Archive for April, 2009

Old treasures

Wednesday, April 15th, 2009 by Agro Rachmatullah

During my 4 and so years in university, I’ve developed quite some programs whether for fun, for Omah TI research project, or others.

I think it would be nice if I could upload them so that I can put URLs on CVs and such…

So stay tuned…

Yumeko in the Media

Saturday, April 11th, 2009 by Agro Rachmatullah

One of my blogs was actually featured on a newspaper! It’s kinda cool, so go see it :).

Wizard of Oz: Hyped Children Friendliness?

Saturday, April 4th, 2009 by Agro Rachmatullah

L. Frank Baum on his preface for The Wonderful Wizard of Oz wrote:

Yet the old time fairy tale, having served for generations, may now be classed as “historical” in the children’s library; for the time has come for a series of newer “wonder tales” in which the stereotyped genie, dwarf and fairy are eliminated, together with all the horrible and blood-curdling incidents devised by their authors to point a fearsome moral to each tale. Modern education includes morality; therefore the modern child seeks only entertainment in its wonder tales and gladly dispenses with all disagreeable incident.

Having this thought in mind, the story of “The Wonderful Wizard of Oz” was written solely to please children of today. It aspires to being a modernized fairy tale, in which the wonderment and joy are retained and the heartaches and nightmares are left out.

Reading it, I smiled and really thought that there would be no blood whatsoever on the Wizard of Oz. However, from the very beginning Dorothy accidentally “killed” an evil witch:

… Dorothy said, with hesitation, “You are very kind, but there must be some mistake. I have not killed anything.”

“Your house did, anyway,” replied the little old woman, with a laugh, “and that is the same thing. See!” she continued, pointing to the corner of the house. “There are her two feet, still sticking out from under a block of wood.”

Two feet of a squashed person. Now that’s quite some graphic depiction…

And the story of the Tin Woodman is even more gruesome:

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