Thursday 26 January 2012
Exercise 1
BAHA
by
Andrea Valentina
DM2C
Two Filipino children, Aquilino and Zabel, are lost in a terrifying flood in Mindanao island where they are trying to survive and stay alive together but sadly, their health condition makes it even harder and at the end, Aquilino gave his life to save Zabel’s which managed to survive and make her way to the save haven.
My Blog: http://amonologueinanonimity.blogspot.com/
Date: 27 Feb 2012
Notes:
Have you emailed the lecturer yet? YES / NO
lecturer: jeannette teo
email: syteo@nafa.edu.sg
EXECUTIVE SUMMARY:
TITLE:
BAHA
GENRE:
Fiction, drama
1 SENTENCE SUMMARY:
Two Filipino children, Aquilino and Zabel, are lost in a terrifying flood in Mindanao island where they are trying to survive and stay alive together but sadly, their health condition makes it even harder and at the end, Aquilino gave his life to save Zabel’s which managed to survive and make her way to the save haven.
SYNOPSIS:
Aquilino woke up one morning alone. His family is out to work in the gold mines of Mindanao. His family is actually consisting of one person only, his older brother, Benigno who is like a father to him. That day, he is going to prepare breakfast for himself when suddenly a flood came and struck the city. The flood in growing worse, accompanied with landslides across the island. Poor Aquilino finds himself clinging onto dear life in he flood when he spotted someone he knew, Zabel, his schoolmate.
Both of them are faced into challenges from a no-hero-scenario to food scarcity and water scarcity. They survived alone for 5 days already when at last they are both struck by a nasty cold. Being the one with the jacket, Aquilino tries his best to save the weak Zabel who is in a verge of hypothermia as well. For the next two days, Aquilino hugs Zabel to safety, when she actually gained warmth.
Aquilino succeeded with his plan. Zabel is saved. He gave his body heat to her while actually having a fierce battle inside his own body. He was frail and broken, but he chose to save his friend instead by hugging her to protect her body from harm whilst directing all foreign matters to attack his body even further. At the seventh day of the flood, at last one search team member found them. He found two bodies, cradling each other, unconscious. But only one remains in this world. The boy gave his life for his friend, Zabel, who managed to regain consciousness and lived along by herself many years after.
CHARACTER LIST (All characters)
Aquilino
Zabel
Benigno (Aquilino’s older brother)
Rescuer (from Search and Rescue team)
CHARACTER BIO (Key Characters only)
Aquilino
He is a ten years old boy who lives in the island of Mindanao. He has one older brother, Benigno, who works in a gold mine for a living. Aquilino is very friendly and brave. His inquisitiveness is admired by his friends. He has a lean body with tan skin and dark brown short hair.
Zabel
She is a nine years old girl who lives in the island of Mindanao. Born and raised by a family of gold miners and being an only chlid, she often spent her days alone in the house, just like the day of the flood. She is a very shy girl, but she finds himself enjoying Aquilino’s company in school. She has a tan skin and dark brown smooth hair which is tied into pigtails.
RESEARCH
Hundreds dead, hundreds missing in Filipino floods
By Adam Harvey and wires
Updated December 19, 2011 12:40:47
A major humanitarian operation is underway in the Philippines, where rescuers are continuing to search for hundreds of people missing after flash flooding which has already killed more than 600 people.
More than 650 people are dead and 800 are missing after floods inundated coastal plains on the southern island of Mindanao in the aftermath of tropical storm Washi.
Entire villages have been wiped out and many of the dead and missing are children.
As bodies that had washed out to sea begin rising to the surface, mortuaries have been overwhelmed in the port cities of Cagayan de Oro and Iligan.
Local officials in Iligan said they were preparing to bury unclaimed bodies in a mass grave later today.
Twenty thousand soldiers have been sent to the northern end of Mindanao to help find the missing and get supplies to survivors.
It is an enormously difficult task. The floodwaters were thick with mud and silt, the debris has blocked vital roads, and bridges have been washed away.
Gwendolyn Pang, the secretary-general of the Philippines Red Cross, says the scale of the disaster is hampering rescue efforts.
"We had difficulty in penetrating many of the areas because of the debris. Many of the houses were wiped off, were washed out," she said.
The worst of Washi hit after midnight and the sheer volume of rainfall had not been forecast.
Ms Pang says many Filipinos had no idea that the water was coming.
"This thing happened in the evening when people were asleep so we are also doing psychosocial support to the people to help them cope in this crisis and to help them cope as well we are looking into their other needs like water, food, shelter and other things," she said.
"We and the government and other agencies are working very close together so we can address the needs of the people on the ground."
Anna Lindenfors, the Philippines director of the Save The Children charity, says the storm caught many people off guard.
"And a lot of people were still in their houses and just the houses were washed away and I think that the people were not, in this region, were not really prepared for a storm like this," she said.
"They usually come in the same places and this is a place where they don't normally come."
Residents unprepared
The head of the government's disaster response agency, Benito Ramos, said its own count stood at 516 deaths and 274 missing but conceded that the toll would likely go higher.
"I'm out here retrieving bodies that are starting to rise to the surface," Mr Ramos said by mobile phone from a rescue boat off Cagayan de Oro.
President Benigno Aquino has ordered a review of the country's disaster defences as it became apparent that residents were unprepared.
Ms Lindenfors says many of the victims were very young.
"And of course it was really difficult for the children because children when they are caught in a flash flood, they are not really capable. So what we are see is that a lot of the casualties are children," she said.
She says aid agencies are scrambling for donations to try and help the victims.
A lot of people were still in their houses, and just the houses were washed away, and I think that the people were not in this region really prepared for a storm like this.
Anna Lindenfors, Save The Children Philippines
"Now it is will be more a matter of making sure the children are reunified with their families and making sure that they have some clothes, dry clothes on their bodies or a blanket or something that will keep them dry and warm and food and clean water," she said.
"Clean water is really coming out as one of the major problems at this point of time."
Mr Ramos said most of the victims were "informal settlers" - a term often used for internal migrants who are unregistered as residents or property owners.
"They were not prepared for the typhoon. Our weather bureau had already warned them way ahead but they had not heeded the advice," he said, adding that floods struck "at an unholy hour, 2:00 am, when everybody was asleep."
He speculated that climate change could have been a factor in the unusual trajectory of the storm.
"Northern Mindanao is not a typhoon path," he said by telephone.
Authorities likened tropical storm Washi to Ketsana, one of the country's most devastating storms which dumped huge amounts of rain on Manila and other parts of the country in 2009, killing more than 460 people.
The floods wiped out local crops, and food shortages are expected for some time.
ABC/AFP
Topics: floods, disasters-and-accidents, philippines
First posted December 19, 2011 10:49:52
http://www.abc.net.au/news/2011-12-19/philippines-am/3737498
REFLECTION
The Filipino flood is an interesting topic. This event has many aspects inside it; the strategic location filled with gold mines which were rupturing in the time of flood, creating a landslide that became an instant death trap for the gold miners. The number of casualties is also high, proving the significance of this event even further.
This event brings me an idea to create a story about two children who are trapped together in this event, which leads them to try to survive this ill-fated experience together. A dramatic twist will be added at the end in which one of the kids die to spare another’s life.
3 ACT STRUCTURE: (in point form below)
3 ACT STRUCTURE: (in point form below)
| ACT1 SETUP | ACT2 CONFRONTATION | ACT3 RESOLUTION |
| Key Character(s): Aquilino Zabel Must-have Info: Aquilino and Zabel are both kids from a family of gold miners, so they are often alone – including the day of the flood. | Confrontation: Aquilino tries to find shelter, but it took too long to find, making more than enough room for diseases to catch into the kids’ bodies. | Climax (Grand Finale): Aquilino reaches his maximum capacity, but he did not want to let go of Zabel’s body he’s been protecting. Resolution: Both kids are finally found by the rescue team, but only Zabel is alive. Aquilino is dead because his body cannot take the pressure of the circmstances. Zabel survived long enough although her family is no longer around, due to the landslide on the gold mining site. |
| MOTIVE: Surviving the flood and reuniting with family. | TURNING POINT: The kids are starting to have symptoms of hypothermia. Aquilino cannot bear to see Zabel, a girl, hurt. Thus he does his best to protect her. | MOTIVE RESOLVED? At least one of them survived. |
| Conflict/Obstacles: The flood is too dangerous to handle, especially for two kids. | Conflict/Obstacles: Aquilino is actually not in the condition to protect anyone from the cold. Up the Stakes: Aquilino starts to drift away, unconscious. | Moral of the Story if any: Anything could happen to us. Our lives are built upon sacrifices of others. |
TREATMENT / STORYLINE & STORYBOARD
In the beautiful island of Mindanao, amidst the gold-laden land, lived a little boy named Aquilino. He lives with his older brother, Benigno. There’s only two of them in the family now, and Benigno, being a healthy guy in his twentieth year, must work in the local gold mine for a living.
Aquilino was alone that day when he noticed that the rain outside his window was more than what it seems. He has just woken up when he realized that his entire house is flooded. It was six in the morning and he’s out cold. Feeling lucky that he was wearing a jacket the night before, Aquilino waited inside his one-story house until he realized he must swim or he will sink.
He swam out of his house. Piles of furniture are floating around helplessly. He starts to worry about his brother. Did he make it out of the mine alive?
When he came out, he’s in a real jeopardy. The flood consumes the whole village. Not a keen swimmer himself, the found a piece of log and clings onto it, praying that it will bring him someplace safe.
Along the way, he saw a very familiar face. She’s alone too. Seeing his dear friend, he yelled her name until she snaps out of her confusion. Crying, Zabel reaches out her hand to him. After a tedious paddling, Aquilino succeeds to bring her onboard.
For the next five days, they are practically finding pieces of safety. As each day passes by, they are being even hungrier, forced to ‘drink’ the flood since there is no clean water. They are moving from shelters beneath some trees above the water, but never for long. Consumed by the cold and famine, they are barely alive.
At day six, Zabel is starting to feel extremely cold. She shivers uncontrollably. Seeing this, Aquilino did what every gentleman would do: he took off his jacket and gave it to her. The instant he took off his jacket, he feels a lot weaker. The wind is crushing his spine. The water is smothering him with dampness and thus, diseases. He wrapped his arms around the frail shaking body, and he said ‘Everything is gonna be alright..’. He keeps repeating that until the next day, when he speaks no more.
The seventh day, Zabel is awake. She’s trying to piece out fragments of memories: Aquilino swims to her; him giving his jacket with a concealed pain on his face, forcing her to put it on; him wrapping his arms around her.. Until she heard someone calling ‘Hello! Anyone here? Hello!’ Panicking, she shrieks, ‘Here! Here!’ with all the power she has left in her. Oblivious to what’s happening to her friend, she tries shrugging to wake him up… to no avail.
It’s been eight years since that day. Zabel, now a healthy seventeen years old girl, is standing beside a grave. She puts flowers on the tombstone ‘Aquilino Peregrine’, the last bouquet of flowers she put on a tombstone that day, the day when she honors the death of her whole family, and of her friend who gave her the chance to live.
Thursday 12 January 2012
Mind Your Language Season 1 - Pilot : The First Lesson
One Sentence Summary
Jeremy Brown is a new English teacher in an English institution to teach English as a foreign language for a number of international students and he is currently having a chaotic situation due to the mayhem caused by the differences and misunderstandings of the students.
Quick Character List
1. Ali Nadeem - Pakistani from Lahore, unemployed
2. Principal Dolores Courtney - British
3. Jeremy Brown - British, teacher
4. Maximillion - Greek, works with ships and tankers
5. Anna Schmidt - German
6. Giovanni Cupello - Italian, chef
7. Jamila Ranjha - Arabic, housewife
8. Ranjeet Singh - Indian Sikh, railway worker
9. Taro Nagasumi - Japanese, Representative of Bushedo Electronics
10. Juan Cervantes para Seville - Spanish, bartender
11. Danielle - French
12. Chung Su Lee - Chinese, Chinese Diplomat Secretary
Character Bio
1. Ali Nadeem
Ali is a Pakistani from Lahore. He is unemployed but he pays for a living by collecting unemployment subsidiaries from the government once every week and he claims to gain more than what he can get if he works. He actually is able to comprehend some English phrases quite well and he can even speak closely to the grammar, but even though he is like that, he still can't understand some very simple questions. In class he speaks a very Pakistani-clad English and he often quarrels with fellow classmate, Ranjeet, an Indian because they have religious differences.
2. Juan Cervantes
Juan is a bartender from Spain. He can't seem to comprehend English at all, apart from some body languages. In class he was helped several times by Giovanni because he understands a bit of Spanish but that doesn't help much either. His catchphrase is 'Por favor?' which is 'Pardon?' in Spanish because he genuinely didn't get what's going on with the people around him.
Three Act Structure
Act 1
Setup : Ms. Courtney is looking for an English teacher and Jeremy Brown was the one to apply. She needs him to teach English as foreign language immediately.
Act 2
Conflict : The students quarrel with each other out of misunderstandings.
Act 3
Resolution : Mr. Brown dismissed the class.
Jeremy Brown is a new English teacher in an English institution to teach English as a foreign language for a number of international students and he is currently having a chaotic situation due to the mayhem caused by the differences and misunderstandings of the students.
Quick Character List
1. Ali Nadeem - Pakistani from Lahore, unemployed
2. Principal Dolores Courtney - British
3. Jeremy Brown - British, teacher
4. Maximillion - Greek, works with ships and tankers
5. Anna Schmidt - German
6. Giovanni Cupello - Italian, chef
7. Jamila Ranjha - Arabic, housewife
8. Ranjeet Singh - Indian Sikh, railway worker
9. Taro Nagasumi - Japanese, Representative of Bushedo Electronics
10. Juan Cervantes para Seville - Spanish, bartender
11. Danielle - French
12. Chung Su Lee - Chinese, Chinese Diplomat Secretary
Character Bio
1. Ali Nadeem
Ali is a Pakistani from Lahore. He is unemployed but he pays for a living by collecting unemployment subsidiaries from the government once every week and he claims to gain more than what he can get if he works. He actually is able to comprehend some English phrases quite well and he can even speak closely to the grammar, but even though he is like that, he still can't understand some very simple questions. In class he speaks a very Pakistani-clad English and he often quarrels with fellow classmate, Ranjeet, an Indian because they have religious differences.
2. Juan Cervantes
Juan is a bartender from Spain. He can't seem to comprehend English at all, apart from some body languages. In class he was helped several times by Giovanni because he understands a bit of Spanish but that doesn't help much either. His catchphrase is 'Por favor?' which is 'Pardon?' in Spanish because he genuinely didn't get what's going on with the people around him.
Three Act Structure
Act 1
Setup : Ms. Courtney is looking for an English teacher and Jeremy Brown was the one to apply. She needs him to teach English as foreign language immediately.
Act 2
Conflict : The students quarrel with each other out of misunderstandings.
Act 3
Resolution : Mr. Brown dismissed the class.
Thursday 5 January 2012
Research - Exercise 1
25 dead, 150 missing in Philippine landslide
At least 25 people were killed in the southern Philippines on Thursday when a landslide buried gold prospectors who had refused to leave an area declared too dangerous for habitation.
Officials said up to 150 people were missing on Mindanao island after the collapse of a rain-soaked hillside that had been settled by thousands of migrants in search of instant riches.
Rescuers using hand-held tools pulled 25 bodies and 15 injured residents from the rubble after the dawn landslide in Napnapan, a hamlet of more than 8,000 people near the town of Pantukan, civil defence chief Benito Ramos told AFP.
"A military unit is in the area but they are basically digging with their hands," he told AFP.
The National Disaster Risk Reduction and Management Council said 150 people were missing and that the health department was transporting 150 body bags to the site, even as heavy rain halted rescue efforts for the rest of the day.
Local military official Colonel Lyndon Paniza, who is coordinating the rescue from Pantukan, about two hours away via rugged mountain roads, said rescuers fear there could be more fatalities.
"We expect many were killed since the worst-hit was the middle, where there are more than 50 shanties," he told AFP.
The landslide buried a 7,500-square-metre (81,000-square-foot) area as people slept, Paniza added.
The provincial government and local mining firms have been asked to bring heavy equipment to the village.
Pantukan and nearby Monkayo, both on the west flank of Mindanao's Pacific Cordilleras mountains, have drawn gold prospectors for years despite frequent, deadly landslides.
Their largely unregulated tunnelling have made the mountainside unstable, government experts say, while officials also said a 2.8-magnitude quake that hit the area about three hours earlier could have triggered the disaster.
Paniza said another landslide had occurred about two kilometres (just over a mile) away on April 22 last year.
Local officials said that landslide had killed 14 people, while another in 2009 killed 26.
Aerial photographs released by the army showed an expanse of brown mud crushing wooden homes and vehicles, as rescuers scrambled down dangerous, near-vertical slopes to search the rubble.
Mines and Geosciences Bureau head Leo Jasareno said miners had been told to leave the area as early as 2008, but local officials failed to enforce the ban.
"That place is full of tension cracks. Geologically, the stones beneath were really fractured," Jasareno said over ABS-CBN television.
He said the ground had been saturated, with heavy rains from a storm off Mindanao's southeast coast soaking the peaks over the past two weeks.
"We classify this as rain-induced, although structures built on the mountain aggravated the problem," Jasareno said.
Disaster reduction chief Ramos said the victims were partly to blame.
"These are small-scale miners who tunnel into the side of the mountains like rats," Ramos told AFP.
"It's obvious that the gold attracts them. We cannot guard the mountain 24/7 because we have other responsibilities."
The Philippines has some of the world's biggest gold, copper and nickel deposits, according to expert estimates, but most of these have remained off-limits to big mining firms partly due to local opposition.
The situation has let in individuals or small-scale ventures that simply start digging on slopes and process ore using antiquated and dangerous methods.
The environment department estimates that 70 percent of all gold in the country is produced by small-scale miners, many of them in areas like Pantukan.
The landslide came just barely three weeks after a powerful storm caused heavy flooding elsewhere on Mindanao, killing more than 1,200 people.
http://sg.news.yahoo.com/25-dead-100-missing-philippine-landslide-034419984.html
At least 25 people were killed in the southern Philippines on Thursday when a landslide buried gold prospectors who had refused to leave an area declared too dangerous for habitation.
Officials said up to 150 people were missing on Mindanao island after the collapse of a rain-soaked hillside that had been settled by thousands of migrants in search of instant riches.
Rescuers using hand-held tools pulled 25 bodies and 15 injured residents from the rubble after the dawn landslide in Napnapan, a hamlet of more than 8,000 people near the town of Pantukan, civil defence chief Benito Ramos told AFP.
"A military unit is in the area but they are basically digging with their hands," he told AFP.
The National Disaster Risk Reduction and Management Council said 150 people were missing and that the health department was transporting 150 body bags to the site, even as heavy rain halted rescue efforts for the rest of the day.
Local military official Colonel Lyndon Paniza, who is coordinating the rescue from Pantukan, about two hours away via rugged mountain roads, said rescuers fear there could be more fatalities.
"We expect many were killed since the worst-hit was the middle, where there are more than 50 shanties," he told AFP.
The landslide buried a 7,500-square-metre (81,000-square-foot) area as people slept, Paniza added.
The provincial government and local mining firms have been asked to bring heavy equipment to the village.
Pantukan and nearby Monkayo, both on the west flank of Mindanao's Pacific Cordilleras mountains, have drawn gold prospectors for years despite frequent, deadly landslides.
Their largely unregulated tunnelling have made the mountainside unstable, government experts say, while officials also said a 2.8-magnitude quake that hit the area about three hours earlier could have triggered the disaster.
Paniza said another landslide had occurred about two kilometres (just over a mile) away on April 22 last year.
Local officials said that landslide had killed 14 people, while another in 2009 killed 26.
Aerial photographs released by the army showed an expanse of brown mud crushing wooden homes and vehicles, as rescuers scrambled down dangerous, near-vertical slopes to search the rubble.
Mines and Geosciences Bureau head Leo Jasareno said miners had been told to leave the area as early as 2008, but local officials failed to enforce the ban.
"That place is full of tension cracks. Geologically, the stones beneath were really fractured," Jasareno said over ABS-CBN television.
He said the ground had been saturated, with heavy rains from a storm off Mindanao's southeast coast soaking the peaks over the past two weeks.
"We classify this as rain-induced, although structures built on the mountain aggravated the problem," Jasareno said.
Disaster reduction chief Ramos said the victims were partly to blame.
"These are small-scale miners who tunnel into the side of the mountains like rats," Ramos told AFP.
"It's obvious that the gold attracts them. We cannot guard the mountain 24/7 because we have other responsibilities."
The Philippines has some of the world's biggest gold, copper and nickel deposits, according to expert estimates, but most of these have remained off-limits to big mining firms partly due to local opposition.
The situation has let in individuals or small-scale ventures that simply start digging on slopes and process ore using antiquated and dangerous methods.
The environment department estimates that 70 percent of all gold in the country is produced by small-scale miners, many of them in areas like Pantukan.
The landslide came just barely three weeks after a powerful storm caused heavy flooding elsewhere on Mindanao, killing more than 1,200 people.
http://sg.news.yahoo.com/25-dead-100-missing-philippine-landslide-034419984.html
What makes a good story?
A good story must have a character that the readers can relate to.
This character will be involved in a certain plot that must be interesting and constructed beautifully and coherently, or even combined with a twist which entices the readers which avoids dull and flat storyline.
The character's intentions or motive are also important in a story. As storytellers we are expected to be able to convey that clearly into our readers.
The storyline of a story must not be stagnant. It must have a 3-act-structure in which there are a beginning, a climax, and a resolution of the conflict in the story which our character is being faced with.
To make a good story, we should have a theme or genre.It can be horror or even a romantic drama, or just a story about a funny family living in a spaceship.
A good story is not necessarily complicated and it can be found everywhere, as long as it is creatively leading the readers into a situation in which the writer wants to convey and makes them not able-or at least reluctant- to leave it.
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