~ Jing-Mei Woo~

Today is the day that I left the Hong Kong Border arriving to Shenzhen, China. As I entered China, I realized that I've never known what it means to be Chinese. I only knew a few phrases in Chinese, even though I am 36 years old. Now, I am on a train, thinking of my dead mother, and her dream to coming home. First, my father, Canning Woo and I are going to Guangzhou. We will visit his aunt, who my father hasn't seen for more than 60 years. As I look at my father, I see tears in his eyes looking out the window of the train. This also makes me tear too, even though I don't have any memories of being here.

My guidebook tells me that we will arrive in three hours, and it also shows me that the spelling of the places have changed. Chungking has become Chongqing, Kweilin is now Guilin, but shanghai is still the same. After we visit Guangzhou, we will take a two housr trip to Chanhai, to see my half sisters for the first time. They are twins, who were from my mothers first husband, and she was forcd to abandon them on a road during an escape fromKweilin to Chungking. I thought about when Auntie Lindo received a letter from my half sisters, and thought about when she didn't tell them that my mother was dead. I saw a scenario where I've arrived to Shanghai to see them, but they ran away.

I look out the window of the train, and I see old factories, and tracks. We're here. We met our family, and ended up at a hotel that looked expensive. I thought it was the wrong hotel, but it ended up being the right one, but it was more luxurious than I have imagined. Time passes by quickly, and I get nervous that the time to meet my sisters is coming close and closer. The time is finally over, and now I am at the airport waiting for what will come next.

Almost done(:

I'm still reading I Know Why The Caged Bird Sings, but I'm almost finished! The story is getting really interesting, because when I first opened this book, I never realized that the story would be like this. It's very odd that there are portions in the book about church and religion, but there are also parts which talk about sexual intercourse and sinful things. It's weird that there are things that contradict in this book, but this shows that the book is more on the nonfiction side. This might make no sense, but some parts of this book seem so ridiculous that you wouldn't believe that it's true. Those ridiculous events show what happen in real life, and the most religious people can do the most sunful things. Maya, isn't too much on the religious side, but in this book, there are chapters that talk about the church that Maya goes to. Also, in the book, I Know Why The Caged Bird Sings, there is a chapter that talks about the church that Maya goes to, but there are many weird things that happen there. I thought that religion would be a great factor in this book at first, but as I get closer to the end of the book, I notice how religion isn't really important to Maya.

Since I'm almost done reading I Know Why The Caged Bird Sings, I'm thinking about reading Go Ask Alice, which is a book written by an anonymous author. I'm excited to read this book, becuase I heard that it's really a great story, even though it might be a short book. Sometimes reading short books are better, incase they get boring, but other times, authors make episodes of the book, so you have to wait to get the new book. I think that GoAsk Alice, would be a fun book, even though it has fewer pages that many other books. Also, I think that I would be able to see the point of view of a teenager, who is around the same age as I am, who is also addicted to drugs.

I Know Why The Caged Bird Sings

While reading I Know Why The Caged Bird Sings, I realized that the book was very interesting, but some chapters were just long and boring. This reminds me of the book that we recently finished in class, Things Fall Apart. Both books have a great story, but they also have some chapters that make me fall asleep.(not offense)For example, I Know Why The Caged Bird Sings by Maya Angelou has chapters about the church that Marguerite/Maya attends, and Things Fall Apartby Chinua Achebe has chapters on wrestling matches. As I read throughout this week, I wrote down notes in the book and a short summary of each chapter. I think that writing down short summaries of each chapter is helpful, when you need to look back to what you read.

While reading this book, I thought that many things were very interesting. In the beginning of the book, I didn't know what was going on, so I felt bad that Marguerite/Maya and Bailey weren't living with their parents. I think that there are many different themes in this book, and one of them is something dealing with family. Also, I think that if Maya lived with her parents as a little girl, many things would've been different. As the book progresses, Maya and Bailey meet their parents and they live with them, but that is different from living with your parents when you're a young child.

Besides that, I thought that it was very weird when Bailey and Maya used to play "house." They seem like children, but when I read the parts about playing house, especially with the girl named Joyce, I was surprised. The more surprising part was when the character Mr. Freeman was introduced. He seemed like a nice person at first, but later on, he turned out to be a bad person. There are a lot of characters that I want to talk about, but I don't want to spoil the book TOO MUCH. I spoiled it a lot right now, but I hope that you still want to read the book to find out who Mr.Freeman is and what he did.

As I read, I found a lot of vocaulary that I didn't know.
-aptly, servile, appellations, opulent, anachronism, eke, calamitous, porter, reneged, fiscal, troubadour, kerosene, query, waifs, gaiety