Used by the permission of myself. (If you don’t get this, I’ll tell you: We students are supposed to type in “Used by the permission of ..” and type in the person’s name, when you use picture websites like Creative Commons and Flickr. But, I made this picture by myself, so it means I have to use this picture with the permission of myself, which does not make sense.)  First, I’ll just explain some facts about making pictures like this since I like to talk about technology. You may skip this part if you want, but it may be useful. I made this picture using Pages (Apple) , and it is really easy. Get a background picture, (like Urumqi on the BG in my picture) and a main picture as a flag. I recommend you flags that have marks, and not plain colors. Click the picture one time, and then click Format, then Instant alpha. Make sure you hold click. The parts you don’t need will be highlighted with a  color (example: red), and release clicking. If you need more information, there is a tutorial below, so enjoy!!

If I was a traveller on the Silkroad, I would stop at Urumqi, the city I studied, because there are various buildings as the drum towers, and they look awesome. Also, looking at Chinese traditional art is a great reason to stop by.

The most interesting thing I learned about Urumqi is  that the city is in the Guiness Records. Urumqi is recorded as the most remote city from any seas. I think it is a really interesting fact, but I love seas, so I would prefer regions that are really close to the sea. (Laugh)

I would not like to go to Urumqi, because of religious reasons. Mostly the people are Islam, and I am afraid I am going to do something that is not allowed for Islams. If I study, I think I can go.

The physical geography is really important for the Silkroad, because it connects the east and west. If Urumqi was not connected, there would be not that much resources. Urumqi has resources because of the silkroad, and trade occurred.

I researched in the Internet, and Samarkand was connecting mostly the east and west. It means that Samarkand was extremely busy about trading and economy.

Lots of things happened. Some regions traded their weapons to fight with others. Some regions traded food to eat. I got to know about how the traded products passed on and on. I thought about how it was hard to trade in real life, but we just threw the string and then the products passed on and on. It was a really enjoying activity, and it was expressing how the middle city was very important. (travel until other regions)

Kate and Emily’s group was in the middle, and it looked like it was really busy, because they were holding loads of strings. It means that the middle city is the most busy place in economy.

Used with permissions of Creative Commons:CULTURE by Jakob Montrasio

1) What similarities did you find among the civilizations you studied? Why do you think civilizations share these things in common?

I think that the similarities are that there is a temple which is a type of architecture in many civilizations, and that it seems to worship something because there is a silhouette of a statue in the temple if I look close. I think most civilizations have a place to worship their beliefs, and to serve them. But some civilizations do not have beliefs, so they would not need architecture as this,  and that may effect workers in the civilization.

2) What differences did you find between the civilizations? Why would these civilizations evolve differently?

When I see this picture, it seems that these temples are high-technological than other civilizations, and they are a really likely to the current countries’ shrines/temples. Civilizations can evolve differently because of their arts, architecture, beliefs, their society, the government, people’s ideas, and all other sorts of things. I have heard that people’s ideas have made all sorts of architecture around the world different and unique. The person might not be famous, but a simple idea can grow into large things. There might be a simple idea for example there should be a roof, a fancy place for the beliefs to stay, in a shrine. Eventually this idea might end up with the picture I found in Creative Commons. (Flickr)

3) Why do you think humans needed civilizations? Why did they need community?

Civilizations are needed because they would have a certain culture, and mostly jobs are related to the civilization’s cultures and other unique things, but currently there are varieties of jobs.. Mostly in a civilization, there is a King. (somebody in the top) For my opinion, obviously a King is not supposed to be a person who does what ever he/she wants and be greedy, and I think it is not appropriate to treat slaves really badly. I actually think a good King is a person who rules the civilization peacefully, (some do but some don’t) and to be trustworthy about decision making and many other things. Well, I also think that a good King is a person who listens to people and their ideas, and new cultures for instance might be formed. A community was needed because people had different jobs, and they could have traded products and goods based on their job. For instance, a fisherman and a potterer could’ve traded fish and pottery, or other products they traded with others in a community. There are many other reasons why a community was needed.

4) If you could have lived in any of the civilizations which one would you live in and why?

I think I would be living in the Nile River Civilization (Egyptian) because I want to do something based on the Rosetta Stone,hieroglyphics, or constructing pyramids. I have experience on those things, because when I was in 5th grade, we studied about ancient Egypt, and I and my friend made a project about construction of the pyramids, using a method of the Plumb Bob. I think making a pyramid is such a hard thing to do, but if I see a completed pyramid, I would feel so impressed. I also went to Minato Mirai to explore a history museum about Egypt. We saw Egyptian arts, money, and all other marvelous things. Also, I went to the British Museum in Tottenham Courtroad, London, to see the Rosetta Stone. The Rosetta Stone is a big stone shown below.