"All persons licensed to conduct a restaurant, shall serve either white people exclusively or colored people exclusively and shall not sell to the two races within the same room or serve the two races anywhere under the same license".

   Well, for our assignment, we were supposed to search and find a Jim Crow law from one of the Southern states. A Jim Crow law was said to be a law to separate but to keep equal all negroes and all white people. This law encouraged people to have different colored and non-colored water fountains, different public schools, etc.
    However, the law that I have chosen to write about has to do with restaurants and it is that:
"all persons licensed to conduct a restaurant, shall serve either white people exclusively or colored people exclusively and shall not sell to the two races within the same room or serve the two races anywhere under the same license".
    This means that people can have restaurants restricted to negroes, or white restaurants restricted to whites, but no restaurants for both. This law was from Georgia. I believe that Georgia passed this law because they thought that negroes weren't people (white people were treated better) and had to have their own separate restaurants for the lower class. Also, they probably were afraid that they would catch some sort of disease from sitting at a table where a colored person once sat, or eating from a utensil that was once in a negroe's mouth. The motivation of white people to enhance these laws were probably just to make them seem bigger or more important. They enjoyed the fact that they were the ones who were being treated correctly and not the black people, with whom they thought were some sort of "creature" with no right to being an equal, even if it is said that the Jim Crow laws were to separate but to keep equal. Besides, if that was to be true, then why would a black person have to give up their seat for a white person on the bus? See, that's not equality, that's treating the black person unfairly.
   As you can probably tell, I am not a fan at all of the Jim Crow law. I think that it is absolutely unnecessary to pass a law for people to have separate restaurants, what's the point? If peoples' excuses were that they would catch some sort of disease, then go, touch a black person's arm, go to the doctor, and you'd be fine! After all, the black people never suffered any diseases from living in their own skin. If it was up to me, these laws would never have existed.

   Law Source:
 "Examples of Jim Crow Laws." Autoredirect to Main Site. Web. 02 Feb. 2012. <http://academic.udayton.edu/race/02rights/jcrow02.htm>.

   Picture sources (in order from top to bottom):
1)     "Civil Rights." Jose M. Web. 02 Feb. 2012. <http://josempurple.blogspot.com/2011/04/civil-rights.html>.

 2)   "Poplicks.com: October 2008." Poplicks.com. Web. 02 Feb. 2012. <http://poplicks.com/2008_10_01_poplicks_archive.html>.

3)    "November 2008." Artofthepossibleonline. Web. 02 Feb. 2012. <http://www.artofthepossibleonline.com/2008_11_01_archive.html>.

4)   "Memories: From Racial Segregation to the Oval Office (1 of 3)." TripodGirl.com | Official Website of Photographer Donna Laframboise (Canada). Web. 02 Feb. 2012. <http://www.tripodgirl.com/memories/2008/10/from-racial-segregation-to-oval-office.html>.

Where In The World????? :)

   Alright guys! It's my turn for Where In the World, Student Edition!!!! Good like, you'll need it!!! ^.^ :)

Both are of the same place in case you can't figure out the first one :)

My Parent's Wedding

   In this wedding story, I shall be telling you about Becky Rauf's and Hilvan Alpay's happiest day of their lives. They married on February 14th, 1998, eight months after they met. About 200 people attended the Alpay wedding and friends and family came (I didn't go, because I was busy that day, with not being born and all). They got married by a registrar. My parents got married in a mosque registrar. My mum and dad chose that place because it was the only religious AND official mosque registrar. They got married inside a very ornate mosque, with a very Ottoman style. It was a small, beige building, right in the middle of old North Nicosia.

   The bride (my mum) wore a beautiful, creamy white, Victorian styled, lacy wedding dress with a violet flower tiara and a veil, her hair flowing lazily down. She also wore clear with silver and diamante, Cinderella style shoes. My dad wore the same thing (just kidding). He wore a dark, crisp, navy-blue Armani suit with a blue tie. There were no special colors used. Nobody else participated in the wedding apart from one flower girl dressed in a white Alice in Wonderland sort of dress. The room was filled with vases full of dainty white lilies. It was also filled with the echo of modern music. There was no dancing due to the fact that it was a more cocktail type wedding. There were mounds of finger foods piling up in the room, along with a special chocolate mousse wedding cake.

   A tradition was that the one who steps on the partner's foot first (after being pronounced man and wife) will lead the family. They also cut the cake together and the guests threw rice as my parents walked out of the mosque. They handed out small Godiva chocolates to the guests. My mum wore borrowed earrings, a blue “evil eye” bracelet, a brooch, given to my mum by her grandma, and a new pair of shoes. She also threw a bouquet of flowers.

   My parents' special memories of the day was that it was very windy at the cocktail party and every time a guest came into the restaurant (at the harbor) the wind blew out most of the candles that filled the room, so there was a person relighting most of them all night. My mum most enjoyed everything and she would change nothing, it was perfect.

   Apparently my mum was really nervous about whether the wedding would go smoothly, if the guests were happy and if there was enough food and drinks. Her wedding was full of personal things.

   “At the cocktail party, I filled the restaurant with burning candles, it was beautiful” she said, I could tell by her face that she was remembering it. My parents specially chose February 14^th, because it's said to be the most romantic day of the year. They loved their wedding at the mosque because it was magical. There was no Maid Of Honor or a Best man because it is not in the religion. There was a variety of music playing too. Also, they loved their gifts. My parents' favorite gift was the Scenic car that my mum's parents got for my my parents.

   “It really helped us settle into Cyprus more comfortably” my father says. They sent out their simple invitations with silver writing and after two months their big day arrived!!

   What I most enjoyed was having candles everywhere, it sounds really cozy! I would have done nothing differently except, even though it's not tradition, I'd have a Maid of Honor. I could imagine having a pearly, white wedding in a mosque, with music and a chocolate fountain dribbling sauce. Guests would be laughing and having a wonderful time.

11 For 2011

   Since we were looking at the video Life In a Day, I have to answer the following questions with my own answers, so here they are!

In my pocket I have my phone, some money, my ipod and (if at school) my locker keys.
The last thing that I had to drink was some water.
My family and friends make me happy because they are always there for me.
Something really nice I did was making my mum bed in breakfast on her birthday.
Spiders scare me immensly because they are extremly disgusting and hairy. EWWW!!
The last movie that I saw was The Collector.
The last song that I listened to was Party Rock Anthem by LMFAO.
The last thing I bought was a new shirt.
I couldn't live without my family because I need them! They mean everything to me and they are the most important things in my entire life.
I hope that one day I will be a well-known lawyer.
I could live without cockroaches and other yucky things because they are terrible!

My Name

   My name is Rachelle and it comes from Rachel, which comes from Hebrew. Rachelle means female sheep, so I guess I taste delicious. People who are named Rachelle, are indescribable, perfect, beautiful, the most intelligent, kindest, caring and very thoughtful. However we do not like to be the center of attention and can sometimes hurt other people's feeling without meaning it. My name doesn't have any cultural significance because I'm Turkish Cypriot and it is derived from Hebrew.

   There really is no story behind my name. My dad thought of it because he read it in a magazine somewhere, told it to my mum, who loved it and there it was, my name! I wasn't named after anyone in my family, I was just named Rachelle because my parents liked the sound of it.
   I love my name. I do because it is so different, I don't think that there is anyone else on the island with the name Rachelle. It's so unique and uncommon, which is what a name is supposed to be. You are an individual and there is no one else like you, so I believe the same rule should be applied to your name. I mean who are you more likely to bump into, a Sarah or a Rachelle? I don't really know what I'd name my children. Probably it would be something very rare to have as a name, I don't mean to say that I'll name my kids Batman or The Hulk or something, but a name that nobody else has. Still, I'm not quite sure.

My Family Traditions

  One of my family's traditions that we do yearly is celebrate New Year's Eve with both sets of my grandparents. New Year's Eve is when people get together to celebrate a new year. Common things that can be found on New Year's Eve are parties, music, traditional dinners that include things like turkey, potatoes, more food, lots of people and fireworks. We celebrate it on December 31st, the last day of the Gregorian calender. Even though most celebrate New Year's on December 31st not everyone does. The Chinese celebrate their New Years on different dates. In 2012 it will be celebrated on January 23rd, which will be the Year Of The Dragon.

   This tradition is an old one that has been going on since my mother and father met. They realized on their first New Year's Eve together that they both celebrate it the same way. They always visit their parents and have a large feast. So,they decided to keep the tradition going but, they decided to have the feast with everyone together.

    Our New Year's Eve is special because my maternal grandparents, paternal grandparents, mum, dad and I celebrate it together. On my first New Years Eve my mum's parents, my mum, my dad and I went over to my dad's parents house. My paternal grandma made a huge feast of turkey, roast potatoes, traditional Turkish Cypriot foods and a traditional dessert where a cake is baked and a coin is put in it and whoever gets the piece with the coin gets good luck. For the next few New Year's Eves, everyone started coming over to my house and my mum would cook. My dad's parents were getting too old to come all the way to our house (my paternal grandma is now 96!!!) so currently,my mum cooks the food and we all head over to their house.

   When I have a family of my own I will definitely keep this tradition going. I will because this is a great way to spend a celebration. When you're with your family fun things happen, you laugh, you're happy, it's just great. You also have a whole bunch of stories to tell. For instance on my first New Year's Eve, I was asleep until midnight then I woke up until 3 or 4 am. This then continued as a pattern for a few weeks.....! That’s what I mean by stories. There's nothing better than spending time with your family, especially on a celebration :).

Welcome To My Blog

Hi Everyone, welcome to my blog for my Social Studies class and it's going to be completly awesome. I hope you enjoy it. :)