Family

Family is the single most important thing in many people’s lives. From the moment of their birth, children rely on their families to provide for them and make sure their needs are attended to. The most important learning process of a person’s whole life takes place in their earliest years and their main teachers at this stage of their lives will be their parents.

The importance of family can be seen very clearly in the impact it has on people who are not fortunate enough to have a loving family during their childhood years. People who suffered abuse, neglect, or had one or both of their parents missing from their lives during their childhood usually suffer some negative effects throughout the rest of their lives. Children who were brought up badly are much more often to grow up to be criminals, drug addicts, or suffer from mental health problems. Even children brought up in good foster or care homes are more likely to have such issues than other children, suggesting that growing up with your biological or at certain cases adopted family is important.

Family is important as you get older because people of all ages need a good support network around them. Many people rely on their parents or other older relatives for advice about a variety of topics, even when they have grown up and have their own children, because these family members have more life experience and have probably been through many of the same things before. When a woman has her first child, for example, one of the most important people in her life is often her own mother. Many women want their mother to be present at the birth and be available for support, particularly during the first few weeks, because their mother has done it all before with them.

Another reason that family is important is that a loving and supportive family will be there for you no matter what. Friends may leave your side when things get very tough, or if you mess up and do something wrong or something to hurt them. Many families however, will stick by a person no matter what they have done, because they love them unconditionally. This kind of unconditional love can only be found within a family unit and is most commonly found from a parent to their child.

Siblings can also be very important to many people. Children growing up as an only child can be lonely during childhood and they don’t learn vital social skills from an early age, like communicating and playing with other children and dealing with conflict. Many people are very close to their brothers and sisters when they grow up, even if they fought as great deal as children, and there are lots of people who consider their brother or sister to be their best friend. Siblings are usually a fairly similar age and have had similar experiences, so if there is a difficult time as a family a sibling may be the best person to talk to.

Stress

Teenagers nowadays are going through a lot of stress. Stress is a body’s way of reacting to challenges. It has a wide range of effects on emotions, mood and behaviour. For example, the person may have chest pain, palpitations, rapid pulse, obsessive or compulsive behaviour, social withdrawal and isolation.  There are many factors that contribute to this problem such as family problems, school, relationships and also financial issues.

Divorced and broken families affect the children mentally even if the parents do not realize it. There will be constant arguments or even fights between family members. Some children may even have the thought that their parents argue and divorce because of them and often put the blame on themselves. This causes them to lose focus on their studies.

Other than that, school may also cause stress in teenagers. There are many cliques in schools nowadays, especially high schools and there are also many students that do not belong to any of them. They usually have the need in them to belong somewhere and they often have stress trying to make themselves fit in. Not only that, students also tends to compete with their classmates and compare their grades which may be a good thing to push them to do better but may not be a good thing also. This is because they will feel stressed even if they tried their best but did not meet their expectations.

The King of Fruits

One of the many things Malaysia is known for is the various kinds of food. Many tourists come from all around the world just to have that taste of Malaysian food.  Durian, the king of fruits is most sought after but there are many who think that it has a bad scent. Thus, dare not have a taste of it. The smell has been described variously as rotten onions, turpentine and raw sewage. Yes, it has a very strong smell but it is pleasing to some. It has a taste like creamy custard. The durian is a seasonal fruit, unlike some other non-seasonal tropical fruits such as the papaya, which are available throughout the year in Peninsular Malaysia. The season for durians is typically from June to August, which coincides with the season for mangosteen, another fruit that compliments durian.  Prices of durians are relatively high as the demand for it is also very high. It varies with the species and different grades. This very fruit can be eaten by itself when it is ripped or it can also be used in desserts such as ice creams, cakes, puffs, dodol and cendol. These are just a few examples out of many. Durian is indeed a pride to Malaysia.

Freedom Writers

The movie "Freedom Writers" is based on a true story about a young teacher who goes above and beyond her call of duty to motivate her students to learn and excel in a society filled with prejudices. Erin Gruwell is the new English teacher at a recently integrated high school in Long Beach, California. Her students are divided along racial lines and have few aspirations beyond basic survival. Surviving to the age of eighteen is seen as an accomplishment in a society filled with gangs and racial prejudices. When she discovers how much of her students’ day to day lives are engulfed by racial prejudices she introduces them to books like the Diary of Anne Frank. Using the story of Anne Frank, she opens her students’ eyes. She encourages her students to start a journal, like Anne, and to write in it their innermost thoughts. After sharing these stories with each other, the students learn more about their classmates and the racial barriers begin to reduce.

The “Freedom Writers” also shows strong stereotypes within the minority community in the USA, which included African American, Latino, Cambodian, Vietnamese and Caucasian. They belonged to a segregated community. Therefore the issues that affect them the most include racism, violence, crimes, discrimination and drugs. The negative perceptions that surrounded the school environment triggered resentments and acts of violence. The students fate was changed after the arrival of the new teacher who advocated to change what the students believed.