Kii Yazhi

The culture conflicts that plague Alvord throughout her life start from the day she was born. She was literally born out of two worlds: her mother was white, while her father was a full-blooded Navajo. Her identity was “split in between cultures.” In Navajo she would be called an ‘alni meaning “a person who is half.” Her identity is very much affected by language so when she is labeled as an ‘alni and consequently accepted by neither whites nor Navajos. She was rarely invited to play with the Navajo girls her age and faced racial prejudice from non-Navajos. Early in life she learned, “to be Navajo meant to be downtrodden and broken, treated like a lesser human being by white people.” Unlike Richard Rodriguez who wished to be white, she was ashamed of her Caucasian maternity and longed to be a full-blooded Navajo.

In Sherman Alexie’s novel “The Absolutely True Diary of a Part-Time Indian” the narrator portrays both internal and external conflicts throughout his journey to success. Arnold Junior Spirit is a fourteen-year-old boy who believes that in order to pursue his dream he will have to choose between staying in his Spokane Indian reservation or moving out to an all-white school in the neighboring farm town. But things aren’t as easy as they seem when Junior tries moving schools because he know has to be part of two communities. Many conflicts form within the Spokane Indian reservation and the Spokane Indian reservation as well comes into conflict with the white community.

Purpose: Alexie highlights how he ultimately overcame the hardships suffered during his early years due to his Indian ethnicity and displays how Native Americans were, and continue, to suffer from discrimination.

Sherman Alexie, in “Indian Education” tells his experiences in school on the reservation. Some of his teachers did not treat him very good and did not try to understand him. In his ninth grade year he collapsed. A teacher assumed that he had been drinking just because he was Native American. The teacher said, “What’s that boy been drinking? I know all about these Indian kids. They start drinking real young.” Sherman Alexie didn’t listen to the negatives in school. He persevered and became valedictorian of his school.

Adjusting to another culture is a difficult concept, especially for children in their school classrooms. In Sherman Alexie’s, “Indian Education,” he discusses the different stages of a Native Americans childhood compared to his white counterparts. He is describing the schooling of a child, Victor, in an American Indian reservation, grade by grade. He uses a few different examples of satire and irony, in which could be viewed in completely different ways, expressing different feelings to the reader. Racism and bullying are both present throughout this essay between Indians and Americans. The Indian Americans have the stereotype of being unsuccessful and always being those that are left behind. Through Alexie’s negativity and humor in his

Education —an institution for success, opportunity, and progress — is itself steeped in racism. In Sherman Alexie’s short story “Indian Education” from his book The Longer Ranger and Tonto Fistfight in Heaven is set in two places, the Spokane Indian Reservation and a farm town nearby the reservation. The story is written in a list of formative events chronologize Victor’s youth by depicting the most potent moment from each year he is in school. Alexie addresses the issue of racism in education by examining examples of injustice and discrimination over twelve years in a boy’s life. Victor faces his initial injustice in first grade when he is bullied by bigger kids, but his understanding of injustice becomes much more complex in grades two through twelve as he experiences discrimination against his American Indian identity. Familial experiences of a Native woman, Alexie’s style and humor, and Victor’s awareness of discrimination from grade one to twelve all reveal the grim reality of growing up and being schooled on an American Indian reservation.

At the beginning of Alexie’s life teachers and classmates demonstrate the racism. Sherman Alexie’s classmates are the first example of racism, with racist nicknames and bullying that start the chain of hardship in his life. Alexie narrates, “I was always falling down; my Indian name was Junior Falls Down. Sometimes it was Bloody Nose or Steal-His-Lunch” (Alexie 3). This quote is important because it conveys the racism that Alexie’s see in the early parts of his life with racist nicknames and the bullying that is brought. One way that this quote is racist is that Alexie refers to these nicknames as “Indian names”. It also depicts the bullying that Alexie endured with getting his lunch stolen, getting bloody noses, and falling down. Although this is a minor plot point to the story, this sets the reader up for the more and more detailed hardships that racism brings. Another example of racism in Sherman Alexie’s life is his teacher who bullies him for no reason. She makes him stay in for recess, hold books for fifteen minutes, and force him to cut his braids, and on top of all that she uses a negative connotation when describing

"The end is near they feel it in their bones, it cuts in deep to the skin the cold metal is right there you hear a bang and the world goes dark and cold. They see it coming there's no escape now who will save their souls when all hope has left their bodies say goodbye and leave me with a story of heroes who were not to blame for what happened brothers sisters mother fathers hold hands and fall together now say your last goodbye it's not your fault but the end has come you will be remembered ."

Firstly, when Ned finally came home from the war, he was confronted by a man in a bar for overlooking a sign saying “NO NAVAJOS ALLOWED”. Despite his Marines uniform, he was still called a ‘stupid Navajo’. There

Growing up on a reservation where almost everyone has lost hope, Junior feels like an outcast for having a passion to chase after his dreams. When he moves to Reardan to find hope, he is gawked at and teased because he is the only Indian there. Junior faces internal conflicts within himself figuring out how to balance his two selves. According to Junior, “traveling between Reardan and Wellpinit, between the little white town and the reservation, [he] always felt like a stranger. [Junior] was half Indian in one place and half white in the other. It was like being Indian was [Junior’s] job, but it was only a part-time job. And it didn’t pay well at all” (Alexie 118). Junior is determined to discover his identity as it is evident in his choice of words. Feeling like a stranger wherever he goes, he believes that he is too white for the reservation while being too Indian for Reardan. The people on the reservation live in an atmosphere where they trust only each other and stick up for one another. However, when Junior goes to the reservation after being exposed to a community filled with white people, the Spokane’s do not see him as a true Indian anymore, hence the reason why Junior

If you were a Navajo boy, forced out of your own culture and made to live in the brutal world of white man's racial standards; could you survive that reality? The book code talker, written by Joseph Bruchac, biased on the historically fictionalized story of Neds Begay's life. Ned as a child, is herded into the extremely deprecative atmosphere, of boarding school. Ned, eventually goes on to fight for the same country that implemented him into the hardship he was forced to endure; at the same time making friends that would be so loyal as to sacrifice themselves for him. Ned’s friends talked to cheer each other up and be were always there for Ned or anyone else if things got tough for them. They would laugh, talk and overall have such a strong connection with each other that even if it was for a second Ned would forget

This draws a connection to the erasure of Native American culture in history, they are seen as rare and different from the ordinary, and for some people their existence is completely forgotten or denied. His own comments of not belonging at a white school, because of his nationality and family history further show the division of race that he can see at Reardan. Junior’s cursing accentuates how frustrated and pathetic he feels, viewed as less than everyone at his school, and constantly rejected and isolated by his white peers. The negative, demeaning mindset of those white kids is that Native Americans do not deserve anything from white people, not their time, attention, care, or even a proficient education. According to Jens Manuel Krogstad at Pew Research Center, Native Americans have the second highest high school dropout rate- eleven percent. This is very high, especially when compared to the white or Asian dropout rates- five and three percent, respectively. Additionally, it says Native Americans have the second lowest percentage of bachelor’s degrees, only seventeen percent, compared to the two highest, white and Asian, at thirty three and fifty percent (Krogstad). Many Native Americans today are not allowed a chance at education because of poverty at reservations, and lousy, penniless schools. These issues are not thought about or spoken of often, because they are simply not

In Alexie’s vignette, “Indian Education”, these themes of racism and discrimination come up very often when Victor describes the challenges he faced going through school. Victor recalls how his second-grade teacher made him “...stay in for recess for fourteen days straight.‘” (Alexie 172) but he explains that he didn’t do anything to deserve a punishment like this. In this situation, Victor’s teacher is denying him a privilege because of his race. In another circumstance, Victor’s teacher makes Victor apologize for “‘Everything’” (Alexie 172) she then makes Victor “...stand straight for fifteen minutes, eagle-armed with books in each hand.” (Alexie 172-173). During this situation, Victor is forced to perform a specific action as punishment for nothing, this unjust treatment of Victor sparks from the grounds of his race. Once again in second grade, Victor receives another chastisement out of the disapproval of his ethnicity when his teacher, “...crumpled up the paper and made me eat it.” (Alexie 173). Lastly, Victor’s teacher, not accepting Victor’s cultural differences, “She sent a letter home with me that told my parents to either cut my braids or keep me home from class.” (Alexie 173). Victor’s braids are symbols of his culture and ethnicity, and when Victor’s teacher threatens to take away his education if they are not removed, discrimination against Victor is very prominent.

Wagyu Yakiniku is a popular restaurant in Kanagawa that specializes in Japanese style grilled meats, where diners can create their own barbecued feast on their table grills. At Wagyu Yakiniku, you select the types of meats you would like and they are brought out to your table, freshly sliced by in-house butchers. Popular cuts of meat include the lean Wagyu beef, the pork ribs and Sakura beef tendon, all of which are accompanied by delicious sauces.

Due to Yugi exercising his nature of compassion, selflessness, and pacifism in the name of friendship throughout, he's made plenty of friends along his journey to find his partner's name and memories. Ever since he had put together his Millennium Puzzle, an Ancient Egyptian pendant housing the spirit of an amnesiac Pharaoh, and befriending said spirit, he's been eager to put his life aside to assist him. He's hardly petty or one to keep grudges, as he forgives easily no matter the crime, even if somebody has threatened his life or the lives of his friends. Yugi always sees the good in people, since his opponents certainly couldn't be that awful! Somewhat trusting to a fault and naïve at times, he's done some pretty dumb things such as hand over his Puzzle to a "fortune-teller" who ran off with it. Despite the smidgen of gullibility, he's very clever, especially when it comes to games. *********************************************. Board games, card games, video