Improve Family's life

Geralda Gjergjaj

Composition#9 draft#2

Dec 6, 2009

Dear Mr. Mayor

Recently I read in the news paper that you want to improve the family’s life who has small children. I know that you have two options and you have to choose the one that it’s going to improve the family life better. I believe that a free day care would be a terrific idea because small children need to be in good and safe hands. If you decide to afford free day care you will help families to save some money, you will give a chance to new teachers begging working, and you will increase the education.

One of the biggest problems and especially in the United States is small children because parents need to work and they can’t because of their children. Many parents are unable to work because they have to take care of their children, while they are little. This means that only one member of the family works (father or mother) and if they have many children it is difficult to handle it. A day care can help parents a lot because parents are going to send their children there and to save nine hours of work. By saving nine hours of work I mean that both of the parents can work and have more money on their saving account. Parents can relax their selves sometimes and some other important activities like going to bank, or shopping while their children are in day care. I believe that is going to help a lot the poor families because they really need help, and actually the poor families have more kids than they are supposed to have. New York city Is the city with the biggest population so I believe that day cares are so important and not only for the poor people but also for rich people.

Dear Mr. Mayor don’t you think that many people with diplomas from college they don’t have a job because of the bad economy? The biggest problem in the whole world is the economy. Thousands of people their graduate from college but they didn’t find a job about their major. They working in another jobs and this is unfair because they were studying from years and after their graduation they couldn’t found a job. In the day cares you can hire many teachers who can help the kids, they can watch them, play with them and do many activities with them. Day care is nine hours so of course you have to hire many people to work in the kitchen and many cleaners. Kids are going to stay long time in the day care so they have to eat over there. Automatically they need some cookers and some people to help in the kitchen. Also in a day care need to hire people to clean because of many illness and jams. Especially little kids need more protection from adults or teens. The cleaners have to clean almost twice per day because is more healthy for little kids. Day cares can provide many and different kind of jobs.

My last reason that I believe a day care can be a great opportunity for many people is that kids are going to grow up with manners. Is the best age to start building the personality of a child when the child is little, you can learn your kid by playing with him, and of course that the family is have to give good manners to their kids, but also teachers can learn kids what is good and what is not. Children can learn for a young age how to speak politely, and how to act. I believe that if you decide to the free day care many of those children can succeed in their lives, many of them can be good personalities and not spoiled or rude. It is better to give your kid some good manners and to learn him how to act with the people and the best age is when the kid is little because they can catch the meaning of the life fast, and of course when they are young they have a weak personality so you can help a kid build his/him personality with strong thoughts.

It is a great idea to improve the family’s life by offering free day care. It will increase the education, jobs, and of course some families can save some money for the future of their children. Some families need this kind of help because they don’t have enough money and they can’t work because they don’t have where to leave their children. A baby sitter is a good idea but some people don’t trust them and some people don’t have enough money to pay them.

Thank you for reading my paper

Sincerely ,

Geralda Gjergjaj

Album review

Geralda Gjergjaj

Composition#8 Draft#3

Dec 5, 2009

Under My Skin

By Geralda Gjergjaj

Avril Lavigne is a girl who was born on September 27, 1984 in Canada. Avril moved in Manhattan at 16 and she dropped out from high school because she secured a record deal. At age 18 she released her first album titled “Let Go” and inside the album she had a song named “Complicated” witch went six times platinum. Avril Lavigne is a pop-punk-rock singer and almost all of her songs are happy with a nice beat. My favorite album from Avril Lavigne is “Under My Skin” and she released this album on June 19, 2007. Under My Skin has 12 songs and she has some hard rock songs and three or four songs are rock ballads. I like this album because she released before getting too famous and she still had the rock style. I love three songs from this album because each of the songs has a meaning for me.

First song that I love is “Nobody’s Home”. This song has e great rhythm and I love the meaning a lot. I don’t know why she wrote this song. Even though I search it on internet I couldn’t find why she sung it. My thoughts about this song are that Avril is telling us a story about a girl who is very lost and confused about her life. In the chorus she has a sentence that I think there is the whole point of song” Open your eyes and look outside, find the reasons why. You’ve been rejected. All of us we have some hard times and we feel like nobody can understand us, or we feel alone in the whole word. I like the song because when I was younger sometimes I felt like the girl in this song. I believe that this girl had a really hard time, and I believe that it’s not about and I’m glad that is not for a boy, because many young girls are like disappointed or in a deep sadness because of a boy. When you are young you can’t think very clearly. I believe that this girl have some problems with her family because in the song says that she doesn’t have a place to go and that she is rejected.

The second song is “Take Me away”. This song starts with a piano and develops into a rock song. The rhythm of the song is great and is 100% real rock music and Avril in this song did great vocals. I think these are the best vocals that she ever did in any of the others songs. This song is really “strong” song. This song reminds me of the first song, “Nobody’s Home”, because both of the songs have almost the same meaning. The song talks about confusion, pain, and that she feel a pain. Actually I don’t really love the lyrics so much, but the voice of the singer is really good and I like that Avril handle her voice very well. I like to listen to this song when I’m mad because it is so powerful that it makes your feelings come out. I don’t know why, but in my mind I have a gothic situation. It is hard to explain it, but in my mind I have a picture of angels and dragons fight each other. Sounds craze, but I don’t know why I have this picture in my mind.

The third song that I really love, and is one of my favorites songs ever, is the song “Slipped Away”. This song I written by Avril and she wrote it for her grandfather who died while Avril was touring all over the world. She couldn’t even say goodbye to him because she was miles away. This song doesn’t have an official video clip but when she did a tour, she sung this song in front of her fans. She sung this song with only a guitar and in the middle of the song she started crying, and you can hear that her voice starts getting wobbley because of her depression. When you hear this song, you want to cry because it is really sad. I lost my grandfather too, but I was little so I didn’t understand much. This song touch me because when I moved from Greece to the United States I thought that I never would be the same person as I was and that everything from my life die by the time I was coming here. difficult situation, but is better when someone moves away in another country from dying. When is far way you know that someday you are going to see this person again or you know that he is alive, but you know that this person is dead you know that you are never going to have e chance to see him/her again. The video that she is singing this song is really good because you can see her feeling. And I believe that a singer has to show the feelings of the song. I believe that this song is a song with many strong feelings and actually is you lost someone like a father, mother friend, if you listen to this song you are going to cry immediately. I have never lost someone because of death (except my grandfather), but when I listen to this song I want to cry.

I can rate this album with three stars because I like only the three songs, and not all of them. The music is really great and besides these three songs Avril has some other songs that are fairly good. I don’t like the whole album because I believe that some songs are not good enough (my opinion) but these three songs are great, especially the one which she wrote about her grandfather. I would recommend this album to the people who want to cry about someone who they have lost. I don’t recommend this album to the people who listen to hip-hop or heavy metal music because it is kind of slow, and it’s not the kind of the music that they like. However I sincerely believe that the song “Slipped away” can make a person cry even if this person listens to other kind of music. Well it’s not necessary to cry but the words they really can touch somebody. It’s not my favorite album but it is a pretty good album.

Singles(the movie)

Geralda Gjergjaj

Composition #7, draft#3

Dec 5, 2009

SINGLES

Singles is a Romantic-Comedy movie, released in September 1992 in the United States, and was written by Cameron Crowe. The film follows a group of friends who live in the same apartment building and hang out at the same coffee shop. The central couple is Steve Dunne and Linda Powell. In this movie we have also some other important characters like one crazy boy that he thinks he is the best musician, one girl that she loves the musician guy, a crazy situation. This movie is based on the relationships of the people and how different characters can be friends or couples. My favorite quote from the movie is, “Have fun stay single”.

Linda is the female protagonist of the movie and she works in an environmental office. Her best friend’s name is Ruth and they like going dancing together. Linda and Ruth work together in the same office. One day Linda met a guy named Luis, who helped her on the road because her car was broken. Linda liked Luis a lot and she thought that she was in love with him. Luis was student in the United States, but he was from Spain. He said to Linda that his visa runs out in two days, so he had to leave the United States. When Luis went to Linda’s house to say goodbye, he gave Linda a ring as a promise which meant that he would come back. Linda gave him a garage door opener which meant a lot for her because she was the garage of her house and she always had a space to park her car. Linda was in love with him and she confessed to Ruth that she wanted to marry him. If she marries him, Luis could stay in the United States. Ruth told her that she is crazy because she don’t even know him. One evening Ruth and Linda went out dancing and Linda saw Luis with some random girl at the same club. She felt disappointed because she realized Luis had told her lies about everything. She ran out of the club and she started crying. In this paragraph we saw that “is better to be single” because Linda had a bad experience with Luis. Linda is kind of a quite girl because she saw the man who she was in love with him was many other women. And she didn’t react. She just left and started crying by herself. Have fun, Stay single…

Steve is the male protagonist of the movie. Steve met Linda in a club and he liked her immediately, but Linda wasn’t ready for a relationship or to find another boyfriend because she was still disappointed from Luis. Steve and Linda start hanging out together but not like in a real relationship. They made love and after some weeks they were in a real relationship. Linda had a small conversation with Steve and she told him that she was a little late this month. She was thinking that she might be pregnant. Steve went to the pharmacy and he bought some pregnancy tests to see if Linda was actually pregnant. Linda did the pregnancy test and it turned out that she was pregnant. They didn’t talk much for this situation bat they decide to keep the baby. One day Linda and Steve were in the car and Linda was driving. Suddenly out of nowhere another car came and hit Linda’s side. Steve took Linda to the hospital because she felt dizzy and shocked from the accident. Unfortunately Linda lost her child after the accident. She was in deep sorrow and she decided to go on a cruise by herself to think, relax and gather her thoughts. Linda came back from the cruise after one month, and Steve went to pick her up. Steve and Linda had another little conversation and they decided to break up. They didn’t really want to break up, but I think they were both confused and distant, so they made the mistake. Linda re started an old comfortable relationship with a guy named Andy. Andy is type of the boring man. Steve was so sad all the time that he was away from Linda and he didn’t take care of himself at all and he also lost his job. Until one day Linda went and visits Steve at his house. They immediately start kissing each other. They rekindled their relationship after a long break up. Steve is a great man, because even though Linda went on cruise for one month, Steven was waiting for her. Also Linda told him to break up and she return to Andy, but Steve was in still in love with her. Steve was patient with this relationship because he was really in love with Linda. In this relationship they had fun, but they weren’t single.

Cliff is the funniest character in the movie. He thinks he is the best musician and he also plays in a band, but actually he is a jerk. Cliff had a girlfriend named Janet and Janet was really in love with Cliff, but Cliff was playing with her heart. He didn’t love her. He just wanted to mess around. Janet worked in a coffee shop and she also lived in the same apartment as Cliff. Janet asked Cliff if he liked her breast (because Janet has a small breast) and Cliff said “sometimes”. He said it in a way that Janet decided underage plastic surgery to make her breast bigger than normal. She wanted to do the operation because she thought that if she had a big breast Cliff would love her. Janet made an appointment with Doctor Jamison and she went to do the operation. Doctor Jamison said to Janet her boyfriend should like her the way she is and she looks. She shouldn’t have to change something. Doctor Jamison tried to show Janet that she doesn’t have to change anything because if Cliff doesn’t like her like, she could find someone else who is going to like her, Like the quote says, “there are many fish in the sea”, many men in the world, not only Cliff. After thinking Janet decided to break up with Cliff and after some days Cliff fell in love with Janet. But Janet didn’t want him anymore. Cliff was trying to talk to her all the time going to her house and trying to be in a relationship again with Janet. After some months they started again being together. Before Janet get to Doctor Jamison office she was talking with Steve and she told him that she want a man who she is going to tell her “bless you” when she sneezes. At the end of the movie Janet is in the elevator with Cliff. Janet sneezed and Cliff told her ‘bless you’ and automatically they start kissing each other. It is kind of funny because Cliff it’s not the person who has good manners and Janet got impressed from his good attitude. Have fun, but in a relationship

This movie tells us about different minds, different people, different relationships, and of course different situations. I believe that this movie is true because whatever happened in the movie is the ugly truth of the life. All the characters had a role that most of us have had in our lives and. I believe that the writer did a successful job by writing this movie. The quote “Have fun stay single” I think is a great quote and I believe in this quote. But in this case no one is single at the end of the movie.

Improving schools in bad neighborhoods

Geralda Gjergjaj

Composition#6, draft#3

Nov 18, 2009

Dear Mr. Mayor,

Recently I heard on the news that you have received a large donation. I know that you have to options. One is to improve the schools in bad neighborhoods and one to improve the quality of the neighborhoods near tourist attractions. I know that is a hard decision, but you have to think what the best choice for the city is. I believe that you should use the money to improve schools in bad neighborhoods because it will increase jobs, kids are going to learn arts and many new programs are going to be available.

First of all we know that education is a big problem. Many of New Yorkers are dropping out from school in a young age. More than 60% of children’s cannot read English in fourth grade. This number is very disappointed for the United States. Schools in bad neighborhoods need some help. Many of the kids need a lot of help from the teachers and some teachers doesn’t help the kids so the kids are missing many of the lessons they are behind and of course they drop out of school before finishing high school. We all know that rich schools have better teachers than the poor schools. If you give better teachers to poor schools you will increase the education. Kids are going to take seriously the lessons and they are not going to drop out of school and they are going to continue their studies. Is very important to improve the education and of course those kids need your help for being successful in their lives.

Secondly, if you decide to give the donation to improve schools it will help kids a lot. After school some of the teachers or substitutes teachers can stay in school to do new lessons or help kids that need help with their homework and is going to be a great idea, because many parents are working and they can’t be on time to take their kids after school. Also the school can create some classes for adults. Many immigrants don’t know how to speak in English so they understand nothing. They can’t help their kids to improve in English and kids are behind in school, so of course they can’t succeed. By doing these classes for the parents, many of the kids are going to improve their skills. The school can have some ESL teachers to help kids who are some months in The United States and need extra time for English class. It will help those kids a lot because many of them they can’t speak. Also their parents can’t help them because they don’t speak either. Learning a new language takes time and it’s not easy at all. Creating these programs in those schools it will improve language and basic skills also can help adults and parents.

Finally by improving the schools in a bad neighborhood it will give a chance to the kids who really care or they have a talent on arts. A music class can provide many good singers. It is a good opportunity for those kids who have a good voice to start training their voices. They can also do a CD with of school and they can sell it to earn money by selling the CD’S. Dancing is a really good job too. Kids can start dancing from a young age and they can become professionals. They can also go to talent shows and win some medals. Another good art is painting. We don’t have many painters at this time so some professional painters can help kids to be successful in this category of art. It is a great opportunity to learn arts, and especially when you are young you can learn easily and faster than an adult. Art classes can be useful only to the people who really care about it or to the people who have talents.

Improving schools in bad neighborhoods gives opportunity to learn arts, language, and of course jobs are going to available. It’s a great opportunity to improve those schools because kids need a better neighborhood. They need a good neighborhood because they are going to be happy and enthusiastic everyday that they go to school.

Perfect Paragraph

Geralda Gjergjaj

Composition #5 draft #1

Oct 15, 2009

Example paragraph

I admire Martin Luther King because he never gave up. First, he went in school that African-Americans had separated bathrooms and seats from the whites. He was born in one bad season that everyone was against black people. He did many marches to saw that black and white are the same. Second, I admire him because he enters college at age 16. He was a preacher at the same time as his father was. He always was a calm boy and he never fought with the people. The third reason is that he starts doing a boycott on the bus. In the past African Americans the wasn’t supposed to seat in the front of the bus only in the back and if they were seating in the back and one white person didn’t have a seat the African American had to give their seats or the bus driver was supposed to call the police. Whites were very racist and they looked Blacks suspiciously. So MLK decided to stop taking the bus until the rules is going to be equal for everyone and finally he won the boycott. Martin Luther King believed that in Conceivable future everything is going to be equal. MLK was a great fighter a great father and a great preacher, he was a significant person.

High fidelity book

Geralda Gjergjaj

Composition#4, Draft#3

Oct 22, 2009

Rob

Nick Hornby is the author of High fidelity book that is based on Rob’s life. This book is based on Rob’s (the protagonist) life. This book is 323 pages and only adults can read it because the context of the book has some bad words. I believe that Rob is decent guy, but he doesn’t know what he wants from his life. In High Fidelity we can read about a guy named Rob telling us about his ex-girlfriends, his personality, and that he’s insecurity. Also in the book the reader can see Rob’s hobby which is of course music and his way to explain everything with a song.

In the book Rob talks about his ex-girlfriends and he tried to explain to the reader how his relationships unfolded. Alison Ashworth was Rob’s first girlfriend when they both were 13 years old. They were together for four days, but they broke up because Alison cheated on him by kissing another guy in front on his eyes. Rob felt heartbroken because Alison was his first girlfriend, and it was weird when he saw her with another guy but he didn’t try to stop them. He only stood like stone and looks at them. Probably he wasn’t in love with her or he didn’t know how to act. Penny Hardwick was his girlfriend for three months. Rob describes Penny as a “nice” girl. In the book Rob told the reader that Penny had a “nice” mother, a “nice” sister, a “nice” house. By the word “nice” he tries to tell us that she wasn’t so important, but she was just “nice”. Rob was with Penny for three months, and he was trying to make love with her, but Penny wasn’t ready yet. One day Rob told her that their relationship didn’t have a point and that it never goes anywhere. Rob and Penny broke up and after a week Rob learned that Penny slept with a guy that she had only known one week. Just like with Alison, in this situation, Rob didn’t do anything again. Of course he felt disappointed, but he didn’t try to win her back. Laura was Rob’s longest relationship. She was the girl who moved in to his house and they lived together. Rob met Laura when he was D.J in a club. Laura was a lawyer, but when she met Rob she didn’t have much money. After a couple months she started earning a significant amount of money. Rob and Laura broke up after a few years (three or four). In the begin of the book the reader can see that Rob claims that he doesn’t care about Laura, and that Laura is not on his Top-Five ex-girlfriend list. But in the middle of the book the reader can clearly understand that Rob really did care about Laura and he wanted her back. He doesn’t know why he wants her back but he is trying to be in the relationship with her again. I believe that Rob wants Laura back because she left him, and after a few days Rob learned that Laura was with a guy named Ian. Ian lived in the same apartment with Rob, so I think Rob is jealous and that’s why he wants her back. As we saw in page 162 when Liz (Laura’s friend) asked him why he is still calling Laura all the time he answer I don’t know. Rob is not sure why he is doing this. In fact Rob remains indecisive throughout all of his relationships.

Rob has a really inconsistent personality. You can’t understand if he is a decent guy or if he is a selfish guy. At times Rob acts like an honest person. The reader can see that on page 77, when one lady tried to sell him some records at a very low price. These records belonged to her husband, but he had left her for a young girl and moved to Spain. The man’s wife wanted to take revenge by selling all his records at a cheap price. Rob didn’t accept the price because he believed it wasn’t right to buy them so cheap. The reader can see that Rob really wanted the records, but he thought it wasn’t fair to buy them. On the other hand, Rob is an unfaithful man because he treats Laura badly in three ways. As we saw in page 92 Rob slept with another woman, he borrowed five thousands from Laura after her abortion and after their breakup Rob told Laura that he was looking for someone else. The reader can see that Rob treat her un fairly and Laura didn’t deserve it. Marie De La Salle is the one who Rob didn’t know what to do. Rob liked her but Marie wasn’t his type. Marie was a singer and a powerful woman. Rob and Marie slept together but he wasn’t sure if he wanted to be in a relationship with her. He had a good night with her but after they slept together Rob didn’t want to sleep again with her. We can see that he is not sure about his decisions. Rob is honest and unfaithful at the same time. On one hand he didn’t accept the once-in-a-life-time price for the records, but on the other hand he cheated on Laura and he wanted her back, but still slept with Marie without having feelings for her.

Rob was always insecure about himself. We saw that on page 167 when one costumer came to Rob’s record store and Rob felt weird because the costumer was nice looking. He was wearing his suit, he was well spoken, and he had his car keys in his hand. Rob started worrying about himself because the costumer was almost at the same age as Rob, and he had nice clothes, a nice attitude, was married, and worked in a respectable profession. Rob doesn’t have anything like this. He have his record store bad he don’t have serious clothes, no car and he is not married he don’t even have a girlfriend. He wants to change and to be like him but he doesn’t try to make a plan for his life. In page 141 of our book we saw that rob went to the movies with his parents. That day he saw a guy that he referred to as “THE MOST PATHETIC MAN IN THE WORLD.” The most pathetic man in the world was so ugly, and he saw Rob and he gave him a smile which meant, they were the same, in the same situation. Rob was with his parents, and the most pathetic man in the world was with his parents too. This disturbed Rob so much that he couldn’t focus on the movie. Rob felt so angry because he didn’t like the event that happened. He said that they are not the same at all they are totally different. Rob is old enough and he must start thinking about his life seriously. He has to change some think in his personality. He has to start growing up.

Rob’s life is kind of a strange because he is not really sure what he wants to do with his life. In this book he told us that he wants to change, but he isn’t sure in which way. He told us about his ex-girlfriends and about his personality. In High Fidelity book we learned about how Rob is in his life, his way of thinking and his way of explaining things with a list five songs. Rob knows everything about music and song, but he doesn’t know anything about women. Every situation reminds him a song. I believe that Nick Hornby tried to give us a way to understand how men think with the example of Rob. How he feel, he act, his thoughts and his beliefs.

Homeless Shelter

Geralda Gjergjaj

Composition #3, draft #3

Oct 28, 2009

Dear Mayor,

Yesterday I heard on the news that you received a large piece of land and you have two options. One is to build a shopping center and the other one to build a homeless shelter. I know that it is a hard decision because you have to think about what is the best for the city. But I believe the building a homeless shelter is beneficial for New York City because it will provide jobs, improve the community education and rebuild a happy community.

You should build a homeless shelter because it will increase jobs. First of all a homeless shelter can provide opportunities to work for constriction workers. In order to build the shelter, we will need to hire many different workers. We need carpenters, engineers, plumbers, electricians and painters. Currently the unemployment rate is very high. Hiring people to build the shelter is going to lower it. Secondly there are some homeless who need help from social workers. Social workers after finishing school will have a chance to find jobs in shelters. Finally building a homeless shelter will help to give chances for doctors and nurses to work. Homeless people need medical attention, so doctors and nurses could offer services. A homeless shelter is another place that doctors and nurses can get jobs. A homeless shelter provides many different jobs.

A homeless shelter would be a good option for the city to provide community education. First of all reading and writing can provide the possibility of a successful future for homeless children. Reading and writing education for homeless children is expected to be an important opportunity to make them successful in school by giving them free education. After their graduation from school they can easily find a job because they are going to have a diploma from high school or college and stop being homeless. Secondly, sex education can help homeless people, especially teenagers, learn how to take protections precautions sexually transmitted diseases. The most popular mistake that teenagers make is having sex without protection they didn’t have enough sexual education and this will prevent diseases such as aids. Finally, financial education will teach the homeless how to manage their money. Once they get out from the shelter, homeless will be able to make financial decisions to manage their own bills for example paying rent. The shelter can help them by bringing some experience or some teachers to teach the homeless how to be responsible out of the shelter. The homeless shelter can teach the homeless how to be prepared in the life out of the shelter.

A shelter is a good idea to build a happy and beautiful community. First of all, we have to encourage homeless not to sleep on the train. It’s disastrous when homeless get in the train because they never take a shower so they really smell bad. And this is not discrimination. It’s only unhealthy for the other people because homeless are dirty and they have many bacteria’s and germs. If they have a place to stay and to sleep they are not going to sleep in the trains anymore. Secondly, homeless are sleeping in the streets and the image of the city looks terrible. On almost every street there is one homeless sleeping on the ground. It’s really negative because when tourists come to visit ours city they see all these people sleeping or living on the streets. New York City is one of the most popular tourist destinations in the world, and we have to do something about the homeless. Tourists are coming to visit the city and to see how beautiful it is, not to see homeless in the streets. If homeless are in the shelter we are going to have a better image because all the homeless are going to be in one place and not in the streets. Tourists are going to like the city and of course they are going to visit the City again. Finally, the streets need to be clean. The homeless don’t have a place to stay so they live in the streets with all their personals items like clothes, food, and much garbage. They take a big shopping cart and they walk or around the city with it filled with garbage. They don’t have a place to put it. Because of the garbage, we have so many rats in New York City, but if we keep the homeless in the shelter, we are going to keep the city cleaner that it is. A homeless shelter is going keep the city clean and beautiful.

Building a homeless shelter is beneficial for New York City because it will rebuild a happy community, improve community education and it will provide many jobs. If you decide to build the homeless shelter our city is going to be cleaner. Every year we will receive many thousands of tourists and our image is going to be the best. We will be the best tourist’s destination