Reflections on Unsustainable Development and Ways to become more Sustainable Development

Nowadays, as we know, the earth becomes warm and warm day by day due to the melting of ice-mountains, emitting of Greenhouse gases, pollutions in air and water and others. Why did they occur? It is all because we use the energy and develop the new things without thinking that whether it is sustainable or unsustainable for the environment. The effects will not only cause on the environment and the present, it will also cause to our next generations. It can be made our next generations not able to continue living any more. Scientists call it, ELF: Environment, Local people and Future.

Today, people invite things without thinking. For example, they invite the vehicles in order to improve their transportation. But for the energy to force them to move, people depend on oil. And now the problem is people over depend on oil leaving in an environment that is full with air pollutions and the scarce of oil resources. And another example is that paper. Nowadays paper plays a huge role in our daily lives. They can be a thing that transports information between us and notes for study and others. I think everyone knows paper is made from trees. So there will have expenses in trees as long as we use paper. For this issue, now the most popular way is reforestation: if u cut one tree then plants a new tree in that place.

 I don’t mean that people should stop inviting new things but I want to say that we should invite things that are not only useful for human beings but also useful for the ELF. So people first should know how to develop sustainably. Solar power, wind power, water power and wave power and any other power that can renewable can be the best alternatives to produce energy for machines and prevent the environment. They don’t cause any pollution or emit harmful objects that can harm the environment. So, if the things are developed using the above energy, they can classify as sustainable development.

                In conclusion, development is something that is essential for the survival of human beings. So as long as people know how to keep development sustainable, and understand how to apply it in the developing progress, then development is not something that is bad, but it is something that will help human to keep on evolving. And it will also have long term benefit on ELF and the next generation can also living in a happy condition.

Reflection on Tsunami - The Aftermath

The movie: Tsunami the aftermath is the story tells us some about how people who still alive after the tsunami suffered for their other family members who passed away during that disaster that occurred at December, 2004. The tsunami hit the coast of Thailand (Thailand's Phuket and Khao Lak) and 12 other countries coast. When the movie came out, it is estimated that over 227,000 people were killed while 50000 bodies are still missing. The director of the film is Bharat Nalluri, and this movie shows me not only how beautiful is the nature and how many fun, relax, happiness that the nature can give to human beings but also how a terrible giant the nature can be as in that movie it also shows me the devastation, damages and many bodies lost lives. In 2006, that tsunami was defined as one of the most violent disaster in human’s history.

I feel that the tsunami that hit Khao Lak was a real catastrophe; it swept the whole village down with one big wave. Khao Lak is a very beautiful place that attracts many tourists to come and in that tsunami, most of the victims are foreigners. And the movie focuses on a fictional group of characters who've lost loved ones and those who are still looking for closure.

In that movie, I saw that how woman can became powerful or useless when they face with dangers as a British woman in the movie tried to not cry when she heard her husband was gone and her eldest son was in hospital with bad situation. She told her younger son to stay besides of his brother and she came to the embassy and talk to the authorized person of Britain for making her eldest son could go and have medical treatment in London as soon as possible. The woman with strong heart can be seen. The other side is that the responses of Susie as she blamed her husband for not protecting well their daughter, Martha. It was not fault of Ian because he also suffered the same like Susie. And another one is that Susie tried to run out from the reality by adopting the girl that looked like Martha when they arrived to the hospital and knew that the girl that they came to find was not their daughter. I can understand why Ian against her wife of adopts a daughter because he loved her daughter a lot and there was no one could replace the place of his daughter in his mind.

In this movie, I saw Thai monks are disposing of the dead bodies as per their customs and for public health, they are cast as heartless villains with no concern for people finding their loved ones without caring whether the corpses were foreigners or locals. I know why they burnt the bodies because they want to prevent the spread of diseases, but they had to respect the cultural differences. I felt it was bad for the people who were searching for their family members. They couldn’t know whether their family members were alive or died if they burned the bodies without noticing.     

As for the Thai government, they introduced Professor Meeko. He had uncovered the tsunami many years before, but hadn't known when it would strike. He told the government, and they refused to believe. They bribed him to keep his mouth shut and not hurt the government when the disaster really happened in 2004.

After watching this movie, I knew how important are preparing for preventing the disaster and educate the people how to stay safely during the events of disaster. All in all, this was a great and powerful movie. It really touched me and I would watch it again any time.

Reflection: The Cove

Louie Psihoyos

             This movie was directed by former National Geographic photographer, Louie Psihoyos, who wanted to shown some about the dolphin hunting operations in Taiji, Wakayama, Japan. The film, the cove, is a real life documentary which was filmed secretly in 2007 by using underwater microphones and high-definition cameras disguised as rocks. This film highlights the fact that the number of dolphins killed in the Taiji Dolphins hunting drive is several times greater than the number of whales killed in the Antarctic, and claims that the country's whaling industry in Taiji, Japan killed 23,000 dolphins every year. 

              In an isolated cove of Taiji which is surrounded by wire fences and "Keep Out" signs, there had an activity that the townspeople attempt to hide from the public. Attempts to view or film of the dolphin killing in the cove are also physically blocked by local volunteers who treat the visitors with open intimidation, derision and anger. Foreigners are also shadowed and questioned by local police. Many dolphins are herded into that secret hidden cove where they are netted and killed by means of spears and knives over the side of small fishing boats. The film argues that dolphin hunting as practiced in Japan is unnecessary and cruel. 

Dolphins slaughtered in the cove of  Taiji

              The dolphins that are caught are selling some to the aquariums and marine parks and the lefts that are not sold out are then slaughtered in the cove and the meat is sold in supermarkets. According to the evidence presented in the film, most Japanese are unaware of the hunt or the marketing of dolphin meat. What is more shocking, the truth about the cove in Taiji, and the covert operations of the Japanese fishermen was not something that is known by most Japanese! They did not know that the free meat that the children are being fed on public school cafeterias have high-levels of mercury, this could lead to mercury poisoning.

                At the end of the film, O'Barry went into a meeting of the Commission carrying a TV showing about the Taiji dolphin slaughter. O'Barry walks around the crowded meeting room displaying the images until he is escorted from the room.

                 In my opinion, dolphins should not kill and also should not live as a pet of human. They are wonderful creatures of natural. Looking to the photo on the left side, what do you feel about it? Don't you think that dolphins are smiling when they are swimming in the sea, their real home, not in the pool of aquariums or marine parks? So I want to request people that please don't disturb them and let them swim as they like as the conclusion.

               

Reflection of video - South Park "Whale War"

           South Park "Whale War", well, it is an video that show about Japanese who kill an alarming rate of dolphins, even most of the people around the world against it and sees its as a crime. The movie style is writing as funny as it can in order to reduce the horrify of killing dolphins. If they don't make this video funnies, it will be very disappointed because the video is full with dolphins' blood.

            In my view, the Americans who think that Japanese are stupid, crazy and silly are the actual stupid one in the movie. I think Japanese are not killing the dolphins and whales without any reason at all. They kill dolphins because their hatred of Americans. They also even kill the members of Miami Dolphins Football teams. So can you imagine how serious is the Japanese hatred towards dolphins now? 

Paul Watson

             In this video, one of the funny cases is that Japanese say that "F*** you Whales, F*** you dolphins!" when they are killing the dolphins. It is quite funny for me. And also Paul Watson, the first captain, is called as "Big Fat Liar" by the kids, they also called the reality series as a "crappy show". So, I think that the director of this movie seems to hate Watson and the reality series Whale wars a lot.

             But actually, in the end of the video, the reason for the Japanese "hatred" towards the whales is revealed: It turns out  that the first atomic bomb was dropped on Hiroshima by the Americans at the end of the second war. And so nowadays Japanese kill the dolphins and whales which are loved by Americans a lot  as some paybacks against the whales whom they believe dropped the A-bomb on Hiroshima!

                Finally, Stan gives the Japanese another edited image in order to make the Japanese stop killing whales and focus their anger on another "much more acceptable" things like butchering cows and chickens. And the remark was given by Stan's Dad, “At least they’re normal now, like us.” suggesting that whatever Americans do is the norm and that unless others conform with them, they are not “normal”.

Why Study Geography?

                   Geography is a science subject that show about the phenomena, lands, features and inhabitants of the earth. In other words, it can be said that write something about the earth. Four historical traditions in geographical research are the spatial analysis of natural and human phenomena (geography as a study of distribution), area studies (places and regions), study of man-land relationship, and research in earth sciences. But modern geography is mainly about understanding the Earth and all of its human and natural complexities. Geography has been called "the world discipline" and "the bridge between the human and the physical science". Geography is divided into two main branches : physical geography and human geography.

Why Study Geography

There are several reasons for study Geography like -

•  to know how to make our lives 'easier'
•  to know how to prepare for protecting many kind of natural disasters
•  to understand the five themes of geography
•  to help us know not only the place that we live but also the places around all over the world
•  to be a well-educated global citizen and also
•  to know more about our planet
  

Realize there is many beautiful places on our earth

7 Wonders of the world

By studying Geography, we can know many places that we didn't never heard before day by day. For me, I know many beautiful places in different countries like 7 wonders of the world, the London Bridge, Paris Tower and also the statue of Liberty now. It is quite exciting for me. In the past, I only think that Myanmar, the country that i born is so beautiful, but now when I saw many amazing places through Geography, it make me really speechless. And also you can visit to many different countries through the pictures and also the words that are in Geography. You can enjoy in the flow of many sentences that write about how beautiful is our planet. Don't you think that it is really an exciting experience and have many fun? So I want to say that studying geography is really good for knowing any other places around the world, not just the place where we live.

Know how to protect many kinds of natural disasters

              A natural disaster is the effect of a natural hazard (e.g., flood, tornado, hurricane, volcanic eruption, earthquake, heatwave, or landslide). When it happens once,financial, environmental or human losses cause. If these disasters continue it would be a great danger for the earth. This understanding is concentrated in the formulation: "disasters occur when hazards meet vulnerability."  The term natural has consequently been disputed because the events simply are not hazards or disasters without human involvement. As we know, there has several natural disasters like volcano explosion, tsunami, earthquakes, forest burning and so on happen all over the world nowadays. For us, we must to learn how to prepare for protecting from that kind of disasters or what should we do after disasters. By studying Geography, we can know how terrible are the natural disasters and we will also know what to do when they happen in the areas that we live. And the tables below are some natural disasters that happened in 2001 - 2011, let's take a look on it.

From the table, we can see that there always happens many kind of disasters every year. So, it is enough for us to study Geography even only by this reason.


Being a well-educated global citizen
          The people who take the subject that teaches about geography will actually study about critical thinking, research and communicate their ideas through writing and other ways of communication independently in order to know about our planet and its people. So, they will have skills that are really useful in all kinds of jobs.

          Finally, geography,a well-rounded subject, provides the people who study geography with both a huge range of career opportunities and knowledges about how humans are effecting the planet that we live, and also our rapidly-changing world.

Knowing more about our planet

         Studying geography can provide a person with a fully understanding of our planet and how it system works. The people who learn about geography are better prepared to know topics that are affecting the world such as desertification, natural disasters, global warming, climate change and others that are related with the world. And also by understanding political geography, they are in the well-positioned to solve the issues that happen between countries, cultures, cities and regions between countries. So it seems like that the world are in our hands and it has gotten smaller by learning about our planet through geography.

Understanding the Five Themes of Geography

        The Five Themes of Geography were written in 1984. Created by the Joint Committee on Geographic Education of the National Council for Geographic Education (NCGE) and the Association of American Geographers (AAG). Those five themes are describing about location, place, human-environmental interaction, movement (travel; immigration; emigration), and regions. 

Location are in two different ways: Absolute Location describes about latitude and longitude on the Earth and Relative Location, a location as shown by where it is compared to something else.

Place, a description of what it is like to live in a certain place.

Human-environment Interaction shown some about how people interact with the environment and how the environment responds.

Movement describes the travel of people, goods and ideas from one place to another or political events.

Region contains clusters of areas that are distinctive by their uniformity of description based on a range of statistical data.

Making our lives 'easier'

        There are several branches in geography and the subject that teaches about human geography is also one of the branches of geography. In human geography, it mainly teaches about -

• Culture  geography - subject of cultural products, norms, variation and relations to spaces and places.
• Development  geography - the study of the Standard of living and Quality of life.
• Economic  geography - examines relationships between human economic systems, states, and other factors, and the biophysical environment.
• Health  geography - the application of geographical information, perspectives, and methods to the study of health, disease and health care.
• Historical  geography - the study of the human, physical, fictional, theoretical, and "real" geographies of the past.
• Political geography - concerns with the study of both the spatially uneven outcomes of political processes and political processes affected themselves by spatial structures.
• Population Geography - the ways of spatial variations in the distribution, composition, migration and growth of populations are related to the natural of places.
• Tourism Geography - study of travel and tourism.

So, we can make our living style easier than before if we learn some about human geography.

               In conclusion, I want to say that if you are interested in a career that involves travel, you won’t be disappointed. Geographers really can work anywhere in the world! And also, I think that these are all reasons for me about the question why study Geography?

References
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Geography
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Five_themes_of_geography
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Human_geography
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_natural_disasters_by_death_toll