Where I Am From - Spoken Word Poem

Where I am from I see clear skies and flowing water,
Where I am from I see people having fun everywhere,
Where I am from I taste fresh tropical flavours and different kinds of spices,
Where I am from I taste the smoky food cooked by the barbecue,
Where I am from I feel happiness and sadness around me,
Where I am from I hear laughter and joy from friends and family,
Where I am from I hear the shouting of playful children,
Where I am from I smell roasting chicken and chocolate biscuits,
Where I am from I smell fresh spices and delicious sausage sizzles,
Where I am from I touch soft grass and freezing waves,
Where I am from I touch the green grass as I lie down for a rest.

Barnyard Narrative

“Come here Vivienne and Osana quickly,” called out Tom to his small chubby dogs. Turning the corner he noticed something but couldn’t see because of the dark. “Come on girls lets go check that out,” “Wow an abandoned barn,” Tom sprinted to the door. “Errr,” went the door as he entered with the two dogs. All he could hear was footsteps but they had stopped.

”Ohhh freaky house” whispered Tom.  Getting closer and closer to the end of the hallway the debris got worse “Slam!!” “Woof Woof “screeched Vivienne as she was getting dragged into a room. “Vivienne NO!!!” Tom shouted with anger, “Osana come here,  Osana, OSANA!,”

Tom searched everywhere but had no luck, ”I wish I never came here” he sobbed, “Oww,” one of the dogs whined. Suddenly another thud, “Viv, Osana are you there,” silence filled the room as he headed towards a small door for him just to fit in. “Err, bang,” the door slammed behind him. He started to freak out as a weird sound was approaching him, “Arghh.”

To be continued........

Thanks to Ashleigh for helping me producing this narrative.

Year 7 and 8 Social

Getting ready for tonight I realised that I didn’t have anything to wear. Rushing to the computer to look for a costume to wear. “Aha that’s it.” The Theme was New Zealand olympic team (Black and white)

“Boom, boom, boom,” the music blared as I entered the hall. Lights flashing everywhere I saw Kingston dancing alone in the middle of the dance hall.

There was only three different competitions at the social Dougie, cat daddy and azonto. My favourite competition was Dougie. Mary, Rita, James and Nezinli were the final four. “Oh, oh,” Everyone was shouting as they were dougieing “And the winner is ..... Nezinli,” Mr Barks announced as the boys started screaming and shaking Nezinli around.

Finally everyone was saying as Selena said we could go and eat now. “Mmm..,” I said as I smelt the delicious smell of sausages. “Pick a drink any drink,” Mrs Lavakula said to us, everyone was coming in to have a good sausage sizzle.


“Ok guys this is the final song so everyone dance,” the DJ said. Everyone started dancing then all of a sudden the music stopped and I realized that the social was over. I was bummed that we couldn’t carry on. At the end of the night I was tired and I hope we can do this again.

Precious McKenzie

Precious McKenzie is a well known New Zealand weightlifter but he wasn’t originally from here. In 1936 in Red Cross hospital in Durban South Africa was where he was born. Unfortunately when he was born he had a chest condition. Luckily he survived it and that’s how he got his name ‘Precious One’.

In his early childhood his father Joseph was killed by a crocodile. After he had died his mother Christina started drinking heavily so Precious and his sister got put up to foster care. Life in foster care was horrible, where his foster mothers were evil and treated them very poorly. The foster mothers malnourished them and that caused their growth to stop at 4ft10.

Later on in life he had been practicing gymnastics and his dream was to be in the circus. He wanted to be in the circus but got turned down because they said his skin colour was wrong. When he got rejected by the circus he tried a different sport, which is weightlifting. McKenzie went to try out for the South African weightlifting team and sadly didn’t get selected for the team.

Precious McKenzie moved to England and he hoped that he didn’t get treated the same as he did in South Africa. Once he got settled in England he tried out for their Olympic weightlifting team, without a doubt he made it in the team.

After he competed in the olympics for England he got emigrated to New Zealand in 1970’s. He became very well known for weightlifting here in NZ because he won gold medals in the commonwealth games. Precious McKenzie still lives here in New Zealand and is aged 75.  

Brown Brother

Joshua Iosefo is a prefect at Mt Roskill Grammar. Recently the prefects at Mt Roskill had to prepare a speech to say in front of the school so Joshua decided instead of writing a speech he would write a poem. The name of the poem is “Brown Brother”. His friend Rashad recorded him while he was saying his speech and then he posted it up on youtube.

Joshua Iosefo’s poem “Brown Brother” is about not believing stereotypes. Stereotypes are labelling a whole group with a characteristic often negative. Some of the stereotypes are like how brown people can't get proper jobs because their not qualified enough or that they

When Joshua’s poem was posted on youtube Rashad (friend), his dad, and Joshua ended up being on campbell live. When he was on live television he got the opportunity to recite his poem “Brown Brother”. I think the message in the poem is that you should never underestimate yourself and that be who you want to be.

Precious McKenzie

Precious McKenzie, the weightlifter, was preparing himself mentally for the final lift. The weight of the bar showed no mercy and bought tension to his body. As his muscles grew taut his veins were bulging. He was struggling to continue. Reaching towards the end he was determined to succeed.


Mino and Sylvia helped me produce these few sentences.

Kiwi Kick

The sky was dim, the air was cold and goose bumps started to appear on my arms. I stood in line waiting anxiously. “Finally,” I said as we arrived. Siting down our instructors Sandwich and Mike started to tell us about Kiwi Kick.

First we played a game called continuous tag which is when everyone is in, so when someone tags you, you have to bob down and wait to they get tagged so you can stand up again. If you both tag each other at the same time you have to play rock, paper, scissors and who ever lost had to sit down and wait.

The first skill we learnt was how to Drop Punt. They told us some phrases to help us get a better idea on how to drop punt. One of the phrases was laces away from faces. My partner was Vivienne. Then we learnt how to hand pass for this skill my partner was Mubasshira. What we did with this skill was we played a game where we had to try and hand pass through your partner's legs.
Next we learnt how to mark, marking in Kiwi Kick is when someone drop punts to you really high and you catch it then you get a free kick or pass. The first mark we learnt is called the chest mark, the chest mark is where you catch the ball in your chest area (my partner for these drills was Osana). Second was the high mark, high marking is when you catch the ball over your head. Last but not least my favourite mark of all is the speci mark, the speci mark is when you jump off one leg for the catch.
I have really been enjoying the past few sessions of Kiwi Kick lately because I have not only been learning a new sport but I have also been having lots and lots of fun learning it. I like to say a huge thank you to our tutor’s Sam, aka Samwich, Anita, Mike, aka Micky and Charlie that have been teaching us how to play Kiwi Kick, choice guys.




Web site of picture: http://www.google.co.nz/imgres?hl=en&safe=active&as_st=y&biw=1024&bih=460&tbs=sur:f&tbm=isch&tbnid=dEfaaQ9odY_VyM:&imgrefurl=http://www.fotopedia.com/items/7h2bn07bt31ib-kbNcKD5Pui4&docid=W4qXXm2nIwyDfM&imgurl=http://images.cdn.fotopedia.com/7h2bn07bt31ib-kbNcKD5Pui4-hd.jpg&w=1272&h=847&ei=Mt3GT73bGOaciAfh9fSWCg&zoom=1&iact=hc&vpx=67&vpy=149&dur=1078&hovh=183&hovw=275&tx=186&ty=93&sig=112085664380859194917&page=1&tbnh=96&tbnw=128&start=0&ndsp=13&ved=1t:429,r:0,s:0,i:77

'Weeping Woman' and 'Woman With A Hat'

Henri Matisse’s style of art was Fauvism, Fauvism is non-naturalistic colors. Pablo Picasso’s art of style was Cubism, Cubism is about different perspectives, Picasso did not only used Cubism he used much more styles of painting.

The same thing about these paintings are that they are both portraits of women and they both look unhappy, however their themes are very different. Henri Matisse’s painting ‘Woman with a Hat’ is a portrait of his wife. Pablo Picasso’s painting ‘Weeping Woman’ is about a lady suffering from the 1950’s war.

Pablo Picasso’s painting ‘Weeping Woman’ is made of different shades of yellow. While Henri Matisse’s painting ‘Woman with a hat’ is made of a multitude of colours and shading with them. The medium for Picasso’s painting is oil Matisse is the same type of medium as Picasso’s.

Both Henri and Pablo used bold lines in their paintings but Henri mostly had light lines around the face area. Pablo has only used sharp straight lines and shapes except for some curves on the fingers. While Henri’s lines and shapes are curved and bumpy. Pablo’s painting had lots of different perspectives while Henri’s painting has only one perspective which is the front part of the body.

I think their paintings are excellent and that they are both fantastic artists and will live on forever through their amazing talent. Rest in peace Henri Matisse and Pablo Picasso.

Daniella Hulme's Journey

When Daniella was in her teenage years in Holland, she wanted to become an artist, but her parents were not supportive of her dream job. They held traditional views about what career pathway was appropriate for her. So she was a nurse for a couple of years instead.

Daniella met her future husband through nursing and emigrated to NZ. She got married and had children. Daniella’s husband supported her dream of being an artist so he got her into an art class to learn how to paint. It was through these art classes that she learnt the techniques of painting with oil. She liked the texture and the smell of the paint and how it gave her more time to work on her depth of colour.

Daniella's work is inspired by her husband's culture (Samoan) so the theme for the majority of her paintings are the pacific. She uses vibrant colours in her paintings because she likes to cheer people up and give people a sense of well-being.


I worked with Mino to Produce these paragraphs

Vincent Van Gogh Starry Night

Vincent Van Gogh painted the Starry Night in the year 1889. His technique was to paint with short bold strokes. This texture made his paintings stand out,  look effective and create a sense of movement. Often the colours he used were vibrant which made it more exciting to look at.

Bibliography

Starry Nights Picture site: http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/thumb/e/ea/Van_Gogh_-_Starry_Night_-_Google_Art_Project.jpg/300px-Van_Gogh_-_Starry_Night_-_Google_Art_Project.jpg

Jarna, Mino, Sylvia Show Not Tell

Tears of misery ran down her rosy red cheeks. Hunched over, her tears dropped to the ground like rain from the sky. As she blew her nose her sister was looking at her, but her hair hid her face.

Cyber Smart

At first Matty thought it was a good idea to post that picture, “It’s ok my settings are on private and only my friends can see it,” she had thought to her self. But the next day, unbeknownst to her, lots of different people had got hold of her picture. She was feeling disturbed by it,”How did this happen,” she cringed in shame.

On that same day Matty had tried to remove her picture but it had just reappeared again. After trying and trying to take it off it was futile so she gave up, she had no more control over it.

Cyber Saftey

It is important that you think before you post otherwise there will be serious ramifications. Do not flippantly put pictures or post things online.

If you put inappropriate pictures online, and you think the settings are on ‘only friends’, what you thought was private ends up public.

How might this happen? Someone you thought was your friend had taken a screen shot of your picture and shared it to the whole wide world.