It's Not a Trip or Vacation It's a Second Life...

Why did you decided to become an exchange student? This is the question that I was asked most since I’ve been in the United States. My answer can be really long. Being an exchange student was an opportunity that I’ve got lucky to get. Although I had to go through many exams, interviews and months of waiting for information, this is an opportunity that everyone else would wish to get. By applying for FLEX (Future Leaders Exchange) program (Click here for more information about the program), I was just trying to check my English knowledge. I didn’t even have an idea that I might become a finalist and get the opportunity to come to the United States. I’ve been waiting about 6 months to know information about if I passed the program or no. I can’t even described my happiness when I finally got the long waited call telling me that I’ve become a FLEX finalist and I’m going to do an exchange year in United States, live in American host family and go to AMERICAN HIGH SCHOOL.

It’s a dream of every student in my country (and not only) to get a chance to attend American High School. It’s an example of perfect education and also something that we could’ve only seen in the movies. I know that this sounds really funny for most of my American friends, but it’s true.

    After knowing that I’d become a FLEX finalist, it was the time for me and my parents to make the decision. Although it’d always been dream to me to live in the United States, it was the time to think more deeply and make responsible decision. I’m very thankful to my parents that they supported my dream and let me come to the United States.

   

Finally I made that step and now I’m in the United States. But not everything worked easy for me. I had some difficulties at first but I overcame everything due to my friends, teachers, and of course my host family. Living thousands miles away from family was not easy, but leaving my loved people back to Armenia brought me many new experiences that I won’t change with anything else. I became self-confident, independent and ready to overcome any difficulties.

     The time has flight, and I realize that I’ve got only a month left in the United States. I don’t even want to think about the day that I’ll have to say goodbye to my friends and host family here. I had such a great experience in U.S., and I’m going to miss every second of being here. I feel like that I’ve been living in Langford all my life. This is a great community to live and also perfect for every exchange student.

     I can talk endless about my experience and how much I’m going to miss Langford and it’s people but I’m just going to end this by saying that I enjoyed every second of being here and I’ll never forget this wonderful year of my life. 

    

                                Flat tax or Progressive tax?

 While everyone is debating about, whether the flat tax is fairer than the progressive tax, I think that the taxes are not fair, overall. People are working really hard to earn money, so why should they pay a big part of their own money to government, when government has no role in making that money? It doesn’t matter if the person is rich or poor, either way they work hard to earn the money that they have.  

     In the United States there is a progressive tax, which is a tax that takes a larger percentage from the people who earn more money; and lower percentage from the people who have lower income. According to the flat tax there is the same tax rate for all taxpayers.

      Some people think that it is not fair to tax rich and poor people with the same rate of tax. I think it’s fair and it’s equal for everyone. In this article it says that for example if a person earned $50,000 a year and another earned $300,000 a year, both would pay 17 percent of their income to the government. I think this system is fair or everyone. People claim that if a person is rich that he/she should pay taxes with more tax rate.

      But who said that it’s that easy to become rich, expect to the situations when people just get wealth from their parents. People actually worked hard to earn the money and be rich, so they deserved to control their own money. I think that government should just tax people equally, letting rich people to manage their own money. If people think that they have more than enough money they can send it to charity, so they can also know that their money is actually used or a good reason. 

                               1915...NEVER AGAIN

     

 

      100 years have passed since the day that the Armenian Genocide began. Armenian Genocide was committed by Ottoman Empire. This human disaster still remains in a memory of every Armenian. No matter gender, age and believes every Armenian recognizes the Armenian Genocide and demands justice. Such massacred happened in a world history many times, but most of the time the countries that had been committed such crime, recognized what they’ve done and apologized for it. Turkey, instead of facing their history keeps denying what happened in 1915 and claims that the deaths were part of a civil conflict triggered by WW1.

     As Turkish government doesn’t want to recognize the Armenian Genocide, the main goal of all Armenians is to make the whole world to know about the Armenian Genocide and recognize it. Only 22 countries have recognized the Armenian Genocide. The United States is one of the world’s most powerful countries and it’s really important that the US recognized the events of  1915 as Genocide.
  

  After Genocide Armenians spread all over the world, and there is really big Armenian communities in United States. During his campaign President Obama promised Armenian communities that, as being elected the president of the United States he would officially recognize the Armenian Genocide.

     After being elected, Obama is giving speech every year on April 24 about the Armenian Genocide. In his speeches Obama says that events of 1915 are “one of the worst atrocities of the 20th century.” Since his presidency Obama never used the word “Genocide”, instead he calls it “Meds Yeghern” (which is Armenian term of “Great Calamity”).

     Obama’s careful wording is understandable but not really acceptable. He does it because United States is allied with Middle East affair. Of course, Obama doesn’t want to have bad relations with Turkey, because Turkey is big and rich country and by avoiding the much-feared word Obama has pleased ally in Ankara.

     On Sunday, April 12, Pope Francis described the mass killing of Armenians under Ottoman rule in WW1 as "Genocide", which of course, provoked Turkish government, and they even called the Turkish ambassador in Vatican, back to Turkey. This step by Pope has really significant meaning for Armenians. This event can be a great example for Obama and other country leaders to do the same. 

  

   Towards to the 100^th anniversary of Armenian Genocide the most discussing question in Armenia, right now is “Will Obama say the word “Genocide” on April 24?” If he would say the word “Genocide” it would mean a lot for Armenians, but in my opinion he would not say it, because he doesn’t want to provoke a big and rich country like Turkey.

    No matter how many years will pass, Armenians are going to remember the 1915 and demand recognition. Turkish government needs to face every shadow they denied and recognize the historic events.   

NOTHING WILL BE FORGOTTEN...NO ONE WILL BE FORGOTTEN.   

            Agriculture Industry in the U.S. and the Soviet Union

The main goal of Joseph Stalin was to transfer the agriculture of Soviet Union form individual farms into a system of large state collective farms. He believed that collectivization would improve agricultural productivity. One of the Stalin’s goals was the rapid industrialization, which he achieved by forced collectivization, but it harmed people a lot. People worked hard but they didn't get the profit that they made, so it made them not to work as hard as they did before.

     The United States’ agriculture during the same period of time was quite different. There was capitalism in the US which means that they were lot of private owned businessmen and farmers. This method was more profitable. People worked hard and they got the profit that they made, which made them work harder and harder and develop the economy. 
                                                
                                                 The Korean War

     One of the most important goals of United States during the Cold War was to prevent the spread of communism in other countries. This policy was called Containment. According to Containment United States found it important to help all the countries that were oppressed by communism, and needed help. That’s why United States entered into Korean War. The Containment Policy gave United States a reason to intervene other wars, which involved communism. The United States used this policy not for just fighting for democracy, but for its own interest, which created many casualties and economic issues and also was highly criticized. 

                                                    The Red Scare

     The Second “Red Scare” in the Unites States occurred during the Cold War. The major fear of the United States population and the President Truman was the spreading of the Communism. The Democratic United States had concerns that Communists might work as Soviet spies in United States. That was the main reason that President Truman issued Executive Order, according to which all federal employees had been analyzed to determine whether they were loyal to the government. One of the efforts to investigate communist activities was called House Un-American Activities Committee (HUAC). HUAC’s investigations were focused on Communists working inside the federal government and in the Hollywood film industry. Movie executives created blacklists that barred suspected radicals from employment. The same thing happened in other industries. 

     

                Richard Nixon's Presidency

     Over 30 years has past till Richard Nixon’s presidency but he is still remembered as one of the scandalous presidents of the United States. Nixon became 37^th president of the Unites States in 1969. He was well respected but not very likable. Nixon was highly intelligent. He is also famous for being very good public speaker. Nixon surrounded himself with only trusted people. One of the people that Nixon trusted most was Henry Kissinger, who was his national security advisor than he became Secretary of State.

     Richard Nixon was really good politician and he had many successes on his foreign policy. One of the most important successes of Nixon’s foreign policy can be considered the fact that he took the United States out of the Vietnam War, by keeping Americans out of the danger.

     Another very important thing that Nixon has done was to improve relations between the United States and the Soviet Union. After years of bad relationship between the Soviet Union and the United States Nixon established a policy of Détente, which focused on weapon limitations and peace between two nations. Nixon’s visit to Moscow became the first time that the leaders of two nations met each other in Moscow. Nixon also made another very important trip to China. Later U.S recognized the government of the People’s Republic of China. American Ping-Pong team, by accepting China’s invitation to visit PRC became the first Americans to be allowed into communist China since Chinese Civil War.

    During Israel’s War against Arabs, America, by the order of President Nixon, highly supported Israel, not only military but also politically. This event had really serious consequences on American economy. Because of America’s support to Israel, Arab nations declared that they would not sell oil to the United States anymore. This was the first time that Arab nations would use economy as a political weapon.

     Despite all the success and failures that Richard Nixon had on his foreign policy, while talking about him people still first mention his involvement in Watergate Scandal. On 17 June 1972, 5 men were arrested while trying to bug the headquarters of the Democratic Party inside of Watergate building. One of the men arrested was the head of security for the Republican Party, James McCord.

      Nixon kept denying his involvement in Watergate scandal but finally on 27 July 1974, The House Judiciary Committee approved Articles of Impeachment against Richard Nixon. Nixon thought that the Senate would not vote to remove him, but when the so called “smoking gun tape” became public, Nixon realized that he would not survive the vote in the Senate. So, on 9 August 1974, Richard Nixon resigned, becoming the first American president to resign. Although 30 government officials went to prison for their role in Watergate, Richard Nixon was not one of them. After becoming a president Gerald Ford gave Nixon a full Pardon.

     Watergate events also had moral impact on population. People started not to trust politicians as much as they did before.

     I think that Richard Nixon has done many important things for U.S. that should always be mentioned, and one thing I’m pretty sure that he should not be remembered as the worst presidents of United States. He has done a lot for the United States and he deserves respect.

                         WW2 Massacres

WW2 is considered one of the bloodiest pages of the world’s history. Events like the Holocaust and the Nanking Massacre has occurred during WW2. The Holocaust is considered the biggest massacre during WW2; it was the systematic persecution and murder of six million Jews by Nazi Regime. Another huge massacre during WW2 occurred in Nanking, China by Japanese Army forces.

Although doctors are called to cure, protect and take care of people, during these horrific events in both of the countries two doctors were famous for using people as a lab rats to experience new things. Those “doctors” were Josef Mengele from Germany and Shiro Ishii from Japan.  Josef Mengele became known as the ‘Angel of Death’, in charge of huge numbers of fatal and brutal medical experiments which killed over 400 000 victims. Shiro Ishii was the commander of Unit 731; his strategy was to develop biological weapons which would assist the Japanese army's invasion of south-east China.

     The way that those two doctors had acted is just unforgivable and there is nothing that can justify this kind of inhuman and terrible events.

     Both of those crimes are equally brutal and horrific, but the organizers weren't punished equally. While Josef Mengele had to hide during rest of his life, all the scientists at Unit 731 were freed and allowed to continue their careers. The reason was that Japanese were allowed to erase Unit 731 from the archives, by American government, which wanted to use it for itself.

     Germany atoned for its war crimes but japan has been able to deny the evidence of Unit 731. But denying of the history doesn't mean that it didn't happen. Some nations are just too scared to recognize their own crimes. Even after all that has happened I respect Germany and German people because they found courage in themselves to recognize the crimes they have done. Such massacres are huge crimes but the denials of those are even worse, it can make the history repeat itself. 

      Yesterday, on  February 4th my government class with teacher Mr. Reints went to Pierre, which is the capital of South Dakota. We have had a really long trip but everything was awesome and we learnt a lot. We have been in the state capitol and met the representatives from our district. One of the most exciting parts of our trip was that we had a really good conversation with our district’s representatives.  We also got chance to participate of State Affairs Committee meeting. It was very interesting to be there and see how everything that we learn in our government class is actually happening. We have also got chance to be in House of Representative’s session, say the Pledge of Allegiance with South Dakota representatives and see how  they are voting. 

     While looking at the pictures of all representatives and Senators, we have found a picture of representative from Langford, who has been representative more than one hundred years ago. It was exciting too.

     So, although the trip was really long and all of us were tired we had lots of fun. I’m so happy that I’ve got this chance to be in South Dakota State capitol. It’s going to be one of the best parts of my exchange year.