When people think about the Holocaust and Jewish refugees during WWII, they rarely think about Shanghai. For a long time, I didn’t even know Shanghai was open to Jewish refugees at that time. Recently, I watched the documentary Survival in Shanghai. That documentary featured many Holocaust survivors who told of their escape to Shanghai. When I watched it, I couldn’t help but think of the current Syrian refugee crisis, and how my country, the U.S., doesn’t allow many Syrian refugees to cross our borders. Like Shanghai did more than 80 years ago, the U.S. should help those people in need, even if we do have problems of our own. The Holocaust was one of the most horrific and notable genocides in history. It began when Adolf Hitler started to persecute Jews as a scapegoat for Germany’s financial problems. That persecution became widespread in 1933 when he rose to power in Nazi Germany. Jewish homes and businesses were smashed, and synagogues were burned. Many Jewish people were put in concentration camps, and were then killed in numerous ways, including starvation, gas chambers, and overwork. As a result, over 6 million Jews were killed in the Holocaust. As Jews tried to flee from Germany, they had no place to go, for not many countries wanted to rouse Germany. However, He Fengshan, a Chinese diplomat, issued Chinese visas to Jewish immigrants. The exact number of visas he issued is unknown, but he gave out twelve hundred over the first three months of his position, so the number is believed to be in tens of thousands. One must realize during that time, China had its own hardships to deal with. The Japanese, allied with the Germans in WWII, were occupying much of China, including Shanghai. Despite their own mistreatment, the Chinese pushed their misfortunes and grievances away in order to help others. They sacrificed money and time to help refugees settle in to their new homes. The Chinese opened their arms, and gave their kindness and food, even when they barely had enough food for their own families. “What impressed me most was the welcome we received,” said Jared Cohen, one of the Holocaust survivors. “…they accepted us, they were happy with us, and we were respected.” Willa Sassoon, another refugee, recalled her friendly neighbors, who invited her to their home every day to play with their daughter after school. “They more or less adopted me,” she said. Today, Syria is in the middle of a civil war. 13 million Syrians have lost their homes, and need a safe shelter. Since 2015, 18,000 Syrians received US visa. However, in 2017, the US president, Donald Trump, imposed a travel ban on six Muslim countries, including Syria. He said terrorists may be hidden in a crowd of Muslim immigrants. That ban stopped the flow of Muslim immigrants of many ethnicities. America, as a developed country, has more resources than most other countries, and should take the responsibilities to help others in need. Many Americans believe Syrians would commit crime, and would be a bad appendage to our society. However, that is not true. After the Syrian civil war broke out in 2011, ordinary people just like you and me, lost their homes overnight. Hardworking adults and innocent kids were placed in refugee camps. Men and women who could bring benefit to our society are refused by the US government a chance to rebuild their lives. A study on Syrian immigrants by the Washington Post shows that Syrian immigrants have been a “highly entrepreneurial group.” 11% of Syrian immigrants in the US are entrepreneurs, compared to 3% of the people born in the US. Also, according to the Center for American Progress, all immigrants in the US for less than ten years have an average annual income of $30,000, while recent Syrian immigrants earn average wages of $43,000 a year. One of the biggest fears Americans have about Syrian immigrants is terrorism. What if a terrorist sneaks into the US by pretending to be an immigrant? According to the Nation Institute and Center for Investigative Reporting, there have been about 90 deaths caused by Islamist terrorists in the US, from 2008-2016. That may be a lot, but in only 2016, there have been 37,461 deaths caused by cars in the US. Does that mean we should be afraid of cars, and ban them? No, we should use precautions to make our roads safer, educate drivers, and enforce driving laws. Similarly, instead of cutting off the flow of immigrants, we should enhance border control, intelligence work, and law enforcement to minimize terrorist attacks. In fact, even with the travel ban, terrorists may still come into our country illegally, so blocking immigrants is not an effective strategy. I live in an active Jewish community called Scarsdale, New York. At school, during the holidays, many people go around saying “Happy Hanukkah” instead of “Merry Christmas.” Many of my friends are Jewish, and they are so nice, dedicated to study, and kindhearted. I hate to imagine what would have happened to them had they been living in Nazi Germany. I would have definitely helped them, even if it meant endangering myself. To put them up for mistreatment and choose not to help would have made me hate myself for the rest of my life. The Jewish during the Holocaust and the Syrians today could be your neighbors, classmates or friends. They are just ordinary people like you and me. In summary, Americans should allow Syrian immigrants into our borders, like the people of Shanghai did for the Jews. We should look past stereotypes and fear of terrorism, and lend helping hands to less fortunate people. If the people of Shanghai were able to support Jewish immigrants on their meager resources, Americans should do so too.
Young Bloggers
How to Play Kabaddi: Part 2
Hello again! When I left off my last blog post (Kabaddi: Part 1), I had just finished explaining a bit about Kabbadi. Well, I’m back! In this blog we will cover how to score in Kabaddi, and how scoring is kept, as well as how to be a Kabaddi referee. Here we go! We left off with some special terms. Now, the following table shows the different ways to score. Kabaddi is a contact sport, however, you can’t just barge in like a rhino, or try to touch someone in haste, and get out; no, you have to be quick, like a ninja. Just a small touch counts! Toe Touch/Kick: Where you thrust your foot toward the defender and lightly brush him. A kick uses the entire foot, but they are practically the same. Hand Touch: When a raider lunges toward a defender and touches them with their hand. Escaping a Tackle: When the raider just drags the defender and touches the midline without losing their breath. You can make many combinations of these techniques like kicking a defender, using the same kick to get to the bonus line, get someone with a hand touch, and drag someone back to the midline. That would get you 4 points! Now, you will learn how to referee a Kabaddi game. Whenever someone scores, the ref must thrust their hand up in the air with the amount of points scored counted by the fingers. At the same time, they hold their other hand sideways and point it to the side of the team that scored, and then say how many points they scored, and say the team that scored. When the game ends, the ref must point both hands straight ahead and say, “match completed.” There are six officials: 1 Referee, 2 Umpires, 1 Scorer, and 2 Assistant Scorers. Duties of the Referee: -Take the toss. -Supervise the match. -Announces the score of each side before the last 5 minutes of the match. -Takes care of recording the time. -Warns about the time remaining at last 5 minutes of second half of the match. Duties of the two Umpires: -The Umpires conduct the match and give decisions according to the rules of the game. Duties of the Scorer: -Fills in the score sheet. -Announces the score with the permission of the referee at the end of each half. -Complete the score sheet in all respects and get it duly signed by the Umpires and Referee. Duties of the two Assistant Scorers: -Maintains record of the players who are out. -Sees that the players are seated in the order of being out. -Will help referee regarding any player who goes out of boundary. Just like in soccer, Kabaddi also had the warning card system. Here it is: -Green card: It is a warning sign. If a green card is given twice to a player or coach or manager twice, the next card shall be directly a yellow card. -Yellow card: That member is temporarily suspended for 2 minutes. If a yellow card is given twice to a player or coach or manager, the next card shall be directly a red card. -Red card: Suspension from match or debarred from tournament. Each team shall score one point for every opponent out or put out. The side which scores a special term shall score two extra points. The out and revival rule will be applicable. Each team shall score one point for every bonus point awarded. So, that’s it! I have shared with you all that I know about Kabaddi, and anything you would need to stage a Kabaddi game. Leave your thoughts in the comment section, and see you in October.
The Cold Winter
It is Saturday morning, and Nellie yawns as she wakes up from her bed. The air feels crisp and cold in her room. It hurts to breathe. Hopefully dad just turned off the heater last night, and can turn it back on again today. Last time, the power company shut off our heat, and it took a long time to get it turned back on. Those were very cold days. Quickly dressing in long pants, a warm shirt, sweater, and socks, Nellie walks down the short hallway from her bedroom to the living area. “Momma, why is it so cold?” Nellie asks her mom, who is sitting at the kitchen table. “Nellie, good, you’re bundled up. The power company turned off our heat. They turned the heat off for everyone on our block. I’ve been trying to figure out who still has heat at the Rosebud Reservation all morning. I haven’t found anyone yet.” Nellie is cold all weekend, and worried. Its November, and the weather is only going to get worse in South Dakota. Would everyone on the entire Rosebud Native American Reservation freeze to death this winter? The power company turned off power for over 100 houses on the Rosebud Reservation, and they won’t turn it back on until all bills are completely paid off. With no jobs, and no extra money, Nellie didn’t know what her family would do. Nellie is always excited for school on Monday morning because her teacher, Ms. Smith, is so smart and inspiring, and really seems to care about her students. “Good morning class!” sings Ms. Smith as they get seated. “Good morning Ms. Smith!” the class sings back. The students all look around and seem relieved. Ms. Smith asks the class, “Did anything exciting happen this weekend?” Nobody speaks. Ms. Smith asks again, “Nothing? Nothing interesting happened this weekend? If not, then let’s get started on our math lesson.” Nellie cautiously raises her hand, “Excuse me, Ms. Smith?” “Yes Nellie. Did something interesting happen this weekend?” “Ms. Smith, they turned the heat off again.” Ms. Smith looked confused. “What do you mean, Nellie? The heat is on, thankfully. It’s going to be cold today!” “No, Ms. Smith. The power company turned off our heat at home. They won’t turn it back on until we pay off our bill.” Ms. Smith replied, “Oh. Nellie, I’m sorry to hear that. Let’s talk about it after class.” “Ms. Smith? It’s not just at my house.” “Oh? What do you mean?” asked Ms. Smith. Nellie said quietly, “They turned off the power at all of our houses.” Nellie’s classmates all started talking excitedly amongst themselves. They all confirmed that they’ve been without heat since Friday, and that they all got the same message from the power company. They wouldn’t get any power again until they paid their bills in full. Ms. Victoria Smith watched her students talk about the power company, the lack of heat, and the coming winter. She needed to get to a quiet place so she could think of a way to help these children, but that couldn’t happen until school let out. She needed to get through today’s lessons first, and then she would try to think of a solution. “OK kids. We will try to figure out what to do about the heat problem later. For now, let’s enjoy the heat in the classroom, and get started on our lessons. Today we are going to start with working on our multiplication table.” Victoria Smith is a young teacher at a school on the Rosebud Reservation. She is 26 years old, and recently graduated from Wellesley College near Boston, Massachusetts. Wellesley is a college for women, and it has a special motto, “Non Ministrari sed Ministrare.” That means, “Not to be ministered unto, but to minister.” Wellesley College’s goal is to educate women who will make a difference in the world. That’s why Victoria chose to become at teacher on the Rosebud Native American Reservation in South Dakota. Most of the families here live in poverty. They don’t have access to education, jobs, money, or anything else to help improve their lives. Victoria hoped she could make a difference for her students. Victoria had been thinking about her students’ power problem all day. She corrected assignments after school let out, and now she was reading through Facebook before bed. She enjoys keeping up with her friends on Facebook especially now that she’s living in South Dakota, far away from her friends and family. As Victoria read through some posts, she came across some Wellesley message boards. Suddenly, Victoria had an idea. Since Wellesley is known for women who make a difference, the Wellesley graduates are an unusually helpful group. Maybe they would like to help Victoria’s students get their heat back? It was worth a try. Victoria quickly posted a message of her own on a Wellesley Facebook message board explaining the problem, and asking for ideas. Then she turned her computer off, and went to sleep. Victoria woke up the next morning to her phone ringing loudly on her nightstand. She answered the phone, “Hello?” A voice replied, “VICTORIA. Its Keisha.” Keisha was Victoria’s roommate at Wellesley during her first year. “Hi Keisha! It’s so early here. Is everything ok? Keisha replied, “Have you checked Facebook this morning? A bunch of people responded to your post last night. You have hundreds of women asking if they can donate money to help your students!” “Really?” asked Victoria. “I’ll check it out right now!” The next few weeks are a whirlwind for Victoria, Nellie and the rest of the students. A handful of Wellesley graduates took charge of organizing payments from hundreds of other Wellesley graduates. Those women paid off the families’ power bills one by one. It was thousands of dollars, and it took a lot of their time. They had to get each account number, and the power company did not make the process easy, but they did it.
