Overcoming Adversity and Challenges

In the book, Persepolis, there were a lot of examples about overcoming adversity and challenges. The book takes place in Iran in the late 1990’s. Marji had grown up with her family in hard times with the wars that were going on in there country. When things had gotten bad enough her parents had decided to send her Europe so that she would be safe. She had to overcome living on her own in a completely different country. Marji learned to take care of herself and learn things on her own without her parents being there with her. When she had decided to go back to live in Iran, she was 19. While she lived there she had to overcome more wars and her newly married life. Her husband and her finally had gotten a divorce. Now, mostly everyone can somewhat relate to that.

Hotel Rwanda is a little hard to watch because of the things that the people go through. It took place somewhere in Africa. Paul, the manager of the hotel, has to deal with a lot of stuff. In the beginning he seems to only want to take care of his family. It took place in the early 1990’s and yet is still happening today. Paul took very good care of his family and his business. He was a Hutu, yet his wife and kids were Tutsi. The Hutu were the ones “in charge” or so they thought. So the Tutsi people were always scared and being horribly treated by most of the Hutu people. Paul soon realizes at the end of the movie that he can take care of his family, being everyone not just his wife and children. He sends his wife and kids to somewhere else so that they can be safe although he stays behind to help all of the Tutsi people that are staying at the hotel for safety. He overcame the challenge of people trying to kill him for helping the other people and also for living in that kind of situation. He was a hero to so many people.

The Nazi people are hard people to watch. They had done so many horrible things to innocent people. They believed in certain things and everyone else in the country had to suffer. Swing Kids is a movie that had a lot of meaning to the word ‘freedom’. Nobody really had any. This took place in 1939. Not being part of the HJ was a little like putting disrespect to the Nazi’s. The kids in the HJ beat everyone who was different. Peter and his friend Thomas had to join the HJ so that they didn’t get into anymore trouble. They had decided to be swing kids by night and HJ kids by day. Yet, Thomas had transferred into thinking that what he was being taught at the HJ was right and betrayed Peter at the end of the movie. They had a handicapped friend, Arvid, who was treated horribly because he was handicapped. He ended up committing suicide because he was so overwhelmed with the torture the HJ put him through and because his “friend” turned his back. Thomas had kept his head on straight and overcame the challenge of being both a swing kid and part of the HJ. He was taken away and still had a smile on his face because he knew what he did was right and he was proud of it. He overcame living with all the things he had gone through with his country, friends, family, and himself.

Kelsee