Reflection:

It's been an only okay week, but so far my weekend's been good. Went to the game last night with a friend and had so much fun bundled up in my heavy coat, sipping hot chocolate. I am loving this cooler weather. I even slept in sweats and socks last night....it's finally starting to feel like Winter! : )

There is a Native American Proverb that says:

"We do not inherit the earth from our ancestors, we borrow it from our children"

At first I didn't understand the meaning of this proverb, but after letting it sink in the meaning hit me. I took from it the idea that the earth temperarily might be ours, but our life is so small in comparison to what comes after us. I think by children they mean the following generations not just the immediate one. I agree with this proverb because we need to take care of our fragile planet because really soon it's not going to be ours anymore, once we're gone it's our childrens' forever.

I made the connection of this proverb to the issue of global warming. It's not my generation that started it, but the ones that came before us, but now we're the ones who have to deal with it. Below is a link to this commercial that really makes you stop and think. It really emphasizes the idea of how we're "borrowing this world from our children" so we need to take care of it. And when you think about it, if you borrow someone's sweater your not going to return all dirty and torn up....so why are we doing it to our planet if it's not going to be ours in a couple years?

Reflecting time!!!

Not a lot of time to reflect...so much homework to do. I have to get ahead on homework because this weekend I'm going with my youth group on our Fall Retreat to Highland Lakes. I'm so stinkin excited because we will learn so much and grow so much closer to each other. Also a little bummed because I'm missing the game tonight... heard it was gonna be good...

GO TROJANS!!!

Illegal Immigrants

Undocumented alien, illegal alien, migrant, undocumented worker...

...what do all these terms have in common? They are used to describe an individual who is living in a country illegally.

Illegal Immigrants- a very controversial topic, but one that is (obviously) illegal!

Who are they?

Illegal immigrants are people who either came into the U.S. illegally or entered legally, but stayed past their visa's expiration date. It is estimated that there are around 12,000,000 illegal immigrants in the U.S. Even though illegal immigrants come from all over, Mexico is the largest contributer of illegal immigrants to our country. There are many ways to cross the border illegally. For example people in the Caribbean crossing the Atlantic in homemade boats or tubes, people from South America flying to Mexico and then cramming themselves into boxes to be shipped into the U.S., paying people to smuggle them in. No matter how they attempt in getting into the U.S. they are risking their lives by doing it.

A survey taken by a Pew Hispanic Center in 2005 shows the following break down of where illegal immigrants are from:

57% Mexico

24% Other Latin American countries

9% Asia

6%Europe & Canada

4% Other places in the World.

So why do they do it?

There are many motivations for people to do this. Many want better lives for themselves or for their children. Others leave because of reasons dealing with politics or the economy. Also many come because they are financial need and are desperate to get money to feed their families and put a roof over their heads. Texas, being a border state, gets many illegal immigrants, many people who come here for job oppurtunities to send money back to their families.

How does the U.S. deal with them?

Supposedly, if found out, they are held in immigration detention and then deported, or sent out of the country. One complication of this is when the illegal immigrant's child(ren) were born in the United States, making their children U.S. citizens

...detention, deportation...does this always happen?

Illegal immigration is a sticky and controversial subject, but one that is a huge problem to the United States.

Here's a link to how illegal immigrants fit into Obama's health care plan