The Boy Who Harnessed The Wind Essay Example

view, William describes his life and the numerous obstacles he has to overcome to build the windmill.

Most people in his situation would have given up. "But most of the time we had no money so we spent our afternoons in hunger and dreams. "William ascribes how difficult it is for him to build the windmill throughout the book. He makes it seem like he's talking directly to his readers. "My first and only experience with magic had left me with a sore eye and hands that throbbed from bad medicine. "(48) William first experience with magic got him beaten to a pulp. When he talked to the boy who gave him strength he told him that he cheated him.

The boy said that his medicine doesn't allow you to bathe the first day. The boy hadn't told William this. "Often while we fixed our radios, people would approach us and say "look at the little scientists! Keep it up boys, and one day you'll have a good job. " I'd become very interested in how things worked, yet never thought of this as science. " (71 ) William had not only become interested in how radios worked but also how trucks and compact discs worked. William went to the trade center and asked one of the truckers " 'What makes this truck move? How does your engine work?

But no one could tell me. They just smile and shake their heads. Really, how can you drive a truck and not know how it works. " William asked his father how they worked assuming he would know but not even he knew. When William asked people how

they put the sound on the disc they would answer "who cares? " "Although the people in the trading center were content to simply enjoy these things without explanation, these questions constantly filled my mind. If solving such mysteries was the job of a scientist, then a scientist is exactly what I wanted to become.

If William passed he would advance to secondary school, where students have extended lessons in science and were assigned to conduct experiments. "Perhaps reading could keep my brain from getting soft while being a dropout. "(1 61) Since William wasn't in school e spent his time going to the library in Wimple Primary School. William got books for every subject that day.

William didn't really spend time looking at the bottom shelf since it had dictionaries and other things. When he looked at the bottom shelf he saw a textbook. Pulling it out, saw it was an American textbook called using Energy, and this book has changed my life. The cover featured a long row of windmills--;though at the time I had no idea what a windmill was. "(1 67) "I'd never built anything like it before, but I knew if windmills existed on the cover of that book, it meant another person had lilt them, after looking at it that way, felt confident could build one too.

Before William built the big project he wanted to experiment with a model "When I walked out carrying my windmill pieces, they would yell out, 'Hey look it's William, digging in the garbage again! ' At first I'd tried to explain the windmill, but they just laughed and said, 'lee, you're wasting your time.

This junk is good for nothing. '" (188) Given our situation: he said, 'I've decided its better if we go down to one meal per day.

It's the only way make it'. "(99) "No magic could save us now. Starving was a cruel kind of science. (1 51 ) The hunger was so bad that it was taking peoples vision in the village. His fathers bones showed and his teeth looked bigger. "My greatest fear was coming true: I would end up just like him, another poor Mammalian farmer laboring in the soil. "(1 86) Even today most Africans are raised to believe in some form of witchcraft or magic. Confirming this, William begins the book by writing, "Before I discovered the miracles Of science, magic ruled the world. " (3) Early in his life, Williams father overcame alcoholism and urine to Christianity.