Today is a day of reflection. It has been a tough few days, and your homesickness and the reality of your situation is starting to sink in. Consider Cristina’s situation described in her blog (http://cristinamillan.blog.com/2006/10/) when living in the extreme conditions of Antarctica, and consider how she writes about her experience. Also, consider the kind of memories that come to Ralph’s mind throughout chapter 5.

Each member of the island must write a “reflection” or “blog entry” about their experience so far. Remember, you must pretend you are on this island, so write about the island not the wiki. The entries must be two paragraphs long (7-9 sentences). At the top of your paragraphs, include your name. You must also answer the following questions within your paragraphs:

What kinds of foods do you miss? What do you miss from your room? Anything else you took for granted that you now lack?

What is it like working with people you don’t know that well? When has order broken down?

What kind of issues have you had to resolve as group and individually?

What happened to the people who got sick/hurt? Did you get sick/hurt?

Do you think you will be rescued? Why or why not?

How do you entertain yourself/yourselves in times of boredom?

Section [04] Members

Stephanie:

     The last few days have been pretty tough for me. I am starting to miss my friends, my house, and technology. I cannot believe that I have gone four days without cell phone and internet reception. I really miss eating pizza because all we eat is fruit and the occasional wild boar. I miss my bed the most out of all of the things in my room. I definitely took my microwave for granted when I was at home. It was so easy to make meals, and now without a microwave, I have no idea how to cook. I also took my shower for granted. Bathing in the stream does not make me feel clean. It is difficult working with people who I do not know very well, but I am getting to know them and it is becoming easier.  We had trouble choosing a leader for our group. We finally decided on one, but it was a long process, and a lot of people got upset and irritable.  In times of boredom I like to play games in the sand, such as checkers and tic-tac-toe, with my other group members. We use a stick to draw a tic-tac-toe or checkers board in the sand. Then we use rocks as checkers or just write X’s and O’s in the sand. Also, I like to make mosaics in the sand on the beach out of rocks. My creations have not been fantastic so far, but it is a fun way to pass the time.

     Yesterday, our group had a problem with the other inhabitants of the island. The tribe kidnapped some of our group members and we had to liberate them by communicating with the people in the other tribe. We used sticks and drew pictures in the dirt to explain what we wanted, and we brought an offering of a wild boar. The tribe took offense to our actions, and they gave back our group members, but decided that they will steal out food. We solved this problem by hiding our food and leaving out our leftovers for the other tribe to steal.  Personally, I have had trouble adapting to the climate here. It is very hot, and unlike at home, I cannot escape to air conditioning. I am resolving this issue by using palm tree leaves to fan myself and bathing in the stream, when the heat get’s unbearable. Neither I, nor any of my group members have gotten hurt or sick. If someone were to get hurt, we would use materials in the first aid kit to help them. I still hold onto the optimistic hope that we will be rescued soon, but my confidence is beginning to lessen. We have a signal fire to attract attention to the island from passing ships, but since there are other inhabitants on our island, I think that if a passing ship saw smoke, they would not suspect anything out of the ordinary. Being on this island is very challenging. I hope that we are rescued soon.

Erin:

We have spent four days on this island and already I miss the conveniences of home.  I miss being able to go to my pantry and just grab a pop tart, rather than fighting with other islanders of both my own and other communities for food.  We have already been raided by a neighboring village and they not only took food but kidnapped some of the members of our tribe.  I am afraid of these uncivilized islanders, who are so unfamiliar to us.  There are so few people that I know and trust.  I find little comfort in our tribe.  Not only do I miss the safety and food of my former home, but I miss the cleanliness of civilization.  Our shelters are made of mud and other materials.  That in itself provides little room for the sanitary hygiene I was so accustomed to.  I miss clean clothes, clean beds and most of all, sanitary indoor plumbing.  Our diet of fruits and boar, prepared in barbaric ways, is so unfamiliar to us that it is difficult not to get sick.  Even though we have only spent four days on this island it feels like it has been a month.

I hope that we will be rescued, but if I look at our situation realistically, I see the folly in the idea of someone finding this remote island.  All I can do is hope that someone discovers us so we do not have to endure much more of this primitive life.  Its times like this when I look to the other island members to distract me from such dreary thoughts.  We play games like tic tac toe in the dirt with sticks, and we draw pictures in the mud.  We have even developed some of our own games.  Mostly though we focus on keeping the island running smoothly, and we pray that we are found.

Nicholas:

                It’s my fourth day on this miserable island, and I am getting more homesick each day. I miss all the modern conveniences of today’s world... my wii system, my computer, my TV, and most of all my comfortable bed and pillows! The fruit here has been…fine…, to say the least, but I crave for junk food…… french fries, hamburgers, ice cream, and candy. The people in our group have been arguing constantly for the past few days, especially over our leader.  Some people, myself included, have been trying to be reasonable with each other’s attitudes and opinions as well as trying to solve all emerging conflicts but our attempt to maintain an apollonian society is not succeeding.  We have also been having trouble with the local island people living on the other side of the island. They have been stealing our meager food, and kidnapping my fellow castaways. We have negotiated with them, and even though they freed our people, they have continued to steal our food. Fortunately for us, they do not know that what they were stealing were rotten, leftover food. 

                For anyone living in this kind of insect and vermin-infested forest environment, and eating usually nothing but fruit, we have been remarkably healthy. Nobody in our group has been badly injured or has gotten really sick. Nonetheless, I actually still have high hopes of getting rescued. We have a signal fire going on and if a ship or plane gets near enough to the island, we could signal them using the mirror. But waiting to be rescued is frustrating and quite boring. We usually entertain ourselves by playing on the beach, making sand castles, swimming, and exploring the island. We play make shift games such as tic-tac-toe on the sand or soccer using a coconut or a piece of fruit as the ball and the trees as the goals. It actually made us more imaginative and inventive with our skills!!

Edward Wroten

We have been on this island for a pretty long time. Being stuck here has not been as intense as they make it seems in movies, we have not encountered any giant spiders or corrupt dinosaurs. One problem that we have had is the presence of a cannibalistic bystander. It began when they started taking our food, and then they took kidnapped some of members of our group, so we had to make so many sacrifices. But now we have not had too many problems other than fighting in the group. We had lots of troubles trying to choose a leader, but it all worked out in the end. I am really missing fried foods and Chinese food a lot. I can’t stop thinking about my family and my room, mostly my bed and my chair that my mom bought me before I left. I also had to spend my birthday on this island. It was nice cause I was with my friends but I really missed my family. The food on the island is really bad; I have had to eat fruits and anything else I can find. I wish I could watch TV and just relax at home, but it does not look like this will be happening soon.

The food incident started when we found food missing. We knew that there were people on the island so we assumed that they were taking our food. Then some of our people were taking captive and we figured out that the other people were kidnapping our friends. So then we decided to confront them and take our food back and stop them from taking it.  So we first drew pictures in the sand so we could communicate them, and if that did not work we would give them a pig in exchange. Finally they were returned and we placed guard’s in front of our food. We also had some disputes choosing a leader, but finally we came to a conclusion. While we were choosing though many people were being a little rood without realizing it but it all worked out and our disputes were solved. It has been a long few days but no matter what we have pretty much stuck together even though we have had some hard times.

Section [06] Members

                Chris:

I have been on an island for a few days and it’s pretty tough.  I am starting to miss some of the everyday things I was used to.  I miss my house which is much better than the shelters that we have made on the island. I miss all the junk that I ate at home, like French fries and pancakes.  I miss having a bed because sleeping on sand is annoying and I miss my iPod because now when I am bored I have almost nothing to do.  Working with people I haven’t met before is hard because sometimes it is hard to communicate with them. Sometimes we have disagreements, like about who was going to be leader, since we both do not know who would make a better leader because we do not know each other.

                We have run into trouble because there are other people on the island. They steal the food we collect. We have sent people to watch them and we found something horrible, they practice human sacrifice. They are also cannibalistic, but luckily we managed to get our members back.  I think that we will be rescued if we work harder to make ourselves notice. But sometimes there is nothing to do but wait, in these times I try to fix shelters or gather fire wood. I hope help comes soon.

     It’s been four days since we landed on the island, and it hasn’t been easy.  While some of the others may have enjoyed the freedom from adults, I have seen no joy in this experience at all.  Having to eat only pigs and leaves that I don’t know whether they are safe is very difficult.  I wish I could have any type of regular meal, whether it is a burger or just a salad, but I know this is not going to happen, so there is now point in worrying anymore about it.  At first I wanted to know what was going on outside, but then I realized in order to survive I had to focus on the island.  It’s near impossible to work with people I don’t know, especially in an extremely stressful environment.   People constantly lose their temper and freak out.  We have had to overcome many tasks such as building shelters and finding food.  Some days I wonder how we will survive to the next day.

                When we landed, we saw smoke from the far side.  When we went over to investigate, we found other huts.  We were fearful of them, so we returned to the plane.  The night after that, the other tribe came to our makeshift camp and stole our food.  The day after we sent spies who were captured.  They were safe and survived.  We hope that we will be rescued, although every day we lose more hope.  We have seen no sign of a plane of boat.  There is nothing to entertain myself with so I try to be as productive as I can for the tribe.  Living on this island has been the hardest experience on my life.

Kevin Werner

Section [9] Members

Zach Gates:

Being stranded on this island has been a tough time for me and the other members.  Nothing is the same as it was at home, I miss my bed and room and being inside a house.  The shelters we built are enough for survival but I would prefer my house.  I now realize how much I took for granted at home such as my laptop, cell phone and my iPod.  The food we have here is not very appetizing, I miss the southern foods my family cooked and having hamburgers for dinner.  At first it was very hard for everyone to communicate properly and be able to work things together.  Our most recent issue was deciding who the leader should be.  There was much arguing and tension between certain others but eventually we all made a decision and have begun to work with each other more efficiently than before.     

On one occasion our food and a couple of members from our group were stolen by the inhabitants that we were unaware of before.  We needed to make a decision on how to rescue the others and also how to take back what was ours.  No one in our group has become sick or felt ill.  At nighttime we try to keep ourselves busy by playing games or telling stories about each other’s lives and where they once lived.  This helps us become closer and trust each other more.  I have a lot of confidence in us being rescued because we are becoming stronger and learning how to survive on the island.  I know that we will be found one day and be able to go back to our homes and we all will be stronger people from this experience. 

Jessie Brown

I think it is interesting working with people that I don’t know because while working we get to know each other.  Order broke down when were voting for the leaders because everyone on the island could not agree on who should be our chief.  We had some issues with choosing the leader but we resolved it after a couple of days by choosing Zach as our leader.  Our food was also stolen by the other inhabitants on the island and so now we are striving to get food.  I am still trying to resolve my issue of being away from home.  It is very tough being away from my friends and family and not knowing if I will ever see them again because I miss them very much.  Thankfully, no one in our group got hurt or sick.  However, some people in our group did get captured by the other inhabitants on the island and the remaining people in our group don’t know if we are going to see them again soon, or never see them at all. 

            I don’t know if we will be rescued.  I think with our luck on this island, it would take a very big miracle that we will get rescued.  Our island might be near a well- populated area, either an island or country, although they still might not find us.  Our island is also small so our island is probably not well- known.  I entertain myself on the island by exploring the island.  I like to go around looking for food and I also like to know the layout of the island so that it’s easier to get around, especially in the dark.  I also like to get to know the other people in my group because we might be together for a long time and I think it’s better to actually know the people I am with.  Living on this island is a big change from living back at home but I think I am adjusting to it pretty well and hopefully I will be home soon.

---

Ahmun:

     These last four days have been interesting, and upsetting. For me especially, adjusting diets has been tough. I miss my steak, bread co bagels, toasted ravioli, and chicken noodle soup. I think I’ve lost about 5 pounds already just from not eating enough. However, I really love all of these exotic fruits. For the most part, working with the other members has been manageable. It gets a little crazy sometimes, but we get through it. We all are going through this together, so we need to stick together.  We have had one major group issue so far; we couldn’t decide on a leader! Zach and Arun both wanted to be leader, and for a few days we were leader-less. Eventually, we took a vote and picked Zach. A major issue we went through involved the ‘others’ stealing our food! We sent in spies, but they were abducted. Eventually we got them back, and luckily none of them were hurt. In fact, no one has gotten hurt or been sick yet!

     These last four days have been really busy and I haven’t had much time to myself. When I do have alone time though, I usually lie in the sand and think. I also daydream, draw pictures in the sand, and I nap. Being on this island really made me realize how electronically dependent I am. I’ve never gone this long without my cell phone and it’s been pretty tough. Other than my family and friends, my cell phone is what I miss most. I always took it for granted, but now I don’t have it and it sucks really bad! I want to go home SOO badly. It kills me to say this, but I don’t think we’re going to be rescued. I know I should keep a positive outlook, but we’re on some random island that’s probably like 1 million miles away from home. There might be other people living here, but still… I doubt this place is on a map. The chance of people coming to look for us, here of all places, seems low. I really wish I could be more positive, like the other members, but I just can’t. I just want to go home so bad!

-Hannah Akre-

When we were first stranded on this island, we all thought it was going to be just like one big camp out.  Surviving on this island has proven to be much tougher than any of us expected.  Having to overcome problems with people I have never met before this was tough at first.  We all had to learn how to get along.  After the first a while we all bonded and finally agreed on a leader.  Order broke down somewhat on our island when we were debating between two people to be our leader.  We needed a leader to help us because we had just figured out that there were other inhabitants on our island.  The Others on the island were steeling our food and at one point they kidnapped two members of our group.  We had to figure out how to negotiate with them because they did not speak our language.  This was the first time all of us came together to help each other.  After all of this we are much closer and will be able to resolve other problems with ease. 

Before I fall asleep some nights I find myself dreaming about home.  I think about my family and my pets.  I think about how fun it would be to have my dogs on the island.  I swear that I have heard dogs barking on the island but everyone says that I am dreaming.  I miss ramen noodles and my mom’s dinners the most.  The food we eat here isn’t horrible, but I would love a home cooked meal.  Some days when I’m bored I find myself watching the tide go in and out for hours.  Also when we have nothing to do we will all go climb this one really huge tree.  I think we will get rescued sooner or later, and until then I think our group will survive just fine. 

[Blog entries]