If you found an extremely valuable item, what would you do with it? Would you, A, keep it? Would you, B, sell it? Or would you, C, leave it where you found it and pretend like you’ve never seen it in the first place? Well answer C would have defiantly helped Kino, our main character in the story The Pearl. When Kino finds a pearl the size of a seagull’s egg he obsesses it, and eventually pays the price. The story The Pearl is the perfect example of what will happen to a person when they become obsessed with an object of great value.
Picture this you go out to sea in your boat to go find some pearls. After a while of scanning the water for any oysters you see a cluster under the water. You dive in to retrieve the cluster. You come up and climb back into your boat and begin to break open the oysters. Then you see it, a pearl the size of a seagull’s egg! The pearl that could change your life, glistening in the palm of your hand. Lucky, as it seems at first, but think about this, all the things that this pearl could do to you. It could make you richer, of course, but all those things it could do to your mind, your reputation, to your loved ones. Instantly blinded by wealth, Kino didn’t think about those horrible things that could happen to him. Unfortunately he paid the price.
When an individual becomes so self-consumed that he doesn’t see what’s right in front of him, higher educated individuals begin to seize the opportunity to take advantage of the less educated individual. The Pearl is the perfect example of this situation. When Kino attempts to sell his pearl for, what he thought was a reasonable price, the higher educated pearl buyers rejected his offer and lowered his for their own convenience.
Obviously Kino rejected their offer. He thought his find was much more valuable and the money would be more than enough to change his life. Thoughts of wealth, fame, and his life with the money, are replaying over and over again in his mind. Kino is so determined about getting this money that to help is family, that he’s actually slowly ripping himself farther and farther from them, almost becoming a threat to Juanna and Coyotito.
Eventually, Kino would have to pay a very large price for letting himself be swallowed by greed. He thought he was doing the best for his family, but tragically other’s attempts to steal the pearl from him cost Kino his son’s life. This event is defiantly horrible, but the pearl could have defiantly done more damage to Kino’s life if he were to hold onto it any longer.
In the end Kino realizes that the pearl has cost him more than it could have ever given him. In a desperate attempt to end the pain and suffering it has caused him and his family he throws the pearl back into the ocean. As the reader I have to wonder if this pearl will ever cause another person as dearly as it has Kino. No one should ever have to pay that price again. The Pearl perfectly shows what happens to a person when they become obsessed with great wealth.
Wednesday, February 3, 2010
A Secret for Two
Depending on something your whole life and then realizing one day that it wasn’t there, can really have a devastating effect on your life. An example of this might be if you’re on a plane and the pilot has a heart attack, whose going to fly your plane. Now you might say that’s highly unlikely, but that’s precisely when it happens, it happens when you don’t expect it and when you can’t stop it. ”A Secret for Two” is a great example of that and man’s struggle to deal with the unexpected.
Most of us have experienced things like this happening all around us and have seen how it affects everyone that was associated with it. We have seen nine-eleven victims’ families suffering from the loss of a loved one. We’ve seen families mourning over the death of a family member fighting in Iraq. It’s not an experience that anyone needs to go through and it can devastate entire families. Fortunately most people don’t have to experience these events, although it sadly happens much more often than it ever should. Although this horrible situation has never happened to me before, I can still imagine what these horrible events would do to people.
A great example of a situation like this would be the recent 7.0 earthquake that struck Haiti Tuesday, January 12th just before five p.m. This earthquake demolished schools, hospitals, and homes, leaving these people with nothing except the loss of loved family members, lack of supplies, and no hope. Just imagine, one minute you’re doing your daily chores and the next your house and belongings are nothing but a pile of rubble. Imagine how severely all of those people needed to deal with the unexpected, and how we struggled to provide all of the devastated victims with needed medical supplies, food, and water.
Another natural disaster that represents this might be the category five Hurricane Katrina that hit our southern border, devastating cities such as New Orleans, 105 billion dollars were spent to help rebuild New Orleans and Mississippi alone. Over 1,800 people lost their lives to that storm, and over 700 went missing. This deadly monsoon truly tested mans’ ability to deal with the unexpected.
All of these events are examples of man’s weakness to deal with unexpected events; from nine-eleven, to Hurricane Katrina, and then to Haiti’s devastating earthquake, man’s struggles are everywhere. The only thing that keeps us going is our ability to commit to something and to overcome adversity; to keep going, even though we might end up losing more than we gain. “A Secret for Two” is a great example of this and man’s struggle to deal with the unexpected.
Most of us have experienced things like this happening all around us and have seen how it affects everyone that was associated with it. We have seen nine-eleven victims’ families suffering from the loss of a loved one. We’ve seen families mourning over the death of a family member fighting in Iraq. It’s not an experience that anyone needs to go through and it can devastate entire families. Fortunately most people don’t have to experience these events, although it sadly happens much more often than it ever should. Although this horrible situation has never happened to me before, I can still imagine what these horrible events would do to people.
A great example of a situation like this would be the recent 7.0 earthquake that struck Haiti Tuesday, January 12th just before five p.m. This earthquake demolished schools, hospitals, and homes, leaving these people with nothing except the loss of loved family members, lack of supplies, and no hope. Just imagine, one minute you’re doing your daily chores and the next your house and belongings are nothing but a pile of rubble. Imagine how severely all of those people needed to deal with the unexpected, and how we struggled to provide all of the devastated victims with needed medical supplies, food, and water.
Another natural disaster that represents this might be the category five Hurricane Katrina that hit our southern border, devastating cities such as New Orleans, 105 billion dollars were spent to help rebuild New Orleans and Mississippi alone. Over 1,800 people lost their lives to that storm, and over 700 went missing. This deadly monsoon truly tested mans’ ability to deal with the unexpected.
All of these events are examples of man’s weakness to deal with unexpected events; from nine-eleven, to Hurricane Katrina, and then to Haiti’s devastating earthquake, man’s struggles are everywhere. The only thing that keeps us going is our ability to commit to something and to overcome adversity; to keep going, even though we might end up losing more than we gain. “A Secret for Two” is a great example of this and man’s struggle to deal with the unexpected.
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