Textual Analysis Essay Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 1000 words - 3

Textual Analysis - Essay Example She tries to compare the human ears with the dried peach halves (Forche 1). The use of this simile brings out a stark image where she shows how lifeless the ears were but after dropping them in water, they became lively. The contrast and comparison elaborates on the Colonel’s brutality. Simile has also been used to compare the window gratings in the house with those that are found in the liquor stores. The use of irony is evident in the poems title â€Å"the Colonel† where Forsche is treated to a very sumptuous dinner. They are served with lamb racks, wine and green mangoes which tend to reflect a feast. However, they are also served with bread, which they do not know its type. As the writer puts it, there is a golden bell which is used to summon the maid. It is ironical to have a golden bell just to summon the domestic worker. Another type of irony is evident where the parrot joins their conversation on governance issues. On another perspective, the parrot does not com prehend anything on governance since it is not human but from the poem, it contributes to the interesting topic. The parrot reinforces the ugly events that the Colonel is talking explaining. It is also ironical in situations where the writer nods her head to agree to the Colonel’s stories that are brutal and horrifying (Forche 1). Irony is also evident in the scene where Forche claims that her friend talked to her with her eyes so that she should not say anything after the Colonel kicks the parrot out. The author also brings irony where she talks about the fence that had broken bottle glass, which would rip off and individual’s kneecaps. Repetition has also been used to create emphasis of the story. The writer has emphasized on the use of the word ‘some’, which has been used three times. For example, the Colonel says ‘something for your poetry’. The word has also been used in cases where Forche says ‘some of the ears on the floor’ . The use of ‘some of the’ has been used twice at the end of the poem to emphasize of the number of ears that had been thrown on the floor. Repetition is used in poems to create a rhythm that will help the reader. In this poem, repetition has been used to express emotions that have come up due to the Colonel’s brutality. For poets to come up with good poems, most of them employ the use of repetition since it creates a rhythm and alliteration for the reader. How the visual special devices affect the viewer and their effectiveness In the poem â€Å"The Colonel†, the writer has used visual impacts to reveal the image of the Colonel and his brutal acts. From the start of the poem, the poet tries to bring out a clear picture of the Colonel’s house. The author starts by describing the family members, the house, and its surroundings and later brings out the aspect of brutality after the Colonel brings out the ears. For emphasize on brutality, the author al so says that there is a pistol put on a cushion beside the Colonel. The author has also included every single detail that is happening in the house to create an imaginary house in the reader’s mind. She also explains what was on the television as they walked into the house. These special devices have led to visual imagery in the poem. According to the poem’s structure, the author has presented her work in just one paragraph that emphasizes on concrete poetry. The line placements and flow of words in the poem brings visual imagery. The longest lines in the poem try to

World Civilization - Ideologies Term Paper Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 1000 words

World Civilization - Ideologies - Term Paper Example Neither the USA nor the USSR ever actually fought a war, but they did fight proxy wars, each one supplying arms and ammunition to the side that believed in their ideology. The war between North and South Vietnam is a case in point. Although both the USA and the USSR stayed out of the war, South Vietnam which was anti communist had the backing of the Americans and was supplied with the materials needed to fight the North Vietnamese who were communists. The USSR in its turn, backed the North Vietnamese and supplied them with war material. One would have thought that if Russia and America fought side by side during the second world war, there would be a friendly relationship between them. However, a closer look reveals that it was only the common enemy - Hitler, who brought these two nations together and their underlying differences took a backseat till the end of the war. Once the war was over, as Winston Churchill famously remarked, "From Stettin in the Baltic to Trieste in the Adriat ic, an iron curtain has descended across the Continent." (Churchill, 1946) No one person can be held responsible for the cold war. The clash of ideologies - USSR’s Communism and Socialism versus America’s Democracy and Capitalism; and the fact that each thought that her own ideology was best, and felt threatened by the opposing ideology, is the real cause of the cold war. One could argue, that the cold war came about due to Russia’s aggression in Eastern Europe. On the other hand, if the US had only had the good sense to see that Russia was just trying to create a buffer zone between the east and the west, possibly to prevent further invasion from Germany; perhaps the world might have been spared the tensions and problems created by over four decades of the cold war. Each side viewed the ideology of the other with suspicion and fear, and was lulled into a false belief that it alone held the key that would ensure the happiness and prosperity of mankind. It seems that both the USA and the USSR tried to push their own interests, and in so doing created misunderstandings, that at times brought them to the brink of nuclear war. In the beginning, the cold war was limited to taking sides in wars that were fought by other nations, that subscribed to opposing ideologies; but the real danger was posed when both the USA and the USSR began to amass weapons of mass destruction. Although the cold war was spread over a period of over four decades, it went through periods of high tension followed by phases of relative calm. The Bay of Pigs crisis in Cuba in 1962, when the two superpowers came to the brink of war, had the effect of sobering the two nations, who decided to set up a hotline between them to be able to speak directly in times of crisis. Soon after this both the USA and the USSR agreed to a Nuclear test ban Treaty. According to some historians, this was the beginning of the end of the cold war. In 1972, the USSR and the USA led by Brezhnev and Nixon, announced a policy of peaceful coexistence, strengthening economic ties and signing agreements for increased trade. By the time Reagan became president, the Soviet Union had once again become the â€Å"empire of evil†, till in the second term of his presidency, Reagan was lauded as the architect of ending the cold war. Jack Matlock Jr, who was the US ambassador to Moscow under Reagan, says, Reagan "wanted to reduce the threat of war, to convince the Soviet leaders that cooperation could serve the Soviet peoples better than confrontation and to encourage openness and democracy in the Soviet Union." (Matlock, Reagan and Gorbachev: How the Cold War Ended) At the time the USSR too had got a leader whose ideas

Economy, FDI and Hydropower Sector in Laos

Economy, FDI and Hydropower Sector in Laos Background: Generally speaking, hydropower has various economical, environmental and social and strategic advantages. The hydropower is the largest renewable resource used for electricity and Hydropower is a significant source of electricity worldwide and will likely continue to grow especially in the developing countries. Thus it plays an essential role in economical development especially in many developing countries. Like many countries the Lao Peoples Democratic Republic (Lao PDR) or Laos is in trend in receiving foreign investment mainly in hydropower sector which comparing by sector from 2000-2010 hydropower sector account more than 33% in total investment (MPI, Laos). Laos nature and climate provide mammoth opportunities for the country to develop hydropower sector which in recent year there has been increased demand for electric power in the region of South-East Asia, however less than 2 percent of the hydropower potential has been developed in Laos over the past 30 years (Laos National Statistic in 2007). During the last few years, the hydropower sector has played an important role in the speedy economic growth of the country recently has experienced, more than 70 hydropower projects are under development, and the hydropower sector makes up an significant part of the export industry in Laos. As the government set the economic outlook from now the year 2020, the National Development Vision to the Year 2020 is to graduate from the status of being a least developed country and become sustainable development nation. To reach and achieve such vision, Laos needs the capital and invests in the human resource capacity, as Laos Government lack of these things. Thus, the foreign investment especially in hydropower sector is playing an important role in increasing the governments revenue (capital generation), job creations and new business system introducing. The hydropower sector is playing the significant role in the Laos economic and social development, the investment law in 1994 introduced the huge incentives mainly tax incentives in order to attract more investment, the question is that are these incentives really work and attract more investment into Laos? Or how did the investment incentive policies effect to hydropower sector in Laos? Thus, the objective or thesis statement of this paper is to analysis the effective of incentive policies offered by government of Laos in attracting investment mainly hydropower sector into Laos. The scope of this paper is not go back beyond the investment law introduced in 1994, but it starts to introduce some basic information about Laos such as the basic information about population, land area, religions and so on (See the Laos at Glance in the table 1 below) and the investment incentive policies provided by the government of Laos. Many scholars explained that, market size and cost of production is the key in attracting investment. Krugman (1991a) argues that the interaction of market, transport costs, and fixed investment costs determines the location of industry. In the Morissets article (2003, p. 253), the impact of tax incentives on FDI is not obvious that it can help in promoting investment. In the past few decades the numerous studies of international investors have indicated that the investment incentive policies are not major factor in their investment location decision. More important factors such as infrastructure, political stability, labor and the cost of production, however in this study is going to explain and provide evidences that investment incentive policies provided by government are the key factor in attracting investment in the case of Laos. Most of the data and information using in here are mainly from the concerning ministries in the Laos as essential. Thus, once again, the scope of this thesis is not covering all aspects of the economic development in country; it will focus only on the laws and regulations applied to foreign investment especially in hydropower sector. Furthermore, there is no any hypothesis test in this paper, as the objective of the paper is to analyze and examine the effective of the Strategic Investment Promotion for Laos. The main study shall be identifying the issues of using incentive policies and drawing out the strategic policies for recommendations. In order to make this paper easy to read and complete, this paper is developed into four chapters. The chapter one is the introduction chapter, where the general information, thesis statement and scope of this paper are drawn. The second chapter is literature reviews related to the foreign investment policies. The third chapter will focuses on overview of Laos economy, FDI and Hydropower Sector in the economic and social development in Laos. In this chapter, the data and figures are illustrated in order to see how changing in hydropower sector in Laos through the policies and incentives offering, plus more specific study on the comparative study, which will focuses on the analyzing of the incentive and disincentive on foreign direct investment. The last chapter is conclusion and recommendations approaches. In this chapter, the policies recommendations are drawn. Then the last part of the paper is the references. Lao PDR at a Glance (Table 1) Name Lao Peoples Democratic Republic Surface Area Population total: 236,800 sq km, land: 230,800 sq km, water: 6,000 sq km 1995 census: 4,574,848 (2007 estimate: 6,677,534) Density 25 people per sq km Land Boundaries total: 5,083 km Borders Myanmar 235 km, Cambodia 541 km, China 423km, Thailand 1,754 km, Viet Nam 2,130 km Languages Lao (official), French, English, and various ethnic languages Climate Tropical monsoon; rainy season (May to November); dry season (December to April) Religion Buddhist 65 percent , animist 32.9 percent , Christian 1.3 percent, other and unspecified 0.8 percent (1995 census) Time Zone UTC+7 Currency Kip (LAK) Exchange Rates As of October 6th, 2008 : 1 Dollar: 8560 Kips 1 Euro: 11680 Kips GDP 39,284 billion Kips (Nominal, 2007 estimate) 4.1 US$ billion GDP per Capita 604 USS (2006) Source: Economic Research Department, MPI, Laos, 2007 Chapter II: Literature Review Foreign Direct Investment Policy Recently, many scholars try to explain and point out the factors for foreign investment location decision in developing countries. On the other hand there are many studies and articles related the FDI and its policies in developing countries. The developing countries try to develop their investment policies and strategic plan in order to attract the foreign investment In the article of Shaukat Ali and Wei Guo (2005) explained the behavior of MNCs in China, with its huge potential market size as the most important factor for attracting FDI to China, with its large population, steady economic growth, trade integrations are the perfect combination in attracting FDI. The authors further point out that the Chinese Government incentive policies are another important factor In the article of Ekrem Tatoglu (2002), it is was found that market size, openness of the economy, and infrastructure of the host country had positive effect, but the lack of exchange rate and economic stability had negative effect but not significant, however to some extent, it has slowed down its efforts to receive much higher volume of foreign investment. In the Morissets article (2003, pp. 253) point out that the relation between investment policy such as tax incentives and FDI is not the most significant whether it can help the host country in gaining the foreign investment. Over the past few decades they are numerous studies from the international investors have indicated that investment policy such as tax incentives are not the most important factor for investment locations, more important factors such as infrastructure, labor and political stability. However it doesnt mean that the investment policy has no effect on attracting foreign investment, one of the good examples is the Irelands tax incentives which have been recognized as key in attracting foreign investors over the past two decades. Moreover, there has been growing support evidence that investment policy influence the location decisions of companies within regional economic groupings, such as the European Union, North American Free Trade Area, and Association of Southea st Asian Nations. No doubt that market size is important to foreign investment in deciding location but other factors such as the investment policy and institutional framework, are essential in influential a countrys attractiveness to FDI. There are three forms of investment incentive policies: tax incentives, subsidies, export processing zones (EPZs). The investment policy can be favorable to foreign investment or unflavored to foreign investment in order to protect local industries The effect of FDI will depend, in part, on the form that FDI takes. FDI directed to heavily protected industries or attracted by very costly incentives may have a low, or even negative, effect on growth and productivity, Attitudinal and empirical research on the effect of tax incentives on FDI has been inconclusive. In the article of Hearnest (2007, pp.25-30) dedicated that if the investment policy such as tax incentives may be good for a country. This is so if some conditions are contents. First, the investment policy must lead to an increased of inflow in FDI into that country by attracting FDI that would not come without the presence of the incentives. Second, these FDI should contribute to the countrys development by offering returns to the country that more than offset (the returns) the foregone tax revenue in form of tax incentives granted to the investors. When trying to find out who should qualify for the tax incentives in Tanzania therefore, the work will focus on some types of investments that would not come to Tanzania without the presence of the incentives, but have the potential of contributing positively to the development of the country. As for who should not qualify, a focus will be on those investments that would come in any circumstance (in this case the absence of tax incentiv es). FDI determinants that MNEs look for are the presence of economic, political and social stability; and rules regulating entry and operations of businesses. Others are standards of treatment of foreign affiliates; business facilitation (including, inter-alia, investment incentives and thereby tax incentives; market size, growth, structure and accessibility; raw materials, low cost but efficient labour force and physical infrastructure in form of ports, roads, power and telecommunication. Specific incentives may not be main determinants of a countrys attractiveness to FDI. A countrys general economic and political conditions, domestic market, natural and other resources may be more important than some specific incentives. However various incentives have been found to influence investments. Since specific incentives may not be main determinants of a countrys attractiveness to FDI. A countrys general economic and political conditions, domestic market, natural and other resources may be more important than some specific incentives. However various incentives have been found to influence investments. In the conclusion for the literature reviews, there are both advantages and disadvantages by offering the investment incentives policy from the host countries to the foreign investors. However, most of the articles presented in there seem to support the investment incentives policy (tax incentives) offered by many developing countries. There is no doubt that this form of investment incentives are dominated in many developing from now and in the future, especially the ASEAN nations, particularly Laos. In this context, this paper will lead through the way that investment incentives are really strategic tools for FDI attracting in Laos. CHAPTER III: Overview of Economy, FDI and Hydropower Sector in Laos 3.1 Current Laos Economic Situation As the Lao government set their development goal which aiming to free the country from being least developed country by the Year 2020, it ultimate goal is to graduate from the status of being a least developed country and become sustainable development nation. To achieve the goal, Laos needs the capital and human resource capacity, as Laoss lack of these things. Thus, the Foreign investment especially in hydropower and mining sector are playing an essential role in increasing the governments revenue (capital generation), job creations and so on. Since the Laos government started their economic liberalization, the new economic mechanism (NEM) in 1986, the Government of Laos has made the development of private sector and attraction of the foreign investment as the strategic priority, thus the implementation of investment policies are very important to investment especially in attracting foreign direct investment. With the advantages such as political stability, natural resources, low labor costs, strategic location and incentive investment policies, both domestic and foreign investment has notably evidenced its contribution to the Laos Social Economic Development. Generally the total (public and private) investment mobilized rose significantly from 21.3 percent of GDP in 2001 to about 29 percent in 2005, and averaged at 27.8 percent for the five-year period which mainly from FDI  [1]  . The foreign investment has provided further drive to Laos economic growth. The government of Lao PDR provided good climate for investment, such as infrastructures, telecommunication, political stability, stable macroeconomic condition and law and regulation related to investment. With the Laos National Social and Economic Development Plan (NSEDP), Laos government had achieved to maintain the economic prospect with an average GDP from year 2000 to 2010 approximately about 7.73 percent (see figure 1), mainly benefiting from expanding natural resources within the country. By encouraging Foreign Direct Investment, Laos economy has been gradually increased in many sectors, especially industry sector and services sector, which by 2009 had reached 70 percent of GDP. (See Figure 2 and 3) Industrial sector has grown in recent year with rapid rate, accounted an average rate about 11.3 percent per year. The mining industry increased by 33.87 percent; tobacco 20.75 percent; food processing 9.17 percent; textiles 20.11 percent; and garments 11.15 percent. The services sector has been positively meet the requirements of production and trading, from 2001to 2005, the growth rate in total revenues from services sector accounted an averaged at 10 percent per year.  [2]  According to National Social and Economic Development Plan, in general Government of Laos (GoL) has performed well with its ambitious economic target and strong economic growth which grounding to free the country from the status of least-development country by 2020. Figure 1: Laos real GDP growth in percentage Source: International Monetary Fund (IMF), World Economic Outlook 2010 Figure 2: Laos GDP composition by sector Source: CIA World Fact Book Figure 3: Laos GDP per capita compared by continent Source: International Monetary Fund (IMF), World Economic Outlook 2010 In recent year the Government of Laos (GoL) continue to work hard and try to boost its foreign trade with the aim to increase more in export, the structure of their economic changed with the shares of the private sector and Foreign Investment in the economy have increased. In particular, Foreign Direct Investment has facilitated the creation of new products and increasing size of the markets including the entry of new markets. The number of foreign direct investments and private domestic in the past five years stood at 9.7 billion USD, in which foreign direct investments accounted for 8 billion USD  [3]  . Thus, the private sector has become more and more essential in the economy of the Laos. The Lao PDR has been headed for business in regional and global economic integration. It is vital to Laos economic with its potential in domestic and foreign investors to guarantee the benefits from the liberalization of trade. Being the member of ASEAN, ATFA and WTO applicant providing opportunity for the country in trade and attracting foreign direct investment increasing the market entry by reduced 98 percent of its tariffs (zero to five percent in 2008). However Laos faced the problem of trade imbalance, in the year of 2007 to 2008 the total trade was 2630.9 million USD which number of export only 822.7 million USD (see Table 2) 3.2 Foreign Direct Investment and Hydropower Trends in Laos Foreign direct investment is playing crucial role in Laos economy, with the implementation of Investment Law in 2004 which the Government of Laos (GoL) given huge investment incentive to foreign investors especially tax incentive, as the resulted in 2005 onward the FDI inflow has been significantly increased especially in mining sectors and hydropower sectors. In 2006 the FDI inflow raised up to 2,699 million USD and in 2009 increased more than 4,312 million USD (see figure 4 and figure 5). Figure 4: Foreign Direct Investment in Laos Source: Raw data from Ministry of Planning and Investment, Laos Figure 5: Foreign Direct Investment by Sector 2000-2010(Jun) Source: Raw Data from Ministry of Planning and Investment, Laos Not yet complete 3.3 Analysis Study of Investment Incentives and Disincentives in Laos 3.3.1 Investment Incentives in Laos Tax exemptions from some major industrial nations: Lao receive the trade privileges from European Union such as GSP privilege. Currently, the receiving GSP is from 42 countries from EU, Japan, Canada, Switzerland, Vietnam and etc. Thus, the garment investment sector is still having comparative advantages in attracting many textile companies to invest in Laos. Mostly, investors are from Taiwan, Japan and Thailand. Furthermore, Laos has sign the Normal Trade Relations (NTR) with USA in December 2004. This is the signal for Laos to join the world trade system (membership of WTO is underway). Such membership leads confident for foreign investors doing business in Laos. Land-linked country: This is going to be trade hub in the Southeast Asia region, which has access to ASEAN market with more than 500 million. Inhabitants including southern part of neighboring China, which adds up together reaching nearly 1 billion people, this is going to be the huge market in the world. Currently, the main roads reaching every corner of the international border pointed have been built. In the next five year, Laos can be the transit goods and connect Southeast Asia to the Northeast and Central Asia. Abundant water resources, rich in mineral resources, and plentiful of productive land: Laoss government still enjoys receiving the application for the development of the hydropower dams and mining concession from foreign investors. These two sectors are main attractive sectors for foreign investors around the world. The abundant water resources help Laos to gain more major foreign investors to invest in the hydropower project, which lead Laos to be the electricity supplier or battery of Asia. Furthermore, unexploitations of mining areas are still existed and waiting for right foreign investors to invest in this sector. Most of the mines are gold, copper, coal, tin, Zink and others. Thus, this is another sector that the Lao governments use to promote and attract foreign investors for investing. Moreover, there are plentiful of productive land for foreign investors to do the plantation projects for the industrial plantation such as sugar, palm trees, eucalyptus, and so on. Currently, many big paper companies are investing for the industrial plantation in Laos such as Oji paper factory (Japan), and Birla Pulp Company (India). Laos Economic Zone: Savannakhet Province is a hub of trade and services in the Greater Mekong Sub-region (GMS). The province is linking Lao PDR with Thailand, and Vietnam on the Road No.9. It is also all along the Road No.13 which runs through Lao PDR, leading north into China and South into Cambodia. The construction of Road and bridge will progress develop Savannakhet as a trade and services zone in near future and will bring an expansion of markets which will create further business opportunities for all the economic sectors in Savannakhet province, thus Savannakhet Special Economic Zone (SSEZ) which linking neighboring countries in the Asian region with a total population of more than 500 million people and thus is a main centre for trade and services. The categories of business activities planned to be developing in the Savannakhet Special Economic Zone (SSEZ) include the following: Export Processing Zone; Free Trade Zone; Free Service and Logistic Centre including tourism, banking and other activities. 3.3.2 Disincentive of Investment in Laos Geographic condition (land locked country) and poor infrastructure: Laos has no border with the sea, thus this is only obstacle for the transportation. The cost of transport goods from Laos to the sea port in Thailand or in Vietnam is quite expensive and may take longer time for the goods to reach the destination due to the documentations and unforeseen events that can happen anytime. Furthermore, the infrastructure in Laos is not quite good especially the road condition in some places or provinces. These cause the transportation cost high and the return on investment or profit is not so high as expected. However, with the support from the international financial organization such as ADB and World Bank, the Lao government has put the budget for the infrastructure development for the main route to the sea ports such as Road R3 connecting Thaiiand-Laos-China, the road No. 9 connecting Thailand-Laos-Vietnam, Road No. 13 run through the whole countries from North to South of Laos. The vision of the government is to change Laos as Land-Locked country to the Land-Linked country. By achieving this goal, the cost of transportation will be reducing for sure. Macroeconomic instability: Lao economic is not independent economic system. Directly and indirectly, the economic depends on the changing of the Thai and Vietnamese economic growth. Now, the Lao economic is more likely to depend to the Chinese economic as well now, as the major foreign investors is Chinese investors. The Lao currency (Kip) is none tradable currency, so it depends on the changing of the US dollars and Thai Baht. For instance, when the financial crisis occurred in 1997, supported that Lao can escape from this crisis, however, it hit hardly by the crisis as most of the commodities goods import from Thailand. Thus, when the global crisis hit Thailand, it will directly and indirectly hurt Lao economy. However, Lao government has put more afford to monitoring the economic development in Laos and try to not depending on one country economy such Thailand. Now, the free flow of goods leads Laos to escape from the dependent economic from Thailand. Laos can gain access to the Vietnam and China market now. Small market: Although the economy sounds goods in recent years, but the total expenditure of the Lao people is still low. Most of the markets in Laos are small in size and number of consumers. Most of the big spending on consumers is in the main city, but not in the rural areas. However, most of people in the city cross the border to Thailand in spending for the commodities goods. In recently, the good economic recovered and increasing in FDI inflow in to the country, Lao people spend more money in commodities and luxury goods. Thus, this is the good sign in increasing Lao people spending. In the near future, the Lao small market is going to graduate to the big market soon. Thailand. Now, the free flow of goods leads Laos to escape from the dependent economic from Thailand. Laos can gain access to the Vietnam and China market now. 3.4 Comparative Study of Investment Law (1994 and 2004) 3.4.1 The Investment Law in 1994 Not yet complete 3.4.2 The Investment Law in 2004 Not yet complete Law on the Promotion and Management of foreign Investment in the Lao PDR (1994) Law on the Promotion of Foreign Investment In the Lao PDR (2004) Form   of FDI à ¢Ã¢â€š ¬Ã‚ ¢Ã‚   2 forms of FDI: a) A joint Venture with one or more domestic Lao Investors b)   A 100% foreign- owned enterprises Exemption from import duties for intermediate components and raw materials imported for processing and re-export; Uniform flat rate of 1% of import value of equipment, means of production, spare parts and other materials used in operation of investment projects; No export duties on finished products; Annual profit tax at a uniform flat rate of 20% Special privileges, including reduction or exemption from theprofit-tax rate, are given based on the size of investments and the significant positive impacts that such investments have on the socio- economic development of Lao PDR; à ¢Ã¢â€š ¬Ã‚ ¢Ã‚   3 forms of FDI: a)   Business Cooperation by contract; b) A joint venture with one or more domestic Lao investors (Foreign equity should not be less than 30% of total investment capital); or c) A 100% foreign- owned enterprise 0% of import duties on production vehicles, machinery, equipment and raw materials No export duties on finished products;    Profit tax is classified into 3 groups: 20%, 15% and 10% and profit tax exemption is offered for a certain period depending on activities, investment areas and size of investment 1) Zone One (area with no economic information infrastructure) 7 years profit tax exemption thereafter a profit tax of 10% 2) Zone Two: (areas with certain level of economic infrastructures) 5 years profit tax exemption 3 years profit tax of 7.5% thereafter a profit tax of 15% 3) Zone Three ( areas with good infrastructure) 2 years profit tax exemption 2 years profit tax of 10% thereafter a profit tax of 20% Other   Incentives Investment term is up to 30 years Freedom to expatriate their earnings back home or to third countries Right to employ foreign expatriates Personal income tax at a flat rate of10% Investment term is up to 75 years Freedom to expatriate their earnings back home or to third countries Right to employ foreign expatriates (not exceed 10% of the enterprises labor) Personal income tax at a flat rate of 10% Source: Ministry of Planning and Investment, Lao PDR Case Study of Foreign Direct Investment on Hydropower Sector in Laos Not yet complete Chapter IV: Conclusion Not yet complete

The Snake Essays -- essays research papers

Joseph Campbell, who became the most famous scholar of world religions, because of his book, The Power of Myth. In his studies of world religions over his long career, Campbell discovered powerful and often repeated ideas that imbue all the religious traditions of the world. He found that the stories we call myths were at one time, or is still, a part of all religions and represents attempts to answer pretty much the same fundamental questions. What makes these myths powerful is that they are so basic to all human questing. And if we look at the religions around the world we, too, will find a plethora, a wealth of deities, gods and goddesses and spirits who have been and still are part of serious religious expressions. It helps to remember that the only thing that separates a myth from a mainline religion today is time. These myths are humanity’s earliest attempts to explain how the world came into existence, why there are people and all other manner of life, why bad and sad and glad things happen, why people act the way they do. We are still trying to answer those questions, and while there are some pretty good answers these days, we know that not everyone accepts them. We are still having in this relatively well educated country and even with all our media and science–raging debates about whether evolution or the Genesis creation story got us all here today. We are living in a world that is still filled with mythological stories, with gods and goddesses, and we are still seeking those basic answers to the same basic questions. How did we get here? Why are we here? What are we supposed to do? Is this all there is? Myth is most often nowadays used to mean a story that is not true, but in the study of world religions the term means something else entirely. Myth means both old and part of serious religious beliefs or expression, however incorrect the details may seem to us. Myth is about the metaphors of the spiritual seeking of all peoples, including our own. Myths were first developed out of the simple stories that conveyed on the metaphorical level what people of a given time believed to be true. For instance, the ancient Greeks believed the gods lived at the heights of Mount Olympus, just as many people today believe God is in Heaven. As a people evolved, so did their stories, and out of the storytelling that is innate in human beings, stories grew abo... ...And on and on. There are as many creations and creators as there are have been peoples of the earth. Then the myths deal with the problems of good and evil. For the Judeo-Christian traditions there is the story of the Garden of Eden and the forbidden fruit of the tree of life, also the story of Noah. The last category is Heroes and Prophets, those humans the gods and goddesses use to do their work, to be their spokespersons, as it were, that is to say, there was a time when slavery was an accepted practice around the world with very few exceptions, and the myths supported these practices, even those of our Judeo-Christian traditions. But as people have continued to evolve as social beings, we have come to accept that there are better ways, and so religious traditions have changed along the way. As we still see, though, such change is not easy, and takes a long time. So many of the religious traditions and practices of today will one day fade into that mist of myth, but we will through the stories continue to be a world of many deities. We can only hope that the gods and goddesses and spirits of humanity will move us to do better and kinder things for each other and for the world.

Edward taylor and Metaphor Essay

The Beauty of Metaphor A Metaphor is defined as a grammatical device that â€Å"compares two different ideas by speaking of one in terms of the other. It asserts that one thing is another thing.† One of the best poets at using the metaphor is Edward Taylor, an intellectual New English Puritan. In his â€Å"Meditation One,† Taylor compares â€Å"God’s Matchless Love† to water, saying that it fills â€Å"Heaven to the Brim!† Then, in his â€Å"The Reflection,† Taylor says â€Å"Earth† was once a â€Å"Paradise of Heaven.† In both instances, Edward Taylor calls one thing something to help emphasize the message he is trying to portray, but ultimately, his metaphor in â€Å"Meditation One† is more effective as it reflects a greater idea. Edward Taylor’s use of metaphor in â€Å"Meditation One† and â€Å"The Reflection† shows how he used metaphors to compare an important topic in his poem to something more relatable, but his metaphor in â€Å"Meditation One† is more effective as it portrays a greater message. Edward Taylor’s use of Metaphor in â€Å"Meditation One† helps portray his message of Gods never ending love for us. In Line 7, Edward Taylor starts the sentence of by saying â€Å"Oh, Matchless Love!filling Heaven to the Brim!† Taylor compares the incomparable love of God to water, as he says it will fill heaven â€Å"to the brim.† By using the verb â€Å"filling,† the reader automatically thinks of something more relatable to his knowledge, water in context to a drink. When one pours water in, the water fills the cup. Ultimately, through his diction choice and use of metaphor, Taylor considers God’s love to be something that fills humanities’ needs. Since it can fill â€Å"Heaven,† it can fill our souls with a never ending joy. This is why Edward Taylor’s use of metaphor is so effective, it ulaitmely leads to a bigger, more important conclusion that can be easily derived through his relatable examples. This metaphor, in comparison to the one in â€Å"The Reflection†, is more effective as it plays a vital role in the establishment of a major theme in the poem. Edward Taylor’s use of metaphor in â€Å"The Reflection† helps portray his message that Earth was once a heavenly place until it was corrupted with sin. In Line 19, Edward Taylor starts the sentence off by saying â€Å"Earth once  was Paradise of Heaven Below.† 1Divine life, living and dead, whatever the case may be, existed on Earth at one period of time, until the corruptness of sin took over the Godly world. In this metaphor, Edward Taylor says that Earth once â€Å"was† a Paradise of Heaven Below, or, in other words, that Earth was once a Heavenly place. In this case, Taylor’s metaphor is much more simple, he calls one thing something else. The metaphor’s main puropose in this case is to call earth, in a past time, a Godly place, until the sinful nature of Adam and Eve led to the abolishment of Earth’s divineness Due to its simplistic nature, and the message that it emphasizes, this metaphor is not as effective as the previous me taphor. In conclusion, Edward Taylor uses metaphor to perfection.2 To think brillianty and to write brilliantly are two completely different things, and Edward Taylor does both. In both cases, Edward Taylor uses metaphor to call one thing something else. In â€Å"Meditation One,† He calls God’s love water, and in â€Å"The Reflection,† calls Earth a once Divine place. Ultimately, in â€Å"Meditation One,† his use of Metaphor is more effective because it conveys a more important message of God’s undeniable love for us.

Food and Eating Essay

January 5 & 7 †¢ Hetherington, Kregg, Chapters 1-4 Cultivating Utopia Week 15 Case study: Growing organic Jan. 12 &14. †¢ Hetherington, Kregg, Chapters 5-8 Cultivating Utopia †¢ Exams handed back this week & Make up exam on Tuesday January 12, 1-3 pm Week 16Class and consumption Jan. 19 & 21. †¢ Roseberry, William. 1996. â€Å"The Rise of Yuppie Coffee and the Reimagination of Class in the United States,† American Anthropologist 98 (4). 762-775. (BLS). *Food basket assignment due on Thursday January 21st. Week 17 Gender, food & Community Jan. 26 & 28 †¢ Beardworth, Alan and Teresa Keil, â€Å"Food, family, and community† in Sociology on the Menu, London: Routledge, pp. 73-99. (On reserve) †¢ Allison, Anne, Chapter 15 â€Å"Japanese Mothers and Obentos†¦Ã¢â‚¬  in F & C Week 18Gender, food & the body. February 2 & 4 †¢ Bordo, Susan, Chapter 12 â€Å"Anorexia Nervosa: Psychopathology as the Crystallization of Culture† in F & C †¢ Parasecoli, Fabio, Chapter 13 â€Å"Feeding Hard Bodies: Food and Masculinities in Men’s Fitness Magazines† in F & C Week 19Race, ethnicity & food. Feb. 9 & 11 †¢ Williams-Forson, Psyche, Chapter 21, â€Å"More Than Just the ‘Big Piece of Chicken’: The Power of Race, Class and Food in American Consciousness† in F & C †¢ Nabhan, Gary Paul, Chapter 23 â€Å"Rooting Out the Causes of Disease: Why Diabetes is So Common Among Desert Dwellers† in F & C *Reading response due on Tuesday on either reading Week 20Nationalism & food Feb. 16 & 18 ââ€" ª Penfold, Steve, 2002, â€Å"Eddie Shack Was No Tim Horton†¦Ã¢â‚¬  in Food Nations, ed. W. Belasco and P. Scranton. New York: Routledge. Pp. 48-66. ââ€" ª Wilk, Richard, Chapter 19 â€Å"’Real Belizean Food’† †¦in F & C ââ€" ª Study Break –February 22-28th–Week 21Foundational approaches March 2 & 4 †¢ Barthes, Roland, Chapter 2. â€Å"Toward a Psychosociology of Contemporary Food Consumption† in F & C †¢ Là ©vi-Strauss, Claude, Chapter 3 â€Å"The Culinary Triangle† in F & C. Week 22Foundational approaches March 9 & 11 †¢ Douglas, Mary, Chapter 4 â€Å"Deciphering a Meal† in F & C †¢ Mintz, Sidney, â€Å"Tasting Food, Tasting Freedom† in Tasting Food, Tasting Freedom. Boston: Beacon Press. (On reserve) *Reading Response on either reading due on Tuesday. Week 23Foundational approaches March 16 &18 †¢ Harvis, Marvin, Chapter 5 â€Å"The Abominable Pig† in F & C †¢ Recommended: Beardsworth, Alan and Teresa Keil, â€Å"The mysterious meanings of meat† In Sociology of the Menu pgs. 193-217. (On reserve). Week 24 Mcdonaldization March 23 & 25 †¢ Ritzer, George, 2004 â€Å"An introduction to McDonaldization† in The McDonaldization of Society. Thousand Oaks, CA: Pine Forge Press. pgs. 1-23. †¢ Yan, Yunxiang, Chapter 32 â€Å"Of Hamburger and Social Space†¦Ã¢â‚¬  in F & C * Reading Response on either reading due on Tuesday. Week 25 Challenging Mcdonaldization March 30 & April 1st. †¢ Leitch, Alison, Chapter 24 â€Å"Slow Food and the Politics of Pork†¦Ã¢â‚¬  in F & C †¢ Pilcher, Jeffrey, Chapter 25, â€Å"Taco Bell, Maseca, and Slow Food†¦Ã¢â‚¬  in F & C. Week 26Challenging Mcdonaldization April 6 & 8 †¢ Clark, Dylan Chapter 26, â€Å"Punk Foods† in F & C Course wrap up this week. *Final exam* will be scheduled during the exam period. Please plan accordingly. Have a great summer!

Identifying Truth Or Fiction Example

Identifying Truth Or Fiction Example Identifying Truth Or Fiction – Coursework Example IDENTIFYING TRUTH OR FICTION al Affiliation Identifying fiction or truth Science can be examined as a systematic process of obtaininginformation that depends on the fact that the world in its natural form is governed by certain principles, and the principles can be discovered through experimentation and observation methods. On the other hand, pseudoscience refers to claims expressed in a language that sounds scientific in basing its arguments but the ideas have not been subjected to any testing through contemporary scientific process. Most pseudoscience claims are theories that do not have substances assertions or predictions that are testable scientifically (Montemayor 2012).Pseudoscience often characterized with non-rational justifications are attractive since they appeal idealistically and are fun to contemplate about. In a pseudoscience context of reality, normally it is of little significance whether an idea is scientifically accurate or otherwise (Montemayor 2012). All that is deemed as important in one’s universal spectra is what appeals to them or satisfies some linguistic anger. It is okay in believing what you want but harmful to perceive that your arguments are scientific based when they are not (Montemayor 2012).Two examples of pseudo-science claims are: analyzing handwriting supposedly can be used to reveal a person’s personality characteristics. This concept is used by some companies in recruitment- when they insist on hand written application letters. The other claim is that aliens helped build the world (Baloney Detection Kit 2015). These two claims have not been scientifically tested rather are perceptions that cannot be verified as truth. To know someone’s personality, an oral interview or inquiry from others may give an insight into someone’s personality.Point two of the Baloney Detection Kit: which states if the source makes similar claims. The emphasis is that an open mind should be kept when testing the validity of information and care should be taken to avoid biases. Another concept that has significantly influenced my thinking is the placing of a concept on a practical concept that is if it fit in the world of today (Baloney Detection Kit 2015).ReferencesBaloney Detection Kit, (Dr. Michael Shermer). (n.d.). Retrieved February 12, 2015, from http://youtu.be/hJmRbSX8RqoMontemayor, H. (2012). Pseudoscience. Delhi: Orange Apple.

Favorite Season Essays

Favorite Season Essays Favorite Season Essays Favorite Season Essays Many students find it rather difficult to write favorite season essays. From one side, favorite season essay writing does not require extensive research or the scientific evidence. From the other side, your essay must still be written in accordance to academic standards, gain the attention of the readers, and be interesting to read. The following essay tips may help you with writing your favorite season essays. In addition, do not forget to read tips on writing narrative essays and expository essay. Favorite Season Essays Tips combine different styles and forms of composition: narrative, descriptive paragraphs, expository and persuasive essay parts. writing favorite season essays, do not forget about the flow of ideas. Subordination and strict order in essay writing are essential: use link words to ensure transition from one paragraph to another. You may use the following words/phrases throughout your essay: one reason, another reason, in conclusion, first, second/secondly, in summary, first of all, third/thirdly, in short, for example, another example, to begin with, as well as, to summarize, to start with, too,to conclude, hence, additionally, last/lastly, finally, etc. Favorite Season Essays Structure Lets investigate the main parts offavorite season essays. Introductory paragraph it may be a short story from your life that shaped your preference of the specific season Body - show who, what, where, and when. In other words, the main body of your favorite season essay should be detailed as much as possible. However, do not forget about staying focused on your topic! Do not make your essay heavy with excessive descriptions. Concluding paragraph end your essay with a paragraph in which you emphasize the reasons why the specific season is your favorite Favorite Season Essays Ideas Winter: if winter is your favorite season, you may start your essay with the short story from your childhood when you went to see your grandmother and you spent endless hours outside playing snowballs. Winter is a favorite season for many people because of Christmas Summer: if summer is your favorite season, you may write about the suntan, swimming, lose clothes, warm nights, and all others things that make summers memorable. Undoubtedly, do not forget to mention that summer is a season of vacations and you have a lot of time to spend with your friends Spring: if spring is your favorite season, you may focus on the revival of nature, on the romantic feelings, and the time of exams. Spring is a transition from winter to summer and it is no longer cold and yet there is no unbearable heat. Thus, you may write about the comfort of the spring Autumn: usually, autumn is the favorite season of the older people and depressive ones. Autumn is symbolic of the wading youth and nature. Nevertheless, autumns are very beautiful in their variety of colors. If you are not a depressive person, you have definitely enjoyed walking in the forest in the fall season. Custom Favorite Season Essays If you find the above tips helpful but do not have enough time or ideas to write your favorite season essays, you may confidently rely on the shoulders of our professional writers. We are ready to write a custom favorite season essay for you from scratch and deliver it within the most urgent deadlines. We do not plagiarize! You may review free research paper sample and essay on patriotism in our blog to see the quality of our writing help! Read also: History Thesis Get Dissertation Help Dissertation Thesis Dissertation Proposal Dissertation Expert

5 ways to stand out when you’re applying for competitive jobs

5 ways to stand out when you’re applying for competitive jobs We all know the market is competitive. Any job you apply for is probably receiving a minimum of 100 applications- with some getting up to the thousands. But someone has to get every job, right? People do make it through to the next levels of the hiring process, even in crowded, qualified fields of applicants. You have to assume the majority of job seekers you’re competing with are on the ball- their resumes are spotless and their experience and skill base matches or exceeds the job requirements. So how can you stand out as the best person for the job amidst all the house? Use some of these more targeted strategies to help elevate your application package.1. Make your purpose clear and direct.The most impressive (or at least the most attractive) candidates tend to be the ones that project a kind of professional purpose. These candidates have taken the time and effort to figure out what it is they want to do, and why, and how to reach their goals. Recruiters find it very easy to match these candidates into their companies, because it’s clear if they’ll be a fit. Make sure you can articulate the talents that make you a good match and place them prominently in your cover letter, resume, and other application materials. Know yourself and make that sing.2. Don’t hold back- sell yourself.It’s not enough to just know what drives you. You have to share that vision, enthusiastically, even if you’re shy and not prone to bragging. Put together a short pitch that summarizes why you, and only you, are the best person for the job. Once you have this down, you can use it at many points during your job search. Turn it into an elevator pitch for networking. Emphasize it in your interview. Build it into your social media presence. Make your sales pitch a part of how you present to the world while job seeking, both in person and on paper.3. Sanitize your social media.You could have the greatest application in the world, but if your social media profiles are inappropriate or controversial or just childish, a recruiter is going to toss your file in the trash. Make sure to Google yourself and scour your net presence until it’s every bit as polished and professional as you hope to present yourself to the world.4. Make your professional info a click away.There are some fancy trends out there, and you better believe the competition will be keeping up with them. If you’re up for it, try building a personal website to give a sense of your personal branding. Include the link in your resume, and include your resume on your website. A website can also (stylishly!) convey all the context you didn’t have room to include on your resume. Use this extra space to your advantage!5. Network to build a group of reliable referrals.Sadly, sometimes it really does come down to who you know. Make sure you’re constantly out there networking and making inquiries. Finding inroads to companies you want to work for to make contacts and seek mentors. You never now when someone you meet at a cocktail party or a lecture is going to be the one to pass your resume to a decision maker.

Nursing Curriculum Development Assignment Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 750 words

Nursing Curriculum Development - Assignment Example The CIPP model is useful in that critical external factors are taken into consideration. Moreover, the relationship between courses is established as well as the relevance of a progress to suit the needs of a job. An effective evaluation model must take into account as many factors as possible as long as they are manageable and deliver the anticipated outcomes with ease of monitoring. With regard to the input process, the objectives of the course are clearly stipulated to find a balance between theory and practice. Moreover, provisions for the necessary equipment and other learning resources are made to ensure a perfect learning condition. In the process phase of the cycle, the mode of communication and the responses between learners and the instructors is assessed to weed out any potential barriers. The discipline of the involved parties is also taken into account to ensure that seriousness is upheld. Lastly, the mode of student evaluation, test intervals, and quality of assessments are the final steps, that is, for the product phase of the cycle. Information to be used in decision-making is collected through well-structured evaluation forms, interviews, video recording of class sessions, questionnaires, or informal observations. This eliminates the bias associated with using a single form of obtaining evaluation data. However, CIPP model is deemed exclusive to experts only, and ways to incorporate other relevant stakeholders should be identified prior to the exercise.

Summary Article Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 1000 words

Summary - Article Example Rational signals or laws may just spur them to do worse while making their misdeeds look appealing. There is hue and cry on what should be done. The media firmly supports disarmament although many will be left defenseless . Aspiring politicians further bend the sandy hook tragedy denouncing ownership of firearms for their own career boost (Domenech 45). According to Grant Duwe’s research, both mass murders and homicides have dropped since 1960s. Criminologist, Fox also shows that mass shootings victims have been roughly consistence with margins being credited as sheer coincidence or copycats. As appalling as these murders are, these culprits are not responsible for 1% of the nation’s homicide cases. Criminology studies also support Duwe’s research accusing the media of not laying the true facts of mass murder ignoring the most prevalent cause of death. Political fires are brewing with Senator Diane proposing an ineffectual bill to ban 120 firearms. The bill would also force government seizure of previously bought firearms. In addition debating this bill will ensue in reactions from lawful gun owners. Piers Mogan agrees with democrats blaming the policies that allow gun ownership as a vent of causing violence and denounces the 2nd amendment. Focusing on the UK a handgun ban in 1998 following a shooting massacre was unprecedentedly followed by a rise in serious crime. Shocking as this may be in 2011 the number of legal gun ownership went up by a third and coincidentally the number of gun related crimes dropped by 74%. Majority of shootings is however classified by place and race. Statistics show that 58% of the crimes were in large cities and done mostly by blacks. This represents 16% of the homicide victims. There is no comprehension however of the weapons that the villains use. Research shows that in 2% of gun crimes assault weapons are carried. Adam Lanza used the ar-15 rifle which takes a standard 223-caliber bullet. The rifles used by La kota and Arapaho Indians fired bullets almost 10 times larger than the.223. The caliber does not however determine the lethality of the gun. Others argue that the main issue is the mental health system to not giving proper care to the mentally ill. Steps may be undertaken to ensure they do not possess guns but hurrying to committing to the mentally unstable has its cons: having them bear a lifetime penalty for transgressions never to be committed. The Secret History of Guns Supporters of gun rights argue that the second amendment gives right to gun ownership but portrays no regulation. Advocates still do not support the amendment arguing it covers state militias and is not strong enough to mandate disarmament. The founders of the nation made hard-core gun laws that denied ownership to many people. Individual allowed to own guns had to report regular musters for gun inspection registered on public rolls. According to newton the civil rights movement caused more violence. Malcolm x an d the panthers however argued for their gun ownership right based on the constitution. Guns became a piece of their identity. Luther’s application to own a firearm after his house bombing was denied .The panthers started giving public display of their firearms. Once Newton was stopped by Oakland police to show his gun but he vehemently refused grounding his rights. No arrest was made. The event inspired the

INFLUENCE OF INTERVENTION ON MEDIA RELATING TO TOBACCO CONTROL ISSUES Essay

INFLUENCE OF INTERVENTION ON MEDIA RELATING TO TOBACCO CONTROL ISSUES IN INDIA - Essay Example As tobacco consumption becomes a global concern, countries around the globe face the rising concerns attributable to tobacco use. In this condition, India is not different. The Global Adult Tobacco Survey (GATS India,2010) is a mechanism that has been developed to track tobacco prevalence, exposure to second hand smoking, exposure to tobacco advertising /promotion, cessation, knowledge and attitudes; that are critical for tobacco control program, policies and evaluation. GATS India provide these estimates at national and state level and has captured urban/rural and gender specific data. In the report, GATS India (2010) has shown that 35% of adults or one-third of the population of India use tobacco in some form or another. Of these 35% adult users, 21 % use only smokeless tobacco, 9% only smoke and 5% smoke as well as use smokeless tobacco. Based on these figures, it is estimated that tobacco users in India is round 274.9 million, with 163.7 million users of only smokeless tobacco, 68.9 million only smokers, and 42.3 million users of both smoking and smokeless tobacco (GATS India, 2010, p xxxv). Furthermore, the prevalence of overall tobacco use among males is 48 percent while among females is 20 percent (GATS India, 2010). In this context, the government of India, in 2003, has enacted the Cigarettes and Other Tobacco Products (Prohibition of Advertisement and Regulation of Trade and Commerce, Production, Supply and Distribution) Act 2003 (COTPA). The law prohibits the use of tobacco to protect the health of the public, to ban its advertisement and to provide for regulation of trade, commerce, production, supply and distribution of cigarettes and other tobacco products in the country (Ministry of Health, 2003). The key elements of COPTA includes The Smoke-free Rule was revised on October 2008 to redefine the term ‘public place’ in order to

Involvement of the Volkswagen Group in Chinese Market Dissertation

Involvement of the Volkswagen Group in Chinese Market - Dissertation Example Industries such as information and technology, automobile, fast food, manufacturing, information technology enables services, etc have been majorly influenced by the globalisation. The companies today have realised the fact that sustained growth is only possible when the company focuses not only on the national market but also international market. The major industry that has been influenced by globalisation is the automobile industry. Automobile industry today is a global industry with the demand for automobiles increasing like never before. There are various reasons for this increase in the demand for automobiles. One reason is the increase in demand for automobiles in the developing countries and countries like China. Chinese and Indian automobile markets have now become the major attraction to many European and American automobile companies. In response to this global demand and also to sustain the growth, major automobile companies have now been concentrating on the emerging markets such as China and India. This research is aimed at analysing the internationalisation of automobile manufacturers. In order to do so Volkswagen and the Chinese market is taken as an example. Volkswagen’s operations in China have increased rapidly since its first interest in it in the 80’s. This research aims to analyse the involvement of Volkswagen in the Chinese market and how it has affected the sales and in-turn the growth of the company globally. The research analyses the various strategies adopted by Volkswagen and how it has been implemented. It also looks into the result of these strategies on the overall success of the company. Also the Chinese market will be analysed in detail. That is, the reason behind the attractiveness of the Chinese market to the global companies and the advantages and disadvantages of doing business in China. This is a research proposal outlining the aims, objectives, methodology of the research. It addresses the important aspects such as relevance of the researc h, recipients of the research, rationale, etc. Research Aim, Questions and Objectives Research Aim Aim of any research is to find measurable and testable data or information that adds to the existing human knowledge. Any research must have a specific aim that needs to be accomplished at the end. The primary aim of current research is to analyse the involvement of the Volkswagen group in the Chinese market and relate it to the overall internationalisation of Automobile manufacturers in general. A secondary aim of this research is to understand the Chinese market with respect to automobile manufacturers. In order to accomplish the above aims of the research, there is a need to formulate specific research questions and research objectives that address the various aspects of the research topic. Research Question Research question is the most important aspect of a research proposal as it addresses the core of what the researcher intends to do. Research questions are vital not only for th e current research but also for further research as it leads to the formulation of new questions this leads to further investigation and research in the topic (Lester & Lester, 2009). A research question directly indicates if the researcher is on the right track to accomplish the aims of the research. A research question needs to be well formulated keeping the aims of the research. A research question should not be too elaborative or too restrictive. The reason for this is that an elaborative question might not be intriguing as it might turn out to be a explanation rather than a question. On the other hand, if the research question i

The growth in internet use has affected cultures around the world, Essay

The growth in internet use has affected cultures around the world, leading to a westernised, homogenous culture - Essay Example This is so especially in the case of internet, which is a rapidly growing service almost available and accessible in all parts of the world. The internet, thus is known to have a major influence in people’s lives, their values, traditions as well as culture. This influence is steering the minds of the users into a westernised path of life. However, on the other hand, people are also seen to work towards the uplifting their own culture, as more and more languages are added to the internet in the present time, in order to increase the number of local users. Therefore, growth in the use of internet brings the whole world together into one large westernised homogenous culture while people also follow their own local cultures. Since the ancient times, the superior cultures have almost always had their influence on other cultures. This can be seen by taking the example of the British rule over India, Africa and such other countries or even when the Germans gained control over France . The dominating country always tried to imbibe their way of living as well as culture on the suppressed. This has both benefited the oppressed country as well as had negative influences too. But basically, taking the case of India, the country is in a much better position in terms of intellectuality and has been able to grasp modernity more because it was once under the rule to the British government, which was the driving force back in those days. Now with the advent in technology as well as with the creation of the mass communication computer network called ‘Internet,’ it is easier for the leading countries to promote their own culture. Now the difference here is that, in the olden times people were forced to accept the culture of the dominators, whereas now they have a choice, where they can choose whether to accept this culture or not. In the present world, globalisation aims at â€Å"interdependence† between different countries â€Å"rather than dominanceà ¢â‚¬  of developed nations over the developing or underdeveloped ones (Samovar et al. 2009, p.296). Internet is like an exchange forum, where people communicate and they come to understand the cultures of other people and also share their own cultures in this process of interaction. Internet is growing and now possessing its own culture, it is known by different terms such as â€Å"super-medium, meta-medium or a hybrid-medium† (Elm, n.d., p.85). It is this medium that enables the formation of various â€Å"virtual communities† throughout the world, resulting in a global coming together of people belonging to different nations (Hongladarom, n.d., p.2). Now the main people behind the development of such a medium are obviously the Westerners, who have always remained a superpower, and it becomes clear that the United States as well as UK has major â€Å"cultural and commercial influences† on countries all over the world (Chapter 4, p.49-http://wlxt.whut.edu.cn/new /wlyx/Resource/PaperAnswer/chap04im.pdf). As mentioned earlier, this paper aims to evaluate the influence of internet use in bringing together different cultures into a more homogenised one through the fields of business and language. Both these fields are interconnected and it is possible that when one aspect is taken into consideration, the other may be a prevalent affecting factor there. In order to know

Creationism and Darwinism Essay Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 500 words

Creationism and Darwinism - Essay Example While one is the more "scientific point" of view, and the other a religious point of view, both have their massive followers, and both have strong points as well as weak arguments. In creationism, the belief is that the world and people were created by a supreme being, usually God. This is the belief held by the majority of major religions, that God himself created the earth and mankind. This idea is based strongly on faith alone, and is depicted both in the Christian and Jewish book of Genesis, and the Koran for Muslims. Many Christians feel that the book of Genesis offers an actual account of the creation story, and that it should be taken literally. However, this is a hard pill to swallow for most people, saying that the book was written by humans and it therefore full of error and may not be exactly what happened. Another argument is that the story may simply be a story to teach a lesson. I do not believe that you can take every single word in the Bible exactly as meant, and that some of it IS in fact figurative. This does not fully disprove creationism however. The scientific held though is the evolution of people as taught by Darwin. It was in Darwin's Origin of Species that he conned the phrase "survival of the fittest", that evolution was continentally evolving and changing.

The growth in internet use has affected cultures around the world, Essay

The growth in internet use has affected cultures around the world, leading to a westernised, homogenous culture - Essay Example This is so especially in the case of internet, which is a rapidly growing service almost available and accessible in all parts of the world. The internet, thus is known to have a major influence in people’s lives, their values, traditions as well as culture. This influence is steering the minds of the users into a westernised path of life. However, on the other hand, people are also seen to work towards the uplifting their own culture, as more and more languages are added to the internet in the present time, in order to increase the number of local users. Therefore, growth in the use of internet brings the whole world together into one large westernised homogenous culture while people also follow their own local cultures. Since the ancient times, the superior cultures have almost always had their influence on other cultures. This can be seen by taking the example of the British rule over India, Africa and such other countries or even when the Germans gained control over France . The dominating country always tried to imbibe their way of living as well as culture on the suppressed. This has both benefited the oppressed country as well as had negative influences too. But basically, taking the case of India, the country is in a much better position in terms of intellectuality and has been able to grasp modernity more because it was once under the rule to the British government, which was the driving force back in those days. Now with the advent in technology as well as with the creation of the mass communication computer network called ‘Internet,’ it is easier for the leading countries to promote their own culture. Now the difference here is that, in the olden times people were forced to accept the culture of the dominators, whereas now they have a choice, where they can choose whether to accept this culture or not. In the present world, globalisation aims at â€Å"interdependence† between different countries â€Å"rather than dominanceà ¢â‚¬  of developed nations over the developing or underdeveloped ones (Samovar et al. 2009, p.296). Internet is like an exchange forum, where people communicate and they come to understand the cultures of other people and also share their own cultures in this process of interaction. Internet is growing and now possessing its own culture, it is known by different terms such as â€Å"super-medium, meta-medium or a hybrid-medium† (Elm, n.d., p.85). It is this medium that enables the formation of various â€Å"virtual communities† throughout the world, resulting in a global coming together of people belonging to different nations (Hongladarom, n.d., p.2). Now the main people behind the development of such a medium are obviously the Westerners, who have always remained a superpower, and it becomes clear that the United States as well as UK has major â€Å"cultural and commercial influences† on countries all over the world (Chapter 4, p.49-http://wlxt.whut.edu.cn/new /wlyx/Resource/PaperAnswer/chap04im.pdf). As mentioned earlier, this paper aims to evaluate the influence of internet use in bringing together different cultures into a more homogenised one through the fields of business and language. Both these fields are interconnected and it is possible that when one aspect is taken into consideration, the other may be a prevalent affecting factor there. In order to know

First Time in College Essay Example for Free

First Time in College Essay College is extremely different from high school – creating new friends, dealing with more school work, and being responsible. In some ways it can be a good thing but it can be a frightful thing as well. It is one of the biggest challenges most teenagers will encounter to be successful in life. After all those four years of high school, it is now the time to join the ranks of the high school graduates who have chosen to achieve a higher education. Some might think it is very exciting while others might have a different opinion about it. Regardless of how they feel, being able to attend college is the primary step to the real world. As what Jason Rich, author of The Everything College Survival Book, has mentioned, â€Å"This is the time when you are making that life transition from living at home with your parents to becoming an adult.† It is most likely that these intimidating words will haunt a high school graduate’s mind until the first day of college. Still, there are plenty of ways to deal with the hardships a student may face while walking into college the first time. One of the foremost things on any student’s mind is that you do not know anyone, unless you have a couple of friends that decided to take the same program as you. The thing is, so does everyone else! You can see this as the perfect opportunity to meet and make new friends that can help you get through this last chapter of your studying days. Like everybody else, many students are nervous and no one talks to anyone on the first day of classes. However, students try to overcome that fear and take a risk. In the end it will all be worth it and as each semester passes by, most of them might become the best of friends or even roommates if they live away from home. If for some reason it does not work out during the first week, try to attend on-campus events or sign up for extracurricular activities. This way you can meet and connect with a bunch of great people, not only from your program but also from the entire school. Another difficulty many students may deal with is feeling overwhelmed by the sheer volume of work they may receive during the first month. During those 30 days, the course load is much harder compared to the amount of work in high school. For example, on the first day, the professor has already designated an assignment that will be due in the next couple of classes. In addition to that, another instructor from a different class might say there will be a test on the same day the assignment is due. Hearing this right after a long summer break will definitely overwhelm a student’s mind, especially if he has come directly out of high school. Therefore, before the stress keeps piling up, students may have to find a way to make adjustments to their old study habits. A great deal of effort must be put in each of their work and must not waste time. After all, no one would spend a huge amount of money on college just to fail. In addition, going to college will expose you to brand new freedoms that require a higher level of maturity and responsibility. In comparison to high school, no one is going to check if you have done your homework or if you have studied for a major test. If the instructor says when the due date is going to be, that is the only day you can submit your work and there will be no exceptions; unless there is an emergency then that will be a different story. There is a very limited opportunity that an instructor will take his time assisting hundreds of students. Although college life is about meeting new people, it is extremely important to know your boundaries and do not let your social life interfere with your studies. Managing your time well and being able to organize properly will be a great help to be able to go through college without a problem. As previously mentioned, there are various differences between high school and college. Attending classes could become more difficult due to the unusual atmosphere and having more independence. However, despite the numerous challenges that come with having a fresh start in college, believing that you belong is the best way to overcome them. Given the time to adjust to all the changes, sooner or later, students will start to feel right at home in the new environment. College will be a way to help students shape their individuality and prepare them for the worst possible scenarios in the competitive world. Thus, high school graduates that decided to cross the bridge to attend college are one step closer to become successful in life.

Self Leadership Another Way To Achieve Performance Education Essay

Self Leadership Another Way To Achieve Performance Education Essay Abstract In the quest for employee performance organizations seek novel leadership strategies. Self leadership behavioral-focused, natural-reward and constructive-thought strategies provide a sound solution (Houghton, 2006). Research across diverse settings has shown that the practices of effective self-leadership strategies can lead to many benefits including enhanced motivation, positive self-efficacy perception, and improved employee performance (Bandura, 1991). Rooted in social learning theory cognitive evaluation theory, self-leadership is more comprehensive theory of self influence than self-control and self-management theories. A conceptual self leadership frame work for employee performance is also suggested in this paper for organizational application. Keywords: Self-Leadership, Self-leadership Strategies, Self efficacy/Personal mastery, Motivation, Employee performance. Introduction The most influential part in our life that has the ability to support growth than anyone else is our own self. This paper is not about the leadership of others, rather something more fundamental and more powerful i.e. self-leadership. Simply stated leadership is an art of mobilizing others for shared aspirations (Bass, 1995). Leadership is the behavior of an individual when he is directing the activities of a group towards a shared goal (Coons, 1957). Leadership requires using power to influence the thoughts and actions of other people (Zalenik, 1992). Leadership is about articulating visions, embodying values, and creating the environment within which things can be accomplished (Engle, 1986). Leadership is a social process in which one individual influences the behavior of others without the use of threat and violence (Buchannan, 1997). The simplest definition of leadership perhaps is a process of influence between a leader and follower (Hollander, 1978). There are many definitions or descriptions of leadership based on equally vast and differing viewpoints. So in the light of above, Self-Leadership can be described as a process of self influence to navigate own-self for achieving desired outcome (Manz, 1992). In fact, as the opening lines suggest, our greatest latent source of leadership and influence comes not from an external  leader, but from within ourselves. Self Leadership Self-leadership theory is based on self-influence, self-management and self control theories that has recently gained significant popularity and inspiring potential for application in modern organizations. Simply stated, self-leadership is a process through which people influence themselves to achieve the self-direction and self-motivation required to behave and perform in desirable ways (Manz Neck, 1999). Self-leadership is rooted in Social Learning Theory (Bandura, 1977) and Social Cognitive Theory (Bandura, 1986). Social learning theory explains that how people can influence their own cognition, motivation, and behavior (Yun, 2006). On the other side, social cognitive theory explains that there is a continuous interaction between people and their environment (Davidson, 2000) and behavioral outcomes are means of information and motivation (Bandura, 1986). Therefore, how self-leaders think and behave according to cognitive, motivational, and behavioral strategies (Yun, 2006) is explained by Self-Leadership theory. This is a process of self-influence which is facilitated through the use of both behavioral and cognitive strategies. Self-leadership has three distinctive strategies: behavior-focused strategies, natural reward strategies, and constructive thought pattern strategies (Houghton, 2006). Behavior-focused strategies comprises on self goal setting, self observation, self-reward, self punishment and self cueing. These strategies are intended to strengthen positive, desirable behaviors (e.g. Job performance, Team Performance). Behavior-focused strategies are particularly useful in managing behavior related for achieving performance including its unpleasant aspects. Natural-reward strategies focus on tasks that are intrinsically motivating. These strategies can also include the focusing of attention on more satisfying or rewarding aspects of a given job or task rather than on the unpleasant or difficult aspects. Constructive-thought pattern strategies focus on how thinking functional patterns are created and maintained. These strategies include identification and replacement of false self assumptions and irrational beliefs, creating of mental imagery for future successful performance, and positive self talks. Combining all these strategies yields an impressive package of self-influence kit that has a huge potential for organizational application in todays rapidly changing business environment. Self-leadership is a more comprehensive theory of self-influence than both self-control and self-management (Manz, 1986). Self-leadership combines the behavioral strategies suggested by self-management and self-control with cognitive strategies based on the concepts of intrinsic motivation and constructive thinking patterns. Self-leadership is more of a broader concept than both the theories of self-control and self-management. Self-management highlight extrinsic rewards (e.g. monetary rewards, praise, recognition, and self-reinforcement based on external stimuli). But self-leadership goes beyond this viewpoint and focuses on natural rewards. Natural rewards imply that performance of the task or activity is a reward in itself (Manz Neck, 1999). In summary, conceptualization of natural rewards in self-leadership theory is mainly based on the intrinsic motivation literature. Motivation, according to one definition, is an attribute that moves us to do or not to do something (Garrison, Broussard and Gredler, 2004).Motivation refers to the motives underlying behavior (Guay et al., 2010). Motivation can also be defined as voluntary uses of high-level self-regulated learning strategies, such as paying attention, connection, planning and monitoring (Turner, 1995). However Hornby (2000) states that motivation is an incentive to act or move. Research tells that there are two types of motivation, extrinsic and intrinsic. Extrinsic motivation is the result of externally administered motivators including pay, compensation and benefits, material possessions, monetary gains and positive evaluation by others. Intrinsic motivation is that type of motivation that is activated by personal enjoyment, interest, or pleasure (Deci et al, 1999). Intrinsic motivation is derived from within a person and positively effects behavior and performance (Ryan Deci, 2000). Performance refers to the effectiveness of individual behaviors that contributes to organizational objectives (McCloy, Campbell Cudeck, 1994). However Motowidlo (1997) argues that performance is all about behaviors with an evaluative aspect. Self-leadership theory encompasses both intrinsic motivation literature and cognitive evaluation theory (Deci Ryan, 1985).Cognitive evaluation theory advocates that intrinsic motivation is driven by the need for competence (i.e. to exercise and extend ones capabilities) and the need for self-determination (i.e. the need to feel free from pressures such as contingent rewards). Cognitive evaluation theory argued that individuals will try to seek feelings of competence and self-determination by overcoming challenges (deCharms, 1968). Support for the efficacy of intrinsic motivation has been demonstrated in numerous empirical studies (e.g., Deci, Connell, Ryan, 1989; Harackiewicz, 1979; Zhou, 1998). Feelings of competence and self-control (i.e.self-determination) are central part of natural rewards provided by self-leadership theory (Manz Neck, 1999). Through self leadership strategies, activities and tasks can be chosen, structured, or perceived in ways that lead to increased feelings of competence self-determination that in turns enhance task performance. Self leadership theory is very much complementary with self-determination theory (Deci, 1972). Although natural reward strategies are generally effective, self-reward strategies utilizing external rewards may also be helpful (in those situations where natural or intrinsic rewards are not needed) to increase (individual or team) performance (Manz Neck, 1999). At the heart of social cognitive theory lies the concept of Self-efficacy or personal mastery (Bandura, 1986). Self-efficacy talks about persons beliefs regarding his/her capabilities to achieve a specific task (Bandura, 1991). As per cognitive evaluation theory need for competence and self-determinations (Deci Ryan, 1985) leads to more difficult goals selection and increased perceptions of self-efficacy which in turn, leads to higher future performance (Bandura, 1991). Self-leadership theory incorporates all above components of cognitive evaluation theory and social cognitive theory. In short self-leadership strategies mentioned above enhance self-efficacy perceptions, which lead to higher levels of performance (Manz Neck, 1999). Empirical evidence supports the effectiveness of self-leadership strategies in increasing self-efficacy perceptions and performance. More recently, role of self-efficacy as a mediator of the relationship between self-leadership strategies and performance has also been examined indicating significant relationships (Prussia et al., 1998). Positive Perception of self Efficacy or Personal Mastery SUCCESSFUL PERFORMANCE Based on the literature above it can be summarized here that Self-leadership is a process of self-influence based on self-control, self management and self regulation theories. It is also rooted in motivation theories, Social learning theory and cognitive evaluation theory.  Research across diverse settings, from the educational domain to the airline industry, has shown that the practices of effective self-leadership strategies can lead to many benefits including high motivation, self-efficacy, and enhanced employee performance (Bandura, 1991).  As mentioned Self leadership strategies include behavioral-focused, natural-reward and constructive-thought pattern strategies. Taken together these core self-leadership strategies and aligning them to motivation, self efficacy and performance following conceptual frame work (figure.1) is suggested aiming at to achieve successful performance in an organization. This suggested conceptual frame work is modified from the basic model of Self leadership and personal effectiveness proposed by Manz Neck (2007). Figure.1 In the light of the self leadership literature the figure.1 above is suggesting a conceptual framework which implies that applying self-leadership strategies and their components through effective training programs in organization can help in developing self-led employees who can achieve goals like individual, team based or organizational performance through personal mastery. Successful performance leads to positive perception of self efficacy which creates a positive self sufficient upward spiral effect for new successful performance. As per limitation in this paper identifying individuals team based self leadership and team member work role performance was not studied which creates room for future research. Effective self-leadership strategies do not stress independent employee behaviors by ignoring teams or organization context. Rather, effective self-leadership strategies encourage a coordinated effort by individuals to seek their own personal identity and mode of contribution as part of a group, teams or organization that produces synergistic performance (Konradt; Andreßen; Ellwart, 2009). Furthermore, self-leaders are less likely to be resistant to organizational change (Neck, 1996) which is important for any learning organization as it responds and adapt to changing environment. As organizations continue to redesign and adopt structures that need a greater dependence on individual initiative, the popularity of self-leadership concepts is likely to remain strong. Finally, self-leadership behavior shaping strategies provide considerable assurance for taking the quest for employee performance to the next higher level. Indeed, effectively trained self-led employees, both behaviorally and cognitively, may offer the best blueprint for achieving employee and organizational performance in the 21st century.

Kate Chopins The Story of an Hour - A Big Story in a Small Space :: The Story of an Hour

Story of an Hour – A Big Story in a Small Space  Ã‚      Kate Chopin's "Story of an Hour", tells the story of a woman trapped in a repressive marriage, who wants desperately to escape. She is given that chance, quite by accident, and the story tells of the hour in which this freedom is given her. The story is very short (only two pages), so is interesting to look at as a minimalist piece of literature, and the surprise ending offers an opportunity to look at Chopin's use of foreshadowing. The story is very short, but every word has import in the story and each line has great depth of meaning. It is possible to infer a great deal about the woman's life, even though we are given very little on the surface. A telegraph and a railroad are mentioned in the first paragraph, so there is some idea of the time the story takes place. We are also given her married name and the full name of her husband. The fact that she is referred to only as "Mrs. Mallard", while her husband's full name is given, coupled with what we learn on the second page, gives some indication of the repression she's had to suffer through and the indignity society placed on woman in those times. We also learn in the first paragraph that she lives in a man's world, for, though it is her sister that tells her the news, it is her husband's friend who rushes over with the story. Even after his death, she is confined to the structures she adopted with married life, including the close friend's of her husband. It can also be assumed that Brently Mallard was fairly well off, because they live in a home with an upstairs, comfortable furnishings, and he has occasion and reason to travel. Also, they can afford a doctor's diagnosis that she has a "heart condition". The most important idea that is conveyed in the story is summed up in two sentences, near the end of the story, "There would be no powerful will bending hers in that blind persistence with which men and women believe they have a right to impose a private will upon a fellow-creature. A kind intention or a cruel intention made the act seem no less a crime as she looked upon it in that brief moment of illumination".

Virus Among the Navajo :: Native Americans Influenza Essays

Virus Among the Navajo Medical investigators, such as myself, have not given a great deal of attention to the "medical" traditions of indigenous groups in the past. But the outcomes of the recent investigation that took place in "The Four Corners" area exemplify our need to consider age-old notions right along with the ecological history of the region in question. A few months ago, the New Mexico Department of Health notified my department (Office of Medical Investigations) that three young and healthy adults from the Navajo Nation had died of a sudden respiratory illness. Their symptoms had been the similar: fever, chills, muscle aches, nausea and vomiting, and abdominal pain, followed by coughing and shortness of breath, then the abrupt onset of respiratory distress which is usually fatal (KCPH). Our first inclination was to look at diseases that are known to affect the Navajo specifically, such as bubonic plague, influenza, and viral pneumonia. However, laboratory results indicated that these disea ses had not caused the deaths, nor had toxic chemicals. Furthermore, the perplexing disease had begun to take the lives of non-Navajo people living near the reservation (AMNH). By the end of May the mysterious deaths had attracted significant media attention. I remember seeing the headline "Mystery Illness Kills 10 on Reservation" in the Sun-Sentinel while I was conducting interviews there. Without knowledge of a possible cause, our department, and several other agencies, began an intense investigation. Samples of tissue from patients infected with the mysterious disease were sent to the CDC Special Pathogens Branch for analysis. After a few weeks and several tests, the virologists linked the disease with an unknown type of hantavirus. Because other hantaviruses were known to be transmitted to people by inhalation or ingestion of rodent feces or urine, our next task was to collect as many species of rodent in the area as possible in order to pinpoint the source of the virus (AMNH). While trapping rodents, we decided that it was worth the risk to not wear protective clothing or masks so as to avoid alarming residents of "The Four Corners" region (CDC). After testing approximately 1,700 rodents we had found a link--the prevalent deer mouse carried the unknown type of hantavirus. But why was this mouse suddenly infecting people in this region? I was becoming frustrated, my years of work in medicine were failing me and I couldn't figure out why these people kept getting sick. Virus Among the Navajo :: Native Americans Influenza Essays Virus Among the Navajo Medical investigators, such as myself, have not given a great deal of attention to the "medical" traditions of indigenous groups in the past. But the outcomes of the recent investigation that took place in "The Four Corners" area exemplify our need to consider age-old notions right along with the ecological history of the region in question. A few months ago, the New Mexico Department of Health notified my department (Office of Medical Investigations) that three young and healthy adults from the Navajo Nation had died of a sudden respiratory illness. Their symptoms had been the similar: fever, chills, muscle aches, nausea and vomiting, and abdominal pain, followed by coughing and shortness of breath, then the abrupt onset of respiratory distress which is usually fatal (KCPH). Our first inclination was to look at diseases that are known to affect the Navajo specifically, such as bubonic plague, influenza, and viral pneumonia. However, laboratory results indicated that these disea ses had not caused the deaths, nor had toxic chemicals. Furthermore, the perplexing disease had begun to take the lives of non-Navajo people living near the reservation (AMNH). By the end of May the mysterious deaths had attracted significant media attention. I remember seeing the headline "Mystery Illness Kills 10 on Reservation" in the Sun-Sentinel while I was conducting interviews there. Without knowledge of a possible cause, our department, and several other agencies, began an intense investigation. Samples of tissue from patients infected with the mysterious disease were sent to the CDC Special Pathogens Branch for analysis. After a few weeks and several tests, the virologists linked the disease with an unknown type of hantavirus. Because other hantaviruses were known to be transmitted to people by inhalation or ingestion of rodent feces or urine, our next task was to collect as many species of rodent in the area as possible in order to pinpoint the source of the virus (AMNH). While trapping rodents, we decided that it was worth the risk to not wear protective clothing or masks so as to avoid alarming residents of "The Four Corners" region (CDC). After testing approximately 1,700 rodents we had found a link--the prevalent deer mouse carried the unknown type of hantavirus. But why was this mouse suddenly infecting people in this region? I was becoming frustrated, my years of work in medicine were failing me and I couldn't figure out why these people kept getting sick.

Bag of Bones CHAPTER SIX

On July 3rd of 1998, I threw two suitcases and my Powerbook in the trunk of my mid-sized Chevrolet, started to back down the driveway, then stopped and went into the house again. It felt empty and somehow forlorn, like a faithful lover who has been dropped and cannot understand why. The furniture wasn't covered and the power was still on (I understood that The Great Lake Experiment might turn out to be a swift and total failure), but 14 Benton Street felt deserted, all the same. Rooms too full of furniture to echo still did when I walked through them, and everywhere there seemed to be too much dusty light. In my study, the VDT was hooded like an executioner against the dust. I knelt before it and opened one of the desk drawers. Inside were four reams of paper. I took one, started away with it under my arm, then had a second thought and turned back. I had put that provocative photo of Jo in her swimsuit in the wide center drawer. Now I took it, tore the paper wrapping from the end of the ream of paper, and slid the photo halfway in, like a bookmark. If I did perchance begin to write again, and if the writing marched, I would meet Johanna right around page two hundred and fifty. I left the house, locked the back door, got into my car, and drove away. I have never been back. I'd been tempted to go down to the lake and check out the work which turned out to be quite a bit more extensive than Bill Dean had originally expected on several occasions. What kept me away was a feeling, never quite articulated by my conscious mind but still very powerful, that I wasn't supposed to do it that way; that when I next came to Sara, it should be to unpack and stay. Bill hired out Kenny Auster to shingle the roof, and got Kenny's cousin, Timmy Larribee, to ‘scrape the old girl down,' a cleansing process akin to pot-scrubbing that is sometimes employed with log homes. Bill also had a plumber in to check out the pipes, and got my okay to replace some of the older plumbing and the well-pump. Bill fussed about all these expenses over the telephone; I let him. When it comes to fifth- or sixth-generation Yankees and the expenditure of money, you might as well just stand back and let them get it out of their systems. Laying out the green just seems wrong to a Yankee, somehow, like petting in public. As for myself, I didn't mind the outgo a bit. I live frugally, for the most part, not out of any moral code but because my imagination, very lively in most other respects, doesn't work very well on the subject of money. My idea of a spree is three days in Boston, a Red Sox game, a trip to Tower Records and Video, plus a visit to the Wordsworth bookstore in Cambridge. Living like that doesn't make much of a dent in the interest, let alone the principal; I had a good money manager down in Waterville, and on the day I locked the door of the Derry house and headed west to TR-90, I was worth slightly over five million dollars. Not much compared to Bill Gates, but big numbers for this area, and I could afford to be cheerful about the high cost of house repairs. That was a strange late spring and early summer for me. What I did mostly was wait, close up my town affairs, talk to Bill Dean when he called with the latest round of problems, and try not to think. I did the Publishers Weekly interview, and when the interviewer asked me if I'd had any trouble getting back to work ‘in the wake of my bereavement,' I said no with an absolutely straight face. Why not? It was true. My troubles hadn't started until I'd finished All the Way from the Top; until then, I had been going on like gangbusters. In mid-June, I met Frank Arlen for lunch at the Starlite Cafe. The Starlite is in Lewiston, which is the geographical midpoint between his town and mine. Over dessert (the Starlite's famous strawberry shortcake), Frank asked if I was seeing anyone. I looked at him with surprise. ‘What are you gaping at?' he asked, his face registering one of the nine hundred unnamed emotions this one of those somewhere between amusement and irritation. ‘I certainly wouldn't think of it as two-timing Jo. She'll have been dead four years come August.' ‘No,' I said. ‘I'm not seeing anybody.' He looked at me silently. I looked back for a few seconds, then started fiddling my spoon through the whipped cream on top of my shortcake. The biscuits were still warm from the oven, and the cream was melting. It made me think of that silly old song about how someone left the cake out in the rain. ‘Have you seen anybody, Mike?' ‘I'm not sure that's any business of yours.' ‘Oh for Christ's sake. On your vacation? Did you ‘ I made myself look up from the melting whipped cream. ‘No,' I said. ‘I did not.' He was silent for another moment or two. I thought he was getting ready to move on to another topic. That would have been fine with me. Instead, he came right out and asked me if I had been laid at all since Johanna died. He would have accepted a lie on that subject even if he didn't entirely believe it men lie about sex all the time. But I told the truth . . . and with a certain perverse pleasure. ‘No.' ‘Not a single time?' ‘Not a single time.' ‘What about a massage parlor? You know, to at least get a ‘ ‘No.' He sat there tapping his spoon against the rim of the bowl with his dessert in it. He hadn't taken a single bite. He was looking at me as though I were some new and oogy specimen of bug. I didn't like it much, but I suppose I understood it. I had been close to what is these days called ‘a relationship' on two occasions, neither of them on Key Largo, where I had observed roughly two thousand pretty women walking around dressed in only a stitch and a promise. Once it had been a red-haired waitress, Kelli, at a restaurant out on the Extension where I often had lunch. After awhile we got talking, joking around, and then there started to be some of that eye-contact, you know the kind I'm talking about, looks that go on just a little too long. I started to notice her legs, and the way her uniform pulled against her hip when she turned, and she noticed me noticing. And there was a woman at Nu You, the place where I used to work out. A tall woman who favored pink jog-bras and black bike shorts. Quite yummy. Also, I liked the stuff she brought to read while she pedalled one of the stationary bikes on those endless aerobic trips to nowhere not Mademoiselle or Cosmo, but novels by people like John Irving and Ellen Gilchrist. I like people who read actual books, and not just because I once wrote them myself. Book-readers are just as willing as anyone else to start out with the weather, but as a general rule they can actually go on from there. The name of the blonde in the pink tops and black shorts was Adria Bundy. We started talking about books as we pedalled side by side ever deeper into nowhere, and there came a point where I was spotting her one or two mornings a week in the weight room. There's something oddly intimate about spotting. The prone position of the lifter is part of it, I suppose (especially when the lifter is a woman), but not all or even most of it. Mostly it's the dependence factor. Although it hardly ever comes to that point, the lifter is trusting the spotter with his or her life. And, at some point in the winter of 1996, those looks started as she lay on the bench and I stood over her, looking into her upside-down face. The ones that go on just a little too long. Kelli was around thirty, Adria perhaps a little younger. Kelli was divorced, Adria never married. In neither case would I have been robbing the cradle, and I think either would have been happy to go to bed with me on a provisional basis. Kind of a honey-bump test-drive. Yet what I did in Kelli's case was to find a different restaurant to eat my lunch at, and when the YMCA sent me a free exercise-tryout offer, I took them up on it and just never went back to Nu You. I remember walking past Adria Bundy one day on the street six months or so after I made the change, and although I said hi, I made sure not to see her puzzled, slightly hurt gaze. In a purely physical way I wanted them both (in fact, I seem to remember a dream in which I had them both, in the same bed and at the same time), and yet I wanted neither. Part of it was my inability to write my life was quite fucked up enough, thank you, without adding any additional complications. Part of it was the work involved in making sure that the woman who is returning your glances is interested in you and not your rather extravagant bank account. Most of it, I think, was that there was just too much Jo still in my head and heart. There was no room for anyone else, even after four years. It was sorrow like cholesterol, and if you think that's funny or weird, be grateful. ‘What about friends?' Frank asked, at last beginning to eat his strawberry shortcake. ‘You've got friends you see, don't you?' ‘Yes,' I said. ‘Plenty of friends.' Which was a lie, but I did have lots of crosswords to do, lots of books to read, and lots of movies to watch on my VCR at night; I could practically recite the FBI warning about unlawful copying by heart. When it came to real live people, the only ones I called when I got ready to leave Derry were my doctor and my dentist, and most of the mail I sent out that June consisted of change-of address cards to magazines like Harper's and National Geographic. ‘Frank,' I said, ‘you sound like a Jewish mother.' ‘Sometimes when I'm with you feel like a Jewish mother,' he said. ‘One who believes in the curative powers of baked potatoes instead of matzo balls. You look better than you have in a long time, finally put on some weight, I think ‘ ‘Too much.' ‘Bullshit, you looked like Ichabod Crane when you came for Christmas. Also, you've got some sun on your face and arms.' ‘I've been walking a lot.' ‘So you look better . . . except for your eyes. Sometimes you get this look in your eyes, and I worry about you every time I see it. I think Jo would be glad someone's worrying.' ‘What look is that?' I asked. ‘Your basic thousand-yard stare. Want the truth? You look like someone who's caught on something and can't get loose.' I left Derry at three-thirty, stopped in Rumford for supper, then drove slowly on through the rising hills of western Maine as the sun lowered. I had planned my times of departure and arrival carefully, if not quite consciously, and as I passed out of Motton and into the unincorporated township of TR-90, I became aware of the heavy way my heart was beating. There was sweat on my face and arms in spite of the car's air conditioning. Nothing on the radio sounded right, all the music like screaming, and I turned it off. I was scared, and had good reason to be. Even setting aside the peculiar cross-pollination between the dreams and things in the real world (as I was able to do quite easily, dismissing the cut on my hand and the sunflowers growing through the boards of the back stoop as either coincidence or so much psychic fluff), I had reason to be scared. Because they hadn't been ordinary dreams, and my decision to go back to the lake after all this time hadn't been an ordinary decision. I didn't feel like a modern fin-de-mill? ¦naire man on a spiritual quest to face his fears (I'm okay, you're okay, let's all have an emotional circle-jerk while William Ackerman plays softly in the background); I felt more like some crazy Old Testament prophet going out into the desert to live on locusts and alkali water because God had summoned him in a dream. I was in trouble, my life was a moderate-going-on-severe mess, and not being able to write was only part of it. I wasn't raping kids or running around Times Square preaching conspiracy theories through a bullhorn, but I was in trouble just the same. I had lost my place in things and couldn't find it again. No surprise there; after all, life's not a book. What I was engaging in on that hot July evening was self-induced shock therapy, and give me at least this much credit I knew it. You come to Dark Score this way: 1-95 from Derry to Newport; Route 2 from Newport to Bethel (with a stop in Rumford, which used to stink like hell's front porch until the paper-driven economy pretty much ground to a halt during Reagan's second term); Route 5 from Bethel to Waterford. Then you take Route 68, the old County Road, across Castle View, through Motton (where downtown consists of a converted barn which sells videos, beer, and second-hand rifles), and then past the sign which reads TR-90 and the one reading GAME WARDEN IS BEST ASSISTANCE IN EMERGENCY, DIAL 1-800-555-GAME OR * 72 ON CELLULAR PHONE. To this, in spray paint, someone has added FUCK THE EAGLES. Five miles past that sign, you come to a narrow lane on the right, marked only by a square of tin with the faded number 42 on it. Above this, like umlauts, are a couple of. 22 holes. I turned into this lane just about when I had expected to it was 7:16 P.M., EDT, by the clock on the Chevrolet's dashboard. And the feeling was coming home. I drove in two tenths of a mile by the odometer, listening to the grass which crowned the lane whickering against the undercarriage of my car, listening to the occasional branch which scraped across the roof or knocked on the passenger side like a fist. At last I parked and turned the engine off. I got out, walked to the rear of the car, lay down on my belly, and began pulling all of the grass which touched the Chevy's hot exhaust system. It had been a dry summer, and it was best to take precautions. I had come at this exact hour in order to replicate my dreams, hoping for some further insight into them or for an idea of what to do next. What I had not come to do was start a forest fire. Once this was done I stood up and looked around. The crickets sang, as they had in my dreams, and the trees huddled close on either side of the lane, as they always did in my dreams. Overhead, the sky was a fading strip of blue. I set off, walking up the right hand wheelrut. Jo and I had had one neighbor at this end of the road, old Lars Washburn, but now Lars's driveway was overgrown with juniper bushes and blocked by a rusty length of chain. Nailed to a tree on the left of the chain was NO TRESPASSING. Nailed to one on the right was NEXT CENTURY REAL ESTATE, and a local number. The words were faded and hard to read in the growing gloom. I walked on, once more conscious of my heavily beating heart and of the way the mosquitoes were buzzing around my face and arms. Their peak season was past, but I was sweating a lot, and that's a smell they like. It must remind them of blood. Just how scared was I as I approached Sara Laughs? I don't remember. I suspect that fright, like pain, is one of those things that slip our minds once they have passed. What I do remember is a feeling I'd had before when I was down here, especially when I was walking this road by myself. It was a sense that reality was thin. I think it is thin, you know, thin as lake ice after a thaw, and we fill our lives with noise and light and motion to hide that thinness from ourselves. But in places like Lane Forty-two, you find that all the smoke and mirrors have been removed. What's left is the sound of crickets and the sight of green leaves darkening toward black; branches that make shapes like faces; the sound of your heart in your chest, the beat of the blood against the backs of your eyes, and the look of the sky as the day's blue blood runs out of its cheek. What comes in when daylight leaves is a kind of certainty: that beneath the skin there is a secret, some mystery both black and bright. You feel this mystery in every breath, you see it in every shadow, you expect to plunge into it at every turn of a step. It is here; you slip across it on a kind of breathless curve like a skater turning for home. I stopped for a moment about half a mile south of where I'd left the car, and still half a mile north of the driveway. Here the road curves sharply, and on the right is an open field which slants steeply down toward the lake. Tidwell's Meadow is what the locals call it, or sometimes the Old Camp. It was here that Sara Tidwell and her curious tribe built their cabins, at least according to Marie Hingerman (and once, when I asked Bill Dean, he agreed this was the place . . . although he didn't seem interested in continuing the conversation, which struck me at the time as a bit odd). I stood there for a moment, looking down at the north end of Dark Score. The water was glassy and calm, still candy-colored in the afterglow of sunset, without a single ripple or a single small craft to be seen. The boat-people would all be down at the marina or at Warrington's Sunset Bar by now, I guessed, eating lobster rolls and drinking big mixed drinks. Later a few of them, buzzed on speed and martinis, would go bolting up and down the lake by moonlight. I wondered if I would be around to hear them. I thought there was a fair chance that by then I'd be on my way back to Derry, either terrified by what I'd found or disillusioned because I had found nothing at all. ‘You funny little man, said Strickland.' I didn't know I was going to speak until the words were out of my mouth, and why those words in particular I had no idea. I remembered my dream of Jo under the bed and shuddered. A mosquito whined in my ear. I slapped it and walked on. In the end, my arrival at the head of the driveway was almost too perfectly timed, the sense of having re-entered my dream almost too complete. Even the balloons tied to the SARA LAUGHS sign (one white and one blue, both with WELCOME BACK MIKE! carefully printed on them in black ink) and floating against the ever-darkening backdrop of the trees seemed to intensify the d? ¦j? ¤ vu I had quite deliberately induced, for no two dreams are exactly the same, are they? Things conceived by minds and made by hands can never be quite the same, even when they try their best to be identical, because we're never the same from day to day or even moment to moment. I walked to the sign, feeling the mystery of this place at twilight. I squeezed down on the board, feeling its rough reality, and then I ran the ball of my thumb over the letters, daring the splinters and reading with my skin like a blind man reading braille: S and A and R and A; L and A and U and G and H and S. The driveway had been cleared of fallen needles and blown-down branches, but Dark Score glimmered a fading rose just as it had in my dreams, and the sprawled hulk of the house was the same. Bill had thoughtfully left the light over the back stoop burning, and the sunflowers growing through the boards had long since been cut down, but everything else was the same. I looked overhead, at the slot of sky over the lane. Nothing . . . I waited . . . and nothing . . . waiting still . . . and then there it was, right where the center of my gaze had been trained. At one moment there was only the fading sky (with indigo just starting to rise up from the edges like an infusion of ink), and at the next Venus was glowing there, bright and steady. People talk about watching the stars come out, and I suppose some people do, but I think that was the only time in my life that I actually saw one appear. I wished on it, too, but this time it was real time, and I did not wish for Jo. ‘Help me,' I said, looking at the star. I would have said more, but I didn't know what to say. I didn't know what kind of help I needed. That's enough, a voice in my mind said uneasily. That's enough, now. Go on back and get your car. Except that wasn't the plan. The plan was to go down the driveway, just as I had in the final dream, the nightmare. The plan was to prove to myself that there was no shroud-wrapped monster lurking in the shadows of the big old log house down there. The plan was pretty much based on that bit of New Age wisdom which says the word ‘fear' stands for Face Everything And Recover. But, as I stood there and looked down at that spark of porch light (it looked very small in the growing darkness), it occurred to me that there's another bit of wisdom, one not quite so good-morning-starshine, which suggests fear is actually an acronym for Fuck Everything And Run. Standing there by myself in the woods as the light left the sky, that seemed like the smarter interpretation, no two ways about it. I looked down and was a little amused to see that I had taken one of the balloons untied it without even noticing as I thought things over. It floated serenely up from my hand at the end of its string, the words printed on it now impossible to read in the growing dark. Maybe it's all moot, anyway; maybe I won't be able to move. Maybe that old devil writer's walk has got hold of me again, and I'll just stand here like a statue until someone comes along and hauls me away. But this was real time in the real world, and in the real world there was no such thing as writer's walk. I opened my hand. As the string I'd been holding floated free, I walked under the rising balloon and started down the driveway. Foot followed foot, pretty much as they had ever since I'd first learned this trick back in 1959. I went deeper and deeper into the clean but sour smell of pine, and once I caught myself taking an extra-big step, avoiding a fallen branch that had been in the dream but wasn't here in reality. My heart was still thudding hard, and sweat was still pouring out of me, oiling my skin and drawing mosquitoes. I raised a hand to brush the hair off my brow, then stopped, holding it splay-fingered out in front of my eyes. I put the other one next to it. Neither was marked; there wasn't even a shadow of scar from the cut I'd given myself while crawling around my bedroom during the ice storm. ‘I'm all right,' I said. ‘I'm all right.' You funny little man, said Strickland, a voice answered. It wasn't mine, wasn't Jo's; it was the UFO voice that had narrated my nightmare, the one which had driven me on even when I wanted to stop. The voice of some outsider. I started walking again. I was better than halfway down the driveway now. I had reached the point where, in the dream, I told the voice that I was afraid of Mrs. Danvers. ‘I'm afraid of Mrs. D.,' I said, trying the words aloud in the growing dark. ‘What if the bad old housekeeper's down there?' A loon cried on the lake, but the voice didn't answer. I suppose it didn't have to. There was no Mrs. Danvers, she was only a bag of bones in an old book, and the voice knew it. I began walking again. I passed the big pine that Jo had once banged into in our Jeep, trying to back up the driveway. How she had sworn! Like a sailor! I had managed to keep a straight face until she got to ‘Fuck a duck,' and then I'd lost it, leaning against the side of the Jeep with the heels of my hands pressed against my temples, howling until tears rolled down my cheeks, and Jo glaring hot blue sparks at me the whole time. I could see the mark about three feet up on the trunk of the tree, the white seeming to float above the dark bark in the gloom. It was just here that the unease which pervaded the other dreams had skewed into something far worse. Even before the shrouded thing had come bursting out of the house, I had felt something was all wrong, all twisted up; I had felt that somehow the house itself had gone insane. It was at this point, passing the old scarred pine, that I had wanted to run like the gingerbread man. I didn't feel that now. I was afraid, yes, but not in terror. There was nothing behind me, for one thing, no sound of slobbering breath. The worst thing a man was likely to come upon in these woods was an irritated moose. Or, I supposed, if he was really unlucky, a pissed-off bear. In the dream there had been a moon at least three quarters full, but there was no moon in the sky above me that night. Nor would there be; in glancing over the weather page in that morning's Derry News, I had noticed that the moon was new. Even the most powerful d? ¦j? ¤ vu is fragile, and at the thought of that moonless sky, mine broke. The sensation of reliving my nightmare departed so abruptly that I even wondered why I had done this, what I had hoped to prove or accomplish. Now I'd have to go all the way back down the dark lane to retrieve my car. All right, but I'd do it with a flashlight from the house. One of them would surely still be just inside the A series of jagged explosions ran themselves off on the far side of the lake, the last loud enough to echo against the hills. I stopped, drawing in a quick breath. Moments before, those unexpected bangs probably would have sent me running back up the driveway in a panic, but now I had only that brief, startled moment. It was firecrackers, of course, the last one the loudest one maybe an M-80. Tomorrow was the Fourth of July, and across the lake kids were celebrating early, as kids are wont to do. I walked on. The bushes still reached like hands, but they had been pruned back and their reach wasn't very threatening. I didn't have to worry about the power being out, either; I was now close enough to the back stoop to see moths fluttering around the light Bill Dean had left on for me. Even if the power had been out (in the western part of the state a lot of the lines are still above ground, and it goes out a lot), the gennie would have kicked in automatically. Yet I was awed by how much of my dream was actually here, even with the powerful sense of repetition of reliving departed. Jo's planters were where they'd always been, flanking the path which leads down to Sara's little lick of beach; I suppose Brenda Meserve had found them stacked in the cellar and had had one of her crew set them out again. Nothing was growing in them yet, but I suspected that stuff would be soon. And even without the moon of my dream, I could see the black square on the water, standing about fifty yards offshore. The swimming float. No oblong shape lying overturned in front of the stoop, though; no coffin. Still, my heart was beating hard again, and I think if more firecrackers had gone off on the Kashwakamak side of the lake just then, I might have screamed. You funny little man, said Strickland. Give me that, it's my dust-catcher. What if death drives us insane? What if we survive, but it drives us insane? What then? I had reached the point where, in my nightmare, the door banged open and that white shape came hurtling out with its wrapped arms upraised. I took one more step and then stopped, hearing the harsh sound of my respiration as I drew each breath down my throat and then pushed it back out over the dry floor of my tongue. There was no sense of d? ¦j? ¤ vu, but for a moment I thought the shape would appear anyway here in the real world, in real time. I stood waiting for it with my sweaty hands clenched. I drew in another dry breath, and this time I held it. The soft lap of water against the shore. A breeze that patted my face and rattled the bushes. A loon cried out on the lake; moths battered the stoop light. No shroud-monster threw open the door, and through the big windows to the left and right of the door, I could see nothing moving, white or otherwise. There was a note above the knob, probably from Bill, and that was it. I let out my breath in a rush and walked the rest of the way down the driveway to Sara Laughs. The note was indeed from Bill Dean. It said that Brenda had done some shopping for me; the supermarket receipt was on the kitchen table, and I would find the pantry well stocked with canned goods. She'd gone easy with the perishables, but there was milk, butter, half-and-half, and hamburger, that staple of single-guy cuisine. I will see you next Mon., Bill had written. If I had my druthers I'd be here to say hello in person but the good wife says it's our turn to do the holiday trotting and so we are going down to Virginia (hot!!) to spend the 4th with her sister. If you need anything or run into problems . . . He had jotted his sister-in-law's phone number in Virginia as well as Butch Wiggins's number in town, which locals just call ‘the TR,' as in ‘Me and mother got tired of Bethel and moved our trailer over to the TR.' There were other numbers, as well the plumber, the electrician, Brenda Meserve, even the TV guy over in Harrison who had repositioned the DSS dish for maximum reception. Bill was taking no chances. I turned the note over, imagining a final P.S.: Say, Mike, if nuclear war should break out before me and Yvette get back from Virginia Something moved behind me. I whirled on my heels, the note dropping from my hand. It fluttered to the boards of the back stoop like a larger, whiter version of the moths banging the bulb overhead. In that instant I was sure it would be the shroud-thing, an insane revenant in my wife's decaying body, Give me my dust-catcher, give it to me, how dare you come down here and disturb my rest, how dam you come to Manderley again, and now that you're here, how will you ever get away? Into the mystery with you, you silly little man. Into the mystery with you. Nothing there. It had just been the breeze again, stirring the bushes around a little . . . except I had felt no breeze against my sweaty skin, not that time. ‘Well it must have been, there's nothing there,' I said. The sound of your voice when you're alone can be either scary or reassuring. That time it was the latter. I bent over, picked up Bill's note, and stuffed it into my back pocket. Then I rummaged out my keyring. I stood under the stoop light in the big, swooping shadows of the light-struck moths, picking through my keys until I found the one I wanted. It had a funny disused look, and as I rubbed my thumb along its serrated edge, I wondered again why I hadn't come down here except for a couple of quick broad daylight errands in all the months and years since Jo had died. Surely if she had been alive, she would have insisted But then a peculiar realization came to me: it wasn't just a matter of since Jo died. It was easy to think of it that way never once during my six weeks on Key Largo had I thought of it any other way but now, actually standing here in the shadows of the dancing moths (it was like standing under some weird organic disco ball) and listening to the loons out on the lake, I remembered that although Johanna had died in August of 1994, she had died in Derry. It had been miserably hot in the city . . . so why had we been there? Why hadn't we been sitting out on our shady deck on the lake side of the house, drinking iced tea in our bathing suits, watching the boats go back and forth and commenting on the form of the various water-skiers? What had she been doing in that damned Rite Aid parking lot to begin with, when during any other August we would have been miles from there? Nor was that all. We usually stayed at Sara until the end of September it was a peaceful, pretty time, as warm as summer. But in '93 we'd left with August only a week gone. I knew, because I could remember Johanna going to New York with me later that month, some kind of publishing deal and the usual attendant publicity crap. It had been dog-hot in Manhattan, the hydrants spraying in the East Village and the uptown streets sizzling. On one night of that trip we'd seen The Phantom of the Opera. Near the end Jo had leaned over to me and whispered, ‘Oh fuck! The Phantom is snivelling again!' I had spent the rest of the show trying to keep from bursting into wild peals of laughter. Jo could be evil that way. Why had she come with me that August? Jo didn't like New York even in April or October, when it's sort of pretty. I didn't know. I couldn't remember. All I was sure of was' that she had never been back to Sara Laughs after early August of 1993 . . . and before long I wasn't even sure of that. I slipped the key into the lock and turned it. I'd go inside, flip on the kitchen overheads, grab a flashlight, and go back for the car. If I didn't, some drunk guy with a cottage at the far south end of the lane would come in too fast, rear-end my Chevy, and sue me for a billion dollars. The house had been aired out and didn't smell a bit musty; instead of still, stale air, there was a faint and pleasing aroma of pine. I reached for the light inside the door, and then, somewhere in the blackness of the house, a child began to sob. My hand froze where it was and my flesh went cold. I didn't panic, exactly, but all rational thought left my mind. It was weeping, a child's weeping, but I hadn't a clue as to where it was coming from. Then it began to fade. Not to grow softer but to fade, as if someone had picked that kid up and was carrying it away down some long corridor. . . not that any such corridor existed in Sara Laughs. Even the one running through the middle of the house, connecting the central section to the two wings, isn't really long. Fading . . . faded . . . almost gone. I stood in the dark with my cold skin crawling and my hand on the lightswitch. Part of me wanted to boogie, to just go flying out of there as fast as my little legs could carry me, running like the gingerbread man. Another part, however the rational part was already reasserting itself. I flicked the switch, the part that wanted to run saying forget it, it won't work, it's the dream, stupid, it's your dream coming true. But it did work. The foyer light came on in a shadow-dispelling rush, revealing Jo's lumpy little pottery collection to the left and the bookcase to the right, stuff I hadn't looked at in four years or more, but still here and still the same. On a middle shelf of the bookcase I could see the three early Elmore Leonard novels Swag, The Big Bounce, and Mr. Majestyk that I had put aside against a spell of rainy weather; you have to be ready for rain when you're at camp. Without a good book, even two days of rain in the woods can be enough to drive you bonkers. There was a final whisper of weeping, then silence. In it, I could hear ticking from the kitchen. The clock by the stove, one of Jo's rare lapses into bad taste, is Felix the Cat with big eyes that shift from side to side as his pendulum tail flicks back and forth. I think it's been in every cheap horror movie ever made. ‘Who's here?' I called. I took a step toward the kitchen, just a dim space floating beyond the foyer, then stopped. In the dark the house was a cavern. The sound of the weeping could have come from anywhere. Including my own imagination. ‘Is someone here?' No answer . . . but I didn't think the sound had been in my head. If it had been, writer's block was the least of my worries. Standing on the bookcase to the left of the Elmore Leonards was a long-barrelled flashlight, the kind that holds eight D-cells and will temporarily blind you if someone shines it directly into your eyes. I grasped it, and until it nearly slipped through my hand I hadn't really realized how heavily I was sweating, or how scared I was. I juggled it, heart beating hard, half-expecting that creepy sobbing to begin again, half-expecting the shroud-thing to come floating out of the black living room with its shapeless arms raised; some old hack of a politician back from the grave and ready to give it another shot. Vote the straight Resurrection ticket, brethren, and you will be saved. I got control of the light and turned it on. It shot a bright straight beam into the living room, picking out the moosehead over the fieldstone fireplace; it shone in the head's glass eyes like two lights burning under water. I saw the old cane-and-bamboo chairs; the old couch; the scarred dining-room table you had to balance by shimming one leg with a folded playing card or a couple of beer coasters; I saw no ghosts; I decided this was a seriously fucked-up carnival just the same. In the words of the immortal Cole Porter, let's call the whole thing off. If I headed east as soon as I got back to my car, I could be in Derry by midnight. Sleeping in my own bed. I turned out the foyer light and stood with the flash drawing its line across the dark. I listened to the tick of that stupid cat-clock, which Bill must have set going, and to the familiar chugging cycle of the refrigerator. As I listened to them, I realized that I had never expected to hear either sound again. As for the crying . . . Had there been crying? Had there really? Yes. Crying or something. Just what now seemed moot. What seemed germane was that coming here had been a dangerous idea and a stupid course of action for a man who has taught his mind to misbehave. As I stood in the foyer with no light but the flash and the glow falling in the windows from the bulb over the back stoop, I realized that the line between what I knew was real and what I knew was only my imagination had pretty much disappeared. I left the house, checked to make sure the door was locked, and walked back up the driveway, swinging the flashlight beam from side to side like a pendulum like the tail of old Felix the Krazy Kat in the kitchen. It occurred to me, as I struck north along the lane, that I would have to make up some sort of story for Bill Dean. It wouldn't do to say, ‘Well, Bill, I got down there and heard a kid bawling in my locked house, and it scared me so bad I turned into the gingerbread man and ran back to Derry. I'll send you the flashlight I took; put it back on the shelf next to the paperbacks, would you?' That wasn't ‘any good because the story would get around and people would say, ‘Not surprised. Wrote too many books, probably. Work like that has got to soften a man's head. Now he's scared of his own shadow. Occupational hazard.' Even if I never came down here again in my life, I didn't want to leave people on the TR with that opinion of me, that half-contemptuous, see-what-you-get-for-thinking-too-much attitude. It's one a lot of folks seem to have about people who live by their imaginations. I'd tell Bill I got sick. In a way it was true. Or no . . . better to tell him someone else got sick . . . a friend . . . someone in Derry I'd been seeing . . . a lady-friend, perhaps. ‘Bill, this friend of mine, this lady-friend of mine got sick, you see, and so . . . ‘ I stopped suddenly, the light shining on the front of my car. I had walked the mile in the dark without noticing many of the sounds in the woods, and dismissing even the bigger of them as deer settling down for the night. I hadn't turned around to see if the shroud-thing (or maybe some spectral crying child) was following me. I had gotten involved in making up a story and then embellishing it, doing it in my head instead of on paper this time but going down all the same well-known paths. I had gotten so involved that I had neglected to be afraid. My heartbeat was back to normal, the sweat was drying on my skin, and the mosquitoes had stopped whining in my ears. And as I stood there, a thought occurred to me. It was as if my mind had been waiting patiently for me to calm down enough so it could remind me of some essential fact. The pipes. Bill had gotten my go-ahead to replace most of the old stuff, and the plumber had done so. Very recently he'd done so. ‘Air in the pipes,' I said, running the beam of the eight-cell flashlight over the grille of my Chevrolet. ‘That's what I heard.' I waited to see if the deeper part of my mind would call this a stupid, rationalizing lie. It didn't . . . because, I suppose, it realized it could be true. Airy pipes can sound like people talking, dogs barking, or children crying. Perhaps the plumber had bled them and the sound had been something else . . . but perhaps he hadn't. The question was whether or not I was going to jump in my car, back two tenths of a mile to the highway, and then return to Derry, all on the basis of a sound I had heard for ten seconds (maybe only five), and while in an excited, stressful state of mind. I decided the answer was no. It might take only one more peculiar thing to turn me around probably gibbering like a character on Tales from the Crypt but the sound I'd heard in the foyer wasn't enough. Not when making a go of it at Sara Laughs might mean so much. I hear voices in my head, and have for as long as I can remember. I don't know if that's part of the necessary equipment for being a writer or not; I've never asked another one. I never felt the need to, because I know all the voices I hear are versions of me. Still, they often seem like very real versions of other people, and none is more real to me-or more familiar than Jo's voice. Now that voice came, sounding interested, amused in an ironic but gentle way . . . and approving. Going to fight, Mike? ‘Yeah,' I said, standing there in the dark and picking out gleams of chrome with my flashlight. ‘Think so, babe.' Well, then that's all right, isn't it? Yes. It was. I got into my car, started it up, and drove slowly down the lane. And when I got to the driveway, I turned in. There was no crying the second time I entered the house. I walked slowly through the downstairs, keeping the flashlight in my hand until I had turned on every light I could find; if there were people still boating on the north end of the lake, old Sara probably looked like some weird Spielbergian flying saucer hovering above them. I think houses live their own lives along a time-stream that's different from the ones upon which their owners float, one that's slower. In a house, especially an old one, the past is closer. In my life Johanna had been dead nearly four years, but to Sara, she was much nearer than that. It wasn't until I was actually inside, with all the lights on and the flash returned to its spot on the bookshelf, that I realized how much I had been dreading my arrival. Of having my grief reawakened by signs of Johanna's interrupted life. A book with a corner turned down on the table at one end of the sofa, where Jo had liked to recline in her nightgown, reading and eating plums; the cardboard cannister of Quaker Oats, which was all she ever wanted for breakfast, on a shelf in the pantry; her old green robe hung on the back of the bathroom door in the south wing, which Bill Dean still called ‘the new wing,' although it had been built before we ever saw Sara Laughs. Brenda Meserve had done a good job a humane job-of removing these signs and signals, but she couldn't get them all. Jo's hardcover set of Sayers's Peter Wimsey novels still held pride of place at the center of the living-room bookcase. Jo had always called the moosehead over the fireplace Bunter, and once, for no reason I could remember (certainly it seemed a very un-Bunterlike accessory), she had hung a bell around the moose's hairy neck. It hung there still, on a red velvet ribbon. Mrs. Meserve might have puzzled over that bell, wondering whether to leave it up or take it down, not knowing that when Jo and I made love on the living-room couch (and yes, we were often overcome there), we referred to the act as ‘ringing Bunter's bell.' Brenda Meserve had done her best, but any good marriage is secret territory, a necessary white space on society's map. What others don't know about it is what makes it yours. I walked around, touching things, looking at things, seeing them new. Jo seemed everywhere to me, and after a little while I dropped into one of the old cane chairs in front of the TV. The cushion wheezed under me, and I could hear Jo saying, ‘Well excuse yourself, Michael!' I put my face in my hands and cried. I suppose it was the last of my mourning, but that made it no easier to bear. I cried until I thought something inside me would break if I didn't stop. When it finally let me go, my face was drenched, I had the hiccups, and I thought I had never felt so tired in my life. I felt strained all over my body partly from the walking I'd done, I suppose, but mostly just from the tension of getting here . . . and deciding to stay here. To fight. That weird phantom crying I'd heard when I first stepped into the place, although it seemed very distant now, hadn't helped. I washed my face at the kitchen sink, rubbing away the tears with the heels of my hands and clearing my clogged nose. Then I carried my suitcases down to the guest bedroom in the north wing. I had no intention of sleeping in the south wing, in the master bedroom where I had last slept with Jo. That was a choice Brenda Meserve had foreseen. There was a bouquet of fresh wildflowers on the bureau, and a card: WELCOME BACK, MR. NOONAN. If I hadn't been emotionally exhausted, I suppose looking at that message, in Mrs. Meserve's spiky copperplate handwriting, would have brought on another fit of the weeps. I put my face in the flowers and breathed deeply. They smelled good, like sunshine. Then I took off my clothes, leaving them where they dropped, and turned back the coverlet on the bed. Fresh sheets, fresh pillowcases; same old Noonan sliding between the former and dropping his head onto the latter. I lay there with the bedside lamp on, looking up at the shadows on the ceiling, almost unable to believe I was in this place and this bed. There had been no shroud-thing to greet me, of course . . . but I had an idea it might well find me in my dreams. Sometimes for me, at least there's a transitional bump between waking and sleeping. Not that night. I slipped away without knowing it, and woke the next morning with sunlight shining in through the window and the bedside lamp still on. There had been no dreams that I could remember, only a vague sensation that I had awakened sometime briefly in the night and heard a bell ringing, very thin and far away.