talonsowen's Blog

One of the main themes of the Hunger Games is the gap between rich and poor.

Throughout the book, you can see the large gap between rich and poor.  The rich Capitol watches adolescents fight to the death for entertainment, without thinking about or caring about the families in the other districts who may lose a son or daughter.  The families of the tributes that have lost will feel the loss of son, brother, daughter, or sister.  And yet the Capitol is fine with seeing people killing other people and watching it in detail, no blood or gore taken away.  If they don’t get enough kills during the games, the Gamekeepers can kill the tributes themselves, using various devices like a wall of fire, a flood, mutations, or even an avalanche.

The Capitol and it’s people have no cares, no worries.  Its people can do whatever they want, whenever they want.  They force the districts and the Avox to do all their dirty work for them.  No one is allowed to enter the Capitol without permission because they don’t want them to know what living in the Capitol is like.  If they did, they would all rebel out of injustice.  The Capitol always has enough to eat, unlike the families in the poor districts, who at best just scrape by.  At worst they either starve or sign up for tesserae and get a small amount of grain and oil for a year, per entry into the reaping pool.  But this means that they are more likely to be chosen for the Games, making poor kids more likely to be chosen over those who have just enough as it is.  The gap is an exaggerated version of the gap between rich and poor and the challenges the poor face in the real world.

No matter how much the people’s will are crushed by their oppressors, they still have individual power.  In the Hunger Games, the Capitol tries to control and spread fear around the districts to show that they have control over all districts.  They manipulate people to keep their absolute power from slipping.  But each of the districts produces something special that if stopped, would severely hurt the Capitol.

The Capitol controls and sees all through its eyes and ears, the Peacekeepers.  No transgression escapes the Capitol for long.  During the Games themselves, Rue (a Games player from one of the districts) talks about people being whipped for stealing food or even killed for taking night-vision glasses.  The people in the districts are easy to watch because they are trapped by electric fences, apparently to keep them “safe” (according to the Capitol) from the wilderness outside.  The Capitol’s mind games create a mentality that it is the only one who protects the citizens from the wilderness outside the fences and the other districts.  This is not true because the Capital is not the only one who protects the citizens.  People rely on the other districts for things like food, electricity, and clothing.  Also, the wilderness is not that bad, as Katniss (the main character) is able to make a living through hunting in the woods.

The Capitol manipulates the citizens of the twelve districts.  The Capitol manipulates the lack of trust and fear between the districts through the Games.  The Games strain relationships between the districts because players from one district may have to kill players from another district.  Even if a district wins, it’s not over for the victor as they must mentor the future tributes (players).  The victors may have nightmares or remember the horrible things the gamekeepers put in the Games arena, like the wolf mutations (“muttations”), the effects of the tracker-jacker (mutant bees) venom, killing tributes, or seeing people in their alliance die while they are powerless to save them.  An example of seeing people in your alliance dies would be when Katniss and watches Rue die during in the middle of story.

Each district has a bit of power (freedom) over the Capitol, contrary to what the Capitol would have them believe.  Each district has a specialization, a certain item that they give the Capitol and that the Capitol and all the other districts need.  For example, District Three produces electronics.  If district three was destroyed, sooner or later the electronics in the Capitol and other districts would break down, and the quality of life would greatly decrease there.  In the cases of Districts Four, Ten, and Eleven which produce almost all of the food for the Capitol, if any of these rebelled, many people would starve in the districts, but so would the rich in the Capitol who are not used to going hungry.  If District Two whose citizen’s make up most of the Peacekeeper force went down, the Capitol would be powerless to control the other districts.  The Capitol is held up on their throne by the twelve districts, but if a single district stopped carrying their weight, the Capitol would fall unless the Capitol got the district back under control.

With fear and their Peacekeepers, the Capitol makes the districts believe that the Capitol is all-powerful.  Very few people in the districts are aware of the Capitol’s manipulation, and they think they are powerless to do anything.  However, no matter how much people have been crushed by those in the Capitol above them, they still have something to rebel with.  Each district has something special that the Capitol needs, but most do not realize this.

This post is for the period from April 15 to April 30. At this point, I am still ahead of schedule, with only one C program left.
I’ve completed my mutual exclusion program, but I’m not sure it’s correct. I’ll still post the video (soon) and the link to it.
Mutual exclusion is where you have multiple tasks using one variable to communicate and they have to make sure they don’t override each other.
I’ve started C++ again, and have started moving objects, changing their colour, and turning them. Unfortunately, the movements aren’t very realistic yet.  I hope that I can make them more realistic by the end of the project.

The other countries in North America have been wiped out by the changes brought on by climate change and the wars that followed. A new nation rose in their place, called Panem. It had 12 fenced-in districts to feed and power the extremely technologically advanced capital, who shares very little technology to the districts.
For a novel study, I have chosen the book The Hunger Games. I have already read it, but it will be interesting to read it again and notice the hidden meanings that I didn’t notice on the first time through. However, the main reasons that I have chosen the book are that it was an interesting read the first time I read it. I found I was unable to put it down, even without too many annoying cliff-hangers. It has a great plot, probably based on Roman gladiators and the Minotaur. The series is my fifth favourite book series of all time, that’s how great I think it is.

This post is for the period from March 18th to April 1st. At this point, I am still ahead of schedule, but I have done no work on my in-depth project for the last two weeks. During these past two weeks I have been busy. I have been in Cuba a whole week on a band trip. Instead of having a post about my robot, I will answer some questions about programming.

What is the C language?

The C language is one of many languages that the programmer writes in. When he compiles it, it is translated to an assembly language, and then translated to code: 1’s and 0’s. The robot responds according to the code it receives. C is a function based language, so it tends to accomplish a more specific task with less code than an object based language.

What skills are required to program?

To program, you’ll need to be able to work around computers for hours on end. You’d need patience if your program hasn’t been working for a few days. You’d need to have creativity to break down the task into smaller steps, and smaller steps still. You’d need to be able to research on search engines for bits of code you might need.

Here’s a video on a new bot I created.

I still haven’t finished that program yet, unfortunately.

Hopefully, I will get some programming done for next blog. Again, my next blog will hopefully cover the fixed Light testing and also a modification of the program (to be revealed).

This post is for the period from March 5th to March 18th. At this point, I am ahead of schedule and going on the same rate as it.
My only frustration at this time is the fact I am going away for part of spring break so I will not be able to do any programming for then. Another challenge I have is that my new program isn’t working so well.
I have improved my reflex testing program. The new program can be found here. The program runs with less repetitive code now that I have put the main display inside a task.
I have made a new program. This robot searches for light and moves towards it, checking every so often that it’s going in the right direction. Here’s a video of it working.

Sorry for the short blog this week. My next blog will probably cover the fixed Light testing and also a modification of the program.

This post is for the period from February 18 to March 4.  At this point, I am just ahead of my schedule in C.  In C++ I haven’t done any work in Alice.

Only one frustration at this time: Sorting an array.  I am very close to solving it, but it will be difficult as it involves a lot.  However, this week I learned about arrays.  An array is a variable which contains a series of numbers.  It was difficult for me as I had to do a bit of research as well as I had to learn how to display it.  Here’s the program I made.

Arrays in use:

Here’s a video of this program in action:

For this program, I plan to organise the times from lowest to highest so people can see what their times were in order from best to worst.

Update 1: Link should be working now.

This post is for the period from February 5^th to February 18^th.  At this point, I am still ahead of schedule, but the schedule is catching up because I haven’t done much C programming these last two weeks.  However, I have started C++ with Alice.

With my mentor’s recommended programming, C++, I have done my first set of Alice programs.  They were pretty easy because they did not involve me making a program, I just had to set up scenes.  I had to add, duplicate, move, and rotate objects.  For one program I had to affect their subparts (arms, legs, hats, etc.).

No frustrations or challenges at this time.  However I have corrected my crash avoidance program to make it stop while turning.  Here is the link for the program.

Crash Avoidance Version 2

For next week, I am trying to make a program that records your reflexes by making a sound, having you clap, and recording the time difference.  Also, I am trying to get the robot to find a light source and move towards it.  I also will have a new robot built as well.

For a socials project three other people (Jonathan T, Raiya, and Jonathan Z (click names for links to their posts on this topic)) and I had to find four pictures that we think represent the red river rebellion. We chose the life cycle of a butterfly: the egg, caterpillar, cocoon, and the butterfly.

The egg represents the pent up feelings of people. The Hudson’s Bay Company may sell Rupert’s land to Canada. Canadians want to the land to expand. Surveyors are inspecting the land, thinking that Canada is going to get the land. Some of the British are spreading anti-French and anti-Métis sentiment. The Métis, angry from not getting a say in this trade, want the land as well because they have lived on it for a century or two. Also, Louis Riel has come back to the Red River settlement. Everyone is waiting and watching for something to happen, good or bad.

The caterpillar represents the eruption of a problem. In this case the Métis want Rupert’s Land, and angered by the surveyors who think Canada will get the land, start confronting them. Louis Riel and his supporters form the Métis National Committee to fight for land that they need. Riel then took over Fort Garry, seized some weapons, and set up a provisional government. He arrested his main opposition, John Schultz, and his supporters. His government began negotiations with the Canadian government.

The cocoon represents the penultimate stage of the problem. Louis Riel is not getting very far in negotiations as the Canadian government refuses to listen. His main opposition, John Schultz, has escaped but has been recaptured. He executes Thomas Scott for high treason (threatened Riel). This got many Canadians angry at the Métis and has made the negotiation even harder for the Métis. Even so the problem is almost resolved.

The butterfly represents the creation of something greater than before. The government finally gives into some of their demands: land for the Métis. Still, they decide to arrest Louis Riel and send troops to do so. But when they reach the settlement, they find that Riel has fled. All of the provisional government was pardoned, except for Riel, who was exiled to the US. A new province was formed, called Manitoba.