Classical Piece of the Week: Symphony 4, 4th mvmt

A while back I attended the Tchaikovsky Festival show by the Winnipeg Symphony Orchestra, and it was a mind-blowing experience. One of the pieces they performed was his Fourth Symphony, and the whole piece kept me at the edge of my seat. All four of the movements were extremely impressive, but the movement I want to showcase today is the fourth movement.

The movement is 9 minutes of epic, grandiose, magnificent music. It's everything that's good concentrated into the sound of the bold strings, blaring brass, balanced winds and the booming percussion. (All those b's were definitely unintentional, hehe). The music always builds and intensifies from its momentum, but just when you think it's at its peak, everything just diminishes again and a new, even more powerful momentum starts to develop. And then all this energy just releases at the end, giving you one of the most EPIC endings ever.

Merry Christmas! (With poem!)

 From: Decently Exposed Shop

Hey guys! I just wanted to wish a very Merry Christmas, and I hope your holidays are going wonderfully! Oh and here's a little Christmas poem for you guys! I was going for kind of a "Twas the Night Before Christmas" feel to it (you know, that kind of hearty/homey voice?). And I don't usually do rhyming stuff, but I think Christmas just screams "poems that rhyme"! Anyways, hope you guys enjoy it!

(Here's an awesome playlist of the whole Nutcracker Suite by Tchaikovsky!)

(Title of poem still undecided… if you guys got any suggestions don't hesitate on leaving a comment below!)

Stockings without a stuffer,
a tree but no manger.
Lights wrapped around the stairs,
but none out in the winter air.

What an artificial Christmas,
they deem, tone vicious.
You do not mess around,
with a celebration so renown.

Book Review: A Great and Terrible Beauty (Gemma Doyle, #1)

by Libba Bray
published in 2003
a forgiving 2.5-3 stars
Goodreads / Amazon / Author's Website

"Because you don't notice the light without a bit of shadow. Everything has both dark and light. You have to play with it till you get it exactly right."

A Great and Terrible Beauty, is like what the title suggests, both great and terrible. But for me, it tilted towards terrible.

It's the Victorian Era, and the only place where Gemma Doyle wants to be is in England. Instead, Gemma's stuck under the sweltering heat of India, her dreams of going abroad quickly evaporating under the torrid sun. But one eery vision of the future later, tragedy strikes her family and Gemma is sent packing to the Spence Academy in London, under the worst possible circumstances. At Spence, Gemma's visions seem to occur more often, and Spence's gothic styled building intensifies the supernatural feel. Now, Gemma must question all she's every known. Or what she thought she had known.

I thought the book started off great. The characters had vivid, colorful personalities, and the setting felt very three-dimensional. Gemma had quite a distinct character, one that made her feel alive, vibrant. She always had a strong opinion, and her solid narration made me, the reader, feel involved in the story. 

Unfortunately, the story started to unravel as Gemma started to discover her supernatural talents. Suddenly, several new, important plot lines appeared, yet they held a weak presence throughout the book. The story started to feel drab, as the characters' emotions were never amplified; they just feel flat. And scenes containing very dramatic elements felt like smooth poetry, I mean for a supernatural book, everything just felt a little too natural. 

The Pride in Wrongdoing

*All names in this post have been changed in form of respect and privacy*

Today we had a double bloc of Spanish, and nearing the end of it, you can already guess that our teacher was getting frustrated from all of our little misbehaviours. And so, with Ms. Kayla's mood already in a downfall, one student decided to raise his voice above everyone else's, which resulted in some furious yelling from our teacher's part.

After 10-15 minutes, when the situation was almost forgotten and the class was chattering away, Ms. Kayla grabbed our attention and says, "I'd just like to apologize to Andy for yelling at him. I realize now that he was not the only one that was talking loudly, and singling him out was the wrong thing to do. I know that I'm not perfect and sometimes I do lose my patience, but I really try my best." Looking back it didn't make much of an impact on my classmates and I, but now that I have had a chance to think about it, I now realize just how meaningful what Ms. Kayla said.

Classical Piece of the Week: Vocalise

Missed the last one? Here's a link to Rêverie.

Vocalise, by Sergei Rachmaninoff

And on those days when the leaves are shifting hues, drifting away,

when the trees are left with only their stark limbs, battered with wind.

And on those days when the only rays, are seen through stretched clouds,

gray and soulless but with infinite amount of reason.

And on those days when you stare at the world,

and all you get is a woman in her coat, eyes cast down, stepping carefully.

And on those days when you put the sad records on,

a soft piano, a crying violin.

And on those days when life is dusty and ashen,

but then the music fills you and suddenly everything is so, so alive.

A Human's Worth

"Humans' lives are not of the same worth," declared my mom, grabbing another piece of stir-fried broccoli with her wooden chopsticks.

We were sitting around the dinner table, listening to CBS News when the anchor quickly mentioned a suicide car bombing that killed 53 people in Iraq. The news seemed to have left his thought as quickly as it had came out of his mouth. The rest of the supper was a blur; only the remnants of my mom's comment swarmed in my mind.

That was several weeks ago. And yet I cannot forget that day when 53 people were killed in a bombing, and how the brief mention of it was quickly overshadowed by a news report of more value, but lesser importance. If this were to happen in a developed country like the U.S.A. or Canada, it would be on the national headlines, even international ones, for several days in a row. They would have short biographies of the injured and deceased affected by the incident, and segments where experts would analyze the event over and over.

Actually, it wasn't the way-too-brief report on the news regarding that suicide car bombing that thoroughly vexed me. It was the ignorance of social media. If you engage in social media platforms like Facebook or Twitter, you probably came across a few people posting a message that said "Pray for Boston", during the time following the Boston Marathon Bombing. And that was very respectful, being emotionally engaged to an event that shook the whole nation. But those people completely missed the mark. Haven't they ever looked at the world properly? Looked at Syria, Iraq, Afghanistan, and so many other countries in the midst of turmoil? They should know that these countries experience bombings every day of great fatality. But when has someone ever posted to their Facebook page a message saying "Pray for Syria", or "Iraq Strong"? If there are people who do it, I have yet to have encounter one of them.

It's my BLOGOVERSARY! (Has it already been a year?!)

Yay, it's the one year anniversary of my blog, The Humble Watermelon! It only seems fitting that this is also my 100th post!

My Journey to this Milestone
It all started in July 2012. I had already been on Goodreads for several months now, and I wanted to go further into improving my writing. So with a mind full of ideas and a lot of spontaneous thoughts, I went on Blogger, and created The Humble Watermelon, on July 26th. Then I joined a group on Goodreads called Blogger Lift, where I met loads of awesome people who also had their own blogs. Those people helped shape my blog into the one it is today, and I don't think I would be at where I am today without them.

Throughout the year, I've done book reviews, humanity-ish posts, and a lot of Classical Pieces of the Week! I hope to write many more posts, because writing has truely taught me so many things that are very valuable to me.

Blogging Friends
Once I found my place in the blogging world, I started making friends, and great friends they were (and still are!). I've interacted with a lot of people, so if I don't mention you, just know that you are still a very awesome buddy and I appreciate it so much that you read my blog!

Delaney @ The Awkward-ness: Delaney, you are an awesome human being. You were one of my first followers and one of my first commenters. You are always full of energy and you have great positive attitude that always rubs off on me! Thanks for sticking with me for so long, maybe stay for a little while longer? XD

Annie @ Fallen For Fiction: Remember Leopard Kitty Books? Cause I sure do! Annie, you really inspired me from the beginning, with your beautiful selection of words and excellent prose. I remember reading some of your posts and thinking, "Wow, if I could only write half as good as this girl!". You've been an amazing friend, thanks for making my blogging experience so much better!

Lottie @ Book Adoration: My favourite Wordpress girl, Lottie! When we became friends on Goodreads, it was just like an instant connection (or so I think)! Reading your blog since its beginning was such a pleasure for me, it has been amazing to see you evolve into such a talented writer! Your dedication has inspired me to be better at what I do. Thank you for everything, Lottie!

I'd also like to take time to thank Thomas, for inspiring me with his incredible writing skills and the passion he puts into his work; and also Ruby, the Queen of HTML, for all the time she puts into building her amazing blog, because the quality really shows.

To all of you: Thank you. For reading 2-3 of my posts. For leaving a nice comment. It means so incredibly much to me. And although it's already been a year, I'm still that same girl who get's so excited and pumped when she refreshes her blog statistics and notices that she has one more comment then before! Here's to many more years of way-too-loud typing, book-ish conversations, and late-night blogging!