Last weekend, I was a part of a pre-festival at Victoria Conservatory of Music. I played the violin, which I have been playing for a few years now. The actual festival is next weekend. The tune I am playing is the first movement of Concerto in D Major by F. Seitz which I have been practicing for a few months. I had to memorise the entire piece otherwise they would not let me play. Next weekend when I play, it is like an exam. I did this last year as well. I will be playing in front of judges, without my music, and they will be marking everything I do. Even if there is rosin on my violin, I get points deducted. It may sound intimidating but it’s actually pretty fun. Afterwards, everyone who participated in the festival celebrates with some snacks.
Author: Amelia
IRJE#6 Wolf Bane
Wolf Bane is the final book in the series Wolf Brother, or The Chronicles of Ancient Darkness, by Michelle Paver. So far, Wolf is being tracked by a demon and ended up on an island out at sea when he got lost and Torak and Renn are going out to search for him. A group of people who lived on the island found Wolf and saved him when they saw him washed up on the beach. They then put Wolf in a pen made of wood so he couldn’t get out. They gave him food and water, but we refused to eat anything. Once Torak and Renn find the tribe, they suspect they are hiding Wolf somewhere on the island. When they ask questions, everyone seemed on edge. They were invited to eat with them and while they were eating, a girl from there tribe couldn’t take it anymore and stood up and said,
‘Why can’t we tell them?’ she burst out. ‘He won’t eat, he won’t sleep, all he does is pace! He’s so unhappy!’
‘Who?’ Torak leapt to his feet, nearly braining himself on a roof-beam.
‘Perhaps the child is right,’ mused Chinoot. ‘Perhaps this is why the Ancestors saved them—
‘Who is she talking about?’ shouted Torak.
The Leader raised his eye-blobs at his discourtesy. ‘Why, the wolf,’ he said. (p. 125)
In this quote, the girl is talking about how Wolf isn’t eating or sleeping. I think this quote is meaningful because it shows how Wolf is clearly in distress, and as she said ‘unhappy’. I find it fascinating that Wolf wouldn’t eat because he misses Torak and Renn. Later on in the chapter when they reunite, Wolf was overjoyed to see them, and after greeting them, went straight to the food.
PR to Memorising Five Stanzas to the ‘Ancient Mariner’ Poem
When I first started to memorise the five stanzas, I went over each stanza repeatedly one at a time until I knew that stanza off by heart. I continued to do this to the second stanza than reciting both until I knew the entire five stanzas. When I knew the five stanzas, I would say the whole thing in my head and practice with my friends. Because it was a poem, I found it easier to memorise it than say, a random section of a novel, because the last words of every line, rhyme with another. It also has a beat, or rhythm, to it which helps to know how many syllables are in each line.
PR to ‘The Rime of the Ancient Mariner’ (1798)
‘The Rime of the Ancient Mariner’ is a narrative poem written by Samuel Taylor Coleridge in 1798. It is about the mariner who shoots an innocent Albatross which creates problems for him when his ship stops moving due to the doldrum. When the ship became static, it was on the equator at the time and did not move for many days. With direct sun, it got very hot and there was no water to drink. The mariner’s shipmates all died but he stayed alive. When he eventually gets back to England and confesses his journey and unfortunate events to the Hermit through a poem, he learns that his penance for killing the Albatross is to continue to tell his story to people.
Overall, I enjoyed the story of ‘The Rime of the Ancient Mariner’. I have never read a narrative poem until now and I found it fascinating how someone can tell a story through poetry. Even though the terminology was confusing at times, I was able to piece it together like a puzzle and try and figure it out along the way. Even though I liked how it was written, there were many parts where I was not expecting that to happen and seemed odd to me. Including when it wrote that ‘the dead men rose’ and how there was a ghost ship, ‘spectre barque’. But after finishing reading it, it fit together, and I understood what had happened.
PR – “The Strange Case of Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde” (1886)
The Strange Case of Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde by Robert Louis Stevenson is a mystery and gothic story. It was a complex book to read but interesting to follow along. The story follows Mr. Utterson who investigates some mysterious things that have been happening around London to do with his old friend Dr. Jekyll and a criminal name Hyde. Later in the book, we learn that Jekyll and Hyde are the same person, which caught me off guard because I was not expecting that. He created this potion that turned him into evil Mr. Hyde so he could secretly do anything bad with no one ever knowing who it was.
I found this book a weird one and from the title, it really is a ‘strange case’. For a mystery novel, I found the first chapter well written when the author started the book off in a creepy setting, then Hyde tramples a small child, which would bring in questions about this strange man meaning that you would want to keep reading to find out more. For me, it was weird when Jekyll pulls out a potion that changes who he is physically and mentally. I can understand that people can mentally change, but physically changing back and forth seemed a bit odd. Throughout the whole novel up until this point, everything I was reading I though could be possible in reality. But as soon as Jekyll drank this potion and he changed into a new man, Hyde, a small dwarf-like man, it caught me off guard because this scene seemed to be very different than the rest of the storyline.
PW#6 Hummingbirds
We are already over halfway through the school year. Only 16 weeks left which it’s hard to believe. Soon the migratory birds will be coming back (April/May) which I always love to see. Sometimes I see hundreds of birds flying overhead to come back for the summer. Birds as small as the Rufous Hummingbird migrate to Vancouver Island and other parts of Canada/Alaska from its wintering range in Mexico. They travel nearly 4,000 miles (6437km) when they migrate. The most common hummingbird you will see around here is the Anna’s Hummingbird. They do not flee south went the coldness hits, instead they stay up north and rely on people’s hummingbird feeders that they put out. A hummingbird will always come to a specific feeder once they found one which is why you need to always keep the feeder full and clean. Hummingbirds rely on sugar to keep them alive. In nature they will feed off the pollen inside flowers, at feeders, they drink sugar water. 1/4 cup of white sugar dissolved in 1 cup of water is all they need. It’s crucial that you keep the feeders melted during the frosty days where the water could freeze because they don’t migrate. Since they always feed at the same feeder, if you don’t keep maintaining it, they could die because they is nothing else available to eat. When we moved house, we put up a hummingbird feeder and for the past 5 years I watched the same hummingbirds coming every day to the feeder, and in the spring, I watched their young grow up into adults, and then their young mature as well. I find hummingbirds to be such strong little creatures.
IRJE#5 ‘Viper’s Daughter’
‘Viper’s Daughter’ is the seventh book in the series ‘The Chronicles of Ancient Darkness’ written by Michelle Paver. The series is mainly about a boy named Torak and his friends Renn and Wolf. Torak is clannless and can communicate with wolves. He found Wolf when he was 12 summers old, and Wolf was a cub. His father had just been killed by a Demon Bear and Wolf had been abandoned. Later into the first book he met Renn of the Raven Clan, and they became friends. The stories follow their adventures and revolves around Torak’s mission to defeat the Soul Eaters, a group of powerful mages who only want to destroy all life in the forest.
‘I left so that I wouldn’t hurt you’…’You couldn’t have hurt me more than you did when you left’ (p. 78)
This quote was in the seventh book said by Renn and Torak. Renn ran north and left Torak behind because she thought she was harmful. She kept thinking she would hurt Torak because she felt someone trying to take over her body. Every time Renn fell asleep she would have a dream that involved hurting Torak in some way. She was trying to go to the ‘Edge of the World’ and once Torak realised she had gone, he went after her with Wolf. I like this quote because it shows that you can emotionally hurt people when you’re trying to not to hurt them at all.
PR “Our Town” by Thornton Wilder (1938)
“Our Town” by Thornton Wilder I found was a fast-moving book. In the three acts they talked mainly about Emily’s childhood, then her marriage to George, and then her funeral. Because the book was based off a play, I found that the describing where everything and everyone is, was helpful for me to imagine the scene better. I enjoyed watching the movie whilst following along in the book.
In ‘Our Town’, I think George Gibbs changes after becoming a ‘high school baseball star’ which Emily doesn’t like so much. He stopped speaking to people, even his own family, and was getting conceited and stuck up. George also changes his mind when he decides not to go to Agriculture School because he wants to spend more time with Emily, but he will continue to eventually take over his uncle’s farm. Simon Stimson never seemed to change throughout the entire play. He lived a drunk and died a drunk. There were only a couple town drunks in Grover’s Corners, and he seemed to be the towns gossip. During the book, I was wondering why no one ever tried to help him when everyone knew about his troubles.
PW#5 Christmas in UK
Over the Christmas Holiday’s I was in the UK, more specifically England. We were visiting my family and had Christmas Day there as well. I have a very large family and everyone except for my parents and I, live in the UK, so we travel there a lot. I have 10 full cousins, and about 11 half cousins. We flew into Heathrow from Vancouver then drove down to Witney where we spent five days there, including Christmas. Afterwards, we drove down to Devon where we spent the rest of our holiday staying at a farm cottage with everyone. There were about 30 family members staying at the farm split into three cottages. We went back to Witney for a couple of days before we left to flew back home. It had just rained, and we were working at one of my aunts’ farms. We were bringing sheep in to spray the lame ones with disinfectant and afterwards we went back to the truck, but it was stuck in mud. We spent about 45 minutes pushing the truck out of the mud. Using some of the sheep’s straw and sticks, we shoved it under the wheels hoping it would grip onto it. Eventually we managed to get the truck out just in time to make it to the airport and fly home. It was a lot of fun spending the Christmas Holidays there with family.
PR to The Story of Joseph
I found The Story of Joseph interesting overall, but reading it was more challenging than I am used because of the Elizabethan English used in the story. I felt that the story was missing some details when he was 17 then suddenly 30 but the way it was written made it slide into the next part of Josephs’ life.
I felt sorry for Joseph when he got thrown into a pit then sold into slavery by his brothers because he told his dreams to them. But on the other hand, I feel like Joseph should have known not to say his dreams out loud because he was 17, and his eleven other brothers knew that you should not do that. At the beginning of the story, it’s explained that Joseph does not do any work. Instead, he is their fathers’ favourite, which his brothers know about, and he is bossing around his older brothers so I can see why they hate him.
PR to “An Enemy of the People” by Henrik Ibsen (1882)
The book “An Enemy of the People” was written as a play mainly about the contaminated water in the Baths and Dr. Thomas Stockmann. I had never read a book that was written as a play before, but I enjoyed some parts of it. I found that there was a lot of information at once, and their vocabulary was different then how someone would speak now. I had to read some sections twice to fully understand what was happening but once I started to get further into the book, I started to read and a quicker pace. It wasn’t until later in the book when the enemy came into perspective, which was Dr. Stockmann. During the meeting in act IV, I found that it started getting very fast paced for me. There was a lot of different vocabulary than I was used to and a lot of information in a small amount of text. I feel like the story ended suddenly. I felt like I missed something when Dr. Stockmann announced he was going to teach Morten and Eilif himself. It didn’t seem to slow down until the last three sentences. The book for me felt different to read then I’m used to but I enjoyed reading most of it.
PW#4 – My Bearded Dragon
I have a pet Bearded Dragon named Eddie which I got for my 6th birthday. At first, we thought she was a boy but then she laid about 50 eggs, so we know she is a girl now. When we got her, she was about four inches but now she is 2 feet long! She enjoys running around in our back garden during the summer to soak up the heat because Bearded Dragons are reptiles, (cold blooded). We sometimes take her down to the beach because she loves the sand and logs. We have a tank for her which has a couple logs in it which I picked out from the beach, and a box so she is closer to her heat lamp, and of course, food and water. My Bearded Dragon eats meal worms, crickets, carrots, cucumber, and she loves blueberries. She is 8 years old now but still active. In the morning she puffs up her “beard” which makes her look like a balloon. She usually spends the day soaking up heat, then climbs down into her cave I made her to go to sleep at night.
IRJE #3 The Wizard of Earthsea by Ursula K. Le Guin (1968)
The Wizard of Earthsea is six book series centred on a boy named Ged. He is a wizard and the children in his home village began calling him Sparrowhawk because he loved to summon the birds with his early magical skills. Ged was finally ready to travel to the island of Roke, where he went to school to learn to become a better wizard. At the school, he made friends with a student called Vetch and made a competitive, pride-driven rivalry with a boy named Jasper. At a school lunch, Ged overhears Jaspers’ remarks about him, and because of their rivalry, he takes offence to Jaspers comments and in response, challenges him to a duel in sorcery.
Even foolery is dangerous in the hands of a fool. – Jasper (Chapter 3)
Jasper may not be the wisest wizard, but I think he is saying this to the importance of education as well as using power responsibly. Although it seems that his only goal is to shame Ged, his words do hold truth. I think he is saying that all foolery is dangerous, and it doesn’t matter whose hands it is in.
PW#3 Birding in Ecuador
The weekend of November 11th, me and my dad are travelling to Ecuador for 8 days. If you read my introduction and first personal writing post, then you would know we are only going for one reason…the birds. There are just over 1600 different species of birds and 42 endemics, meaning you cannot find them anywhere else in the world. We will be birdwatching on the western slope of the Andes in Papallacta and we are hoping to see lots of hummingbirds there, including the largest hummingbird in the world, Giant Hummingbird. In the lodge we are staying at, you can get up to 20 different species of hummingbird on the feeders at once! Now that would be brilliant to see. We spend some time at very high elevation, and I will even get to stand on the equator. Our last three days will be spent doing some intense birding in the region Choco Toucan, and yes that is a bird we will hopefully see there as well as some highly colourful tanagers.
It’s brutal getting there and back because of all the flight connections we have to make. Altogether, I will be in Vancouver BC, Seattle WA, Dallas TX, Miami FL, and Quito Ecuador. It will be worth it though once we are there!
IRJE#2 – The Subtle Knife
In The Subtle Knife by Philip Pullman, Lyra and Will both find themselves in this new world and that is where they meet for the first time. They are both from Oxford but from different times it seems. Will is from the modern day Oxford whilst Lyra is from an old Oxford. They manage to get back into Wills’ Oxford by finding a peculiar tear in the air. When they peered through, they could see the rush hour traffic of Oxford. Lyra had never seen so many cars and once they were through they both had their different missions. Lyra is trying to find out more about Dust and Will is trying to find more information about his missing father. Lyra and Will end up working together to and find that both their mysteries are connected.
“Just sort of relax your mind and say yes, it does hurt, I know. Don’t try and shut it out.” – Dr. Malone (to Lyra) (p.92)
I like this quote because I can relate. It can be hard to relax your mind when you have so many thoughts rushing through all the time. On the second sentance when Dr. Malone tells Lyra “Don’t try and shut it out.”, I think she is telling her to not ignore it when your brain is trying to relax and focus. You need to embrace it. Dr. Malone is telling her this when Lyra is trying to focus when they are trying to figure about about Dust and how the mysterious particles are connected to consciousness. Lyra needs to focus because she is connected to wires that will help her draw an image in her mind so ask questions and the answers are in drawings.
PR to “Master & Man”
The story “Master and Man”, written by Leo Tolstoy, makes me think about how different it was in the early days (1895) compared to nowadays. It makes me feel thankful for what we have now. Especially when Vasili and Nikita are riding on the sledge with the ice-cold air constantly blowing on their faces and their limbs numb. Now we don’t need to worry about that because of our recent inventions. At the end of the story, after the pheasants dug them out of the snow, Nikita is the only one that lived, thanks to Vasili, and he had to go to the hospital for two months.
I think the end of “Master and Man” changes the meaning of the title, even though the story still addresses Vasili as Nikita’s “dead master”. I think this because of the situation they were in could have changed the way Vasili thinks. The amount of time that they both spent in thought in an environment where they both think they are going to die. Vasili had time to think about what he should do. His attempt to find a nearby village only lead him back to the sledge with Nikita. I think once he got back and saw how Nikita was nearly dead made him think fast. He could have been giving his life to save Nikita’s because Vasili may have thought he had more to live for, and at the very end of the story, Nikita changes as well by asking for forgiveness from his wife and taking leave of his son and daughter-in-law.
Overall, I enjoyed reading “Master and Man” and having class discussions about each section which helped clear any confusing parts or moments up.
PW#2 Gabriola Island
This weekend, my mum and I went to Gabriola Island which is an island just off Nanaimo for my birthday and we stayed for two nights. It is a small island which takes about 10-15 minutes to drive from one side to the other. While we were there, the Thanksgiving Studio Tour was happening on the island which was fun to be apart of. It happens once a year. Artists on the island showcase and sell their artwork they have created and every one of them are so unique. There were wood carvings, pottery, paintings, metal work, woven baskets and so much more. The weather was nice while we were staying so we got to walk around to see the different studios and we went on a few hikes with our dog. I was amazed on how quiet it was and everybody seemed so nice. In the mornings we walked down to the beach, which wasn’t very far, and watched the sunrise while we went for a walk. You could see Vancouver from the side we were staying at. On Monday, we went to see a few more art studio then it started to drizzle so we decided to head back to the ferry. Around noon, we had a 30 minute ferry ride back to Nanamio then drove back down to Victoria.
(IRJE #1) A Tale of Magic
When Brystal stumbles across a secret section of the library, she discovers that she can do magic. But magic is illegal where she is from so she gets sent to a miserable Bootstrap Correctional Facility for Troubled Young Women. She is forced to hard labour, and terrible food. In the dining room she notices a banner with a message that made Brystal full of hatred and anger.
“Good Girls do what they’re told. They NEVER ask questions. Good Girls finish their work. They NEVER take breaks. Good Girls keep their heads down. They NEVER look for trouble. Good Girls are always truthful. They NEVER tell lies. Good Girls know their place. They NEVER show disrespect. Good Girls are grateful. They NEVER want more.” (p. 129)
She got so angery, Brystal uncontrollably used her magic to rip the banner to pieces. Afterwards, she was in shock and before she knew what had happened and what she had done, she was being dragged outside to get disciplined.
Thankfully, before they could do anything, an unexpected guest arrived to pick Brystal up and take her away. The faculty didn’t want anything to do with her anymore so Brystal was taken away to a better place where she will learn to control her magic.
PW#1 Australia
On August 10th this summer, me and my father got on a plane to Australia. It took 15hr30m from Vancouver to Sydney and when we arrived it was the morning of the 12th. It didn’t take long for me to adjust to the time zone. It was my second time going to Australia but we went to Brisbane last time in 2019 but we were not going there this time. We went to Australia to go birdwatching and I saw 366 species of birds in the three weeks we were there for. We did a lot of domestic flights and covered a lot of ground. From Sydney we drove down to Melbourne, flew to Perth, flew to Darwin, flew to Alice Springs, then flew back to Sydney. The weather was very different every place we went. Since the seasons are switched there, it was there winter. The coldest days were in the south when it got to 0 degrees and the hottest days were in the north when it got to 38C degrees. We only went to go birding but we did see lots of animals like kangaroos, bats, wombats, lizards, crocodiles and a dingo and I even touched an echidna. The day we were supposed to fly back to Vancouver, our flight somehow got cancelled and we spent 5 hours at the airport trying to figure it out. Sadely we missed our flight so we had to stay an extra day but we did get on the plane the following day. By the time I got back to our house, it was the afternoon of September 4th and I was so tired because of the time difference and less than 24 hours later I went to school. Overall, it was a fun holiday!
Amelia’s Introduction
My name is Amelia. I was born here in Victoria but my family is from England and as you may notice I have a bit of a British accent. This is my fourth year at Brookes and I like to participate in the schools Track and Field team in the summer. I love being outside in nature and going for long hikes with my family. One of my hobbies is birdwatching, which I started when I was five. Since then I have travelled locally and internationally with my dad finding birds and recording them using a data collecting app called eBird.
I enjoy reading books, especially non fiction adventures and I like a few fiction novels. I prefer to read series because the set takes longer to read than just one book so I enjoy it more. I am currently reading the sixth and final book of a series called The Land of Stories by Chris Colfer which is my favourite series I have read and this is my second time reading it.
I like to do creative writing and short stories either about something real that happened or completely from my imagination. I’m not a huge fan of writing something really long because I tend to loose interest which makes it harder for me to finish unless it’s about something I can choose what to write about that I enjoy.