The Way To GO (brief description)

GO is a game based on a 19 by 19 board, played by two opponents. It is played with two different colored stones (many of them). The objective is to capture your opponents stones by surrounding them. this is called atari. The stones must be placed only in intersections. It can get very complex, and it has difficulty levels, from 50 kyu to 1 dan.
It is mostly a strategy game, but involves inner thought, since the stones are not killed just, captured, and it envolves defense not attacking. Surviving is the way to go. Two sides, two teams. Two points of view.

Grammar (words that sound alike)

1. Where is my jacket? I wanted to wear it today, and if I can't find it, we're going to be late.
2. Jane wanted to go on the school trip, but her mother said that two hundred dollars was too much for the family budget.
3. As she waited for Rodney to become conscious, Selma was seized with an attack of conscience--was there anything she could have done to prevent the accident?
4. The map led the intrepid treasure hunters to a lead box of precious stones.
5. Have you seen their coats? They're going to need them; it's cold outside. I last saw the coats over there .
6. After conducting careful research, Shufang had a brilliant idea ; she'd write a paper on Thomas More's concept of the ideal society in Utopia.
7. Even though Bob would rather play video games than study, he decided to hit the books and then play some Halo.
8. It's easy to admire a business that puts so much effort into creating its signs and window displays.
9. You're fortunate to have survived the car crash without a scratch; it must have been because you were wearing your seat belt.
10. I would advise you to seek qualified legal advice about how to handle this situation.

A New Book, A New Way of Thinking

I found Confucius particularly interesting and intriguing for two reasons (but yet more to be found). One: It is not a jewish, islamic, or christian/catholic book, and that for me is great because I feel I can get away of cultural and political backgrounds and history for just a second. When I read Confucius one can sense a book filled with knowledge, and with teachings, but I don't quite feel them as the teachings that I receive in school (some are just a boring speech, and a worksheet to be completed), these are like advices, experiences, that you simply absorb. 

These are things you want to learn... It can be absorbed in many ways, and many interpretations can be made.

Two: Each Book is focused on one region of the human life. It tells you before hand what you have to expect and if you are not interested in what that book has to say, you just skip it. It is a relaxed type of reading: not much attention has to be paid to get a message (Not guaranteed you will get the best but...) It makes you enjoy it. 

I will try and remember the most I can about it, for it is a human lesson to be learned in a passive way. 

Enjoy every moment in life...

Presidential Gestures

On Obama's acceptance speech he is confident as he has always been, but now that he is Mr. President he has a straight and penetrating look. He owes nothing to the people. Looks determined to achieve his so promised oaths. He is definitely efficient to convince his audience, but he doesn't have to put much effort into this, they after all chose him President of The United States of America. He is a professional doing this, that is his job, that is what made him win. He uses lots of hand gestures and moves his body towards the people. Nods a lot. 

We ought to get used to the public speaking skills of this man, for we will be hearing him for the next 4 years...

Elie and Job

Comparing the Bible, a sacred and holy text to a memoir of a holocaust surviver, is not to be done, for there would be no chance of getting to a conclusion that is worthy enough for the memoire or the Bible.
Indeed, in Night, Job is mentioned, for Elie (protagonist...) lost his faith in God. For me the memoire is more vivid, It is actually more vivid, you can feel the pain, sorrow, anger, and hunger. 

This is actually a story that is credible, and we know that it is a true one. Unlike Night, we just have to have faith, to be able to see the Bible just as a memoir and teachings book too. 

Now the difference is that in Exodus, the Jews were saved by moses; a leader...

So was that the problem? Lack of a leader in order to save the jews from the camps? 

I don't know. I will never know. Probably my most accurate answer would be that since Exodus to The Holocaust, many things have changed, including the people, so maybe they were not meant to be saved, even though I will always hate to think that... I guess it was not God who saved them, but Moses, and we just interpret the order of God to Moses in a wrong way. 

Night is not just a book, it is historical context (recent one). It is 6 million of my people, including 60 of my family members who perished too. 

The Bible just doesn't get me as much as the Holocaust, its just more distant...

In my opinion, we were asked to read Job in conjunction to Night, because the Jews in the concentration camps, were put to test by God (if you can say that) as well as Job. He was put to test of his faith. The Jews were put to test to see how much did they believe in God, and to question themselves even if he existed, and why (if he did) were they there. 

The test was that if after this tragedy they would still believe in him. Many did. Many did not.

The thing is to always believe, no matter if good or bad overtake you. God is here not only to be around for good things but for evil ones too. He was not the author of this. We ALL have free will. And everyone of us one day will be judge upon him and by him, and that will be the only day that will matter for us to see if we were on the good side or the dark one. 

Choose well for you will be judge in the highest of all courts... 

The Journey (Exodus 16-35)

"I will rain bread from heaven for you; and the people shall go out and gather a certain rate every day, that I may prove them wether they will walk in my law or no. An it shall come to pass, that on the sixth day they shall prepare that which they bring in, and it shall be twice as much as they gathered daily. " (Exodus 16:4). 

In my perspective, this sis one of the most important moments of the journey from egypt to Eretz Canaan. This is because the people in the desert were hungry and thirsty, if they had trusted Moses on to leading them into the desert by God, they expected food too. So this was the first proof of faith that God had of whom really believed in him. Some of them gathered more than one ration of food, because they were afraid that they might not have tomorrow. The people who had enough were satisfied, but the ones who grabbed more, and this is one of the first moments that greed happens, there extra ration rotted, and they could not enjoy it, and for that matter, nor did anyone. When I read this part of the Bible in Hebrew, it said that this Mana tasted of whatever you wanted it to taste like. 

and this is why, this mistrust led to that long long forty year walk in the desert which walking normally it would only take about ten to fifteen days. God needed to wipe out clean all of the people which once had doubted him. And for new trustful generations to merge. Moses was included in this group of people, he sometime had not believed in God, and had doubted him and questioned his actions...

"Yee shall offer no strange incense there on nor burnt sacrifice, no meat sacrifice, neither shall yee pour drink offering there on. And aaron shall make an atonement upon the horns of it ones in a year with the blood of the sin offering of atonements: once in the year shall he make attonment upon it troughout your generations: it is most holly un to the lord." (Exodus 30:9)

and finally here comes one of our jewish first traditions: Not to mix meat with milk, and Yom kippur, the asking of forgiveness, and the sounding of the horn of the goat (Shofar).

In mount sinai Moses hiked and hiked for many days to receive the commandments of God. Finally he came down with the stone tablets. But what he saw was astonishing. His people had made a golden statue and were worshipping it. I imagine this every time I think about it. Moses this great leader having freed all of this people from slavery and no them being insolent by dishonoring God? This was exactly why God left them in the desert for forty years, he needed a pure keen. Moses dropped the tablets from anger,  and God was angry, so he had to go up again for days, to get new tablets.... Exodus ends, and --Moses gets to see the promised land from a mountain-only its overview- for he had too doubted the one and only God.

Pulp Fiction Quote (Ezekiel 25:17)

By chance I was watching the movie by Quentin Tarantino "Pulp Fiction", and in one of the scenes a character cites a passage from the bible. But as a fan of Tarantino's movies I looked into the KJV, and the passage was not the same. It had been adapted by Tarantino and Samuel Jackson to generate popularity. 

The following is the original passage from the KJV:

"And I will execute great vengeance upon them with furious rebukes; and they shall know that I am the LORD, when I shall lay my vengeance upon them."

This is the passage from "Pulp Fiction":

"The path of the righteous man is beset on all sides by the iniquities of the selfish and the tyranny of evil men. Blessed is he, who in the name of charity and good will, shepherds the weak through the valley of darkness, for he is truly his brother’s keeper and the finder of lost children. And I will strike down upon thee with great vengeance and furious anger those who would attempt to poison and destroy my brothers. And you will know my name is the Lord when I lay my vengeance upon thee.”

Its interesting that in this movie many details in scenes are from other famous movies, plays or texts...