Youth of Honduras

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Ever wonder what people are thinking on the other side of the the world? Chances are, if your reading this, you do. Well today is your lucky day, because the youth of Honduras has a message to send out to the world. To be more specific, my tenth grade English students have a message to send. I am confident you will find their views not to much different from those of North American teens. Please note that I have not altered any of these messages in any way. As a class, we worked together to grammatically improve our writing, they aren't perfect, but each student put a lot of heart into every thought. We now present them to you, the world. Please give them as much feedback as possible, as they will be reading your comments and discussing them in class. Your feedback will greatly help my students and also fuel this social experiment in cross cultural communication. If this exercise goes well we will be exploring more possibilities in the future. So please, if your not one to leave comments, make an exception and provide feedback.

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Hassiel Rubi and Cynthia Lopez, Team Playa

The many beaches of Honduras

Honduras has many traditions and tourism. The tourist that come to Honduras visit our beautiful beaches, with luxurious Hotels, that gave them hospitality, security, comfort, great food and an amazing see to the beach. Their population is friendly and their workers are very attentive. Honduras attractive beaches know them and enjoy it.

Islas de la Bahia (Honduras): Is the one of the 18 departments into which the Central American nation of Honduras is divided. The islands boast splendid beaches and unspoilt coral reefs, making them a haven for scuba divers and vacationers. The departmental capital is Coxen Hole, on the island of Roatan. It comprises three geographically separate groups:

1. Islas de la Bahia (with the main islands Roatan, Guanaja, Utila and numerous satellite islands)
2. Cayos Cochinos, further south
3. Swam Islands, 120 km to the north

With the three larger ones being the most popular with tourist: Utila, Roatan and Guanaja. English it so widely spoken in the islands, that some people do not even speak Spanish, despite the fact that this is the official language of Honduras.
Utila and Roatan have ferry service provided on the M.V. Galaxy.

Roatan has a paved road that connects the most important communities of the island.

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Roxanna

How can everybody have a succesful life?

Most of the people tend to imagine that a successful life is similar to the Hollywood stars life or having a lot of money is being successful.
Although if most of the people thinks this. So, we are completely incorrect.

Fist we got to define what means “Being Successful”
Successful refers to:
• Know your goal in life
• Grow and develop your talents
• Make things that benefit others.

In life we got to be original; every person is unique but we always want to imitate successful persons instead of working in being a successful person.

Everyone has different goals and reasons to be alive but we are like babies: we want what others have.
We follow others goals and we privet ourselves from learning and achieving the goals that God has assigned for us.

Each human being has different talents but we always want everything at a same time.
I mean, you cant have:

The richness of Bill Gates
The Body of Arnold Schwarzenegger
The intelligence of Albert Einstein
The ability in sports of Michael Jordan
The imagination of Walt Disney

You can admire but not imitate.

If we do this I am sure all of we are going to be successful. Achieving our own goals not other people goals.

You can read the book about successful people from JOHN C. MAXWEL named: El Mapa para alcanzar el exito, which in English means: Map for reaching our success.

Remember:
Being successful is not imitating others, is being original.
Isn’t being millionaire is being happy.
Isn’t knowing about all branches in the world. Is being a master in your own branch…your own talent.

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Andrea

One of the most Noble Sacrifice that few leaders made for a whole nation with the help of the People.

THE GREAT SOCIALIST REVOLUTION

The greatest revolutionary after Jesus Christ was Ernesto Guevara called El Che Guevara; one of his most expressive and renound ideas on Revolution is:

“Luchemos por el presente, que el futuro es nuestro!”

This doesn’t mean war, this means a start for tomorrow’s orientation and the future’s leadership taking in the largest expression the people’s voice which is the wisest and the one that leads honorable patriotic leaders to take precise decisions for a common goal.

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Ruth and Ana, Team Awesome

What is the biggest problem in Honduras today? Who does affect it? How can we fix it?

Honduras has many problems, with society. Why?

Because many individuals do not like to obey laws and norms, that gobernants established. So we are suffering lack of respect, and we think that is one of the biggest problems that we have today.

We start to learn about respect in our home.

The family needs to teach us, how to interact with others, with respect, but, what is respect? Respect is one of the biggest and the most important value that society needs to practice. One definition is: Respect is a feeling or attitude of admiration and deference toward somebody or something. It affects everybody, the ones that know how to practice respect and the ones that doesn’t know even what is respect. Because, maybe you respect people, but, people don’t respect you, or something like this!

Many people don’t respect others in many ways: one could be, their wrong attitude, and other, the way they talk; because they use bad words. A clear example could be our classmates, they don’t respect anyone. It doesn’t matter if is a teacher or a friend. We think that people that do not respect others are ignorant.

How we can’t fix it?

We think this problem doesn’t have solution, because every person has its own personality; and if they don’t want to change, no one can oblige them. Maybe people need to be reborn to change their minds and be different, respecting others, it doesn’t matter, who are them, but they need to be respected; so if we want that people respect us, we need to respect others too! And we think that one solution could be that the people that do not respect others need to be killed.

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Gloria

SKATERBOARDERS IN HONDURAS

THE "SKATERBOYS" ARE THE MOST HANDSOME BOYS BECAUSE THEIR COMPLEXION IS SKINY AND MOST OF THEM ARE TALL I LOVE THEM AND I REALLY ENJOY THAT SPORT. ONE FRIEND PRACTICE SKATEBOARD SHE REALLY LIKE THAT SPORT SHE GOES ALMOST EVERY SATURDAY TO TEGUCIGALPA TO PRACTICE THAT. THAT SPORT IS REALLY RARE HERE IN HONDURAS, AND THERE'S NO A SPECIAL PLACE TO PRACTICE THAT. SOMETIMES SOME SKATERS GO TO THE PARK AT NIGHT HERE IN COMAYAGUA FRIDAYS AND SUNDAYS TO PRACTICE THAT.I WOULD LIKE TO LEARN BUT IT SEEMS DIFFICULT TO ME.

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Hidemi Waki

How can everybody have a successful life?

Everybody thinks that people that have a lot of Money are successful. They are confused, because success is not the Money or women or the street. You find it in your family and in every body that is around you.
Many people think that the people that have a mansion or a good car they are successful they are every time taking care because they have people around that they are gangsters.

And I send this message to people that thinks that the successful life they will find it in the money and they put apart their family..

And having a lot of money will get you in your mind that you would like to be like:

If you are a man-
-Bradd Pitt
-Cristiano Ronaldo
-and others

If you are a woman-
-Angelina Jolie
-Avril Lavigne
-and others

And this are things that you will never be, because you are one and others are others…

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Michael and Luis, Team Panda Love

Save the pandas

Like you can see in this small World that we live, there are more humans than animalsin this tiny World.
But the thing is that humans don´t know is that they are not alone in this World, humans don´t care animals and they destroy the forests and their habitats.

So we have a case of the pandas,that they are Only 1600 pandas in World because the human destroy their life and now they are in dangerous extinction. Pandas are vegetarians so thats why panadas need the forest and the most important food for the panadas is the bambu.

People use the bambu to make houses and people don´t know that the bambu is very important for the life of the pandas.

So how we can save them?
1. stop destroying the forests
2. stop destroying bambu
3. stop killing the pandas

Take care of pandas and all life that the World has.

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Pamela and Ramon, Team PamRam

"Declaro que mi amor por Centroamérica muere conmigo. Excito a la juventud que es llamada a dar vida e este país, que dejo con sentimiento por quedar anarquizado y deseo que imite mi ejemplo de morir con firmeza antes que dejarlo abandonado al desorden en el que desgraciadamente hoy se encuentra."

I declared that my love to Centroamérica dies with me. I encourage, whom are called to give life to this country that I leave with feelings for being (staying) anarchised and I wish they imitate my example of dieing with firmless befote letting it abandoned to the disorder in which unfortunately it is today.

We love Honduras with all our heart, like Francisco Morazan love the land where he was born.
This is why we feel proud of Honduras because we had heroes like Morazan that would give his life to this beautiful country; this is the reason that Patriotism is always in our minds.

For all Hondurans Morazan is a role model and a reason to feel proud. Of Honduras. To us he influenced the way we think and that we have to fight for our right and ideas.
Many people around the World don’t know a thing about Honduras and Hondurans, but when you meet it or when you understand why we love so much our country and why we defend it above all other things. We can’t understand why people want to emigrate to another countries if you have so much in this beautiful country. That’s why WE say, "Honduras , meet it!"

Honduras is a country full of history and patriotism. We love Honduras because the culture and all the awsome things that our country has, we are ORGULLOSAMENTE CATRACHOS.

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Jorge and Julio, Team Gallo

A MESSAGE FOR THE WORLD

MY MESSAGE IS COOPERATION. EACH NATION NEED TO BE COOPERATIVE BECAUSE THEY NEED EACH OTHER AND BEING COOPERATIVE AND MUST WHEN THEY REALLY NEEDED LIKE WHEN THEY HAD BEING AFFECTED BY A PHENOMENON IS A GOOD WAY TO BE FRIENDLY, BECAUSE YOU NEVER KNOW WHEN THEY WILL NEED EACH OTHER.

EVEN WHEN BIG COUNTRIES LIKE USA,GERMANY,JAPAN,RUSSIA AND LOT MORE THEY DON’T HAVE THINGS THAT LITTLE COUNTRIES LIKE CENTRAL AMERICA AND AFRICA HAS AND THEY CAN SHARE EACH OTHER A PIECE OS RESOURCE THAT THEY HAVE MORE THAT WHAT THEY NEED.
IN THE PAST YEARS THE EARTH HAS BEING SUFFERING OF A LOT OF NATURE OR MAN DESTRUCTIBLE WORK, THIS CAUSE LIKE THE GLOBAL WARNING, PEOPLE DYING YOUNGER BECAUSE THE COUNTRIES DON’T HAVE THE ENOUGH RESOURCE TO HAVE A BETTER LIFE.

MY FINAL MASSAGE IS THAT BIG COUNTRIES HAVE TO THINK WE ALL ARE HUMANS AND WE NEED TO HELP EACH OTHER TO COEXIST IN PEACE, YOU DON’T KNOW WHEN YOU NEED OTHERS..

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Christian and Ricardo, Team Tranquilo

Without the help of others
Anyone of us would die,
Naked and starved…

This message means that all the world needs to be in union or to help one another, because we are in the same team, this means that the team is our World and we need to care everything in our world.

Example: We need the help of the farmers , because they are the people that give us our food like eggs, meat, and vegetables. They are who care the crops and after they sell it to the owners of the supermarkets and they put it, to sell it to the people.

Other thing is that all the world need to be in peace, not in war because we are destroying our world, because sometimes you will need the help of other country or person.

This message help us to see that we need to be in peace to have a better world...

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Guide for feedback
If leaving feedback on a specific entry, please include the student's name or the team name. Make sure to include your name and, if you feel it necessary, your employment. The purpose of this exercise is to reach the widest demographic possible. It will help the students greatly if you include your opinions and how each message may or may not apply to you. Feel free to post questions for the class or to specific students. We will discuss each question and then follow up with a response. And, as always, have a good time.

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Comments

[Damian]

Right On!
Successful refers to: • Know your goal in life • Grow and develop your talents • Make things that benefit others. Right on!

[Tio Tom]

Digame . . .
Just what kind of feedback are you looking for? Exhaustive grammar and spelling? *Gasp* Or did you mean for us to comment on the messages themselves? *** For starters, I'd like to commend Roxanna on her insightfulness. I particularly liked when she said, "We follow others goals and we [prevent] ourselves from learning and achieving the goals that God has assigned for us." I believe this - God gave us all a unique purpose. I speak from my heart on this. Honduras does indeed mean "Deep!" By the way, Roxanna, what goals do you think God has assigned to you? *** And TEAM AWESOME, I agree with you as well that respect is very important. If people could simply respect others - even those that they can't stand - human relations would be greatly improved. But do you really think that the death penalty is the appropriate consequence for disrespect? If you want to know the truth, you weren't far off when you suggested rebirth ;-) The answer is in the heart of each person verdad? *** I'll write some more later. In the mean time, thank you all for sharing your thoughts. Well done everyone! ***Tio

[Clint Holmes]

Feedback
Feedback on grammar will not be necessary. We will be discussing grammar this week and we will be making the appropriate corrections. Any feedback on how the message effects you would be great. Also, please provide any questions so we can dig deeper into our class discussions and continue this writing exercise.

[Eric Chaffee]

Your Essays
Queridos Catrachos, estudiantes del maestro Holmes: Greetings to all! You have written some excellent essays. And you have a superb teacher. (I especially admire his enthusiasm for teaching.) NOTE: I'm told there are no paragraphs in this comments-section; so I will attempt to use an indent along with a paragraph mark, like this ¶. Here goes: ¶ I want to help you with your efforts to write essays in English, so I must begin by correcting your teacher's introduction! (We all need to help each other in order to improve.) If we allow the same mistakes to be repeated, or if we continue to make them unknowingly, we will make no progress. Correction is essential. My friend Clint ALWAYS makes this mistake, corrected below, in his blogs, so I must correct him as a friend. -- But why have I waited until now? I've been meaning to do this for weeks! -- It must be, that I've waited so you could enjoy the spectacle of watching your teacher be corrected, for your own instruction and profit. Notice the humility with which he receives correction. (You see, I am confident he will not conceal his need for improvement, as I know that he teaches by example.) Of course, I need correction in order to continue improving, too. ¶ Note: my thoroughly corrected replies to your essays have been forwarded to your teacher for use in class. He has made hardcopies for you. ¶ Clint's essay misused the words your/you're; and to/too. My comments: [So, what's the difference between your and you're? Your is possessive, por exemplo, coche de Usted=your car, also, su coche. You're is a contraction for you are, as in: Usted esta, o Ustedes son. It's like a collision of two words, which always happens in speech, no problem, but looks bad on the page, and provides a mistaken meaning, if not correctly spelled. Mistake #2: to is either transitive, or used to form the infinitive; too is a matter of degree: por exemplo -- demasiado=too much]. Hey, Clint, I really admire your energy and your creativity for teaching. I think it's especially clever to invite the public to correct your students' papers! You're like Tom Sawyer, who said: "What will you give me, if I let you paint my fence?" Well, my Spanish needs loads of help, so please don't hesitate. ¶ Team Playa (Hassiel & Cynthia) comments: You guys have cheated! Much of your material was lifted, word-for-word from Wikipedia. In a college in EEUU (U.S. for the gringos reading this blog), you would have been expelled for this act, without refund of tuition. Game over. I will simply encourage you to do your own work. If you really want to master writing in English, you must practice with desire and discipline. When we cheat, we fool ourselves into thinking we are smarter than we really are. There is a commandment which says 'Thou shalt not commit adultery.' In ancient Hebrew, it literally says 'You must not cheat.' (Especially consider that, if you won't cheat on God, therefore you won't be tempted to cheat on your spouse.) Remember, God is all seeing. That's how I caught you cheating. He told me to look. ¶ Roxanna. "Can Everybody have a successful life?" Good effort, Roxanna. I like your outlook, namely: ¡Be Yourself! -- By the way, I know gringos don't generally use upside down punctuation. But I like it. It is one of the brilliant devices of Spanish which should be adopted into English, now that we have keyboards with this ability. The reason? It tells the reader immediately of the nature of the coming sentence, whether a question or an exclamation. This is especially useful on longer sentences. ¶ Andrea: "One of the most Noble Sacrifice." [SacrificeS must be plural, as you are comparing one to MANY; the noun therefore must agree with the many, which is plural] >> [Your quote is not translated for the English reader: "Let's fight today, and the future will belong to us." >> spelling: renound>renowned >> While I admire the observation that we all need to struggle together and within ourselves individually, I want to ask you to think about the nature of collective effort. Yes, man is a social creature like the ants and bees; but trusting leaders is sometimes a huge disappointment. Are you aware that honeybees, when winter arrives, put out all the males to freeze to death? The "common goal" of the hive is to preserve community for the future, by minimizing food consumption, even when they have more than enough to get through winter. This may be wise. But if you happen to be a male bee, you might not like socialism when winter arrives, and the Queen says "all the males must die." You see, male honeybees are raised as needed in the spring, to fertilize the eggs of the queen bee. So, is the queen bee an "honorable, patriotic leader," Andrea? What if you were a male under this system? Would you like this plan? Socialism, like any system, has its many costs. Do you recognize them?]. ¶ Ruth & Ana (Team Awesome): "What is the biggest problem in Honduras today?" [Dear Team Awesome: maybe you need to be renamed Team Gruesome? I'm sure you're only joking about killing people wo won't respect others. But violence is never a solution. Life is a gift from God. Are we qualified to take it away? OFF WITH THEIR HEADS!]. ¶ Gloria: "Skateboarders in Honduras" [Hi, Gloria. Complexion can't be skinny, any more than sound can be green. Perhaps you mean the guys' profile or their form. Complexion is the clarity of the face, or skin.. Skin is piel; skinny is flaco. Also, I want to ask you: since "handsome" is a quality of interest for purposes of parenting -- is skill with a skateboard also a good quality to choose when looking for a mate? If so, why?]. ¶ Michael & Luis (Team Panda Love) "Save the Pandas" I love nature, too, guys. I think you would really enjoy reading a book titled Ishmael, by Daniel Quinn. This book won a huge monetary prize. It's a novel about being mentored by a talking gorilla. As silly as this sounds, it is an awesome book. Although I rarely read fiction, I've given away several copies to friends. The author rewrote this book seven times before it was published and recognized as a best seller! That's persistence! ¶ Team PamRam. (an untitled essay about nationalism, which I've titled ¡Proudly Hondos!) [Pam, Ram, Nationalism can be dangerous and costly, but it is also valuable for the esteem of the group. A group that can rise in FIFA as your national team has, could do many great things at home, if you will use many of those same skills in your community. Bravo.]. ¶ Jorge & Julio (Team Gallo) "Cooperation" [Do countries think? Yes, there is a collective intelligence, but "group think" (not a wise thing, in English -- look up the word lemmings, and notice stories about that creature) -- group think is often very mistaken, which is the point you've made. Regarding your English, I want to encourage you guys to simplify your sentence structure. It's like you are building a house, but using too many boards. Economize. Using too many words makes your essay weaker. Think carefully (as you have) but write skinny. A builder who uses too many boards makes less money on the building project. A writer who uses too many words can get lost in his sentences. Read Ernest Hemmingway for a good look at tight writing using few words very effectively.] ¶ Team Tranquilo (Christian & Ricardo, untitled essay about peace) [So, where do you guys get your peace? Here's where I get mine: "Peace I leave with you, my peace I give unto you: not as the world giveth, give I unto you. Let not your heart be troubled, neither let it be afraid." -St John 14:27] ¶ AMIGOS, I've enjoyed reading your papers, and peeking inside your "thinker" [cabeza]. You're getting a good education. Make the most of it. Soon you will be too busy working to keep your lives organized. You may then wish you had time to study and learn, like the good old days of the past, in school. ~eric.

[Ben]

comment
I think is great middle school students have the chance to express this way. And I say that because: 1) I totally relate to the way most of you think at the moment, I mean thinking back when I was your age, and 2) Because like you I am latino from El Salvador and I know Honduras has similar history with the one from my country. I would just want to encourage you to stay in the school and also wish you all good luck.

[Gabby Garay]

Wonderful Job to all the students!!
I just want to begin this memo by saying that I am from Honduras myself; I attended El Alba from Kindergarten to third grade. I am now 27 years old, so that being said it tells you how long that was. I am now living in Houston, Texas and have been in the US for 15 years total; prior to Texas I lived in New York. At any rate, I have been reading this blog for a couple of years now and this is the first time that I see a teacher ( Mr. Holmes) be so involved with the students and wanting to let them reach out and explore their creative minds. Just for the record, GREAT JOB mister....hahaha. (I had to say that.) Ok, on a serious note, I have to comment on Ruth and Ana, Team Awesome. I enjoyed your writing piece. I have to agree with you two ladies, that lack of respect is what is wrong with Honduras, but not just there, it is everywhere. As I mature, I see how the lack of respect affects every aspect of your everyday life. I agree with you when you say that respect has to be thought in your household. I remember when growing up, if you saw an elderly person or relative of yours automatically one had to say: BENDICION (blessings) and they felt sense of respect. I don’t know if that is practiced still, but in my family we still do, the younger generation, not as much. I guess they feel awkward saying it because it gives them the idea of being old fashioned. Anyways, the above comment is just the gist of how I grew up back then and agreeing with both Ruth and Ana. The family values and moralities is what determine what type of respect one will carry on in this journey called life. I will keep reading and writing to my fellow Catrachos and keep up the great job to all who share their thoughts.

[Roxana]

My answer to the question: WHAT ARE UR GOALS?
well, i have many goals in life. I have a goal for my family, my studies and for every part of my entire life. Briefly i can tell you.. that my goal in life is: be happy and enjoy every day. Also everything isn´t happiness because if you want to be happy you pass through a sacrifice. But I´m mentalized that every mistake i commit i will take it as pure knowledge. Life is full of mistakes.. but we got to learn about them. maybe what you think is a mistake, for me isn´t. Greetings.. Roxana

[Clint Holmes]

Go Roxanna
Excellent response, Roxanna. Bonus points!

[NOHELIA ALEJANDRA]

HEY MISTER!!!!!!!!!
THANKS FOR MAKING AOUR COMMENTS PUBLIC I HOPE YOU CONTINUE BEING OUR EACHER

[Clint Holmes]

Nohelia
Your welcome, Nohelia. I am still working on the new website. Soon we will be able to start some new projects.

[chaft]

What a fabulous assignment!
Mr. Holmes - combining kids views of the world and themselves and their ideals with an internet blog in a foreign language. You get my vote for teacher of the year.I have recently begun working in a mentoring program and I will suggest this to the students. Team Tranquilo - if everyone in the world thought the way you do - this would surely be a more humane and peaceful loving place. I am American and am counting down the days until Bush goes back to Texas. I am so excited about Barak Obama - seems like I have been waiting for him my entire life. I must, however, let you all know that tom's comments about the "evil jews" is incredibly offensive. The reason this world is in so much upheaval is this religious division. Peoples beliefs, whether Judiasm, Islamism, Christianity, or any other of the world's religions - should NEVER be an excuse to hate. People are people, some good, some bad and it is our duty as human beings to call out the bigots and haters.