NND1D Spring 2016.CamS

The first story “A City Too Hot to Bother With a Hero” felt at times a bit too flighty with the language. “The man was overweight and dead weight, his wet skin slippery to the touch”, it’s not exactly needed nor is nice to read if you are the man being pulled from the water. It felt a bit wordy as well, with sections not really needed, for they didn’t add to the story. I understand the authors want to create imagery for the reader but it read a bit to try hardy. I also would have liked to hear from the man saved, as it seems he would have died without Mr. Heath, and I think his gratitude is worth more than the cities.

“52, and Still Working the Streets” I thought was a great example of a profile. There wasn’t any opinion, it was facts and direct quotes. But there was still enough creative aspects to carry the story along without going overboard. Such as “By day, heavy industrial traffic fills the streets. By night, the traffic comes for other reasons.” I thought it flowed nicely, good transitions throughout the article.

I really enjoyed “Daily Bread, Every Day for 75 Years.” I liked the arch of the story in that the three people he first mentioned he comes back to in closing. I liked his religious use of language scattered throughout, “consecrated” for example. Looking at this article versus Mr. Barry’s other article about the Hero I can see how his use of flourished language can work here.

Though it seems in “A Cruise Around Manhattan in the Snow” the writer enjoyed the cruise he early on refers to John Masons “deadpan narrative”, not inciting language, nor did it really make me want to read on, though it did get more interesting. This is a moment when language is very serious and when not taken as such can deter the reader. I felt there was too much back and forth from the boat ride and the Mason’s background.

The next article, “Big Pulpit”, it’s an interesting article in that it handles religion like a business, which it seems in some ways many are. I liked the differentiation using italics between real time and the rest of the story. It helps with the configuration without being confusing or jumping around too much.  

The last article “A Chauffeur With a Chauffeur Rode Boyish Dream to Fortune” is a great example of a profile for it is fact packed, but interestingly does not have any quotes. The first sentence is attention grabbing without being cheesy and it leads with a good hook.

Flags line the highway; draped over car hoods, hoisted high in the air by trucks with beams jutting over the road.

Hundreds standing in the cold, awaiting the body of one man. A man coming home for the last time.

His motorcade, at least 30 cars long has come from Boston’s Logan Airport, and he has passed over the Bourne Bridge. It’s final destination of Falmouth, Cape Cod, just a few miles more from where I stand.

John Robert Kotfila, 30 was killed driving on the off ramp of a Tampa Florida highway. By a driver coming the wrong way.

http://www.reuters.com/article/us-belgium-security-shots-idUSKCN0WH1U7

Brussels, Belgium

Victim linked to the Paris attacks

Two others still at large.

Linked to radical Islamists

Happened during a raid on a home in the city suburbs

Police were fired at through a door; resulting in four officers wounded.

The Paris attacks main suspect Salah Abdeslam was not the mission of this raid

Brussels has been on high military alert since the Paris attacks

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/worldnews/europe/belgium/12194789/Brussels-police-shot-at-during-raid-linked-to-Paris-attacks.html

Tuesday afternoon

Took place in the suburb of Forest South, where other investigations surrounding the Paris attacks took place

Two armed suspects, one killed inside the apartment the other is surrounded in “a peice of waste ground” according to Le Soir the Belgian Daily

Police believed the flat to be empty, surprised by the fire.

http://www.dailymail.co.uk/wires/reuters/article-3493465/Brussels-police-hunt-fleeing-gunman-Paris-probe.html

Five hours of intense police activity

One suspect shot dead in a nearby garden after spotted from a police

It is believed that most of the Nov. Paris attack that killed 130, the plans and preparation were carried out by “young” French and Belgian nationals.

Belgium was targeted as being to lax in the monitoring of extremists

Prime suspect 26-year-old Frenchman Salah Abdeslam is still at large. Leaving Paris after the attack, and after his brother blew himself up.

10 people are in custody in Belgium in connection to the attacks

Belgium’s Muslim population of about 5 percent among its 11 million people.

“Has the highest rate in Europe of citizens joining Islamist militants in Syria.”

Eric Van Der Sypt, a spokesman for the Belgian federal prosecutor “ A body was found during a search of a house...his identity has not been established yet but whatever the case, it is not Salah Abdeslam.”

https://twitter.com/Reuters/status/709834315027324928?lang=en

https://twitter.com/BBCBreaking/status/709778219306786817?lang=en

Outline:

Recap of the event

Recap of the Paris Attacks

Belgium security prior and after the attacks.

“Maybe the CEO of a friendship rental company can’t help but see fissures in the psychic landscape, or maybe the crisis is real. Regardless, Maki wants to fix it, one synthetic relationship at a time. Before we part, she stops meBefore we part, she stops me. Am I aware of Client Partners’ ultimate goal? I am not. To render itself unnecessary, she says.”

This article details a man’s trip to Tokyo in which in his time there he hires three different “friends” from the company Client Partners. 

John Oliver in a segment devoted to Donald Trump, brought up that his family’s original name was Drumpf. Using this to make the point that his name in many ways gives him legitimacy, that his name makes some people trust him. These are people’s reactions. 

https://twitter.com/SarahKSilverman/status/708493744572657664?lang=en

DRUMPF is NEGGING us and we've fallen for it - we're obsessed w this candidate we had no intention of ever acknowledging #TheGame

https://twitter.com/search?q=Drumpf&src=typd&lang=en

Chicago shows it feels about Drumpf. 

https://twitter.com/Trumpnado2016/status/709128646561288196?lang=en

Tyrants around world thinking: 1. Make fun of Drumpf's tiny hands 2. Create fake internet videos 3. Watch him cower & crumble! #NeverTrump

https://twitter.com/ChrisWarcraft/status/708492661947129857?lang=en

Sources are telling me we have live footage of backstage right before Drumpf's decision to cancel his speech. 

https://twitter.com/DougBenson/status/708113749824000000?lang=en

"I'm a business man so I do things that aren't right or fair." -Drumpf #GOPDebate

https://twitter.com/nytimesbusiness/status/707356249587843073?lang=en

 My original Project was aimed at trying to get students together who were strangers, to come together in a shared experience. It didn’t really work, mostly because almost everyone I spoke to said that while it sounded like a fun time, they were just too busy with midterms approaching. I realized that I needed to change my project, if I wanted to actually have a real experience with another student. 

Thinking back to an idea we had discussed in our first class, about how we could find other students who had time between classes, when they wouldn’t mind making a new friend, or just having the company of another. I decided to change my project to revolve around a simple sign saying “Sit with me” on one side and “Sit with us” on another. 

I realized when doing this project that because I live and work on the Upper West Side, I don’t actually spend much time at the school unless I am in class or using the library. Which neither are really times for socializing. So it was difficult to make chunks of time to try and sit with my sign. I did get a few people to sit with me, mostly they were curious. But luckily that was enough. Above I posted photos of six of the 15 responses I was able to get. I did end up having to approach 7 of the 15 as I just wasn’t able to get 15 in the time I was able to give to sitting in our public spaces. But I did sit at both the Lang Cafeteria and the University Center. 

Most responses were quite similar, in that they felt community through the individual areas of study, therefore they met people through their classes. But that as a whole it is difficult to meet new people, or feel like it would be easy to just join others. A few made the point that they were here to learn, and not particularly socialize, and that while the signs in one way were welcoming, they might not have joined me voluntarily because when they are in school, there are here to learn. That what’s great about The New School is how dedicated the students are to their work, and she liked the distinction. 

This was extremely interesting for me, because it made me realize in many ways why you come to this university. It’s not because you want a normal college experience, you want something different. A place where  New York is your campus.