Thursday, November 14, 2002

Harry Potter

Brilliant stuff! I loved the Chamber of Secrets! Me and my housemates went tonight. The film doesn't actually open till tomorrow, but we saw a special preview. Besides, we're having another party tomorrow night, and don't want to be rushing around...

ANYWAY, it was really really good. I wasn't at all disappointed. It's about time Ms. Rowling released book 5 though, I'm a very impatient person me. This movie had me jumping though. Imagine! It had its scary moments. Like that damned snake. Those are the most vile creatures.

I'm going to study now, because I have been negecting my work for a while now. Essay time is approaching swiftly (why is time going so fast?) and have yet to begin any.

*The Princess marches fearlessly into her essay doom...*
posted by Tanisha Cross at 11:32 PM Comments []

Sunday, November 10, 2002

Class Trip

Our Visual Anthropology class went on a field trip the other day, to the Powell-Cotton museum. It's got one of the largest stores of anial specimen from Africa. This an, Powell-Cotton killed several thousand animals in the 25 years he spent tin Africa. Not to mention the masses of 'tribal goods' he brought over too. This has got too be onne of the most revolting places I've ever been to. I was even more disgusted by the tour guide - dude has a serious higher-than-thou issue. It's one of those traits some British develop that makes me sick. He mmade comments like 'I know I'm talking about things you are too young to understand'... 'only professionals like myself would understand'... etc etc.

The highlight of the trip was when we went into the stores. There were skeletons of hundreds (I'm serious, HUNDREDS) of animals, some cleaned, and some not cleaned. There were aniimal skiinsn everywhere, there were jars of preserved animals (including a monkey foetus). These things don't realy bother me, but it was so much. There were way too many animals there. The idea that this rich British man decided he was bored with intellectualism so he would travel the world and hunt for fun makes me ill. Our guide was trying to justify it by saying that he only did this so we could study the animal kingdom - but whats the point of knowing everything about a species if it's extinct? There were stuffed displays of endangered and extinct animals in there. There were skins of snakes that would get people locked up for possessing.

But I have to say that the worst part was in the email our dear tour guide sent us. Yeah, some of us made faces when shown what was in the stores (didn't help that the place stank) I mean most would when shown a 12-inch bull frog in a jar. So this is what he sends our professor - a few were finding the whole concept of killing animals for conservation a bit of a strain - mostly the younger girls who - from experience - cant rationalise the emotional reaction.

Is that so? You tell me how shooting all zebra in sight is conservation, how having the carcasses of endangered ones is a good thing. You can't make a carcass reproduce, whatever info you get from the DNA, even tho I can see how it can help with whatever is left. Tell me how, if conserving is the aim, it makes sense to boast of having the 400lbs tusks of one of the largest elephants ever hunted, when it is known that it is almost impossible to ever find tusks over 100, 200lbs max? They should be boasting of having the largest elephant alive in a reservation, so they won't keep shrinking in size.

These people are bogus. Sorry if I bored anyone with this, but these things get me so mad. And then dude has the audacity to turn around and talk about young GIRLS (making us sound like 12) who 'can't rationalise the emotional reaction'. 'From experience'. I hate nothing more than bigotry. But I won't let this get to me. Besides there are so many people trying to make up for the daage caused by people like Powell-Cotton.

Meanwhile, I have a dinner party to go to now.

*The Princess makes it a point to enjoy life, cuz there are some strange motherf***ers out there...*

posted by Tanisha Cross at 5:03 PM Comments []