rude and disrespectful drunk who aggravates the rest of the pilgrims. Throughout Chaucer’s frame tell narrative, the Miller is never seen in a good light. He invokes crude humor into his tale which distinguishes it from all other tales. The Miller is a multifaceted character in this tale, who begets conflict on the pilgrimage to Canterbury. The Miller’s physical appearance deeply reflects his personality. His fiery red hair is much like his outlandish personality. Much like his hair, he is a very noticeable member of the pilgrimage, but unfortunately for all the wrong reasons. The Miller does not hold back in conversation and speaks his mind to the point of cruelty. He has a brawny physic that parallels to his intense and over-bearing persona. The Miller overwhelms conversations and stories told throughout the pilgrimage. He consistently interrupts others and takes advantage of those not willing to stand up to him. An obscene wart on his nose with red hairs protruding out of it, demonstrates the Miller’s human characteristic of annoyance. His wart was so repugnant that one could not stop staring at it. His personality has connection to this thought by the way that the Miller was so out there that one was forced to be aware of his presence. He is constantly harassing people by way of story telling, snotty...
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...Pilgrimages The definition of a pilgrimage is, a long journey or search, especially one of exalted purpose or moral significance. Usually a religious pilgrimage is one in which the pilgrim seeks to strengthen or expand their faiths and beliefs. The Christian faith has a long tradition of pilgrimage, the most popular destination for English pilgrims before the reformation was Canterbury Cathedral and its shrine to Thomas Beckett, martyred in 1170, and made famous in Chaucer’s The Canterbury Tales. Modern day Christians (particularly Roman Catholics) make pilgrimages to Lourdes, in the belief that the waters are responsible for numerous medical miracles. Of the five million people who visit each year, most are sick or disabled and seeking a cure for their condition. Globally the most well-known pilgrimage is the Muslim Hajj. The Hajj is one of the five pillars of Islam and is a religious duty of every able bodied Muslim who can afford to travel to Mecca in Saudi Arabia, at least once in his or her lifetime. In contrast to a religious pilgrimage a “modern” pilgrimage is no less of a transformative experience but tends not to have organised religion as its motivation. An example of a modern pilgrimage is, visiting ground zero in New York, the site were the world trade towers stood, which attracted five million visitors, who paid their respects to the dead in 2011, the tenth anniversary of the attacks. It is common to refer to “pilgrimages” to sporting arenas by fans of that team...
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...She is perhaps Chaucer's most attracted character. She is an obsessive seamstress. She is somewhat deaf. She is forever first at the offering at the mass, and if an important goes ahead of her, she feels depressed. She wears head coverings to the mass which the narrator thinks weighs 10 pounds. She has taken three pilgrimages to Jerusalem and has had five husbands. She has also been to Rome, Cologne and other pilgrimage sites. Her teeth have gaps between them. She is cheerful and talkative, and she gives good love recommendation since she has had a lot of knowledge. She is vain, bossy and immoral, a character typically portrayed by woman hating writers. But Chaucer's portrayal is so sensible and caring that it is hard to believe that he wanted to show her as a satire of a dreadful woman. She has married 5 times and maintains that Christ has never preached that people should be satisfied with one marriage. She affirms that Jesus had stressed that one should go ahead and enjoy bodily pleasures. Her first three husbands were quiet polite while the last two were awful. The first three were wealthy old and impotent. They handed over all their possessions to her in return for physical favours. She used her body at will to extract what she wished from these men. She deliberately used to start quarreling with these men by hurling a handful of grievances and abject lies of their alleged affairs so that she could cover up her follies with young men. She used these means to control...
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...December, 1170. Bucket was not keen to follow the king's orders blindly, this angered the king. The pilgrimage was important in the middle age because a pilgrimage is a journey of great moral or spiritual significance. In the middle ages, the pilgrimage was important since it was believed that if you prayed at the shrines you might be forgiven your sins and had more chance to heaven. Pilgrims visit Becket's shrine because it was rumored that when people were touched by his cloth they got cured from a variety of illnesses such as epilepsy, leprosy and blindness. The type of people who would have been pilgrims are those who have undertaken a physical journey often a very long and difficult one to a distant sacred place, for example, like the shrine. Going on a pilgrimage in the middle ages was a long and difficult journey. The costs involved were dependent on one pilgrimage, where one was going to stay and type of travel. Some of the Pilgrim routes were specific roads that pilgrims travelled on, where the road itself was a thing to experience for religious reasons. The route from London to the Becket Shrine in Canterbury was of this type, as was the Way of St. James. Long distance travelling in general was quite a dangerous activity, since cases of people being robbed along the highways were high. The pilgrims would travel in groups to enhance security. People that are pilgrimage would usually only carry what they needed, and would share with those who had little to...
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...Pilgrimages have taken place since the earliest days of the Church, by those who set out to see the places where Jesus had once resided and preached. Looking at pilgrimages through a religious aspect, a pilgrimage is a journey one initiates to a sacred place to ask for the Lord’s blessing, or to inquire healing. In the Middle Ages the church strongly urged people to voyage to holy places labeled shrines. It was believed that if you prayed at these shrines there was a possibility you could be forgiven for your sins, and have more of a chance to be accepted into Heaven (Spartacus Edu 1). King of Kent, known as King Ethelbert handed over an undersized church in Canterbury to Augustine. Augustine transformed the churches’ architecture and it soon...
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...Dreams, what causes us to dream certain dreams and why have remained mysteries for centuries. A multitude of tests and experiments have been conducted over the course of the past few decades in hopes to provide some answers; one in particular with a similar hypothesis such as these was a study conducted by the Canadian Anthropology Society, more specifically William F.S. Miles, called "Hausa Dreams," from the summer of. This study was inspired and strongly influenced by that of Robert A. LeVine's "Dreams and Deeds," which was also a Nigerian based study however conducted in the early 1960's. This study preformed included an analysis of dreams collected from a small village in Nigeria where he evaluated the root of motivation of ethnically...
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...movie “UP”. Perseverance is when troubles come your way you push past and keep moving through life. One example of this in UP is when Mr. Carl Fredrickson’s wife Ellie dies he keeps working towards his and Ellie’s dream of going to Paradise Falls. Another example of this is when Carl and Russell get to Paradise Falls and they have to walk Mr. Frederickson’s house around the cliffs of Paradise Falls to the falls. In the following paragraphs I will explain how Carl persevered and followed his dreams despite the troubles he faced along the way. When Mrs. Ellie Fredrickson dies Mr. Carl Fredrickson doesn’t give up his and Ellie’s dream of going to Paradise Falls. Carl knew that he would be sent to a retirement house soon and he was running out of time to go to Paradise Falls. On the day Carl is going to go to the Shady Oaks retirement house he comes up with an idea. Mr. Fredrickson ties thousands of balloons to his house and away he goes to Paradise Falls to follow his dreams. When Carl hears a knock on his door he opens it to find Russell, a young explorer scout looking to get his assisting the elderly badge, Carl know he has no other options but to let Russell come on the trip with him. Carl persevered through the loss of his wife and continued to follow his dreams. When Carl Fredrickson and Russell get to Paradise Falls they know that they have to walk the floating house around the cliffs to get it next to the falls. Carl knows that the trip will take a long time and the...
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...Diabetic. My senior year started like it was going to be the best year of my life. I had planned out my future to one day reach my dreams. Varsity cheerleading was working its way to the top. I was so excited about all the things I had accomplished. But on August 22, 2013 my life changed forever. As I was diagnosed I realized I would be changing my lifestyle, adapting to all new things. I saw that my future was not going to be easy, at all. But with my family and friends I knew anything was possible. Beginning of senior year I was ready to conquer the world it seemed like. I was ready to go out and fight for all my dreams. I wanted to make them reality. As a varsity cheerleader I was planning on continuing what I love in college. I was planning on continuing on into college to eventually become a veterinarian. But on that day, the day I was diagnosed I realized everything would be put into a different view now. Everything I had planned now came with the question, “but what if…” Cheerleading is my one love and being diagnosed really impacted it for me. My first practice back was the hardest. I lost most of tumbling because my body grew weak. As the practices continue on though, I will work my hardest at all I do. It is my senior year and a dream of mine used to be to go on to cheer in college. As I look at it now though, it seems as if my dreams were taken from me. High school cheerleading is one thing, college is another. As a senior, working my hardest and being a role model...
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...medication. However Parkinson’s disease would be easier to control if it could be diagnosed earlier. By the time Parkinson’s disease is diagnosed, a person has already lost 80% of their dopamine neurons. In order to diagnose Parkinson’s disease earlier on doctors and patients need to see the sign and symptoms beforehand. Researchers have come upon the fact that an earlier way of diagnosing Parkinson’s disease might be through watching the patients sleeping patterns. Researchers are saying that REM sleep behavior disorder might share a common cause with Parkinson’s disease. REM sleep behavior disorder is a disorder in which there is rapid eye movement while a person is sleeping. It is a type of parasomnia in which vivid dreams are associated with the enactment of dreams. This disorder is a “dysfunction in REM sleep and the motor control circuitry in the pontomedullary structures” (2) which causes the loss of control over movement, especially of the eyes. Within this new discovery the REM sleep behavior disorder being associated with Parkinson’s disease, researchers gave two hypotheses. The first hypothesis is that the degeneration of certain region of the brain stem cause REM sleep behavior disorder and play a role in Parkinson’s and some of it’s symptoms like depression and anxiety. The second hypothesis is that REM sleep behavior disorder is an early form of Parkinson’s...
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...Dreams can be fascinating, exciting, terrifying or just plain weird. Dreams have fascinated philosophers for thousands of years, but only recently have dreams been subjected to empirical research and concentrated scientific study. Chances are that you’ve often found yourself puzzling over the mysterious content of a dream, or perhaps you’ve wondered why you dream at all. Dreams can be mysterious, but understanding the meaning of our dreams can be downright baffling. The content of our dreams can shift suddenly, feature bizarre elements or frighten us with terrifying imagery. The fact that dreams can be so rich and compelling is what causes many to believe that there must be some meaning to our dreams. Why do we dream? Some researchers suggest that dreams serve no real purpose, while others believe that dreaming is essential to mental, emotional and physical well-being. Although there is not much agreement on why we dream there are some interesting theories around. One possibility is that our minds are running us through the worst-case scenario during sleep. Disaster preparation you could say. For example if a new mother was to dream of losing her baby she is rehearsing what it would feel like for that to actually happen. So our dreams are just fire drills? Another possibility is that dreaming is actually aiding learning. Some researchers have found that performance on physical tasks is actually enhanced by dreaming about it. Whatever the reason for why...
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...Daydreaming With each breath I drew I took flight into a new fantasy. I indulged myself in a realm where dragons flew, knights galloped on steeds, and princesses needed rescuing. The next second I was staring up at an all too familiar tiled ceiling, the fourth grade teacher, Mrs. Tilton, explaining how to divide and where to put the remainders. Another breath later and I was off shooting down an alien swarm that looked like division marks. I would be awakened from my dream-like state quite frequently to answer a question that I did not know had been asked. Day after day of this led my teachers to the conclusion that I was mentally handicapped. I’m not actually, just not where I'm suppose to be. What I've spent most of my waking life doing is called daydreaming. It didn’t occur to me until recently that I knew very little of daydreaming, and what I do know was that people often look down on daydreaming as laziness. And I could see why many people would think that. But what is daydreaming really? Is the daydream a place where fantasies are made real, or perhaps something more entwined with reality where problems begin to solve themselves? With purpose and poise I set off on my research journey ready to find out my answers and a hope to find some way to claim my daydreaming frenzy as my own. "A time when the mind wanders" was the textbook definition that I got from the Teen's Guide to Psychology in our library. It was a nice place to start before I dove into the interwebs to...
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...of today. Dream Dreams are something we all experience every night, whether we remember them or not. 1/3 of your life is spent sleeping, and in an average life time you would have spent about 5 years of it dreaming and in that time, you all will experience thousands of dreams. In the next five or so minutes I'm going to tell you the most I can about dreams. . There are numerous theories about dreams, but whomever you are, where ever you live, you will dream. Whether it's a good dream or a nightmare is up to your mind, but there must be some reasoning behind dreams, right? Everyone may know the main idea of a dream, but few may know that the explanations behind dreams are far more intricate than it just being a simple random thought in your mind. Can you remember the last dream you had? Maybe you could fly or were falling down an endless dark tunnel. Perhaps you were awakened by a horrific dream in the middle of the night Sigmund Freud’s Theory 1 - Finding an unused room What it means: The rooms in a house represent different aspects of your character, so finding an unused room suggests that you’re discovering a talent that you were previously unaware of 2 - Out-of-control vehicle The vehicle represents your ability to make consistent progress toward a specific objective, so in waking life, you may feel that you don’t have enough control over your road to success. 3- Falling What it means: Feeling yourself falling in a dream indicates that...
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...Blinded Aristotle once said, “Poverty is the parent to revolution and crime”. Throughout time, poverty has always played its part in America’s history. For some people, they were never offered as many opportunities as the average person. This caused them to look at life in a much different way, because they had to fight for many things that a vast majority of people never had to fight for. For some of these people, being a criminal was the ultimate American Dream. It was not that they were bad people, but they knew that living the life of a felon would give them everything they had ever dreamt of. This gave these criminals the motivation to chase their dream, achieve their dream, and eventually be blinded by the dream itself. In America, there have always been classes among the people who live in it regardless of what time and age in history. When it comes to the American Dream, not everyone thinks of it in the same way. This is due to the fact that not everybody grows up in the same way at all. The life of an upper-class individual is commonly going to be much different than the life of a lower-class individual. This means that these people will usually have much different views on life. In the case of a lower-class individual, they usually grow up in a much more poor background. For the modern era, we could refer to this place as the “projects”. For people growing up in these areas, they will mostly likely always have it harder than others. In an essence, it is really clear...
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