Holly’s Space

WAI Maths is a maths problem solving competition which you do in groups of three. I was in one of the year seven groups along with Sarah and Ryan. While the year 8 team consisted of Laura, Daniel and Matt. I found some of the maths questions rather hard while on the other hand some of them were really easy. Although we tried our hardest my group didn’t quite finish all the 20 problems in the 45 minutes we had .Once our time was up and we had come 14th equal out of about 24, our group decided that it would have been better if we had just passed on some of the harder problems. Hopefully whoever represents our school next time might take this advice and do a bit better next time.

On Wednesday we had our school inter house and inter class cross country run. We had to meet in our house groups on the netball courts after an early lunch break. The teachers talked to us for a bit and then the year 8 girls started off. About 20 minutes later the first few started finishing and the year 7 boys were off. When they were finishing off I (one of the year 7 girls) went for a quick warm-up run and then started to stretch. I heard on your marks, GO!!! and I started to run. We were running the cross country track. I  found a steady pace that I could stay at right the way through. At the end I tried to do a sprint finish but unluckily I didn’t end up passing any one. I thought I did really well as I came 26th out of about 100 other people. After us the year 8 boys took off and once they had all finished the cross country was over. I am still waiting to see if my class or my house won which hopefully both of them did.

With Lots of Love from Georgia

Author: Brigid Lowry 

No. Pages: 192 

ISBN: 1-74114-310-1 

Publisher: Allen & Unwin

This book is about Georgia, she is a girl who lives in a town called Anywhere, she thinks that it has too many shopping malls and not enough skate parks. Georgia is fifteen, she is taller and also weighs more than most other people her age. She has wavy red hair and a best friend named Mel. Georgia is saving up to get two tickets for her and Mel to go to a Natural Affinity’s concert. Natural Affinity is her favourite band and she dreams that if she saves up enough money to go to their concert, she will end up getting together with Jakob, Natural Affinity’s lead singer. To get some money Georgia tries to get a job. Will Georgia be able to find a job, then save enough money to go to her concert and get together with Jakob?  

This book was a good read for me as it wasn’t too predictable and Brigid Lowry has made Georgia to be a very realistic character that I can match up to in some ways. Also in this book Georgia has a journal that she makes lists in which I found was great because it helped you get to know more about Georgia, her thoughts and her life. Some of the list topics are stuff like- things I want, great e-mail addresses and even things to do while watching a sunset. One thing I didn’t like about this book was that it started off boring and it took me a while to start liking and understanding it properly.

Apart from the beginning I really enjoyed this book and thought that it had a good story line to it. Brigid Lowry has also used lots of description which I feel makes the story a whole lot more interesting by making the reader feel as if they are there. I gave this book a rating of three stars out of five. I would recommend this book for young teenagers around age ten or eleven and over. Also this book would be more suited for girls.

Overall I would think that this book was a fantastic read but I still think that the beginning let it down and it would have been much better otherwise. 

Does New Zealand needs more Immigrants

Does New Zealand really need more immigrants or have we already got enough/too many? This definitely makes a great debating topic and most likely always will. Although there have been many debates over this topic the question is still there, does New Zealand need more immigrants? I have gone over both sides of this and still can’t take either side, I have been easily convinced by both sides and here is why.

To start off with there may be times where we may miss out on a job as another immigrant has already taken it. Say you find the perfect job in the newspaper and go to ask about it just to find that an immigrant has taken it because they said it originated from their country. I for sure would be feeling quite depressed. Also on the other hand think about all of our jobs, I have seen a list of New Zealand’s skill shortages and since then I have definitely wondered why we would even think of not letting any more immigrants intoNew Zealand. As that list will just keep on growing and growing and we will still have all those skill shortages. Imagine being suddenly very ill and having to travel all round the country to find a hospital that may have enough well trained doctors/surgeons to be able to help you get better.

Secondly you may say that New Zealand is a lovely clean, green environment and that’s why so many people from other countries come here. But surely if we keep getting more immigrants our lovely New Zealand will turn into a very polluted waste land which I find very disturbing thinking about. We want everyone to carry on thinking of New Zealand as clean and green not a disgustingly dirty place to keep away from. However we all know that New Zealand is the little place down at the bottom of the world that no one knows about and surely if we don’t let any immigrants into the country we definitely will get heard less of. Furthermore with people travelling out of the country and our government not letting any others into New Zealand then we may just start losing our population. 

Another reason is that New Zealand may lose our cultures as along with foreigners also come their cultures and their traditions so instead of just celebrating New Zealand and Maori traditions we may have to start celebrating things like the Chinese New Year, May Day and Hina Matsuri. Nevertheless with new people from lots of different countries visiting and staying in New Zealand then our country will broaden and everyone will have many different places to visit. As well as lots of different styles/flavours of food to try that New Zealand would not have without foreign people as how I said before they do bring their own culture, food and hobbies. 

In conclusion, I am sitting on the fence about the question of New Zealand needing any more immigrants as they may help us broaden and keep our population up. But if we keep on accepting them into our country we could start to become over populated and also have a big impact on the environment/global warming. I have pros and cons for both sides of immigrants in New Zealand and I am still wondering about what I would say if I had to have answer to New Zealand needing anymore immigrants. 

 There is no such thing as Equality

Now imagine this, you’re in a world where every single house you see is just the same, each person is identical all wearing the same clothes and accessories, everybody is exactly the same height and weight, every person works at the same job, everyone’s hair is the same no other colours or styles, each person feels the same as well as eats the same, there is only one name for everyone. No one at all is different. 

Personally I believe that everyone should be treated equal but definitely not to the extent where everything is exactly the same. Do you think there is such a thing as equality? Because I for sure don’t. 

 There has definitely been sometimes where we’re not all equal for example– Adolph Hitler who put all the Jews in concentration camps. When Adolph Hitler was in charge he didn’t treat his people equal, Hitler decided that the blue eyed Blondie’s were better than the Jewish race and so he arrested and also killed millions of Jews. Look at what happened to him, did Germany end up winning the war?

People want and like different things, if we were all equal then we would all like the same things but in this world we don’t, some people may want to be sport stars, doctors, singers or actors while others may want to be models, directors or even teachers.

We all have different opinions, what some may see as pleasure others may see as chores. Chefs love cooking and when others cook meals they may feel it as a chore. If we all get the same opportunities then some will take them happily while others won’t be interested.

For instance if I had an opportunity to choose between fixing a car or going shopping then I would definitely choose to go shopping where as many other people may straight away just say I’ll go fix the car. 

Humans have never been equal on this planet for any amount of time. You would think that, after about ten thousand years of trying to become equal we would get the picture that equality isn’t a natural thing. Like I was saying earlier the only way to make everybody equal is to make them exactly the same. Same clothes. Same house. Same interests. Same everything 

Everything is unique in its own way and the closest example is your own hand your left and right hands are not the same size and even your nails are different shape so if not even our hands are equal how would we be able to make everyone in New Zealand equal let alone each person in the whole entire world. 

I have gone over a few of the points from my view of Equality and also how some people aren’t equal. I hope that you have gained something from this speech because we don’t all want to be exactly the same we want to be individuals and we should all just be ourselves.

The Boy in the Striped Pyjamas

Author: John Boyne

No. Pages: 216

ISBN: 0-385-60940-X

Publisher: David Fickling Books

The Boy in the Striped Pyjamas is about Bruno, a nine year old boy; he lives in a five storey house with his mother, his father, his 12-year-old sister Gretel and also many servants. Bruno doesn’t know anything about his father’s job except that he wears a fancy uniform and that the Fury has big things in mind for him. One day the very important Fury visits them and from this Bruno’s father gets a new uniform, his title changes to Commander and Bruno finds himself, his family and all of his servants moving to a new home at a place called Out-With. When Bruno gets there he feels very sad as he has left his school, Karl, Daniel and Martin, his three best friends for life, his house, his grandparents and the street life of Berlin, with its cafes, fruit and vegetable stalls. His new house at Out-With is much smaller, full of soldiers and there is no one to play with. From his bedroom window Bruno occasionally notices a town of people dressed in striped pyjamas separated from him by a wire fence. When he asks his father who those people are, he responds that they aren’t really people, they are the Jews. One day, Bruno follows the wire fence separating off the area where these people live from his house. He spots a dot in the distance on the other side of the fence that when he gets closer, he sees it’s a boy. Excited by what could be a friend, Bruno introduces himself. The Jewish boy’s name is Shmuel. Almost every day, they meet at the same place and talk. Eventually, for many reasons, Bruno decides to climb under the fence and explore Shmuel’s world and the way he lives.

I didn’t really enjoy this book because I found it very hard in some parts to understand and follow to begin with. I found it quite annoying how it would say something like ‘I used to live in a room with eleven other people before I came here and one boy Luka, who kept on hitting me even when I did nothing at all wrong’ and then later on in the story if it came back to it, it would describe it all over again and keep repeating it each time.

I liked this book because it had lots of really good description in it and also the story line is really good as it shows how some people really do live or used to live. It is a story about a very different friendship as most people think of playing with a friend and not just talking through a wire fence to them which is really cool. 

I gave this book a rating of two and a half because I kind of disliked this read but I also kind of loved that sort of book. I would recommend this book to anybody around the age of about 10–13 or 14. Overall I think that this book was okay and it may be a very good read for anyone who likes the sound of it.

I have been tagged by Hamish for the 8 random facts meme. So here goes…

First, the Rules:
1) Post these rules before you give your facts
2) List 8 random facts about yourself
3) At the end of your post, choose (tag) 8 people and list their names, linking to them
4) Leave a comment on their blog, letting them know they’ve been tagged

 1. I am really short compared to lots of other people my age

 2. I have two pets, a cat called Smudge and a chocolate Lab named Mocha

3. I am a very messy person, I can only keep my room tidy for about a day

4. I have never been overseas the furthest I have been from home is Hamner Springs

5. I went Whale Watching in Kaikoura when I was 4 or 5

6. I am very picky at breakfast, I can never decide what to have but I cant stand going without it

7. I appeared on What Now around the age 4 or 5 when it was in Wellington

8. I live on a dairy farm and the very first calf I took to agricultural day was called Mouse and she was even bigger than me!

So I now tag-

Kaitlyn, Sokeina, Taleta, Celeste, Darcey, Bethany, Matt and Shannon