A couple of days ago it was announced that the release date for the live action Mulan was pushed back yet again to Spring of 2020.
Photo Credit: weibo.com
Meanwhile other movies have been pushed up and newly announced, now I can’t say what is going on behind the scenes at Disney or what is going on with any part of the Mulan-in-the-making, however I can say that from where I’m sitting I’m angry.
I’m not angry at production, corporate, actors, etc. I am a general type of angry that I will have to wait two more years to see my favorite Disney “princess” back on the big screen (admittedly, I watch the cartoon version almost monthly {life is stressful}).
Photo Credit: ew.com
Why, Disney, why? I understand the importance of Avengers: Infinity War but I want to see an Asian-woman-led movie. Which I will get courtesy of Constance Wu in Crazy Rich Asians (GO CONSTANCE!), but it’s not Mulan.
My heart hurts and child-me feels a little bit like I was offered matcha ice cream only to find out it was a heaping scoop of wasabi, but oh well. I guess I’ll have to wait two more years to see Liu Yifei (who I will, until further notice, imagine is me) kicking some major Hun a*s and saving China.
Last year Liu Yifei was cast as Mulan, Kelly Marie Tran became the first Asian American lead in a Star Wars movie, Bangtan Sonyeondan – better known as BTS – became the very first K-artist, besides PSY, to ever win a Billboard Music Award and the first K-group to ever perform at the American Music Awards and Dick Clark’s New Year’s Rockin’ Eve. BTS also continue to break their own records in the Billboard standings and seem to only be growing in popularity.
Photo Credit: billboard.com
Only a month into 2018 Asian representation is looking up and just a couple of days ago BTS again made history as the first K-group and second K-artist ever to earn a RIAA Gold CertificationRIAA Gold Certification for their remix of their son “Mic Drop” with Japanese American DJ Steve Aoki and rapper Desiigner; and just today (February 4) Chinese Canadian singer Kris Wu became the first Chinese Artist to ever preform at the Superbowl Half-Time Show.
Photo Credit: nerdist.com
These examples are just a couple of the milestones that have been met in just a short amount of time. Hopefully these two events this year, and several from late last year, are indicative of how the rest of this year, and the future, will go on the Asian/ East Asian Representation front.
It’s here!… Wait… What? Our class is graduating from high school? That’s not possible, I thought the year just started?
Yes guys, graduation is finally here and this is the last blog I am going to write for the Ojai Valley School Journalism team. For those of you who read my blog one month ago which talked about how graduation is right around the corner, well here we are, just a couple of days away from a huge turning point in our lives.
All those grueling, yet memorable years and the lessons we have learned from our peers and faculty have been, and will forever be, engrained into our hearts. I still remember three months ago, talking to one of my friends about whether or not I’d be able to remember what we had talked about that night. Believe me, I do remember what we talked about, and that moment also taught me that time passes like sand slipping through your hands.
Okay, that’s enough blabbering from me… But I want to wish everybody good luck! It’s been a joy writing blogs for the OVS Journalism team. Here we go!!! It is graduation!!!
There comes a time in every senior’s career when they have to start picking colleges. Now, I’m far from being a senior, but I started thinking about colleges after going to the East Coast during spring break. Through all my time thinking about location, majors, and programs, one thing has stuck with me.
Photo Credit: breakthroughmiami.org
How are we, as children, supposed to decide the course of our lives? When someone chooses a college, they chose their connections, their future job opportunities, and many other hidden factors. When we choose a major, we cut off most of our time to explore other subjects of thought.
Picture this: You walk in to Ms. Oberlander and Mr. Alvarez’s college meeting. You sit down, take out your laptop, and open Naviance. You take a look at the colleges you’re thinking about. UCSB, Chapman, Harvard, or Yale. You have your target schools, but you know in your heart you’re dying to go to your reach school. You raise your hand to go to the bathroom, interrupting Ms. Oberlander’s speech about freedom.
It’s a little ironic. When most students go to college, they don’t know how to handle themselves. Just three months before freshman orientation, they still had to ask to use the restroom. They still had their parents doing their laundry and making them dinner. Teachers still told them how to dress, how to act. At OVS, we have the unique opportunity to learn some of the skills most college students lack so that we are more prepared to take on this new challenge.
However, OVS (and any school for that matter) can’t prepare us for what’s out there. It can’t prepare you for the choice between going to class or playing video games. It can’t prepare you for the people who will hurt you or how to make friends. They can only cross their fingers and hope you succeed.
While scrolling through Instagram, I came across a startling post. In the past 24 hours, 14 young black girls have been kidnapped in Washington DC. Even more astonishingly, it has taken an outcry on social media, not pure human concern, for media outlets to even report on this horrific incident.
When new Metropolitan Police Chief, Chanel Dickerson, was appointed two months ago, he pledged to find all the missing girls in DC. This statement comes at a dire time in our nation’s capital. Since Wednesday, 22 kids have gone missing, adding on to the hefty 501 case so far this year. Needless to say, these missing reports are nothing new.
What is almost more concerning than the sheer number of cases is the public’s lack of knowledge. When I asked my friends if they had heard about these cases, none of them knew. Whether it be lack of speaking out by major news outlets or seeing a headline and forgetting it, they had no idea that 14 girls our age have been taken from their families, friends, and homes. Even though media involvement can be dangerous in some cases, news about these girls needs to come out so that the public can keep a watchful eye and even protect these girls.
Members of the Congressional Black Caucus are appealing to Attorney General Jeff Sessions and FBI Director James Comey to open a federal investigation. They call for help because of the fear of a deeper, scarier underlying agenda and the obvious racial stigmas present.
Photo Credit: bbc.com
“(W)hen children of color go missing, authorities often assume they are runaways rather than victims of abduction,” the lawmakers said. This statement has been backed up with looming facts and other reliable sources coming out to make statements as well.
DC City Councilmen Trayon White believes that there is an underlying theme of racial prejudice involved. “We had a 10-year-old girl missing the other day, but there was no amber alert,” White said. “We just feel like, you know, if this was a white person or from another neighborhood, there would be more alarm about it.”
Especially in cases involving minors, it’s critical to reach out to the public for help, as most child abduction victims are killed in the first 24 hours. White’s concern holds a lot of standing, because although some of the 14 new cases are adults, these people have been put in a terribly unsafe position.
In fact, many DC residents believe these kidnappings to be part of a human trafficking scheme. One would believe that this fact alone is enough to spark national outcry, but we still find ourselves missing 14 girls, with limited headlines and a lack of information on how to help them, before we hear their names in eulogies.
Unfortunately, terrorism is not new and it is not uncommon. But, it is stomach-churningly awful. To hear about a terrorism attack on the news, if it is 5 or 5,000 miles away, makes one’s stomach drop. But to actually experience the attack, to feel, see, and hear it all happen is unconceivable. Marson Wells, a 19 year old boy had to feel, see, and hear 3 terrorist attacks. He was present at the Boston Bombings, the Paris Attack, and, very recently, the terrorist attack in a Brussels Airport. There’s a dichotomy here. Marson Wells is unlucky enough to have been in the wrong spot at the wrong time on 3 separate occasions. Yet, he is lucky enough to survive each one. Unfortunately, there are thousands and thousands more people who have been just as unlucky as Wells. These recent and ongoing terrorist attacks are terrible and unimaginable, yet they could happen to anyone, anywhere, any day. That’s terrifying.
To brie, or not to brie may no longer be the question.
Everything these days seems to cause cancer.
Alcohol, meat, air fresheners, candles, art supplies, shampoos, conditioners, and even sunscreen.
Yes, sunscreen. The thing that is supposed to save you from the harmful rays of the sun and the secret to beautiful skin may slowly be killing all of us…Yay!
But eating good ol’ sharp cheddar or a nice gouda perhaps may help cure cancer.
The “tasty mold” may end up kicking cancers booty because of the nisin in cheese
Don’t know what nisin is? Well basically it is a natural food preservative that grows in dairy products.
This natural preservative has been shown to help battle cancer and other lethal bacteria when given to mice.
Now this theory is still in the testing stages, but it does sound PARMmising.
Two major events have struck American Airlines this week. Lets recap:
Photo Credit: upload.wikimedia.org
Today, October 5th, at 7:10 am American Airlines flight 550 landed in New York mid-flight for the last reason anyone would expect: the pilot passed away mid-flight, the name of the pilot and cause has not been announced.
During the flight, the pilot became unresponsive, at which point the co-pilot took over and was able to safely land the plane in Syracuse, its original destination was Boston.
This unfortunate event was completely unforeseen, thank goodness the co-pilot was proactive and able to get all 147 passengers to ground safely.
Next event. American Airlines flight 31 departed from Los Angeles with a full house, Hawaii bound.
Little known fact that the Airbus A321s was not certified to fly over the Pacific Ocean. This aircraft was no correctly equipped to fly over the Pacific.
Luckily, the aircraft made it safely to Hawaii. The plane was later flown back to LAX with the minimum amount of crew on board.
Thankfully both of these incidents left no passengers harmed… just a bit shaken.
Currently, the human species is the smartest on the planet.
I repeat, currently.
I walked into the living room and my mom was watching a TED Talk on her iPad. About what you may ask?
How freakishly intelligent crows are.
Crows have the intelligence and communication skills of a six-year-old child.
Scared? I’m just getting started.
Crows have the ability to plan, recognize faces, hold grudges, conspire with one another, and have incredible problem solving abilities.
A university in Seattle conducted an experiment where students wore face masks and tagged each of the crows with different colored anklets to identify them, which they didn’t enjoy.
Each time the students would put on the face masks, the crows who were tagged would find the student wearing the face mask that tagged them and proceed to swoop down and harass them
Due to the fact that I am a seventeen year old girl, my general topic choice for T.V. shows is mainly based around drama and vampires.
Recently, in Journalism class, we began watching “The Newsroom”, realistic drama based around life in a newsroom. This show includes their struggle to have the most updated facts about major events that actually did occur in history.
I can honestly say no other show has intrigued me to this extent.
The realistic way this show is written involves it’s audience to the fullest extent. Every time our class has watched, I am completely zoned out and concentrated on the show.
The plot of “The Newsroom” consists of a team of news correspondents who work together to be the most updated broadcasting show on the air. Between trying their best to say the right thing (morally and politically), you learn about each of the character’s personal struggles along the way.
My blog does this show no justice, I guarantee it will be your next T.V. show obsession.
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