Saturday, February 28, 2009

Quarter 3 Post 9- Bollywood

Bride and Prejudice was a really weird movie. I really only got to see one class’s worth of the video but still. I thought it was annoying how they’d just start singing because their voices were really annoying. I also thought a lot of the lines were really weird and cheesy. Mr. Kholi was a creep. He eats really nastily. I also don’t get why the main girl was upset when her bestfriend married Mr. Kholi because she didn’t like him anyways and didn’t want to marry him so she shouldn’t really care. The move did really remind me of Mamma Mia though. I think it was because of the random singing and the whole love stuff. Mamma Mia was better though because it was actually funny and it had pretty decent music. The Bollywood music was just really bad. I think if there were better music and Mr. Kholi didn’t eat so grossly the movie would be a lot better.

Monday, February 23, 2009

Quarter 3 Post 8- Culture

Unknown, Unknown. "Snowboard culture shares blame with Lindsey". The Associated Press. 23 February 2009 .

In the 2006 Winter Olympics Lindsey Jacobellis won the silver medal for Women’s Snowboard Cross. Snowboard cross is a sport where 8 athletes race each other all at once on a course filled with turns and jumps. Lindsey was well ahead of the rest of the pack when she got to the second to last jump, she was so excited at being ahead that she decided to throw in a little style. Lindsey did a nice method off the jump and caught her edge in the landing causing her to move down to second place. Many people criticized Lindsey for being unsportsmanlike and showboating. Rick Morissey who writes for the Chicago Tribune made a comment saying, “It probably would be a good thing if somebody explained to the snowboarders that once they decided to sit at the adults’ table, they made the tacit agreement to play to win. They made the decision to act like Olympians, which now means to act professional.” Many adults agreed with Morissey because they don’t understand the snowboarding culture. Although snowboarding is a very competitive sport and there are many rivalries almost all of the riders are friends. They compete with each other over and over and see each other at many events. Respect is part of the snowboarding culture, not just being nice a polite but respecting people’s talent and style. Snowboarding is a sport built around style. Men’s Snowboard Cross gold medallist Seth Wescott put it like this, “In snowboarding, there’s a huge focus on style, it’s the aesthetic that draws us in,” and that, “It’s the nature of how we ride, it’s second nature to us. That’s how we snowboard.” Many adults are focused on “acting adult” and being mature, they don’t understand that people that are very into snowboarding live their lives different. There are many adult snowboarders that live paycheck to paycheck making just enough to get by because they love what they do. Life needs to be more about having a good time and less about stress and the snowboard culture really exemplifies that.

Saturday, February 21, 2009

Quarter 3 Post 7- Global Warming

M., Tim. "Think climate change won’t affect you, Snow Person? Wrong.". Heresy Snowboarding. 21 February 2009 .

global warming is really bad for our planet. it causes a lot of negative effects. a lot of people think that its not going to affect us because its not that bad yet but it is and it does. This year the siberian tundra has been really warm which is bad because the permafrost thaws and releases tons CO2 and methane into the atmosphere. the added CO2 would make global warmning even worse. Scientists have been warning about global climate change for a long time. NASA first starting bringing up the topic in the early 80's and now organizations like the UK MET, NASA, Australian CSIRO and Bureau of Meterology, are all saying that global warming is happening. Despite all the proof of global warming many people still aren’t worried about it. But the truth is that many people are noticing how the weather is acting funny and that everyday there is more evidence supporting climate change. If we start rapidly changing the amount of our emissions in 2010 they will decrease 47% by 2050, start slowly changing the amount of our emissions in 2010 they will return to the same levels from 1990 by 2050, if we start slowly decling our emissions in 2030 there will be a 76% increase in the amount of emissions by 2050, and if we do nothing by 2050 the amount of emissions will have increased by 132%. We need to start doing something about global warming now so that we don’t destroy the earth for later generations.

Tuesday, February 17, 2009

Quarter 3 Post 6- Paralympics

CTV.ca News Staff, "Disabled snowboarders want into Paralympics". CTV News. February 17, 2009 .

Last year I got to go to Copper Mountain, Colorado and watch my brother compete in the U.S. Snowboarding Association Nationals. At the end of the day everybody went and crowded around a tent set up outside of the Chalet for the awards ceremony. That was the first time i ever realized that disabled people could snowboard like everybody else. Most of the disabled riders that placed were either a single or double lower leg replacement and i couldn't even imagine what it would be like to snowboard missing part of your leg. After the shock of seeing like 4 of those people getting medals i saw the craziest thing ever, a man that was partially paralyzed from the waist down got 3rd in slopestyle. The man couldn't climb up the ladder by himself to get on stage and needed help getting onto the podium, he even had a cane! i can't even imagine how much that guy works and works and works to get better to the point where he can beat people with special bionic legs. At the ceremony they talked about how snowboarding wasn't part of the paralympics yet and that they only needed one more year of a national competition before they would be eligible. In this article it talks about canadian snowboarders wanting to be in the Paralympics. The canadians have a problem with getting enough people to be in the event. I think that there need to be more people aware of the fact that you can do a sport like snowboarding without a limb. Its different than like in track where that one kid got disqualified cuz his new legs made him too fast. i think it would be really cool if there were more disabled riders.

Sunday, February 15, 2009

Quarter 3 Post 5- Mormans

unknown, unknown. "Mormon Athlete Personifies Traits of Mormon Youth". The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints. February 15, 2009 .

Torah Bright is a world champion snowboarder and olympic competitor. Unlike most pro snowboarders Torah doesn't drink and party. She is very religious and doesn't go against the morman rules(?). Morman youth have very high standards to live up to. They have to attend a four year scripture study that is usually held early in the morning before school and they often participate in service projects to help underprivileged people. Some morman youth even skip out on their proms because they think the dancing and music is innapropriate, in California some parents have put together special mormon proms where the kids can go to still have the experience but without sacrificing their standards. Torah seems like she would be one of those kids. In another interview I read from Snowboard magazine she says she's never had even one sip of alcohol and that she doesn't plan on ever trying it. I think its kinda cool to have somebody so prominent in the snowboarding world to be such a good role model. A lot of the other big names in snowboarding like Shaun White, Danny Kass, Kevin Pearce, and Gigi Ruf seem like they are pretty big partiers. Shaun White even crashed his brand new Lamborgini into a tree going 80 mph around a curve in a residential neighborhood. Torah is somebody that would never do anything like that and she seems like she's a very nice person and somebody that young girls could look up to and aspire to be like one day.

Tuesday, February 10, 2009

Quarter 3 Post 4- Women Snowboarders

Lupick, Travis. "Female Snowboarders Catch Up With The Boys". Straight. February 13, 2009 .

women snowboarders have never been taken as seriously as men. Taylor Godber is one of Option Snowboarders only female snowboarders. She also works as a bartender and dressis in mini skirts and high heels each night. Another guy from her work never let her ride with him and the one day he did he realized that if he wanted to keep thinking he was so much better than her he'd really have to step up his riding. Taylor also talks about how she used to ride with some guys that were her bestfriends but secretly talked about her bad style when she wasn't around. Girls in snowboarding have to work really hard to not be thought of as snow-hoes. Even girls that are good sometimes get ahrassed by guys on the hill. Pro women snowboarders are slowly changing the stereotype that women suck at snwoboarding. Although there still is a large gap between women and men's riding snowboard companies are starting to feature more and more women riders and some companies like Runway Films are starting to make all-women snowboard videos like See What I See. Strength is what i think is really holding back girl riders. Men naturally have more muscle than women so they're stronger enabling them to go bigger, spin more, and ride harder. Women work just as hard as men but because of physical differences can't be as good as them, yet. Women's riding is slowly progressing more and more each year. They haven't had as much time and experience as the guys have because back when snowboarding started it was nearly unheard of for a girl to snowboard. At one point the guys were at the same level as the girls are now and i think that girls like Torah Bright, Hannah Teter, Gretchen Bleiler, and Alexis Roland are really going to progress the sport to a much higher level.

Sunday, February 8, 2009

Quarter 3 Post 3- The A Factor

Nuñez, Larry. "The A Factor: Finding Patience in Paradise". Snowboard: Products, Places, and Personalities January 2009: 72-80.

South American Snow Sessions is a program that started in 2005 in Las Lenas, Argentina. SASS is a different kind of summer snowboard camp. Normally you would go somewhere like Mt. Hood, Oregon or Whistler, British Colombia, but the guys from SASS got sick of the slushy conditions and decided to head down south for even more winter. The first camp they held there were 14 campers and 5 coaches. After a 2 years they moved the camp to Bariloche, Argentina for better off-hill activities, more Argentinan culture, and easier accessibility. When you finish riding all day you can go out and party all night with the locals, in doing so you learn a lot about their culture. As Americans we tend to think that i want that NOW and everything has to be done MY way. In Argentina everything depends on your relationships with other people. If you have a good history of friendship and work they will help you get things done, if not you're outta luck. Argentinans also live a very laid back lifestyle, just going where life takes them, this attitude led SASS to develop a motto, "Don't ask questions". So if you were to be at the airport waiting for your ride and asked "when is the bus getting here?" all you get in reply would be "don't ask questions". And it works. The motto seems to help every body chill out a little bit and stop stressing over things that don't matter. I'd love to live in a country where the culture is all about being a respectable person and about going with the flow. In america it seems everybody gets caught up in the small things. If your bus is late you yell at the driver and stress out even more because your boss will yell at you for being late, I don't get why it matters if your a half hour late, if you still get the work done it shouldn't matter. And yes it is disrespectful to waste other's time by being late but hey they could probly use the time to relax or get something else done. I also admire the fact that they care more about how somebody treats them than who the person is. It seems like here so many people do things for somebody else just because they seem important and all it does is stress them out and drive them crazy. If everybody were trying to build up respect there wouldn't be so many people that push others around like nothing just cuz they work at mcdonalds or are the ones that are gonna clean things up when they're done.