Moms and Dads: Think before you fight!

Two days before an incident was reported in Horana, Sri Lanka where a 14 year old girl made an attempt to commit suicide by drinking toilet cleaning liquid because she was finding it extremely difficult to bear up the fights between her parents. As luck would have it the life of the child was saved and she is in no danger, but the question lies where what provoked this girl to take such a drastic measure to end her life? Were the fights between her parents so fierce that she could not bear to witness them?

Parental fighting is a common scenario in many Sri Lankan families where often children are the victims of such tragic fates. Let us shed some light upon the matter to acknowledge parents about the harmful repercussions of their actions to avert future calamities.  

According to Dr. N. Kumaranayake, Psychiatrist at the Base Hospital of Kiribathgoda, no parents in their right mind would fight in front of children. The statement speaks for itself given that there is a severe impact of parental fighting.

It is important to look for reasons why parents throw tantrums whenever there are domestic problems. Situational stress resulting in emotional changes, Inability of controlling emotions and alcoholism are the main reasons why majority of adults in the modern world tend to solve disputes using violence says Dr. Kumaranayake.

He added that this sort of a situation is very common among the rural community of Sri Lanka which is about 80% of the total population while 33% of these families are victims of the issue of alcoholism.

Dr. Kumaranayake said that depression too plays a major role in ruining the family lives of people as people in the modern world lead busy and hectic lives in the race to earn more and more.

One such patient who had been brought to Dr. Kumaranayake is a father of two children who had been a workaholic. He had been spending less and less time with the family and due to work stress had developed conditions like depression, sleep deprivation, irritability and extreme anger which has ultimately led him to the engagement of frequent fights with his wife.

As a result of alcoholism, an addict can develop physiological conditions like delusional disorders such as extreme suspicion of one’s partner says Dr. Kumaranayake. In the introductory incident, the father is an alcoholist and is said to be often accusing his wife of having an illicit relationship while she is innocent of such an act. This too results in numerous family conflicts where the ultimate victims are children.

Concentrating on the impact of parental fighting on children, Dr. Kumaranayake said that there is a significant impact on the brain of a child and there are many ways in which children react to this kind of situations.

Often, children respond to parental conflict by ‘acting out’ which is a demonstration of increased anger and the inability to manage anger. These children may display behaviours such as violence, delinquency and gang involvement.

One such child brought to Dr. Kumaranayake was a boy of 14 years who showed poor academic performance, practised stealing from home and was also Marijuana addict. The reason behind his disturbing behaviour was again an alcoholic father creating parental conflicts.

‘Turning inward’ is another way of responding to parental conflicts. They often isolate themselves from their friends, social activities and demonstrate conditions like depression, headaches, stomach aches, ulcers etc. and substance abuse.

A research conducted by Martin Teicher, a renowned psychiatrist, has showed that children who are exposed to parental conflict do not interact well with others. These kids often have very poor social skills, low self esteem and poor relationships when they become adults. Some children may also demonstrate conditions like troubles in thinking. The effects of being exposed to conflict show up as problems in school, truancy, impaired thinking (things like problem-solving, abstract reasoning, memory are affected) and symptoms that mimic Attention Deficit Disorder.

“Children exposed to high conflict may even become anti social personalities such as criminals but what is even worse is that the future family lives of these children may also be affected. It is like a circle, when they grow up and become parents, they will display the same kind of behaviour as their parents” Dr. Kumaranayake said.

I had the opportunity of talking to some of the children who were often exposed to conflicts. They had varied comments on how they feel when their parents fight in front of them.

“My parents fight almost everyday. Every time they fight I just lock myself inside my room and cry. To see your parents fight in front of you just so depressing” Chathurika, a teenager said.

Ashani, a 12 year old said that she hates it when her parents fight. She said that she is finding it hard to concentrate on her studies and homework and she often gets scolded by teachers for not doing homework.

“I am ashamed to say that I have come to hate my father due to his extreme alcoholism. I know it is bad but I don’t respect him anymore because he makes our lives miserable. Whenever my father and mother fight, I shout back at them and I get angry” Randika, a teenager who is exposed to parental fights said. 
        

As measures to avoid these tragedies, parents should practice proper control of emotions and problems should be dealt with much civilized and proper method than fighting. Getting the help of a professional counselor and couples’ therapy which is a practical method to deal with conflicts can be practiced.

It is important to reserve a special ‘emotional ventilation time’ where family members including children can talk about the problems and issues in their lives in order to facilitate the building of a good and a trust worthy relationship between family members.

On school level, awareness programs should be carried out for children and teachers to acknowledge them of the effects of parental conflicts and teachers should be trained on dealing with children who are exposed to conflicts and to identify students with emotional disorders.

Alcoholism should be dealt with and fathers should understand that what is more important is being a good father to his children, not being the alcoholic who makes their lives miserable everyday. Media has to play a major role in this regard by not promoting the ‘sham’ happiness of alcohol and the education of morals and virtues among children should be enhanced.

So parents, the next time you fight, please bare in mind that the ultimate victims of your conflicts will be your children. It is prudent to find much civilized and practical methods to solve conflicts other than fighting. The world will be a much better place if there is peace and happiness. 

:)

Clinging on to a Frienship

Just the other day, I was wondering, since I had nothing important to do, 'are the ones who I consider to be my true friends are really my true friends??' This question really troubled me. I know I love them a lot and have always considered them to be my best friends. Yet this thought was troubling me. I took a walk down my memory lane, I walked through the times when we were at school. Carefree and having fun. We just didn't care about anything else. No matter what happened, the five of us always stuck around together to face whichever the obstacle (these obstacles most of the time were dumb conspiracies between girls in our class ;P) that came in our way. 

An unforgettable moment with my best friends comes into my mind,
It was when one of my friends was relating us the story of her drunkard father beating her mother, she was crying as she picked up words. it was only a moment later that we realized, the rest of us were also crying, we shared her pain and we cried for her. That is the moment among many happy and cheerful moments, I will forever remember and cherish. 

What happened to those five people? the ones who cried in each others' pain and laughed in each others' happiness? We have changed. We have become so busy in our own work that we hardly care about giving a call or at least sending a text message to our best friends. I haven't called them in months or nor we have gone out together. Makes me sad to think that may be our friendship too has an expiration date. I don't want to lose them. I just lament over the fact that neither have they called me, nor have I called them. May be it is just a matter of making a phone call, but I no more know what I should speak with them if I call them. I remember how we used to speak about keeping in touch and going out at least once a month when we were working. May the past ourselves did not realize the fact that we will be caught up in the hectic race of working and earning and that there will hardly be any time for group gatherings.

I should not let this happen! I should call them! at least for the sake of our 5 year old friendship. They say that friendship is in the heart and not in hanging out or getting together all the time. But I guess we need an occasional gathering or two to remind ourselves the value of the friendship we share with our friends. I mean how can you convey how much you care about them if you don't even meet them. It is now or never. the decision is yours to make....... 

Saviour of Jews in Nazi Germany

There is a common quote among us, ‘Do something good; no one remembers, do something bad; no one forgets’. But the protagonist of the story that I am going to narrate makes that quote seem inaccurate. For himself, though he is convicted for doing numerous bad things, is only remembered for the good he did. He is Oskar Schindler and this is his story.

Schindler was a drunkard. Schindler was a womanizer. His relations with his wife were bad. He often had not one but several girlfriends. Everything he did put him in jeopardy, Yet during the Second World War, what stood between 1200 Jews in the Krakow Ghetto and liquidation was the same man, doing his utmost best to save the lives of Jews.     

Born in 1908 to a family of businessmen in Zwittau, Moravia, then a German province of the Austro-Hungarian Empire and now part of the Czech Republic, he had a younger sister Elfriede with whom he had a close relationship despite their seven-year age difference. Oskar's father, Hans Schindler, was a factory owner and his mother, Louisa Schindler, was a homemaker. Oskar in his childhood was a popular and a friendly student but he was not an exceptional one.

Initially motivated by his selfish interests in war profiteering and money making, in 1939 Schindler came to Krakow, Poland. He was able to create friendships with key SS (special Nazi armed unit) officials often by bribing them and giving them black market gifts. In 1940 he opened an enamelware factory (Deutsche Enamelware Factory) with the help of his hired Jewish accountant Itzhak Stern and using his natural flair, he kept on bribing SS officials to get major contracts to his business. With Stern’s advice Schindler hired Jews to work in his factory because they were considered a source of ‘cheap and reliable labour’.

He eventually was able to create a bond with his ‘reliable labour’ and another side of him, which sympathized the Jews and the many humiliations they had to undergo emerged. He then worked towards saving their lives by bribing the authorities. He spent his entire fortune to save his workers whom he now referred to as ‘my children’.

In his factory, Nazi guards were only allowed outsides the gates and if they had to come into the factory premises, it was done under the authority of Schindler himself. Workers referred to his factory as ‘heaven’. No unnatural deaths occurred inside his factory. These were the same years when millions of Jews died in Nazi death camps like Treblinka and Auschwitz, but miraculous survivors were Schindler’s Jews for they were protected by him. 

As a result of employing all his persuasive powers, uninhibited bribing, fighting and even begging, he was able to get permission from the authorities to move his factory to Brunnlitz, Czechoslovakia not to make profits but to save the lives of his workers by taking them with him since the Nazis had decided to dissolve and close all the satellite camps at Plazow.   

Schindler together with his accountant Stern, made a list, which is commonly known as Schindler’s list of 1200 Jews to be taken to Brunnlitz consisting of men, women and even children.           

Schindler’s Jews survived the holocaust and he earned their everlasting gratitude. What mattered to them was that he who emerged out of chaos of madness and risked everything to save them.

 

He died on October 9^th 1974 and was buried in Jerusalem.

Today there are more than 6,000 descendants of Schindler`s Jews living in the USA and Europe, and many in Israel. Before the Second World War, the Jewish population of Poland was 3.5 million. Today there are between 3,000 and 4,000 left.

No matter how bad he was, he will always be only remembered for the good he did to Jews. He was successful in life.

A movie based on the life of Oskar Schindler was made in 1993 which was directed by Steven Spielberg and Liam Neeson starred as Schinldler. I personally think that it is 
a 'must watch' and that movie was what persuaded me to write this. 

The Flame Within.......

This feeling that burns inside me,                                                  
Makes me dream fantasies of thee,
It burns me to my very soul,
Yet, what keeps me from seeing thou is this wall,
This wall of caste and race,
Only a value of mere face,
What if thee came from a low caste and I from a caste of high?
Everlasting and constant is the love of thee and I;
From my small square window I look at thee every day,
And thee at my eyes in the same way,
Again, the desire of acquaintance burns like a flame,
Yet I am trapped in the fear of blame,
How can one's caste make one low?
It is morals and virtues that make one glow,
Yet of this simple truth, human race will never be aware,
So until we die, to each others' eyes let us stare............

                                                      

Bliss....

What a wonderful feeling happiness is....it puts you to a state of mind where you open yourself to the ecstasy and excitement of the positive pleasant emotions. If you stop a moment and think, you will realize that the ultimate goal of everyone's life is just to be happy. We study hard, pass exams to get good jobs, we need jobs to earn a living, we earn a living to lead a comfortable life, we need a comfortable life to be happy. It all comes down to just one thing, 'Happiness'. We spend all our lives trying hard to find happiness in the disguise of money and physical assets when real happiness is just around the corner. We do not see the happiness in the minute day to day moments. The hectic schedule bothers us so much, we don't even have time to spend with our families, loved ones. We keep on missing out on all those special moments. 


JUST STOP! stop for a minute and think of happiness in terms of mental ecstasy not physical assets. life is short, so live each day of your life like it is the last. Spend time with your family. Call your parents often. Tell your loved ones how much you love them. Live life to its fullest. 


Remember that "Happiness is a journey. Not a destination"

Nazism and Fascism- The Ultimate Ideologies

Introduction

The two ideologies, Fascism and Nazism originated from Italy and Germany respectively. It can be stated that these two ideologies are very same yet very different at the same time. Basically Nazism is a specific type of Fascism because Nazism supports the ideologies of Fascism.

 The word Nazism is an abbreviated form of ‘National Socialism’ where race is considered supreme- master race. According to Nazism, in a country the race which represents majority of its population is the master race. The other minority should either serve the master race or be eliminated. Nazism serves the sole purpose of the advancement of the ‘master race’. Adolf Hitler- brilliant orator and a former leader of Germany was the initiator of Nazism.

Fascism, originated under the dictatorship of Benito Mussolini is an ideology where state is considered supreme. The central theme is the state. The state is supreme and everything revolves around the state. Even though Fascism too practices nationalism they accept he minorities provided that these minority groups adopt their culture, language and religion.

 Simply, Nazism wants to eliminate race while Fascism believes in eliminating the culture. However it is my opinion that none of these ideologies were able to solve peoples’ tribulations and both the initiative dictators of these ideologies only lead their countries to extreme war situations and utter chaos.

National Socialism (Nazism)

The word Nazism is derived from the word National Socialism; basically Nazism is the shortened form of National Socialism. It is a unique variety of Fascism which incorporates biological racism and anti-Semitism. The ideology was first developed by Anton Drexler and then by Adolf Hitler, but the forefather of modern Nazism is considered as Adolf Hitler. Initially Nazi political views portrayed leftist ideas (anti-big business, anti-bourgeois and anti-capitalist but later those aspects were downplayed in the 1930s to obtain the support of industrial owners to the Nazi Party and significance was given to anti-Marxist and anti-Semitist theories.

Nazism advocated the supremacy of the supposed ‘Master Race’ (in the case of Germany which was the Aryan race) over the other races. Nazis believed that the greatest threat to the Aryan race was the Jews whom they called Parasites. To maintain the purity of the Aryan race  the Nazis sought to exterminate or impose exclusionary segregation upon "degenerate" and "asocial" groups that included: Jews, homosexuals, Romani, Blacks, the physically and mentally disabled, Jehovah's Witnesses and political opponents.

The methods adopted by Nazis to achieve their political, diplomatic and economical goals were often based on violence and war. The Nazi theory promoted war and militarism and in fact it envisaged politics as being a battle. They often carried out violent attacks on their opponents, particularly Jews. The party’s brain child Sturmabteilung- a paramilitary organization affiliated to the Nazi party carried out these attacks.

The economic system proposed by Nazis enclosed numerous advantages to Aryans while it deliberately excluded all the other minority races. the Nazis supported völkisch equality that officially ascribed collective racial equality of opportunity, equality before the law, and full legal rights to those able people of German blood or related Aryan blood but deliberately excluded people outside of this definition who were regarded as inferior and rejected the conception of universal equality of individuals. The Nazis advocated a welfare state in Germany for German citizens (able Germans of Aryan racial descent) as a means to provide social justice and eliminate social barriers between the German people. It promoted the creation of a community of common interest between managers and employees in industry where a factory leader would be selected to act in coordination with a council of factory members, though these members would have to obey the Führerprinzip of the factory leader. The economy was to be subordinate to the goals of the political leadership of the state.

The official presentation of Nazism is such that it is a neither left wing nor a right wing political ideology but a politically syncretic ideology. However a majority of scholars identify Nazism in practice as being a far right form of politics.

The Hitler File

Adolf Hitler- The Man Who Hated Jews (Forefather of Nazism)

·        Name- Adolf Hitler

·        Date of Birth- 20^th April 1889

·        Date of Demise- 30^th April 1945

·        Special Skills- Brilliant orator and a bright student at school. He also had a passion for art and said to be extremely good at sketching buildings and landmarks.

·        Hitler was the fourth child of Alois Hitler and Klara Hitler. He is said to have been a very intelligent and a deeply religious child in his boyhood. It was unfortunate that he didn’t use his learning skills at secondary school and his answer for the tough competition was to stop trying. By the age of eighteen he moved to Vienna and joined the German army with the outbreak of the First World War. Due to commitments in war he was awarded five medals including the prestigious Iron Cross and also served the German army as a spy. In September 1919 he joined the German Workers Party and that marked the beginning of his political career. He was able to attract more members to the party with the use of orating skills in his speeches. Hitler created National Socialist German Workers Party (NSDAP) in February 1920 which came to power under Hitler’s leadership. While in power Hitler practiced anti-Semitism and anti-communism where mass culled Jews. In January 1945 Hitler’s government was overthrown with the entrance of soviet troops into Nazi Germany. He spent his last years in an underground bunker and committed suicide with his wife Eva Braun on 30^th April 1945.

Fascism

Fascism is a radical authoritarian nationalist political ideology. Fascism advocates the supremacy of the state which is ruled by the supreme leader by way of a dictatorship. Fascists believe that a nation’s well being is based on the qualitative values and fascist conception states that a nation must be led by qualitatively-able leaders while rejecting democracies for being based on quantitative evaluation of individuals and their opinions rather than qualities. To achieve its goals, fascists purge forces, ideas, people, and systems deemed to be the cause of decadence and degeneration.

Political violence is given vitality in Fascism and war is considered as an action which creates national regeneration, spirit and vitality. Fascism applauds militarism as providing positive transformation in society and providing spiritual renovation, education, instilling of a will to dominate in people's character and creating national comradeship through military service. Fascists commonly utilize paramilitary organizations for violent attacks on opponents or to overthrow a political system.

Fascism supports a socially united, collective national society and opposes socially divided class-based societies (including liberal bourgeois society and Marxian proletarian society) and socially-divided individualist-based society. Fascists claim it is a trans-class movement, advocating resolution to domestic class conflicts within a nation to secure national solidarity. While fascism opposes domestic class conflict, it favours a proletarian national culture and claims its goal of nationalizing society levels and social classes and emancipates the nation's proletariat. While viewing domestic class conflict within a nation as unnecessary and resolvable, fascism believes that bourgeois-proletarian conflict primarily exists in national conflicts between proletarian nations versus bourgeois nations; fascism declares support for the victory of proletarian nations. It is opposed to many ideologies, including conservatism, liberalism, and two major forms of socialism: communism and social democracy. It opposes a variety of economic, political and social systems, it is opposed to democracy, parliamentary systems, in most cases has an inherently anti-clerical background with some exceptions, and holds a distinctive opposition to capitalism. It rejects egalitarianism, materialism, and rationalism in favour of action, discipline, hierarchy, spirit and will. 

Fascists advocate: a state-directed, regulated economy that is dedicated to the nation; the use and primacy of regulated private property and private enterprise contingent upon service to the nation or state; the use of state enterprise where private enterprise is failing or is inefficient; and autarky. They are hostile to finance capitalism, plutocracy, and internationalist economics.

Fascism was founded during World War I by Italian national syndicalists who combined left-wing and right-wing political views, but Italian Fascism gravitated to the right in the early 1920s. Mussolini in 1919 described fascism as a syncretism movement that would strike "against the backwardness of the right and the destructiveness of the left". Italian Fascists described fascism as a right-wing ideology in the political program The Doctrine of Fascism: "We are free to believe that this is the century of authority, a century tending to the 'right,' a fascist century." However they also officially declared that although they were "sitting on the right" they were generally indifferent to their position on the left-right spectrum, as being a conclusion of their combination of views rather than an objective, and considering it insignificant to their basis of their views that they claimed could just as easily be associated with "the mountain of the center" as with the right. There is a running dispute among scholars about where along the left/right spectrum that fascism resides.

 The Mussolini File

Benito Mussolini- The Man Who Believed in State and not in People (Forefather of Fascism)

·     Name- Benito Mussolini

·     Date of Birth- 29^th July 1883 in Predappio, Italy 

·     Date of Demise- 29^th of April 1945

·     Special Skills- Intelligent student at school and he also had good writing and oratory skills.

·     Mussolini came from a very poor family where the father was a blacksmith and they lived in a small and crowded two bed roomed house. Though Mussolini was a bright student he was violent and had a large ego. When in boarding school Mussolini was expelled for stabbing another student and after obtaining his diploma in 1901 he briefly taught at secondary school. In 1904 he joined the military and engaged in full time politics thereafter.   Mussolini became a member of the Socialist Party in 1900 but he deserted the party in 1914 to cross over to the enemy camp, the Italian middle class. He also founded a news paper called Popolo d'Italia in the same year. Mussolini came to power in October 1922 and once in power he took steps to remain in power. The climax of his political career was the 1930s where he received a wider support. However during this period the Italian working class had to undergo a tremendous amount of suffering while only the ruling class benefited from Mussolini’s rule. In 1940–41 Mussolini's armies, badly supplied and poorly led, suffered defeats from Europe across the Mediterranean to the African continent. Italy lost its war in 1942; Mussolini's power collapsed six months later. Restored as Hitler's puppet in northern Italy in 1943, he drove Italy deeper into invasion, occupation, and civil war during 1944 and 1945. He was finally executed by a firing squad on April 28, 1945, at Dongo in Como province.

                                                                                       

How did Fascism Differ from Nazism?

The two ideologies Fascism and Nazism are very different and very similar at the same time.

Not all fascists are Nazi's, but it would be all but required to support fascist ideology in order to be a true Nazi. Fascists are not necessarily racist, which is contrary to the anti-Semitic doctrines which are at the core of Nazi ideology. This is proved when paid attention to the given statement,

‘Not all Fascists are Nazis, but all Nazis are Fascists’

The question is where do you draw the line between Fascism and Nazism?

First let us take the similarities of these two ideologies into consideration in order to differentiate between the two.

·        Both Fascists and Nazis use political violence to achieve their political, diplomatic or economical aims.

·        Both the ideologies believed in practicing militarism and paramilitary organizations under the patronage of the government were established during their rule.

·        War was promoted by both ideologies.

·        Both were right wing political ideologies although initially Nazism showed more of a leftist aspect. However some scholars also claim that these two ideologies were neither left wing nor right wing political ideologies.

·        Both were influenced by the rise of nationalism, fear from communism, crisis of the capitalist economic system and dissatisfaction with the outcome of World War I.

Now, let us consider the differences of Fascism and Nazism.

·        The most significant disparity between Fascism and Nazism is that theory of supremacy. Nazism believes that the ‘master race’ in a country is supreme while Fascism believes that the highest point of supremacy is the state.

·        Another major difference between Fascism and Nazism was their rise to power. The National Fascist Party came to power in Italy as early as 1922, while Hitler’s putsch in Munich inspired by Benito Mussolini’s March on Rome turned out to be a failure. The Nazi Party, officially called the National Socialist German Workers Party achieved virtually no success until the early 1930’s, while its leader Adolf Hitler was laughed at.

·        Nazism had a rule where only the master race (Aryans) were benefited and given the citizenship rights, where as the Fascist rule was state oriented.

·        Nazism practiced genocide and Anti-Semitism while Fascism rejected it and provided the opportunity for the minority to follow them provided the minority should eliminate their own culture and embrace the culture of the master race.

·        Nazism believes in eliminating people while Fascism believes in eliminating culture.  

·        Mussolini focused on territorial expansion rather than creation of ethnically “clean” Italian state.

·        The Nazis rejected corporatism although they supported state intervention in the economy and cultural production. They viewed modernism as a sign of cultural degeneration and promoted “healthy” art that emphasized the ideas of the Nazi doctrine. The Fascists in Italy, on the other hand, did not restrict artistic expression and encouraged creativity rather than promoting the Fascist style. They did, however, censored all works that openly attacked the state or the Fascist regime. Both the Fascist and Nazi architecture had a tendency towards monumentalizing but again, they differentiated themselves in the view of modernism.

·          The state under Nazism serves the sole purpose of the advancement of the "master race." Nationalism is one aspect of Fascism. However, nationalism is often used to stress the superiority of the national culture as opposed to other minority cultures. Fascism accepts other groups, provided that the minority groups reject their culture, language, and religion for the superior nationalism. For example, the fascist Christian Socialists advocate the conversion of Jews to Christianity, not the extermination of the Jewish race, as the Nazi German Nationalists would have it. Fascism wants to exterminate the culture, not the people.

Smoking: STOP SMOKING OR STOP BREATHING!!!

Yesterday I did something what you all might call 'very unsuitable for a girl to do' specially for a girl living in a country like Sri Lanka, which was smoking. Yes, I smoked a cigarette. You might wonder knowing that it is morally and also extremely bad for health, why did I smoke? Well...I wanted to know why people call smoking an amusement or simply I wanted to know what exactly is the fun in smoking.

Believe me when I say this, when I first felt the small cloud of smoke entering my lungs I felt as if my lungs were going to burst and my mouth tasted bad. After smoking the cigar for like three minutes I felt nothing for my respiratory system was by now used to the poisoned smoke. then I realized that this activity was no fun at all. The glamorous image created by the tobacco companies for smoking is utterly fake and misleading for it gives no whatsoever pleasure but it gives you a slow and a painful death. Don't be fooled fake glamour, why dig your own grave when you have a whole life ahead of you to live and enjoy.

'Health risks from smoking begin as soon as the person starts smoking. Beginners often experience shortness of breath, cough, wheezing, and phlegm more frequently than non-smokers. Also, the earlier a person starts smoking, there is also a bigger risk of premature death from common smoking-related diseases such as emphysema, lung cancer, and heart disease. Adult smokers also put themselves at risk of early onsets of osteoporosis, menopause, and fertility problems' says Rachel Brown (Harmful Effects of Smoking)

Don't get into thse utterly useless habbits and let your life be wasted. We were gifted with our lives to learn and live happily. Keep in mind that smoking can cause health risks to smokers and as well as to non-smokers who inhale the smoke. Protect yourelf and your loved ones, quit smoking.

                                                                               

Novel Experience

By: Annie

'The old order changeth, Paving the way to the new'

A year has come and gone with victories, losses, tragedies....I can go on and on, yet whatever happens, Life goes on as it is. It is what we call, 'the nature of life'. Life gives us oppurtunities to make our impact, to be someone. Now is the time, it is my time to make my impact. Journalism has been a novel experience and I am enjoying every moment of my brand new work experience. I now feel more responsible and I look froward to do my bit to the society and the commiuinity through my career. I feel a transformation within me. Being in the company of extremely frinendly and knoledgable people has made me a better person. I now thrive to learn, read more and more. 

Life is good......for now.