10 Reasons Why Haiti Is Poor....

1. A bad Colonial past and slavery.
2. Haiti was the first black independent country in 1804, USA, England and France still had slavery and were afraid their slaves would want to go free. So they didn't buy any goods from Haiti. The result ended as Haiti got no money.
3. 1915-1938 Haiti was occupied by the USA and took over the financial income.
4. Power of the elite, not sharing, wealth and land.
5. Corruption: the elite were corrupt, no money nothing happens.
6. Human rights violations: resulted in a regime of fear.
7. French is the official language but only 10% speaks it and 90% speaks Creole
8. Ignorance and illiteracy, because of the language barrier.
9. Mis-education, education is free but very limited. 30% of kids start school but only 2% stay after 5 grade.
10. Soil erosion: Mountainous country, they been have cutting trees down for fuel, living and ignorance.

Update On Haiti Earthquake

On the 12-01-2010 there was an earthquake of 7.0 on the Richter-scale. People from France, US, Brazil, Spain and members from the UN are helping the Haitians to recover from the disaster that occurred last week.

Humanitarian Aid is coming in to the capital Port-Au-Prince but is not getting distributed to the other villages in the rest of the country. The UN is distributing the aid very slowly while the Americans are distributing in large numbers by coming in a helicopter 10 feet of the ground and throwing the aid to the people on the ground. People miles away from the capital in despair are digging with their bare hands to get any resources from crushed houses. People are getting violent to get a hold of supplies for them selves and the injured.

Earthquake Destruction In Haiti

On the 12 of January 21:53hrs an earthquake of 7.0 on the righter scale hit the island of Haiti and it's surroundings. The Epicenter of the earthquake was only a few miles away from the countries capital Port-Au-Prince. The Focus of this earthquake was only 13km below the surface. Haiti is located between to tech tonic plates and that is why the affect was so terrible. After the big earthquake, most buildings barely made it, but after the many aftershocks the city got wiped out.

The impact of the earthquake was huge. Many buildings collapsed, the presidents palace got destroyed also many other important buildings were wiped out by the after shocks. People from all over the country are hurt, some even stuck under collapsed buildings. The major hit was in Haiti, but people in America, Jamaica and the Caribbean islands felt the earthquake too. They are now saying that the death toll is in the tens of thousands. I find it very sad that the people in Haiti are all suffering, and I feel very sad for all the children who have lost everything and everybody.

Countries from all over the world are helping Haiti to recover from natural disasters. Humanitarian Aid is being imported each day to help the people in Haiti. The Haitians are helping each other to get out of collapsed buildings and help all the injured.

Water Questions 2

1. List the main reasons for water scarcity.
   Very low rain fall, population growth, agriculture, pollution and global warming which causes many climate changes


2. a)What is a drought? A prolonged period of time when there is less than average rainfall. b)What type of hardships do you think that a drought could cause if were living in a village in a poor country such as Ethiopia? People would have no water supply, it would be very hot, crops would die and people and life stock will also die. There will will be a famine and land will dry up.


3. How does land degradation affect the supply of fresh water? It stops fresh water water going into the soil, and instead all the rain water will directly flow into rivers and lakes. Also the rain water will take away the top soil and you will have erosion


4. a) What is El Nino ? The warming up of the SouthernEastern Tropical Pacific Ocean. b)Why does El Nino often cause drought in Australia? The clouds and rain storms that come come with warm oceans also shift towards the east. As a result rains which would normally fall over Australia start falling over the dessert in Peru. This causes forest fires and drought in the Western Pacific and flooding in South America.


5. Observe the map showing the global effects of El Nino in 1982-83. a)What effects does El Nino have on the availability of fresh water? The regions where there is a drought the fresh water supply will run on reserves and might run out. But in the regions where there is more rain than average the aquifer will fill up, but floods will probably also happen and cause salt water intrusion. b) Name the countries and describe the problems that arose from decreased rainfall caused by El Nino ? Indonesia : many forest fires and clearance of tropical forest causing very high air pollution levels. Singapore & Malaysia : air polution due to burning of tropical forest. Philippines : lower rice harvest following drought. China : agricultural land under threat from drought in Northern regions and flooding in Southern regions. Papua New Guinea : Drought related failure of food crops, leading to famine conditions requiring food aid. Africa : reduced corn crop in Sub-Saharan region. Australia : wheat exports threatened by drought across grain growing areas and mostly in New`South Wales

Questions On Fresh Water

1. What percentage of the world's supply of water is fresh water?
2.5% of the world’s water is fresh.
2. Where is the world's supply of fresh water found?
Most of the fresh water is found in ice, but humans get it from the ground water.
3. Even though the supply of fresh water is abundant it is still a problem. Why?
The water is not evenly spread out across the world and humans do not handle it properly. Also if people us it properly not everyone can get to it.
4. Observe the map of the world average annual precipitation (opposite). a) Describe the changes in rainfall that occurs as you move from the Northern to the Southern tip of Africa.
At the Southern tip is a bit dry but when you get to the middle it rains more often, just past the middle the northern tip is just like the southern tip drier and does not rain that often. b) Describe the changes in rainfall that occurs as you move from the Western to the Eastern tip of Australia along the Tropic of Capricorn.
At the Western tip it is bone dry with hardly any rainfall but as you move closer and closer to the Eastern tip it just gets wetter and wetter.
5. Observe the map above of water availability per person. a) Which parts of the world appear to have large amount of water available per person?
Countries that are not overpopulated, they also have enough money to sustain their country and population. b) Which parts of the world appear to have a small amount of water per person?
Countries that are overpopulated and don not have enough money to give their whole population the fresh water that they need.
6. Observe the diagram of water use. a) What are the main uses of water?
Agricultural and industrial use the most water. b) Which uses have increased the most over the last century?
Agricultural has increased the most over the last century.

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.

Tasikmalaya Earthquake

On the 2 September 2009 an 7.0 magnitude earthquake hit Tasikmalaya, West Java, Indonesia. It is said that there are 44 dead and many wounded. The earthquake hit in two phases first at 3:00pm and 8 minutes later the second hit but this more powerful. During lunch yesterday at JIS a big 1 meter long black snake slithers in to a hole under a tree because we think that snake moved from its place to another because it could sense the earthquake and didn't want to be killed.

In Jakarta the capital of Indonesia were all the sky scrapers were all swaying from side to side. At my house in Mega Kuniningan was moving a lot and the whole residents had to be evacuated, and on the road every was waiting to get in their house, offices and apartments. At least nobody died in Jakarta and my family was safe. On the bus when I went on the first the whole bus was shaking and every on shouting EARTHQUAKE!!!!!!!!!!!!!! Now a tsunami watch is on and people are preparing

Typhoon Morokat

On the 8-9 of August there was the worst storm in Taiwan in 50 years with 2 and a half meters of flooding. Each day non-stop, many people have suffered from this natural disaster. Here in the picture you can see a hotel has fallen down by the major flooding. Luckily no one in the hotel got killed. The news estimated that 800-900 people have been killed in this storm. In this little town in Taiwan, Chaiya was the most affect town in Taiwan. In Chaiya the whole was right at the bottom of two mountains with their reservoir. By this town has two river on each side on the North and on the South, during the flooding these rivers over ran over and destroyed a brige connecting a highway. If you look closer to the picture can see how fast the water is running.