Character: Boxer

Name: Krishaw
Age: 30
Gender: Male

Childhood and family life
•Physically and mentally abused by father when father was drunk
•Father burnt him with cigarette butts and beat him until he was bruised and swollen
•Also insulted him and scolded him
•Even when his father was not around, he would still feel tremendous terror and anxiety
•As a result of the abuse, he developed panic attacks, schizophrenia and depression
•The schizophrenia caused him to hear voices in his head
•Father abused his mother until she died
•The voice was that of his dead mother, telling him to kill himself to join her
•So he climbed up a tree and threatened to commit suicide
•Sent to mental hospital

Social life and education
•He attended school until Primary 6
•Always jittery and nervous
•Anti-social
•He hallucinates that all of his friends are trying to beat him up as well but in reality they are actually trying to help him
•Friends tell the teacher that they suspect that he is being abused
•Teacher confronted him but he denied

Character
•Emotional scars after being abused
•A lot of pent-up anger

Career
•Became a boxer to work of his anger

- Shenlin & Eleen

Labels: Character biography

Character: Teenage Student

Here is the character biography done by me and klara on the teenage student.

Character's name: [unconfirmed]
Age: 14-15
Gender: [undecided, depending on which gender better fits the storyline]
Childood: parents died when he/she was only 7/11 years old [undecided age depending on plot]. Living with adopted parents who sometimes mistreat him/her.
Family: Adopted Parents and their son.

Family life: To him/her, hi/her house has no warmth, the place is only for him/her to sleep. Adopted parents have a son whose results are very good, thus he/she often feel inferior to him. Adopted parents also do not treat him/her as well as their own son.

Social life: He/she has little/no social life, so he tries to fit into the crowd, trying to find a sense of belonging by fitting into school cliques. He/she is not the popular kind, as he/she is more reserved.

Education: He/she studies in a neighbourhood school. Therea are two options about his academic results -
a) If his/her parents died when he/she was 11, he/she used to be an outstanding student but deteriorated when his/her parents died.
b) If his/her parents died when he/she was 7, he/she has always been an average student. results are fair and not particulary outstanding.
*choice will be made based on suitablity of plot*

Character: He/she is quite good looking, but does not belong to any clique in school, so he/she is not that popular. However he/she wants to fit in and find a group of friends so that he/she has somewhere he/she can belong to since he/she does not feel that he/she belongs in him/her adoptive family. However he/she feels lonely in school and at home. With no alternative to find a sense of belonging in his family, he/she wants to find friends at school but it is quite difficult for him/her.

- Hilary

Labels: Character biography

Character: Abused Child

Hey! Here is the character biography Bernadette, Michelle and I have done up during the last Drama lesson. This one is on the Abused Child. Will update the one about the Abused Parent tomorrow :D

Character's name: [Something that implies fragility (?)]
Age: 13
Gender: Girl
Childhood: Tragic, deprived but fortunately doted on by caring Mother, yet constantly abused by Father.
Family: Mother (sole breadwinner), Father (gambler, alcoholic)

Family life: Mother works as tissue paper seller for long hours everyday in order to support her daughter and help pay off the heavy debts incurred by Father's gambling. Father gambles a lot, is jobless, gets drunk every night to numb himself from the gambling losses and further vents his frustration by abusing the Protagonist in drunken fits. Family lives in poverty.

Social life: Does not have many friends, as people often look down on her and as she lacks self-confidence. Frequently gets insulted/bullied in school.

Education: Average-performing, but continually strives hard and harder to ACE in her studies so as to not disappoint her loving Mother.

Character: Filial to Mother. Soft-spoken and unconfident. Terrified of father and constantly lives in state of fear. Loathes Father for abusing Mother. Always wears a jacket to hide her bruises/scars/injuries, even in hot weathers.

-Shichun

Labels: Character biography

Mental Disorder + Eleen's Suggestion

Oooooh I just remembered about a 文章 I did for Chinese SIA and it’s about child abuse!! It’s called 铁匠的儿子 from 爱的教育. And it’s about this boy who gets beaten by his father which is the 铁匠, then his classmates all want to send his father to jail but the boy LOVES his father a lot （亲情亲情亲情!!）so keep denying that his father abused him but it’s pretty duh cos he 鼻青脸肿 all the time. And other evidences of his poverty and abuse include: he’s a scrawny sickly saddy scaredy-cat, his workbook was torn and burnt by his father, the author heard he getting kicked down the stairs by his father just because he asked for money to buy a grammar book, he has no food to eat and is always hungry T.T, he is terrified of his father like a mouse is of a cat and 战发震震 everytime he see him, he wears baggy and raggy clothes that are prevented from dropping by a raffia string tied around his waist等等. But 他仍然刻苦学习. And he always covers up his father’s wrongdoings!! So 感人肺腑!! D’: You can read it here: http://jnxcschool502.bokee.com/5687643.html

Yeap anyway I’m supposed to research about mental illnesses!!

Facts
1) POST-TRAUMATIC STRESS DISORDER
Follows a traumatic event which causes intense fear and/or helplessness in an individual.
Symptoms include re-experiencing the trauma through nightmares, obsessive thoughts, and flashbacks, the individual avoids situations which remind him or her about the traumatic event, increased anxiety in general, possibly with a heightened startle response.

2) SCHIZOPHRENIA
A serious mental disorder which h symptoms include thought disturbances, hallucinations, anxiety, emotional withdrawal, delusions, disorganized behaviour and speech.

3) DEPRESSION
A type of mood disorder, characterised by persistent feelings of great sadness, hopelessness, worthlessness, guilt and a loss of interest in activities.

4) BI-POLAR
A mood disorder characterised by extremes of mania and depression (mood swings).

5) AUTISM
A developmental disorder, whereby children are unresponsive and avoid contact with others, and demonstrate a lack of language and communication skills.

6) PANIC DISORDER
Sufferers experience ‘attacks’ that are unpredictable, and involve intense feelings of apprehension, anxiety and fear, and physiological symptoms of chest pain, dizziness and heavy breathing.

7) OBSESSIVE-COMPULSIVE DISORDER
An disorder characterised by obsessions (uncontrollable, persistent and irrational thoughts or wishes) and compulsions (repetitive ritualistic acts).

8) BODERLINE PERSONALITY DISORDER
A serious disorder that is characterized by severe emotional pain and difficulties managing emotions. Symptoms include impulsivity, severe negative emotions, chaotic relationships, an extreme fear of abandonment, and accompanying difficulties maintaining a stable and accepting sense of self.

9) MULTIPLE PERSONALITY DISORDER
Existence in a person of two or more distinct, independent personalities, any of which may control behavior while being unaware of the other personalities and their memories and experiences.


Stories
1) “Keeshawn,” a 7 year-old boy, was referred to Washburn Child Guidance Center, a children’s mental health center in Minneapolis, during a shelter placement after he climbed a tree saying he was going to kill himself.

Keeshawn's parents' rights were terminated after chronic abuse and neglect. He then went to live with his aunt and cousins (and several pit bulls). Keeshawn was suspended from school regularly for nearly daily explosive and aggressive outbursts during academic tasks.

Therapy in an intensive day treatment program focused on teaching Keeshawn self-regulation skills to manage his frustration with academic work and to build his sense of competency and efficacy with learning. Keeshawn also got involved with sports and this proved beneficial to his treatment and education.

Keeshawn’s daily aggressive outbursts dissipated over the course of treatment and he successfully "graduated” after about 11 months. Six months after graduation, he had had only one outburst at school. Keeshawn made rapid academic progress, and went on to win a citywide wrestling tournament.

Source: http://www.thenationalcouncil.org/cs/suicide_children_and_teens

2) I was diagnosed with schizophrenia and depression when I was 16 years old. It hit me and my family hard. I would see and hear things that would make horror movies like "Saw" and "Friday the 13Th" look like Disney movies. I'd get scared so much that I wouldn't speak for weeks or leave the house alone because of what the voices said they'll do. Then there were voices of dead family members telling me stuff, or I would have a conversation with someone that was not their and have black outs in time were I been talk to someone or do something and have no recall but was told by others that it happened.

Source: http://www.experienceproject.com/stories/Schizophrenia/525811

Movies
1) I’m a cyborg but that’s okay
It’s a wonderful source of mental illnesses!! Summary: A young woman lives in a mental institution as she believes she is a cyborg. At the hospital, she befriends a young schizophrenic, anti-social young man as they team up in hopes to escape the hospital while she wants to take revenge on the people who hospitalized her mentally-ill grandmother. Warning: This movie contains disturbing and ridiculous scenes and makes you go nuts too.

2) Two faces of my girlfriend
Very cute movie about a girl with split personality!! The girl is soooooooooo pretty!! :D

Suggestion
I was thinking of having a mental hospital as our setting and there are mental patients there who recount their life stories which revolve around child abuse and peer pressure haha. Like got one person’s life story is the child abuse story Shichun suggested and another person’s life story is the peer pressure story Hilary and Klara suggested. This way all the topics are linked together!! But would that be very diluted, like there’s no focus of the play??

Man I haven’t started on any homework!!!!! T.T Die die die!!!!!

- Eleen

Labels: Mental Disorder

I'm afraid I'll never see Mum again

Hai :D

Here's one story/idea that came to my mind upon watching this video, it's pretty meaningful, watch it if you can:



The song is Concrete Angel by Lora Merriman.

But that's not the main point haha, the point is that there was this particular comment on the video that provoked my thoughts:



"my dad abused me in every way and when ever i had to see him i had a fear that it would be the last time i ever seen my mom"



Sounds pretty sad right.

So I was thinking of a story, where the protagonist lives in a very poor family where her mother is the sole breadwinner (perhaps a tissue paper seller) with meager income while the father is a little white face (小白脸) who only cares about gambling but/and doesn't win any bread (punfully intended) at all. Not only does her dad constantly lose money from all the gambling (people 十赌九输 he 十赌十输), he tries to release his anger by drinking every night, and the worse thing is he returns home drunk every night and vents his anger further by physically abusing the protagonist.

Thankfully for the protagonist, she can to find a lot of solace from her mother, who dotes on her dearly and sells tissue paper for long hours, working till very late into the night in order to support her up to university and fend her useless husband. She's not very aware that her daughter gets constantly abused 'cos of her long working hours.

So every time the protagonist is abused, she fights hard to survive her dad's blows 'cos she's afraid she'd never see her mum again because she loves her mum dearly, too, as her mum cares for her so much and works for her so hard to pay for her school fees and all.. she really reciprocates her mum's love, studies real hard and aims be successful in her future career so that she can take very good care of her mum.

But sadly, the protagonist, like her mother, is a high S person chooses to suffer in silence 'cos her mother does. Supposedly because the dad threatens to kill them if they report to the police/if the mom lodges a divorce.

Then one night, the protagonist is harmlessly doing homework until her dad, like always, comes home and starts hitting her, but this time, he is armed with something fatally sharp (broken glass bottle, knife...) and attempts to hurt her mindlessly. Then just in time, the mother comes home from work and witnesses the horror and tries with all her heart to defend her daughter. Then the dad accidentally stabs the mum instead.

It's like robbing the protagonist of her heart. It pains her so terribly, she becomes hysterical and

i. grabs a knife from the kitchen or something and kills her dad on the spot before trying to shake!! her mum awake (wah so drama) [END]

OR

ii. hurriedly phones for the ambulance while the dad escapes from the crime scene. Then the next day the doctor pronounces her mother dead 'cos her heart was stabbed too badly. The protagonist went wild in the mind and specially goes home from the hospital, ...

and sits on the sofa, waiting...

Waiting for her dad to come home, with a chopper/knife/gun...
Waiting to kill... [END] -.-

Yup that's all from my TRAGIC brain for now. I realise our ideas are all very TRAGIC haha and they can be summarised like this:

Poverty -> Abused + Bullied = Pressure + Suffer in silence = Crime or Suicide/Homicide/Death = TRAGEDY :D

Haha, have a sunny Sunday though our drama researches are very TRAGIC! Bai!

- Shichun

P/S. Methinks Bernie's and Michelle's research on the effects/signs of child abuse is informatively useful and pretty thorough. If we really work on this topic for our play, that can really be put to use :D

P/P/S. Hilary's and Klara's ideas are pretty nice :) Although I'm a bit confused with the aims of the scrupulous company, the tensions can all be really well-created if we work on it I think :D

Labels: (Child) Abuse

Peer Pressure + Klara's Suggestion

With teens, peer pressure can be both good and bad. It can influence you in many different ways, including:
•How you dress.
•Who your friends are.
•Your grades in school.
•Whether you have a boyfriend or girlfriend.
•Whether you use drugs or alcohol.

When we think of bad peer pressure, it's usually connected to pressure to:
•Smoke.
•Drink alcohol.
•Do drugs.
•Have sex.
•Do something illegal.
•Do something violent.


Reasons for peer pressure

Reasonings:
•It'll be fun.
•It won't hurt you.
•Your parents will never find out.
•Everyone's doing it.

Putdowns:
•You're never any fun
•You're such a baby.
•You're such a wimp.

Rejection:
•Who needs you as a friend any way.
•If you don't, we won't hang out any more.
•Why don't you leave then.

All of these have been convincing arguements because we:
•Don't want to hurt someone's feelings.
•Don't know how to get out of the situation.
•Don't want to be made fun of.
•Are afraid of being rejected by others.
•Want to be liked.
•Don't want to lose a friend.

The Huddle - A group of kids is standing together. Everyone is talking and maybe looking at something you can't see, laughing and joking.

The Look - Kids who think they're cool give you a certain look that says "We're cool and you're not."

The Example - A group of kids is walking off to do "whatever," laughing, talking, and slapping each other on the back.

Taken From: http://www.teenbreaks.com/confidence/peerpressure.cfm

I think hilary’s idea is pretty cool! In addition to her idea I was thinking, it could be perhaps a unscrupulous business who pay perhaps some youngsters to help pressure their schoolmates into buying one, like taunt them if they don't? and like maybe one of the schoolmate maybe is a poor person one and then feels like he needs to fit in and to do that he has to buy the item from the company, which probably isn’t cheap for a student, maybe 50-100$$. The school mate is poor then like parents don’t want give money, so maybe he steal from parents money or something?

Or maybe he do something illegal?

Or maybe we can even have it like the poor person steal from the company-pay-to-pressure-schoolmates-into-buying-company's-product-person or something like that?

What do you think?

and then like in the end, the poor kid kills himself from all the pressure he's facing (if we are talking about the spray paint on debtor's door one, then maybe we can say like the kid is pressurised from like police looking for him and parent's finding out he spray paint at people door so beat/scold him, and also like he can’t believe he committed a crime? or something like that?!!!!

I’m not sure if it will work, but i mean it sort of includes peer pressure, parent abuse if we say parent beat child, and like killing himself means he went crazy=mental illness!

- Klara

Labels: Peer pressure

More About Child Abuse

Facts

Some Signs of Child AbuseEmotional
-A child who is apathetic (just doesn't care).
-A child who suffers from depression.
-A child who won't take part in play or school activities.
-A child who is often hostile or aggressive.
-A child with a loss of appetite.
-A child who compulsively overeats

Neglect
-Any of the signs above.
-A child who is hungry much of the time.
-A child wandering outdoors unsupervised.
-A child unsuitably dressed for the weather.
-A child who is continually dirty or wearing the same soiled clothes.
-A child who shows up early or stays late at school.

Physical
-Bruises or welts shaped like an object (belt buckle or electric cord).
-Bruises in unusual places (back, eyes, mouth, buttocks, genital areas, thighs, calves).
-Layers of different colored bruises in the same general area.
-"Sock" or "glove" burns on feet or hands or doughnut shaped burns on buttocks (from forcing the child into hot water).
-Small round burns from cigarettes.
-Burns in the shape of an object (iron, fireplace tool, or heater).
-Rope burns on ankles, wrists, or torso.
-Adult sized bite marks.
-Suspicious fractures (doctors and nurses are trained to recognize these).

Sexual
-Withdrawal or anti-social attitude.
-Refusal to undress for physical education or sports.
-Exaggerated interest in sex or "acting out" sex with other children.
-Unusually seductive behavior.
-Fear of intimate contact (hugging or sports)
-Torn, stained, or bloodied clothing.

Parent Abuse

Parent abuse is any harmful act by a teenage child intended to gain power and control over a parent. The abuse can be physical, psychological, or financial.

Physical abuse includes hitting, punching, slapping, and pushing and is the most visible form of abuse. A number of large-scale studies suggest that up to 14% of parents are physically assaulted by their adolescent children at some point.

Psychological abuse includes name calling, criticizing and put-downs, creating fear, running away from home, and threatening to hurt or kill a parent or themselves. Although behaviours such as yelling occur at some point in many families, they can be considered parent abuse when they become persistent. Abuse often begins verbally and escalates to include other forms.

Financial abuse includes stealing or taking things without permission, damaging the home or possessions of the parent, and demanding things that parents cannot afford.

Stories of Abuse

Neglect -
Feb. 2009 - A mother in Dallas, Texas, was charged with neglect after her nine-year-old died from complications of diabetes after she failed to help her manage her disease.

Physical Abuse -
Jan. 2009 - In Fall River, Massachusetts, a mother was charged with burning her four-year-old foster son with a curling iron, causing third-degree burns that required skin graft surgery.

- Michelle

Labels: (Child) Abuse

Peer Pressure

I know all of us know what peer pressure is, but just in case we have different definitions of peer pressure, peer pressure is pressure from one's peers to behave in a manner similar or acceptable to them.

Stories about peer pressure:

1) This is a typical peer pressure story: A poor girl is surrounded by rich friends who have esigner clothes, branded wallets, latest handphones. She feels pressurised by the fact that she doesn't own any of these products as she's too poor to afford one. Her friends often tease her about being poor too. She feels that to maintain her friendship with her rich friends she have to own something trendy, so she resorts to shoplifting. She is being caught, and the result of her actions leads to a disastrous ending. (Or perhaps you want to have a twist to it? )

2) After visiting a website, it occured to me that what the writer said is quite true, that everything is actually peer pressure.

Well, you only have to look around at society today to see everything IS peer pressuree!

- Kids joining gangs to feel like they fit in.
- People who started smoking when they were young, because they thought that would make them appear cool.
- Kids doing drugs to fit into the group or scene.

- Even adults succumb to peer pressure - having to have that large TV, Car, designer bag, big house so it will make them appear just as good or better than other people

Everything is peer pressure and advertising companies know this!

Taken from: http://answers.yahoo.com/question/index?qid=20081126033617AAwK3vg.

So maybe instead of the typical peer pressure, we could have a storyline about an advertising company using peer pressure to advertise their latest products. Like showing the different advertisements the company tries to create (we can act them out), and all these advertisement are mainly using peer pressure to pressurise viewers to buy the product. And slowly people find these advertisement not as appealing as other unique, comical and entertaining ones (we can act them out too). In the end the company collapses? I'm not very sure about it though, cause I think it'll be quite hard to act out the fact that everything is peer pressure.

Thanks!

- Hilary

Labels: Peer pressure

Child Abuse

Signs of child abuse:

Labels: (Child) Abuse

Mental Disorder

As some of our group members do not have a blogger account, those with one will be posting their research on this blog on their behalf.

This is Shenlin's research:

Here are some possible types of mental disorder we can use:

1) Bipolar disorder - experience mood swings of manic happiness to depression, sometimes at the same time. May have periods of normal mood in between mood swings.
2) Obsessive-compulsive personality disorder - like OCD, except without the need to repeat rituals constantly.
3) Oppositional defiant disorder - hostile and defiant behaviour towards authority figures beyond the bounds of normal childhood behaviour.
4) Panic attack - sudden periods of intense anxiety

Stories:
1) Woman wanted to become a university academic, but couldn't because of bipolar disorder.
2) Man with panic attacks doesn't dare to go out on his own, so is stuck at home.

- Shenlin

Labels: Mental Disorder

Group Members

Hellos! Welcome to vnsatiable-axiome, Nanyang Girls' High School Class 202 Group A's drama blog.

Here are the names and index numbers of our group members (which can be found in the right column of this blog):

03. Eleen Lee
04. Goh Shi Chun
06. Klara Koh
07. Hilary Lau
08. Bernadette Lee
09. Michelle Lim
14. Shen Lin

- Hilary