The Water Cycle

I chose this picture of evaporation because even if it maybe childish it shows how H2O (water) goes up into the air from the water and will soon turn into clouds. These molecules are turned in to a gas and the sun makes them float into the sky to form clouds and restart the water cycle. Evaporation is very important because if the water from rivers, oceans, pods ect... does not turn into water vapour the water cycle breaks apart and there is no more rain.

I chose this picture on condensation because as you can see there is a cup with cold water in side it. The cold cup and war moist air collide and form condensation. This is because of the water vapour in the air and when it hits something colder than it's self it turns back in to it's original form water, but it stick on the cold glass.

I chose this picture on precipitation because it shows that precipitation can be a bad thing and because it also indicates what precipitation is(rain, snow, hail etc...). The reason raining is so bad is because the clouds have to much water vapour and need to let it out. Also by this big storms come and can wipe out towns and cities. Precipitation is one of the most important because the Earth would get to hot and there would be much less water that will be able to become water vapour.

I chose this picture of infiltration because it clearly shows how the ground gets water from when after it rains. On this picture you can see that it rained and then the water sank into the ground and and the travel until it reaches a ocean or river/steam. Infiltration is very important because it gives water to plants. This ground water can also be a bad thing because if it rains on a mountain the rock might get slippy and may cause a landslide.

My Personal Narrative

Thomas Maher
Oct. 5 2009
The day I Nearly Got Killed

Coming back from school my dad was down at the pool reading his magazine. I say “hi” to him.
He responds “Hey Thomas you know what I found this morning?”
“No” I told him.

"This is what I found," holding up a bullet from the air attack last night
"Where did you find that” I asked my dad.
“Down over there by the playground” he told me.
“Awesome” I replied.
BOOM, BOOM, BOOM!!!!! “Thomas get up!!!!!” everyone was shouting in my house. The LTTE has come and The Government is firing back. Still asleep I didn’t know what to do so I walk to where my mom was standing. Everything was blurry for me and things were ringing in my head.

“Quick Thomas hurry up or do you want to die by bullets flying through the windows” my mom shouted. Once I heard that I sprang into action running as fast as I could to get behind sleep through the air attack, but it was to noisy with the guns outside making a walls. I finally got there and I was extremely scared, so I tried to racket, tourist laughing and my mom shouting through the radio to the security of my dad’s office.
“Thomas get up we are going in here so we are safer” my mom told me once I was awake. We went into the bathroom and the noise of guns firing was even louder because it echoed and echoed so loud we could not stand it. By now I was fully awake and was trying to think straight and not thinking that I was going to die. We were now inside behind walls, when all of a sudden the shooting stopped for about a minute.
We looked outside to check if the air attack was over but we were wrong, an airplane had just crashed into a building 500m away form my house and The Government army thought all the airplanes were down. We could see a fire in a shopping mall and in a building right next to a hotel were an airplane crashed and then exploded. Then all of a sudden, The Government wanted the last LTTE airplane down and started firing again but this time with all they had. Now The Government sent their airplanes out but the airplanes were to fast for the LTTE airplanes. It was funny. So the Government stated firing again but this time randomly into the air hoping that they would the airplane.
I heard the phone ring and my mom picked up “hello” she said. My friends on the 9th floor were all alone with their parents out partying.
My mom told them “to stay behind walls and as far a possible away from windows”. They did as told, but they were still very frightened.
We called my dads office and said “what on earth is happening?” my mom shouted ant them.
They said “to stay behind walls and just stay calm’. We did every thing correctly but still scared of the war.
My friends called again and asked “if we could call their mom?” We called their mom just when she started driving to her apartment. The Government said no lights were allowed on so it was all dark outside and she was driving in the darkness.
My dad’s office called up and said “stay behind walls and you will be safe” we did as told and we were safe for the rest of the night. Every time I heard fire crackers I jumped out of my seat and ran for my life thinking it was an air attack. Also that day on the best newspaper in Sri Lanka said “What a Failure” in big bold letters, under the title it said 12 dead and 81 one wounded. I was laughing my head of be cause that is not a failure. My parents agree and my dad showed it to our driver and he also laughed and told his story of his family in the air attack.

The Gym

Today there was no wind and I had to go sailing. I rigged up my boat and sail, and was ready to sail after the briefing which always is about 30-1:30 minutes each time, but he says the same thing over and over again, but each time differently.

While we were waiting for the coach my sister was showing off her mandarin to the Singaporean boys sitting with me. They were amazed and then the coach came in. He was also impressed by my sister and then he started talking away about team racing. The wind died down and we had to go for physical training in the gym.

My parents were in the members lounge, they were not surprised as there was no wind forecasted for this morning. So we went for a work out. In the gym we first had to run for 10 minutes straight with no breaks. I ran for 11kmph for the first nine minutes and in the last minute I ran 13kmph. This was only the warm up for the 2 hours of the gym session. Next we stretched for 5 minutes, now we had to do all the weight lifting machines in the gym and each one, we had to do 2 times. Then we had to do 30 sit ups, and then the machines again for 2 rounds and then again 30 sit ups. Next we could do anything we wanted while someone was on hiking chair. Finally we finished with pretending to sit 90* against the wall. This was the end of physical training for the day, in the afternoon we were sure to go sailing unfortunately in light winds, but this is better than nothing.

Water Skiing

For the first time this holiday I went to the East Coast Park water ski cable park. I checked on my bike early morning and went back to the apartment and had breakfast, which was delicious. I had to do the dishes so I rushed them and sprinted of to my bicycle at the back of the car park. I undid the lock and cycled really fast up to the top of the car park. Then I remembered that my sister had the money and could not go without her to the cable ski park. She finally reached where I was standing on my bike. She was cross that I didn't wait for her by her bicycle down in the car park.

My sister and I raced each other to the underground passage and who ever won could do whatever they wanted to the other person. I won as always and I am not a mean brother so I said I would do nothing to my sister. We climbed up the stairs by the underground passage and were able to go up hill, cross the highway on a bridge, go downhill and cross the road until we were in the East Coast Park. My sister was a bit slow so I had to wait, until we could race to the ski park. My sister went ahead but she had a passage that was on the outside, and since I was on the inside I was ahead and won again. We got the wrist bands and went off to go water skiing.

Here I go, I was first in line and on my first round. My sister chose the wakeboard and she was right behind me. I now was on my second round when my sister fell off at the last turn. Too bad she had to walk back in the line that was building up every few minutes. My sister was off again by the time I was on the my sixth round, this time she made the last turn and I was on my eighth round, my hand started to hurt a bit so I went in between two marks and that meant I was finished with my go.

I stood in line, luckily it went really fast so I was up and going again in no time. This time I did 18 rounds and the instructor said I had to stop because the crowd was building up and I was doing too many rounds. Then went off again and only did 4 rounds because there were people in the way and I could not pass. I was very happy with myself and couldn’t wait to tell my family.

Fixing My Bicycle

Today went down to check up on my bike to see if I could use it to cycle on the East Coast Park with my parent and sisters. I was amazed by the condition my bike was in because the chain was all rusted up and would not move and my tyres were completely flat with almost no air in them. My mum came down to check on her if it was usable. Her bicycle was worse than mine, the tyres were even more flat, the chain, the handle bars and the pole to keep the saddle up were all rusted up. My mother said that we would need some supplies, so I sprinted up and got the W-40, a spanner, a hammer, the pump and another tool, once I got all these supplies I raced down to my mother so we could get to work.

Now the fun had just begun. We setup all the tools and got to work. We started with the tyres, I pumped and while my mother made sure that the air got in. My mum’s bikes front wheel was really flat so I had to pump a lot until the tyres were rock hard. The wheels were now done and we moved onto the rusty chain. We sprayed the whole chain with W-40 and then started getting the all the parts of the chain moving to full flexibility so the bicycle would work. It took us a long time before we got the whole chain to work properly and the bicycle would move. Last we sandpapered all the rusty parts of the bicycle. When finished the bicycle look good as new. My mother tried the bicycle around the car park and she found the bike was working really well. Now we wanted to fix my bicycle but we had just run out of W-40, so I cycled on my sister’s bike to the Esso station to get the W-40.

Upon my return we started with the chain because my mother’s hands were already dirty and we didn’t want to make other things dirty with oil. We sprayed the chain with the lube and we found out that it was a kind of gel meant for putting on chains, but keeping the chain from rusting in a long period of time. We sprayed it any way and tried making the chain flexible again. We were done fast but my mum cut her hand and I had to pump the tyres on my own. Finally 2 hours later I could cycle.

Aisa's Restaurant

After a tiring week, my family and I decided that we were going to go to the Asia's Restaurant. Around 6:00pm we went down to restaurant at the Ritz-Carlton. Now it is Asia's Restaurant, but it used to be The Airlangga Restaurant until the bomb explosion happened and they changed the name to get their business back. It took the restaurant a few months to get back to normal. Luckily I was not in my apartment when the restaurant blew up. My family and I wanted a memory of this place, since it was our last meal there, because we were going to move to another apartment in Kuningan. The buffet is amazing with foods all over Asia. From Japan it had sushi, from China Peking duck and roasted duck and with many more Chinese foods, from Thailand skewers, traditional foods from over Asia and it had all sorts of noodles and soups. My favourite food there is sushi and Peking duck.

For my starter I went directly to the sushi counter at the beginning of the buffet, knowing me I took loads of it and waited for my family until I was allowed to eat. My main meal came and I got my soup, duck and various dishes of Indonesia. Finally I was allowed to get my desert and I went straight to the chocolate fountain and to my favourite apple crumble.

When my sister went to ask for the bill, she came back confused. So I went up and after a while I found a waitress. She came back with the bill 10 minutes later. My mum checked the bill before she paid, but there were mistakes. We explained but the waitress still didn't understand, so we explained the promotions (children which are 12 and under eat for free otherwise half price, free flow of wine and we had a 25% off coupon). After 4 trials we finally received the correct bill, my mum signed it and went up, but frightened that an aftershock of the earthquake would strike on Jakarta.

Maximum Security By Robert Muchamore

This movie is about the book Maximum Security and an interview with James Adams on his misssion in Arizona Max. I, Thomas am the interviewer and I pretended to be James as he does not really exist. I home you enjoy the movie.

New Words 2

1. Rowdies - Someone that does not behave very well and is a trouble maker.
2. Resurrected - To bring something back to life.
3. Pledge - A really unbreakable promise to someone, like an vow.
4. Brazier - When camping a big round thing to cook food, coal can be in it.
5. Putrefy - Something roting with a fetid smell.
6. Spontaneous - To act without thinking or planning things through.
7. Discreetly - To do something without drawing to much attention.
8. Martyred - To give up your life for your believe.
9. Preposterous - Extremely stupid, silly or out of the zone of normal.
10. Scouring - The way you look for something you have to find.

New Words

1. I saw a nefarious person because she robbed a store.
2. I was gagging when my sister was holding a cloth over my mouth.
3. There was fetid smell in our classroom.
4. My sister bought frivolous stuff at Block M.
5. It was intolerable to not do your homework.
6. In my science experiment I had to use a vial to heat the chemical.
7. I saw a pour man under a corrugated roof next to my house.
8. I bought and car because my little conceited siater said so.
9. I was in the desert in was so desolated without anything around.
10. The chemical started frothing when I add a different chemical.