Choose a representative passage from this novel that holds particular significance to you.

I was about to narrate the victorious resurrection of the Peace Child when I was interrupted by an anguished keening from Hato. The look on the one-eyed patriarch's face startled me. Stark sorrow.

Hato's son, Amio, explained. "Not long before you came my father gave a peace child to the Kayagar. THey took the baby and did not give one in return."

Amio winced as he continued, "Later we heard they killed the baby and ate it."

I drew in my breath sharply in horror. I reached out and touched Hato's hand and felt my being flow together with his in a mute sharing of anguish.

Near the edge of our cell of sorrow Amio's voice kept on explaining, "We learned then that Kayagar do not seal the peace by laying their hands on the living tarop, as we do, but by actually partaking of the tarop child's flesh. That was an accidental death of the child does not end the peace, because he is still living inside everyone!

"The people of Haenam and Yohwi chided us, saying, 'You Kamur people don't understand the Kayagar. You only understand the Auyu. If we had known you intended to give a tarop to the Kayagar, we would have warned you.'"

Someone else added, "That was the reason we almost started fighting with the Kayagar the day you arrived to build your home."

Stunned by this complex of revelations, I sat musing in silence, when Hato's voice came to me softly, "Myao Kodon nohop kahane savos kysir nide?"

My eyes swelled at his words. He had said, "Myao Kodon[God] must have been sad just like me."

To the novel, this passage is significant because it shows how the Sawi are making connections with their experiences to God. They are finally beginning to understand how much God loved us, enough to sacrifice his own son, just to have him get killed. To me, I can use this passage to kind of get a feel of what God was going through when he sent down Jesus to us. Even though I don't have a child to directly relate it to, if I had to tell my sister to go somewhere, knowing that she was going to be killed if she went, I don't think I would be able to let her go. I would have done everything to avoid my sister from going there. However, God wasn't like that. He didn't make excuses on why Jesus shouldn't go. He deliberately sent Jesus, knowing that he was going to die. At first, from churches and Bibles, I couldn't imagine the emotions of God, but now that I compare to an everyday example of sacrifice, I know how hard it would have been for God to do what he did, unless he loved us A LOT.

What reflections and connections can you make with this novel?

When I was young, I made grand plans about my future. I was going to study very hard, go to a famous college, get a magnificent job, get piles of money and change the world. However, as I got older, I realized that my plans were just going to be dreams. The reality of this world did not allow success to happen as easily as I thought it would when I was young. I lost hope in my young immature dream and just settled to achievable goals in my life. Through reading Peace Child, I got a lesson that probably was not the major lesson the author wanted the readers to get. I regained hope that one person indeed could make a difference in the world. Even though the author did not become a millionaire through his experience, he changed the traditions of hundreds of people, which had been obeyed as long as since their existence. To me, the book was saying that you do not need excessive fame, money, or intelligence to make a difference. You can just be the average typical person, with strong perseverance, faith and an attitude willing to serve others; that is all that is needed to change the world. I had lowered my plans for my future at first because I thought I would not be good enough to achieve them all, and if I didn't, I thought I would be disappointed in myself. In a way, this book inspired me to strive for as much as you can, because even the smallest person can change the outcome of the future.

What concepts in the Sawi culture intrigued/reviled/saddened/angered/surprised you?

There were many new things of the Sawi culture that I had not experienced before, and I was shocked to hear of it. First was the Sawi concept of cannibalism. Although I had heard of human-eating people before in my life, it was quite amazed (not in a good way!) at how they thought of it as a way to open the eyes to the knowledge of the world. Just the thought of eating another human being was disgusting and unacceptable to me, let alone eating someone you know! This leads me to my second point; the honour of treachery. In our world, betraying someone is considered as a huge moral crime. It makes you unreliable and disloyal, characteristics which are often frowned upon. However, in the Sawi world, the more times you betray someone, the higher up you are in your tribe. I couldn't understand how these ideas could be used to determine a person's position. The desire for power often leads the tribesmen to plot evil treacherous schemes to trick and kill enemy tribe members. To me, the traditional practice of 'fattening with friendship' seemed so cruel. I am the sensitive type of person that gets hurt easily. When I found out that my friend was only befriending me because of a certain resource I could provide, and then ditched me, at first, I refused to believe that he/she (to make the person remain anonymous...) had those kinds of bad intentions, despite my friends continuously warning me. In the end, it took me a while to find out, and when I did, I felt like an idiot, failing to recognize what his/her motives really were. In a way, although my example did not risk my life, the feelings of the betrayed tribesman must have been similar to mine. I just couldn't understand why people would want to do that to one another.

As I read the book, I kept on wondering what had made the Sawi so cruel in their ways of living. With my experience with my friend, I could partially understand his/her reasons for doing what he/she did; for his/her own benefit. But, for the Sawi, although the concepts of cannibalism and betrayal were partly because of their desire for power, it was mostly done because it was a traditional practice that had been passed down. It made me question what kind of ancestors the Sawis had, and if our ancestors were same, whether deep down, we were as mean as them.

How different is your modern culture from the Sawi tenants?

When I first started to read Peace Child, I was alarmed at how gruesome and inhumane these Sawi tribes were. To critically put it, I was thinking how the same human being could differ this much. However, as I kept on reading it, what surprised me more was to find out how alike we actually were. As I discussed this book with my English class, many treated the people of the Sawi as if they were poor people who needed rescuing, and that we, as a modern and "better" society, should be the rescuers. Yes, it is true that the Sawi culture's traditional methods are quite unlike ours, but deep down, their motives for the acting out of the methods are as same as ours. Outward appearance wise, the Sawi are as different from us as possible; they do not clothe themselves completely, they cut off fingers for every loss in the family and they use bones of their victims as decoration for their body. However, by examining the Sawi world and our world, I came to the conclusion that there are some things instinctive about human nature that even time cannot change.

Betrayal and selfishness are two of them. Although we don't openly state it like the Sawi, we have a tendency to fight for what we want, and this selfishness can lead to betrayal. Everyday around us, I see people willing to hurt others to go the full way and be the best. In reality shows, such as America's Next Top Model, the competitors can be friends one minute, and the next, when they're in front of judges, they are willing to criticize the very same people that they called "friends." Then, in a way, aren't we 'fattening our friends for the slaughter,' too? Also, another similarity between the Sawi and us is the desire for power and control. In the Sawi tribe, the various tribes always fought against one another because of, first; revenge, or second; power. It was important to be the dominant tribe with the most territory, most people, etc. Meanwhile, in our modern world, we live to gain power too. In the America's Next Top Model example, the girls in the show are willing to betray and be selfish in order to gain what they want; the power of being America's next top model. On a broader level, there are wars in the Middle East for gains of oil, minerals, land, etc. Although there have been no huge wars since World War II, small wars still break out. This is because of each country's want for more power and control in the world. Lastly, deceit is also common in both the modern world and the Sawi world. The Sawi feel no guilt upon lying to their victims to come to a feast or a party, and then kill them brutally. They believe that more betrayal is more honour and pride. Although we don't believe that lying against another human being is the best thing that one can do, like the Sawi, we still lie. We cannot even live a day without lying. Sometimes, we lie unconsciously. Lies jump out of our mouths, and we don't even realize it. Human nature tells us that we cannot not lie.

At first glance, the Sawi tribe and the modern world seem like nothing is similar. We do not dress like the Sawi, we do not talk like the Sawi, we do not act like the Sawi, and we do not think like the Sawi. However, the Sawi and the modern world people are both people, humans living in the same planet. Therefore, we share similarities in human nature that time cannot change. Unfortunately, these natures are not "nice." The few similarities that we share are ideas of betrayal, selfishness, the desire for power, control, and deceit. Although we, as a "better" society people, want to believe that we are superior to the Sawi, by reading the characteristics of both groups, it can be said that deep down, we are not that much different.

How does faith relate to to the world in which we live?

As mentioned in the blogs underneath, to me, faith means to trust in God and believe in him, even when things don't turn out the way you want them to. Faith is a motivation for me to carry on. No matter how much I slip and fall, faith tells me that all my adversities will be nothing compared to what I will get in the future if I endure through it.

Some people might argue that there is no such thing as faith, and that faith is for people who have no strength of their own, so they rely on another supernatural presence. However, in our world, faith is more omnipresent than what we think. This is because faith does not only mean a belief in God. The real definition of faith says that it can also be confidence in a trust or thing, belief in a code of ethics, etc. In a way, our faith is what we believe to be true. For instance, we have faith, or trust, whichever one you prefer, that our legs will support our body when we wake up every morning from bed. We have faith/trust in our legs. Thus, it is impossible to live without faith in anything. Everyone has faith in something, whether it is surface level, or deep.

Surface level faith is something that anyone can do. People do it unconsciously, without a doubt. Deep level faith, to believe in an intangible God, is harder to do. Although I confidently say that my faith is in God, there are so many people who have stronger faiths in God that it makes my faith look shabby and weak. When I read or hear other people's accounts of how faith influences their lives, it is similar to how faith acts in my life; as motivation, as inspiration and as encouragement. Although statistics show that the number of religious people have decreased over the years, faith unites all believers together in a way that they identically turn to faith during hard times, and trust upon it to be their guidance.

What do traders and NGOs do for these cultures?

Although it might seem very ignorant of me to say so, before reading Peace Child, I never fully understood the idea that in our time, there could still be Stone Age tribes in the "real world", as most people like to describe it, of cell phones and iPods.

Just like my ignorance of their existence, they are ignorant of our existence too. To me, this seems like a very good opportunity for greedy traders to take advantage of the tribes' naivety, often leading to abuse. These situations have appeared in other parts of the world. In Alaska, traders arrived and hired Native Americans, in return for the giving of non-traditional food. Although the Native Americans thought this as an opportunity to get rare items that they have never seen before, the huge influence of traders ended up in a change in the way of living for the tribes. Traders set up small trading posts, which later became a shop, which became a business, which turned into a factory, etc. It was only a matter of time before the government started to get involved in the issue. "Captains" were designated to teach the U.S. law to these Natives. Tribes were banned from their usual activity of whale hunting, and some were even forced to allow access to their territory (information taken from http://vila.alaska.edu/site-templates/timeline.html). In the Sawi population of New Guinea, a similar situation was happening. Soon after Don Richardson arrived, he realized his need to hurry up because the government of New Guinea was sending "...government officers and police patrols [to penetrate] the Sawi domain... (pg. 231)."

Even without the traders, the Sawi, and generally all Stone Age tribes, are in risk. NGOs, or non-governmental organizations, are purposely designed to encourage "...the observance of human rights, [to improve] the welfare of the disadvantaged...(information taken from http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/NGOs#Purposes)." Although there are NGOs who want to help these tribes by providing medicine, supplies, and food, but accept their way of life just as it is, there are other NGOs who go there for financial benefits, such as the resources that the tribes' lands might provide. The latter group is no different than ordinary traders, and can bring the same effects of destruction to the rare cultures of the world.

Although the Sawi, and many other tribes in general, might not see the importance of which type of people arrive to help them, it is imperative that the right type of groups go there. It is time that the world begins to notice the importance of the survival of these indigenous tribes, and makes sure that they are safe from abuse and deceit.

What should we do when we are confronted with other cultures?

As a child, I had to experience what it was like live and adapt to different cultures. To me, it didn't seem like too much of a hard task. Although Britain and Korea had different languages and customs, the same concepts of human life applied; do not murder, do not steal, respect one another, etc. In a civilized world, no matter where you go, to the cold regions of Alaska, to sun-shining Spain, these rules apply. Although different regions have different cultures, because they still withhold the rules that the majority of humans follow, they are not considered as a threat.

So, what happens to cultures like the Sawi? They were "headhunters and cannibals who valued treachery through fattening victims with friendship before the slaughter." Their ways of life were everything the civilized world thought was uncivilized. Their laws were everything the world thought as unlawful. In this case, our first instinct would tell us to change these eccentric cultures to a culture we would regard as acceptable. However, in my opinion, these cultures shouldn't be forced to change because they are different from what we consider as ordinary. They have their special way of life, just like every single one of us has special cultures that we have been known to follow since our birth. Just because we are more technologically advanced than them, it does not give us the right to force them to change their culture into what we believe is 'right' in our standards. It is true that some parts of the Sawi culture needs to be changed, for the sake of the tribe's safety, but except for those, I believe that everything else needs to be left alone. They should have the choice of changing their religion, culture, faith, or belief, rather than by oppression from a force they believe to be supernatural. After Don Richardson went to the tribe and explained about Christianity, the tribe had the option of choosing whether to believe or not. Voluntary actions provoke more changes and improvements than an authoritative figure commanding someone to do something.

Sometimes, because we live in a world where civilization is ubiquitous, the thought of uncivilized people in the world immediately equal to our brains as a threat. We think without a doubt that they are uneducated people who will have a happier life if they got out more and explored the world. In our point of view, we see ourselves as reality. But, I think it is time to change that belief. Just because a majority believes something, it doesn't mean that every single minority has to follow. Everyone is entitled to their different beliefs. Cultures like the Sawi don't need to be forced to face the world we live in right now, but they should be given the choice of accepting the new world, or staying in their present condition. That choice is for them to make by themselves, not by anyone else.

How do I relate to faith?

Taking TOK classes this semester has made me very skeptical about life. Mundane phrases such as "I'm telling the truth," mean anything but mundane. Truth, used in this phrase, has ambiguous definitions that can never be defined perfectly and completely. What is truth? How can anyone define it?

To me, faith is like one of these phrases; ambiguous yet mundane. As long as I can remember, I have always woken myself up at 9 A.M. to go to church with my parents, without knowing anything about what faith actually was, and how it affected my life. When I was young, church was a place to go and play with friends, plus they gave you free gifts and food. I questioned nothing; God created the world, Jesus died for the bad things we did, so if we were good, we could go to heaven and live happily ever after.

But, as I grew older, I got distracted. My family moved back from England to Korea. I faced hard times as I tried to fit into a Korean environment. I spent many sleepless nights, just trying to finish my homework, taking twice as much time than everybody else. I had nosebleeds everyday, due to the stress that I was facing. My grades were crawling on the ground; I barely passed, and sometimes, I didn't even manage to do that. Church seemed pointless to me. I was so preoccupied with the things that I had to overcome that I started to build a wall between me and God. And every year, as my stress levels grew higher, so did the wall.

There wasn't really a certain point in my life that I finally accepted God and became a Christian. It was more of a gradual process, still in effect right now. After coming to TCIS, I wasn't stressed and worried about my life as I was before, so I decided to give God a shot. It was only after making efforts that my faith slowly began to grow. Faith began to make holes in the wall that I had built.

Even now, I still have not managed to break down the wall completely. Faith is still an enigma to me. But, every time I find myself unconsciously turning to God, unconsciously praying and unconsciously feeling guilty about sinning, maybe that is the faith I relate to in my life.