Recently I read Almost a Woman by Esmeralda Santiago. In the last blog post I only read about 25 pages of the book and I basically had no idea what the book was going to reflect on. In the last blog post I stated that the memoir was a reflection of her success of going to Harvard University(stated in the author's biography), but that is not what the book is about at all. It was actually about the experience she had in life from 13 to 21.

    The book stayed consistent throughout and I actually enjoyed the way it was written. The amazing detail made me feel as if I were sitting right next to her in 1965. There are many pros to this book including: the details, the juiciness of her life, and need for me to not stop reading it. The only con I had with the book is that it didn't become juicy until about ¾ of the book was done. But I understand that this is nonfiction and that this is someone's life we are reading about. The only question that I really have for this book is: What happens next? The book basically leaves you hanging and it stops just before her 21st birthday. Hopefully there is a third book. Anyway below is what the book is actually about and my thoughts on why she made the decisions she made in life.

    The memoir actually starts out slowly. I didn't expect it to be fast paced or anything because it is a person's life but, I did expect it to move a little faster than it did. Santiago is basically explaining how she didn't know a lot of English, how she learned it and became an actress at a performing arts school, and how she met people and stereotypes that she had not thought existed. In the memoir she explains racial tensions and explains how she was not Puertorican, in America, but Spanish. She learned in the acting business that she was not an asset because of her puertorican background. I think that her background was a important aspect in the memoir that made it interesting. If she wasn't puertorican and if she were Caucasian than her life would be completely different. She would have gotten parts in plays and she would probably be successful, as an actress and a dancer, and not have written this book explaining the very crazy details of her life.

    After graduating high school, and she was the first in her family to do so, she got jobs and went to school part time. This confused me because in the biography it was stated that she went to Harvard University, but it is possible she might have gone after the age of 21. She graduates and meets lots of new people from her many jobs, plays, and classes. She meets some of her best friends at her job as and office secretary over the years. Her best friends Regina and Shoshana were there for long periods of time and helped her through things that she never thought she would get through. Unfortunately her best friends leave her to do something else with their lives. This is important because they contribute to the overall theme of the book.

    From graduating on, she was partially independent because she was out of the house, where she lived with her strict puertorican mother, to go to school/ work. This means she could secretly date men, which is something she could not do before. She dated many men and fell in and out of love with them. This is a consistent theme because without the vivid details of the experiences that she had with these men, the book would be absolutely boring. After she started to date men the book got more interesting. I mean at one point in the book she was going to marry a man that she met just 3 hours before he proposed to her. And to make matters even worse the man that she was going to marry stole planes for a living! Luckily she called off the wedding 2 days before they were going to get married. Other guys she met were minor but added more drama to her life that I didn't think happened in real life. But one man named Ulvi, a famous Turkish film director, was the most important. After knowing Ulvi for just a week, after asking Santiago to play the lead in one of his films, she lost her virginity to him, while some guys she dated for years wouldn't have even touched her because of her strict morals taught by her mother. I think that Ulvi is the most important guy Santiago ever dated not only because he was her longest relationship and that Santiago lost her virginity to him, but because he created the hardest decision for Santiago: the love of him or the love of her beloved Mami.

    The overall theme of this book is: Other things may change us, but we start and end with family. Santiago changed remarkably when she came to America. She wanted to be more American, with makeup and high skirts. Then when she graduated she became a different person with different men. But in the end she always came home. The last chapter of the book is devoted to her mother. It explains how Ulvi wants her to leave her mother's house to come live with him without marriage. Knowing the only thing that her mother wanted from her, other than a great education, was marriage(which is why she didn't leave her mother's house until he was 22). The last passage summed up the whole book and made me realize the theme of the book, “Over the seven months we had known each other I had relinquished my will to his. I'd stopped seeing my friends, stopped dancing, ran from work straight into his arms. But I still went home at night to sleep under Mami's roof. Without say word, Ulvi was asking me to give up too, to choose between them... Covers were pulled over my head to block out the noise, the confusion, the drama of my family's life, I knew, just as Ulvi knew when he asked, that I had made my choice.” ( Santiago 310). It explains how people come and go but family is forever.

    Overall this book was AMAZING! I want to know what happens to the rest of her life. Her acknowledgements explain that she is married and has two children and that she graduated from Harvard, which makes me want to know how she got there. This is such a descriptive book and I hope there are more of them I can read them.

     The book that I am currently reading is Almost a Woman by Esmeralda Santiago. This inspiring memoir explains the struggles and hardships of immigrating from Puerto Rico to New York. It also demonstrates how your weakness do not determine your abilities; an example of this in the book would be how Santiago goes from knowing a modicum of English to becoming an actress at an amazing performing arts school and graduating from Harvard University.

    The book cover of Almost a Woman has a picture of Santiago as a young lady and in the background a skyline of New York. This emphasizes the fact that Santiago moved around New York at least 20 times from age 13 to 21. Also, the picture of her on the cover has Santiago in a school uniform. This is a major part because in the book it explains how she wants to be more like an American girl and wear her uniform skirts high and hair done because the girls at school jerThis emphasizes the struggle of pressure, of any young person, to be an imitation of everyone else, instead of being yourself.

    Santiago's photo and biography are located in the first 3 pages of the book. The picture is of Santiago in her young adult age. The biography explains how Santiago moved from Puerto Rico to New York in her adolescent years. It also explains how she came to graduate from Harvard University and how her eloquence in writing earned her 3-award winning books. This is important because it says the success of Santiago, and this will make the reader want to read of how she got her success.

    The Los Angeles Times stated, “ [Santiago has] the skill to render the most minute details of her before and after lives... Richly evocative.”, on the front cover of the book. When I read this statement it made me want to checkout the book immediately. Detailed books, in my opinion, are always better than books without much details. In non-detailed books I feel as if I am just reading a book. But in detailed books, such as Almost a Woman, it seems like I am sitting right next to the person while a part in the book is happening. .

    The coolest thing I found about the book was the table of contents. In the book, every chapter's title is a quote from the upcoming chapter. The first quote, I thought, summarized the whole book; the quote is “Martes, ni te cases, ni te embarques, ni de tu familia te apartes.” (Santiago P.2). It means “On a misty Tuesday, I didn't marry, but I did travel, and I did leave my family.” (Santiago). This basically is what the whole book is talking about; it talks about her family, her travels, and her struggles of love. I like the quotes as chapter titles for an upcoming chapter because it gets me excited about what is going to happen next in her life.

All in all, I think this book is super interesting and I look forward to reading the rest of it.

 Car Explosions All Over U.S.A Cause Lower Gas Prices

Jaelyn Jeff
March 2, 2031

Last week working-class Americans set their cars on fire to let the gas companies know how they feel about the extremely high gas prices. On February 23, 2031, gas prices rose to a whopping $12.13 for a regular gallon of gas. This week gas prices dropped to the lowest it has been this century, $1.98 a gallon. The cause for this extremely low gas price: the American peoples strike against gas prices.

The Department of Motor Services of America estimated that over three-fourths of the cars in the United States were set on fire and exploded, last week. The head of the Department of Motor Services of America stated, “ The American people have gone crazy... this will devastate our economy for the next half of the century, not to mention ruin the history of automobiles for the younger and future generations.” The DMV of America is not the only one furious about the American peoples actions. The oil companies, who seem like they are making quintillions of dollars off of the outrageous gas prices, are devastated by the lack of income in just a week. Oil companies such as Texaco and BP have already reduced the salaries of most of the workers and are ready to let go of as many employees so they can continue to produce oil.

The inflation of gas prices have been a problem for the American people since the beginning of the new century. The catalyst for the rising gas prices this century was 9/11. Most of the oil produced for the U.S comes from Middle Eastern countries. When 9/11 shocked the globe, the United States was very selective in gas which caused inflation. Social and political change also caused inflation. In 2011 there were numerous revolts for reform in the Arab world, which is where the greatest quality oil was produced ,. As a result of this Libya shut down there oil production until the revolts seized. This caused massive inflation in the U.S and took years for the gas price to go down to under $2. . The increased demand for oil in places like China and India, high gasoline taxes, civil unrest in Venezuela and in the Middle East, and too few refineries in the U.S were also reasons why gas increased over the past three decades.

Many have questioned why gas prices rose to such extreme heights over the course of thirty years. Amanda Wilkerson, a school teacher from Illinois, set her car on fire in protest last week. She exclaimed, “ It is ridiculous that I have to spend $42.00 or so for me to go to work, to the grocery store, and to pick up my children in a day. It took less than $2.00 for my mother to do all of the same tasks when I was younger.” When asked what she thought the reason gas prices inflated over the years, she responded, “ Oil companies are exploiting money from all of the loyal hard working citizens of America.... it will be alright if the oil companies lost some people and money..” Others disagree with Wilkerson. A boy who grew up in the Middle East, Muhammad Dub, said, “The inflation of gas prices has brought prosperity and wealth to my nation... inflation increases salaries and produces more jobs for people in the U.S. And the Middle East.”

There are many reasons why oil production is important around the world. It produces jobs, wealth, and transportation around the world. The American people were just sought up with the majority of their money being taken away by oil. With three-fourths of the cars gone and more to go in America, oil production is down and this will affect the economy of the world for years to come. We will just have to wait and see what will happen with our economy, but until then most of America will be walking, bicycling, and carpooling to work, school, and to the grocery store.

Reflection

I choose this gas prices to satirize because the gas prices directly affects me. It takes me an hour to get from home and school, which results in a fair amount of gas money. With the gas prices rising like they are now, by the time I will be able to drive myself to school it would be nearly impossible for me to drive to school. In my satire I made the fact that gas prices will get high enough to where people will start burning their cars. This masks the fact that in 20 or so years this may actually happen. My satire would attract anybody who is old enough to drive and pay for their own gas. This includes young college students to old retired married couples. I choose an article to express my opinion on this because first I can't set a car on fire for a video and second I can not sing. In all seriousness an article can be more informative than any other media and you can learn a lot more than you anticipate from reading an article. The definition of satire is the use of humor to emphasize human weakness or imperfections in social institutions. My satire emphasizes that people,especially Americans, will not know what to do if gas prices were to get to $12.13. If this were to happen hopefully someone will come up with an alternative to gas that everyone will start to use. The three literary devices that I used in my satire were: euphemism(to let go of instead of firing), understatement ( it will be alright if the oil companies lost some people and money; if this happened this will tank the economy of America and the Middle East), and hyperbole (who  they are making quintillions of dollars off of the outrageous gas prices).