Wise Monkey News is here to provide young people an opportunity to discuss the issues that affect their lives. We hope that, through your participation, this website serves as a forum for the development, exchange, and expression of ideas that will prepare us to assume our positions as the leaders of tomorrow's world. Have something to say?
Are the two Koreas ready to shake hands?
by: Boo Yoo - printed on 10-18-2000
Korea is the only country that is divided into two different governments, economic systems, cultures, and militaries. It was portioned along the 38th parallel, with the Soviet Union occupying the north area and American troops occupying the south area ever since it was independent from Japan in 1945. The North and South fought a fierce war from 1950 to 1953 and have never singed a permanent peace treaty.
Third wave of executions in China
by: Mono Vergara - printed on 10-10-2001
After shooting the prisoners in the back of their heads, the executioners lay the corpses on ground, rapidly removing their organs so they can be used in transplants. Thousands of people witness these mass executions; among these crowds, the prisoners’ families watch the executions and search for answers. The family members have not seen the prisoners since the police took them to interrogate them.
Nurturing our Bodies/Nurturing Mother Earth
by: Tim Crump - printed on 03-28-2001
My morning bicycle ride to the University of Portland is one of the few times in the day that I feel good, truly and deeply good, about what I am doing. In our lives, so many of our decisions and actions involve trade-offs. To keep the apartment warm we have to turn up the heat and burn more energy. To learn more about an important subject, we print out an article, using a few more sheets of paper.
Irish Famine Concert brings awareness of hunger to U of P
by: Paige Thomas - printed on 09-11-2002
Many may wonder what exactly contra dancing is. It is a form of English country dancing in which each dancer has a partner and moves to the music with the assistance of a caller who announces the steps.
Beer, wine, cigarettes and other dispatches from Spain
by: David Miller - printed on 02-28-2001
My flight from Portland to Madrid, Spain had a layover in Newark, New Jersey. As I had four hours to spend in Newark, I bought a premade, mushy Philly-steak-and-cheese sandwich and sat down to collect my thoughts. I was on my way to Spain to spend the next four months studying there, in Spanish, all in Spanish. It wasn’t like I hadn’t ever traveled before, I had. I wasn’t worried about that. It was the 15 credits of college courses .
‘That’s the thing about Christmas in Ghana’
by: Isaac Vanderburg - printed on 01-31-2001
It is an organic story, really. In 1969 two Peace Corps volunteers went to Ghana, West Africa. They taught English to the Twi-speaking children of villages called Aducrom and Laarte. They ate fufu and banku and redred and nkatiekwein. They did all the things that volunteers do: teach, travel, work, wander, laugh and cry. Of course, they couldn’t help but to love the kids they taught, love the work they did, and love most of Ghana in general.