30 for 30

The story of South Africa's rugby team was a Cinderella type of story. South Africa just elected their first black president who spent 27 years in jail previously. The whites expected terrible punishments and did not like the look of how the country was changing. The blacks were mad for getting mistreated for years by the whites and it seemed like the two groups were in for a battle. However Nelson Mandela, the new president had different plans. He wanted to bring peace between the whites and the blacks and he did this with the sport of rugby. Nelson Mandela urged for the Rugby World Cup to be held in South Africa and they hosted the 1995 Rugby World Cup. Rugby was considered a white sport and there weren't blacks playing. Blacks enjoyed the whites getting hit hard by the opposing team and rooted for the opposing team. However this was all before the 1995 Rugby World Cup. As a team with little to none international experience, the Springbok team entered the Rugby World Cup without any recognition from other nations. On the Springbok team, one black was named to be on the roster. Throughout the Rugby World Cup, Nelson Mandela urged the nation to rally behind the Springbok rugby team. It was amazing to see the people in the stands rooting for their team the Springbok. Whites and Blacks celebrated the team's success and both races were rooting for Springbok to win. What makes the story even more extraordinary is the fact that the Springbok made to the finals against the powerhouse New Zealand. No one gave South Africa a chance but the South Africans still rooted for their country. The whole nation watched the game together. The white people respected Mandela for his kindness towards them and the black people were able to find a connection with the whites through the sport of Rugby. Even though there were still problems afterwards, the sport of rugby brought the two sides closer significantly.

Helium balloons carries propaganda

http://www.cnn.com/2010/WORLD/asiapcf/05/31/south.korea.message/index.html

North Korean defectors that now resides in South Korea have sent bags full of paper, dollar bills, and radios attached to a giant helium balloon. They hope this will reach the heart of Pyongyang where they feel that many people have been brainwashed by Kim Jong Il. The group of defectors believe that if North Korea can't receive messages from the outside world, the news have to be delivered to them by the outside world. A North Korean defector, Kwon Young-Hee says that North Koreans know nothing but the power of Kim Jong Il as a general and no nothing of the truth. The Fighters for Free North Korea hopes that the citizens of North Korea can listen to the illegal radios and realize the truth about North Korea. Even though the propaganda war is heating up, the citizens of South Korea don't feel threatened by a real war.

This is important because I would think that this would anger Kim Jong Il and make matters worse between the two countries. War should be avoided but I don't understand why South Koreans would do such a thing that might agitate Kim Jong Il. It said in the article that South Koreans feel that North Koreans wouldn't attack because South has too many strong ties with their allies. I don't think South Korea should depend too much on their allies because even though they do have allies, no one wants to go into war.

Israeli military gives version of flotilla incident

http://www.cnn.com/2010/WORLD/meast/05/31/gaza.flotilla.israeli.raid/index.html

Nine people were killed in the fight between the Israeli soldiers and a group of activists. A group of activists on a flotilla were looking forward to deliver aid to Gaza and while attempting to do so attacked Israeli soldiers. Israeli soldiers said that they were immediately attacked by the group of activists as they boarded the boat. One soldier said that they were beat by metal sticks and knives from the activists. The soldiers said that there were about 30 activists and that they were all speaking Arabic. While the soldiers say that they were attacked, the activists have said that the soldiers opened fire on unarmed civilians.

This is important because skirmishes between Israeli soldiers and the group of activists who seem to be Palestinians have been going on for years now. This conflict has been difficult to solve. The Israelis have been looked as the bad guy in this conflict because the media states that they killed citizens. There are two stories behind this but when viewers see that Israeli army has opened fire on unarmed citizens then the Israeli army looks like the bad guys even though they were only trying to protect themselves.

Tropical storm leaves many dead in Central America

http://www.cnn.com/2010/WORLD/americas/05/31/honduras.storm.emergency/index.html

A big hurricane hit Central America as it killed at least 135 people. The storm hit 3 countries, Guatemala, Honduras, and El Salvador; it affected Guatemala the hardest. 92 were reported dead, 52 missing, and 59 were reported injured in Guatemala. Bridges collapsed, houses were destroyed, and rivers were dramastically over their normal levels in Guatemala. In Honduras, 14 people have died. Nearly 3500 were evacuted from their homes and nearly 3300 were living in shelters. Many houses have been destroyed or damaged due to the storm. In El Salvador, the conditions were less severe. Only 9 people were dead and the rain had stopped. This storm was recorded as the first pacific hurricane.

This is important news because even though it's not as bad as the Haiti earthquakes, people still died from this natural disaster. Nations need to learn from this and need to prepare their citizens better so nations don't have the death toll up to the 100s. Many people have been affected throughout the 3 countries so it will be vital for the government to replace them back to their homes.

Response to the Berlin Conference

I thought our group did well for the position we were in. We were the last group to pick and we were able to surround Ethiopia. That was one of our goals to surround Italy and perhaps attack them once again to gain more land. We were able to get much of the Sahara dessert which contains oil for future use. A chunk of land in Madagascar were left so we took that land as well. We also were able to gain a little of land in the south where there were a lot of raw materials.

Great Britain did a good job with their planning and got a lot of land. They were able to gain land that possessed raw materials and land that was suitable for farming. I thought France didn't do as a good job that they should have done. If you look at what they were actually able to do, they were able to obtain a large amount of land. In our run through, France only gained small lands around ports near France. I thought they could have done better and try to get more raw materials which they really didn't go for.

The Berlin Conference affected Africa greatly because Africans had no say in what happened and all of their land was lost. Foreigners came into their land and they could do nothing else about it. Families were separated, cultures were broken, and many lives were lost during this phase. It still affects Africa now because many African countries are in terrible conditions. European countries used the land and destroyed the African's lives. After they left, they didn't help and let the countries run by themselves. Europeans encouraged tribes to fight against each other and now there are violent wars going around in Africa. Now, many countries in Africa need help and lack sanitary living conditions. They are plagued by diseases such as AIDS, dirty water, wars, and lack of food.

The Scramble for Africa

This quote refers to the European countries rushing down to Africa and claiming their territories. The European countries broke up Africa and divided it so they can have the materials Africa contains. For a while, almost the whole Africa was claimed by Europeans. European countries took people, broke up families, and took many raw materials.

African traditions

1. Child takes the characteristics of his/her name. I think this is very bizarre because in the U.S. the name doesn't make the person. The father in the show was worrying about what to name his child because the child took the characteristics of his/her name. It's good to have names that have positive vibes but we don't let the name dictate our lives unless if it's our last name for some people.

2. When the boys are 15, they are taken away to become brave men. This was like their way of going to the army. It was mandatory for boys to go and people in the village took this very seriously. The kids went without even knowing what was going to happen.

3. The goal of war is to win, not to kill. Warrior respects another warrior. This was a different strategy than many other countries would prefer. If a country was in war, they would want to defeat the other country by killing their soldiers instead of just letting them go. Our mindset is to weaken their army by killing and not giving them a second chance to attack.

4. Boys that turn into men can't stay with the family and must live in his own hut. These kids were still about only 16, but they were still forced to leave their parents and live by himself. From this one camp the boys are forced go to, their lives change so much afterwards. It was peculiar to see how the boys changed so much after the camp. The main character in this story acted like a totally different person.

5. Father builds a hut for his son while his son is at camp. I guess men couldn't live in the same house back in the day in Africa. So as the sons prepare to become men, the father has to like jump start his son's life by building a hut for him. Even though not all parents do this, but this would be like getting a car after the teenager finally passes his license test. It would be nice if all the parents were like the ones in Africa.