"Hotel Rwanda" and "Imaculee"

1. I learned a lot about the Rwanda genocide from the experiences I had last week, by watching the movie and listening to Imaculee tell her story. Honestly, before last week I didn't even know that this had even happened in Rwanda. To start off, I learned from the movie that the genocide was in 1994, between the Tutsis and the Hutu, which were the two main ethnic groups of the country. It all started when the Rwandan president and the Hutu president of Burundi's plane was shot down in a plane crash. After the plane crashed, the Hutu extremists began brutally killing and murdering thousands of Tutsis people everyday. The reason why the Hutu extremistst were doing this is because they believed the Tutsis were the reason why the presidents had died.

Through Imaculee's story, I also learned a lot of information that I had not known before. Imaculee's story was very touching. She told us all how she had lived in a small bathroom which was three feet by four feet with a number of other woman, for a period of 91 days! Imaculee had to hide in the bathroom in fear of her dying from being killed by the Hutu people. She survived this tragic experience with little or no food each day, and actually taught herself how to speak english. There were several times when she was almost caught by the Hutu clan, but she managed to stick it out to the end. I will never forget Imaculee's story and how she lost all of her family members. Whenever I think I am having a bad day, I will just think of how much harder it is for Imaculee to continue living with all the hardships she has been through.

Finally, I also learned that through all of this genocide in Rwanda, 800,000 Tutsis people were killed, in the Hutu extremists wills to kill the entire Tutsis population. It is a very sad experience and I hope that nothing like this ever happens in the world again.

2. The real event I am going to tell you about is the 9/11 event. I received all sorts of media messages ranging from television broadcasts to news on the radio and newspapers. I think the most believable messages came from the newspapers, because they tried to give you the most update and truthful information. The most emotional media was definetely the television broadcasts while it was actually happening. It was a very tragic experience in the United States and it was hard for me and fellow citizens to watch the trade towers falling down and killing Americans because of terrorists. In addition, I also remember the television broadcasts the best because that was the first time I had heard about the incident, while sitting in my health class. I think by listening to people on t.v. was very hard because they often blew things out of proportion, while the newspapers wanted to give their audience the correct information, so it was easier to read.

3. I believe the director of a movie has a great responsibility when producing a film about events in history as well as events that are occuring everyday. I believe that directors often blow things out of proportion to make people want to see the movie or to sell it better, but I believe that isn't the best thing to do. Many Americans watch these films and think they know everything about the event after watching the film, but often alot of the film is just lies or dramatic effects. I believe we all have the right to see movies that tell the truth, so we can all be informed correctly about different interests. It is the director's responsibility to sell the movie and make people want to see it, but I also believe that it is the director's responsibility to tell everyone the truth.