In a Village of 100

Term two of semester two is nearly finished. My last project for civics has been handed in, and by the end of the week the class will turn into careers.
As I was cleaning out the subject's binder I came across a paper that I really had to share with you all:

If we could shrink the earth's population to a villiage of 100 people, with all the existing human ratios remaining the same it would look something like this:
There would be:
57 Asians
21 Europeans
14 from the Western Hemisphere (both North and South)
8 Africans
52 would be female
48 would be male
70 would be non-white
30 would be white
70 would be non-Christian
30 would be Christian
89 would be heterosexual
11 would be homosexual
6 would posess 59% of the entire village's wealth
80 would live in substandart housing
70 would be unable to read
50 would suffer from malnutrition
1 would be near death
1 would be near birth
1 would have an education
1 would own a computer

-Em

Eco-Note: Turn the tap OFF when you brush your teeth!
When a faucet is left running for a minute it usually produces six litres of water.
According to We Are What we Do this means that the average family wastes 35,000 litres of water per year, and that your street could fill an Olympic sized swimming pool annually!

Anti-Niqab Law

Tomorrow a new law comes into effect in France banning Muslim women for covering their faces on the street, public transportation and in government buildings. I have been told that Muslim women wear the Niqab because then men cannot judge them on their looks. All they can see are their eyes and the rest is hidden, I've been told that their families don't force them into wearing Niqabs.Some women say they wearing the Niqab is liberating they know they won't be judged on their looks. The only thing these women can be judged on is their personality and the sound of their voices. Its kind of beautiful if you think about it.  France is making it clear that this isn’t prejudice against the Islam religion but many people are unconvinced. The fear is women will refused to stop wearing them and then will be arrested and will create more problems. Only time will tell what happen hopefully this law goes smoothly.

-D

Not your average car wash

I absolutely adore car washes. I mean those flappy rubber things are always terribly exciting, but I love all the water making water falls down the car's windows. However this makes it pretty hard to see, and is quite dangerous in real driving conditions. Now only imagine if the water were sand and you were on the freeway...
A freak sandstorm killed eight drivers and injured 130 people yesterday on an eastern Germany freeway. Due to lack of visibility in both directions, over eighty vehicles crashed with one another, and were later set on fire after chemicals on one truck created a spark. Currently tewnty one people are still in hospital, some with quire serious conditions, but all are hoped to make a full recovery.
-Em

Eco-Note of the day: When you do need to wash your car go through a car wash!
Washing your car by hand in your driveway, or in a coin-wash station uses a lot more water and energy!

And the Quakes Continue...

Yet another earthquake shook northeast Japan today, adding to the current havoc.
This quake was reported to have a 7.4 magnitude, which is the largest aftershock thus far. This caused a power outage in certain regions, and also lead to a tsunami warning (although this was lifted later on in the day.) No further damage to the Fukushima nuclear power plant has been discovered, but the reactors are all being monitored greatly. Injuries have been reported this far, but no deaths thankfully.
-Em

Eco-Note of the day: only fill your kettle with the water you need. If everyone did this we could save enough electricity to run ALL the street lighting in the entire country.

Harper is the new bieber

Stephan Harper is the new or should I say old Justin Bieber.Harper song Imagine by the Beatles as a duet with YouTube star Maria Aragon. Harper has been talking about trying to get the women’s vote and I think he’s found his angle. I got to say singing for a video that he new would be everywhere wasn’t exactly what I thought he would do for the women’s vote. I got to say watching the video made me think are people going to loose respect for him and not take him seriously? To be straight with you it had the opposite effect on me I mean how many politicians would risk embarrassing them selves like that. I don't know about the rest of the world but the video made me laugh, made Stephan Harper more likeable and made him seem real. I personally think it was a success for his campaign it at least got me to like him more, except for the fact that I can't vote it was a success. Props to the people who do his publicity if it was their idea it a good one. My favorite part of this was Harper looking good without acting like a petty teenager whose bashes opposing part leaders.

-D

Where's Weiwei?

In art class today we finished up our clay gargoyles and handed in previous projects. We planned our next assignment, we talked about new techniques, and missing artists.
Ai Weiwei is an internationally acclaimed Chinese artist, who is best known as a designer of the Bird's Nest Stadium of the Beijing 2008 Summer Olympic Games. Lately however, he has been known for his critique of the Chinese government.
This past Sunday morning when trying to board a plane at a Beijing airport, he was stopped and taken away in police custody. Not only has his affiliates been called for questioning, but computers, documents, disks and hard drives have also been seized from his studio within the past few days. Weiwei is still currently detained, but no specific information regarding where or why have been released.
-Em 

Eco-Note- I'm really hoping that by now a bunch of you have tried to cut back on your plastic water bottle intake in order to switch to a more environmentally friendly canteen, right? (YES, is the answer I'm looking for...) Well what if we apply this to juice boxes and pop too? To minimize the need for waste, we can put our juices for lunch in water bottles for our lunch bags, this way we can buy in bulk to minimize packaging materials!

Volunteer

Today I went to a volunteer appreciation banquet for PLASP and after school daycare program were I am a volunteer. Mayor of Mississauga Hazel McCallion and head of Free the Children Craig Kielburger gave speeches about the importance of volunteering in and out of our communities. I found it very inspiring and decided to write a post to inform you on how you can get involved. First you can ask your friends, family or your school. You can go on to your cities/communities website to find if there are any volunteer spots needed to be filled or you can go to public places like your library or recreational centre. If you live near a park or March there is probably an annual cleanup, which is a great way to get your hours, be good to our environment and make your community more beautiful (if you live near the Rattray marsh in Mississauga Ontario our cleanup is this Saturday). There are even trips to other countries were you can build schools, parks medical centers and much more. You can go to places like Kenya, India and Ecuador and volunteer with organizations like hero holiday and Free the Children. Whether your helping a child find the library book their looking for or handing out shoes to children in a developing country your still making a difference as a volunteer.