Photography Club (trip)

Every year, the photography club usually goes on a trip to a national park in order to take beautiful photographs. Sometimes we have a guest speaker to teach us about different techniques and great ways to set up shots. Unfortunately our trip was cancelled this year because of the Westgate attack and security reasons. We also had several people drop out last minute. The trip was meant to be October 11th, 12th, and 13th. It's unlikely that it will be rescheduled as the seniors in the group are pretty much busy for the rest of the year. I'm really bummed the trip isn't happening because I always learn so much about setting up shots, taking my camera off auto, and just experimenting with cool pictures. It's great having a bunch of people who are dedicated to photography all together for a weekend because we can really learn from one another.

The trips are always wonderful because the club consists of many different grades, and getting to hang out with several different kinds of people is always amazing. We truly learn from each other, whether it be different photography techniques, or ways to handle the IB, it's always a great trip. Hopefully we'll be able to get a few guest speakers in photography club during activity time so that the students can still get that benefit of the trip. We also hope to do several smaller day trips (on Saturdays or Sundays) to Nairobi national park or the Kintangala Glass Factory. I'm positive we'll still have a great year!

Book Club - "The Fault in Our Stars"

Today in book club we discussed our first read, John Green's "The Fault in Our Stars". This book is by far one of my favorites from the past year. I really loved it. I found it emotional, both sad and joyful, and perfectly written. It was definitely not a great classic, but it was a simple, entertaining, capturing book. Several of my favorite quotes are below.

 I wrote a review for this book as I really do love it. Here it is:

The ISK book club’s first read was John Green’s The Fault in Our Stars, a book we called “captivating”, “heart-wrenching”, and “intricately beautiful”. The book brought tears to our eyes, and yet managed to have a lot us laughing through most of it. John Green does a marvelous job of turning a story of two teenagers with cancer into an adventure of sorts. He begins by introducing us to his main characters, Hazel Grace Lancaster and Augustus Waters, and letting the readers into their lives. Hazel is a 16-year-old girl living with cancer; Augustus is a cancer survivor (spoiler alert: they fall in love). Their story takes us to Amsterdam and into the life of Hazel’s favorite author, whose book kept her sane through the months of treatment and depression her cancer caused her. Yes, this book is about cancer, but it is also about love. It is about the most confusing, frustrating, brilliant and beautiful parts of life.  There is disappointment, sadness and unwillingness to live. But there is also laughter, happiness, joy, and hope. Most of all, John Green does an excellent job of keeping his reader entertained, whether it be in laughter or tears.

We, as readers, are meant to feel things while reading. It means that we are intended to become completely invested in the piece of literature before us, and The Fault in Our Stars did exactly that. It made us feel. And just as Hazel describes falling in love, we thought about the book in this way: “I fell in love the way you fall asleep: slowly, then all at once.”