" HILLS LIKE WHITE ELEPHANTS"
In my English Tech 12 class we had an assignment to read the short story called " Hill like White Elephants" by Ernest Hemingway. While we were reading we had to put ten comments about the story. The comments had to have a fact and an inference. The fact had to be proven in text and the inference was what we thought what was going to happen next. We couldn't really ask Dr. Griffin what a word meant because he wanted us to look it up, he wanted us to try and understand the story by our self. It a hard story to understand if you don't put your mind in to it. The first time I read the story I said it was the most stupidest story I had ever read because I didn't understand it and it didn't have a meaning. I didn't really put focused on it because I was so busy trying to complete the assignment of the ten comments. I though the story was about a America guy trying to have intercourse with a girl, the girl wasn't sure she just wanted to do it but she would do anything to make him happy. When I was done with the ten comments I re-read it again but I was still lost. I wanted to look it up in the internet but Dr. Griffin said no because the surprise would get ruin when we go over the story in the class. It toke me two day to understand what was the story about. The day came when we would finally go over the story as a class, when Dr. Griffin read at loud it made a little easier because he change he tone of the his voice during the dialogues. The dialogues were difficult to read for me, u can easy get lost because it doesn't really tell who talking. After, he read it he put some words that I didn't even know they were there, and they were IMPORTANT words. I cant believe that I really missed those words while reading. For example the words " operation " means an abortion in this story. We finally knew what was the story about, its about a man and girl who were expecting a child. The guy wanted the girl to have an abortion because he want to continuing partying and drinking, the girl was sad but she wanted to do anything to make the guy happy. The guy told her the " operation" was simple, she didn't care she just wanted what he wanted even if she wanted to start a family. I didn't do this assignment only for the grade, I did because Dr. Griffin said it was going to be an good experience in my reading. I wanted to challenge my self to read this story and understand it the first time but it was IMPOSSIBLE. This story was a good assignment because it showed me a that only one word can have a lot of meaning or it might be the whole meaning. Next time I will read a story carefully because I want to understand it.