Katrina Powell

     Katrina Powell is a Professor at Virginia Tech who has become extremely interested in eminent domain. She has written two books about the displacement of people in central Virginia during the depression while the Shenandoah National Park was being founded. She performed qualitative research from a history point of view. In her research, she looked up letters from people who were displaced. They were written to a variety of different people ranging from the man who was the head of the national park project, Mr. Lassiter to President Roosevelt.

     In regards to her research, which was very interesting, I would like to move past it and talk about her passion on the subject. Her research was initially about the Shenandoah Valley and the Shenandoah National Park, but she found herself becoming interested in Sri Lanka's displacement as well. Her passion on the subject has brought her all over the world and changed several people's lives. During her research she interviewed people who were displaced or their parents and grandparents were displaced. Their stories were so interesting and they were stories that she could tell they've been wanting to tell for a very long time.  One man talked about how he couldn't afford to purchase another wire for his garden and it was left in the national park and he was begging Mr. Lassiter to return it to him since they wouldn't need it. He kept repeating that he was cooperative. The idea of being cooperative was very important at the time and was repeated in many of the stories told. I think that this what drew me in initially. Another story told was about how a young woman loved her house. She talked about how it was not a big house or a magnificent house but it was her house and she was proud of her home. She also talked about how she had a little girl and she wasn't sure how she was going to raise her without their little home. She asked for materials to build a new house, soap, and food. Theses stories further drew me in. 

     The people sold their land and were paid only a dollar per acre, had it harder then I can imagine. 

Hotel Rwanda Convocation

         Paul Rusesabagina proved to be exactly what I thought. He was so interesting and told the story of how the movie was made as well as what happened in Rwanda. He talked about how after everything he endured, channels like HBO and Showtime offered him deals to make a movie.  They wanted to make a movie about the genocide and planned on showing the world what had happened in Rwanda. Paul wanted to world to know but he didn't want it to be shown in the way they wanted it shown. He decided that he was going to make a movie that was about more then just the genocide. He wanted to tell a story about how a community can come together and how some people will stand up and fight, even if others are cowering away. He eventually met a man who wanted to make the movie just like he did. Together they raised money, wrote the script and promoted the movie. In 2004, Hotel Rwanda was released and it spread like wild fire. Today, nearly every student in high school and college in America has seen Hotel Rwanda and knows what happened there. Unfortunately, many people in Rwanda do no agree with the way he portrayed the genocide. Therefore, when he comes to speak about the horrible acts committed, they try to yell him off the stage and call him a "liar," among other names.  Their reasons are unknown to me but they are obviously passionate enough to travel very far and protest his speech. I understand that after such a hard situation, there are mixed views of what should be shown and what shouldn't which makes the story even more interesting. I found the way that he spoke as if he was from both views very interesting also. He had an almost "matter of fact" view about him whether it was for one side of the other. In a way, I can state that he was fair to both sides of the fight.
     The night with him was very interesting and I highly suggest watching Hotel Rwanda.

Paul Rusesabagina

   Paul Rusesabagina is coming to our campus on Wednesday. This convocation has been much anticipated because he is such a strong and impressive man. He saved over 1000 people and possibly more then 1500 people. In Rwanda, he was just a simple family man who worked as a hotel manager at a ritzy Portuguese hotel. As war raged around him between the Hutut's and the Tutsi's he was forced to beg, plead and bribe rebels to keep his family and many many others alive.

   I have not met him yet and I cannot give a first person account but I am sure he will be a very inspiring and interesting man.

Denny Miller

    Denny Miller came to campus for the Tarzan Centennial conference this past weekend. He has been working as an actor for many decades and has worked in television shows, movies and commercials. His most popular work was as Tarzan, The Ape Man in 1959. Although I am not familiar with any of his work because he was popular way before I was born, I did enjoy having dinner with him. He told us stories about how he got into acting. He was originally planning on being a basketball coach and then before he knew it he was swept up into the acting world and working on shows like Gilligan's Island and Charlie's Angels.

    He is not only an actor but also has a career in fitness training. He has written many books about ways to stay fit but without being in pain. He has used his career as Tarzan to promote his fitness career.

    Unfortunately, I can't explain how I feel about him because he wasn't an inspiring speaker or teaching us a lesson. He was very interesting but because he hasn't influenced my life at all, I don't feel any connection to the man.