Track...

In the beginning of the year, my dad and I made a deal that I would play at least one sport this year. I absolutely was against doing a sport except for the summer swim team. In 8th grade, I ran track at Holmes. I liked it-I guess- but it was more of a social activity for me. Hmmm, I thought.. If I have to pick one sport at school, I would pick track so I might as well just at least try it. Track is one of the only sports that I'm some what good at. Like track easy, it is just easy running- or so I thought- that is, until March 15th. On March 15th, the track season started. Well I expected the first day of practice to be just like an informational meeting just like Holmes was. WOW. Was I wrong. The first thing Graham said to us was "I'm leaving in 15 minutes; so go run a mile then get down here-the first day was inside- in 12 minutes." So that was easy. My mile time is a lot less then 12 minutes so that was not a problem. After this, we just ran, and ran, and ran. By the time I got home, I felt dead. I just wanted to sleep. I didn't think that I would be able to take a whole season of this. Little did I know, that first day was probably one of the easiest days. So the first few days of track were outside. During the first few days, the weather was gorgeous! Not to hot, not to cold, it was basically the ideal running weather! That weather didn't last long though. The first cold day really shocked everyone. We had been warned to bring warm clothes, just in case it got cold. I came somewhat prepared. I had brought a pair of old yoga pants, a long sleeve shirt adn my Columbia coat. Probably not the warmest choice but I was better off then some of the other girls. If I had extra, I definately would've shared my warm clothes. Along with it being cold weather, it was a freezing rain. This rain had everyone soaked within minutes. Running in that rain felt like one of those bad dreams; the dream where you keep running but you can't see at all. Yeah, thats how it was running. The icy cold rain stung my face as we ran mile after mile. I somehow made it through that horrible practice but I must say, after that, it made me nervous for what future weather will be. I didn't realize how different Stevenson track was from Holmes. At Holmes we had practice Monday through Wednesday, and Fridays. We NEVER had Thursday practices and ocasionally we didn't have Friday practices. And practices are so much harder this year. Last year, I never did anything at practice. I mean, yeah I showed up but I only did high jump. The reason why I did high jump was so I didn't have to run as much. After a whole season last year of practicing high jump daily, I have became somewhat decent at it. Today as I walked to the outdoor locker room, Bridget came up to me and told me that my name was on the high jump list for the up coming meet at Franklin. WHAT?! ME? Oh gosh. I cannot even describe the thoughts going through my mind when I heard that. How in the world would Graham know I could high jump..? Aha! I thought, I remeber. Last Friday I was just fooling around during practice, and decided to just try and see if I could still do it. Well I could and Graham obviously saw me. So almost the whole practice today, I worked on my high jumping. The thing is, I can get over the bar just as long as I don't think, but the second I start to think about what I'm actually doing, I freak out and can't get over. It makes it really difficult. Right now as I'm writing this, my knees and elbows are skinned from landing wrong on the mat. And my god it hurts- so bad. On the very first day, I was determined to get my varsity letter. Now, I would of course love to get my letter but I'm just concerned about getting through this season. As long as the weather stays nice and I can improve my jumping, I think I will be fine.

Youth Group Lock-In!

Yesterday was the St. Edith youth group lock-in. Olivia and I got ready together and we were somewhat excited. We packed our bags, bringing comfy clothes, pillows and sleeping bags. When we were all packed up, we hopped in the van and my mom drove us to Ally's house, because she decided to come last minute. Well once we got there, we realized we were totally, 100% out of our element. In youth group, everyone has their own little group of friends and although everyone is nice there, its still a little intimidating. When we walked in, we realized that basically no one had brought stuff. All three of us piled are stuff on the floor. I basically felt like a dork for having so much stuff. We saw an empty couch and sat there, sort of unsure of the whole situation. Soon enough, they told us to go ahead and grab some food. When Olivia, Ally and I went in the kitchen, we saw 9 pizzas and a bunch of chips along with quite a few different types of cookies. YUM! Well that is, until I actually opened the box of pizza. It was so so so so saucy and I absolutely hate pizza sauce. I have no idea why, it's just one of those weird things. So I just settled for a few Doritos instead. With food in our hands, we went back to "our" couch and ate our little snack. After this, the lock-in officially started.
First we all went around said our names and that type of thing. Then we played some ice breakers. The first one was called "Baby I love you." Everyone sat in a circle, and one person was in the middle. The person in the middle went around and sat on someones lap. Then they would say "Baby if you love me, please just smile." The other person would say "baby I love you, but I just can't smile." The hard part about it was you weren't allowed to smile or laugh. I personally was horrible at this game because I just laugh so easily. When Olivia was in the middle, she would come to me. All she had to say was "Baby" and I totally lost it. After this ice breaker, we did another one then we had a little bit of free time. The three of us went into the gym and had a great time. We played a little bit of basketball, Olivia and Ally against me. That was totally unfair because Ally is so much better then both of us! Then we decided to just sit and talk. We sat and talked and it basically was wonderful. The next thing we did was paint a brick on the wall in the youth group room. We saw three bricks next to each other so we decided to paint those particular ones. Of course the spot we wanted to paint was much taller then us, so we stood on chairs. Unfortunately, the chairs were spinny chairs so it was hard to balance. Once we got all situated, we decided what we were going to paint. Olivia picked peace, Ally picked love and I picked happiness. In the end, it looked pretty cool. We finished up faster then everyone else so we ran back in the gym and talked more. We did a few more activities and by this time, it was around 2 a.m.. Olivia, Ally and I were basically exhausted. We spread out our sleeping bags "heads in the middle" style and finally just got to relax. We decided to watch Raise Your Voice, that super sad Hilary Duff movie. Wow. I hadn't seen that movie in years and it was just how I remembered it- sad. Olivia and I cried during all the sad parts and quietly sang the lyrics of all the songs to each other during our "favorite" songs. Ally fell asleep in the middle of the movie so eventually me and Olivia just laid there and basically had a much needed heart to heart conversation. We talked, about everything. Seriously everything. Around 3:00 a.m. we both fell asleep, only to be woken up at 4a.m. by all the people in youth group who were still up. They came in literally banging pots and pans, telling us to wake-up and come play dodge ball. UGH. I have never woken up so crabby in my life. We told them to go away so we could sleep and eventually, they did. We fell back asleep until 6 when they woke us up again. This time they told us to go get breakfast. No, no I don't want to go each breakfast at 6 o'clock on a Saturday morning I thought to myself. So we got up and rolled up our sleeping bags and packed up our stuff. We went into the kitchen and pretended to eat, that way they would just leave us alone. Around 6:45, Olivia's mom came to get us. As soon as we saw her we sprinted to the car, ready to go home and sleep. When we pulled into my driveway, Olivia helped me bring my stuff in. After we said goodbye, I went inside and fell asleep until 12:30. I'm so glad I got to spend the lock-in with my best friends

Big Fish

This is a story about the first time I backed the car out of the driveway. Actually, it was the first time I was the driver instead of a passenger. I was scared, to say the least. One day I asked my mom if I could pull the "little car" out of the driveway. It is not just called the little car for any old reason, in fact this car is really tiny, like one of those cute little clown cars at the circus. So anyway, my mom was like "yes I will let you, but not right now, I have to start dinner." Ugh, I thought. This is the thousandth time I have asked you to let me and there is ALWAYS something you have to do instead. Why can't we? It will take literally 2 seconds, just please let me pull the car out of the driveway, nothing will happen. Nothing at all. I mean, what can possibly go wrong?! "Stop bothering me, if you ask one more time, I will never ever let you drive. Just stop. Besides, you are not old enough to begin with." With that being said, I walked away. No, I stomped away. I was so mad, I couldn't even walk calmly, instead I stomped my feet like a little baby. Then I heard the front door open. "DADDDDDD." I said, "will you please, please let me pull the car out of the garage, please, I'm begging you!" I finally persuaded my dad to let me. It took me hours, but he finally said yes. So, I threw on my flip flops and I grabbed the keys and dragged my dad out to the garage. I hopped into the drivers seat. I didn't think that I would need to buckle up since we were just pulling out of the driveway but my dad insisted that I just put my seat belt on. I put the keys in the ignition and started the car. Immediately, I saw my dad get nervous. I told him that it would be fine, that I knew what I was doing. I put the car in reverse, and slowly inched out of the driveway. It was going well until I heard a snap. I wonder what that was? I thought... However, I quickly found out. It was my flip flop. It was stuck on the brake pedal. We were still in reverse and since I wasn't able to press down on the brake, we shot out backwards. I started screaming and my dad started yelling at me. Not knowing what else to do, I shut my eyes and hoped for the best. When I opened my eyes, we were across the street, on my neighbors curb. I looked over and saw my angry dad. His hand was clenched on the emergency brake which he had used to stop the car. "Get out of the car. Now." he said. I immediately started crying. I felt like such a dork. UGH. How horrible. Now, my parents will not let me pull out of the driveway. Hopefully I will be able to soon...

Kidnapping in Haiti?

The Baptists in Haiti were not trying to help the children, instead they were trying to hurt them.

Ten Americans from the Baptist Church charity, New Life Children's refuge are being charged for the abduction of 33 Haitian children from Haiti. "This is abduction, not an adoption" says Haitian Social Affairs Minister Yves Christallin. The leader of this church group, insists that they were just trying to do the right thing but thats not the way the rest of the world saw it. From the perpesective of America, it seems like they were selling these children into trafficking. This group was arrested while on a bus filled with children. These children were between the ages of 2 months and 12 years. They were being taken, across the boarder without the proper paperwork.

Child trafficking is a growing problem within Haiti. It has always been a problem but has been increasing rapidly. The Baptist charities plan was to bring 100 children to a resort orphanage . Although they say they were going to an orphanage, some of these children were not even orphans, they still had a living parent. I think that they were going to sell some of these children into trafficking. Maybe not all of them, but at least some. This group is an embarrassment to the United States since this isn't a sitiuation that Americans would normally take part in.

Others however, think that the New Life Children's Refuge was only trying to help the Haitian children. They
say that the improper paper work was an honest, careless mistake. The people that believe this think that the Baptist ministry was just trying to help and do their part in helping Haiti. I however, think they were just taking advantage of these Haitian children.

For more info:

http://www.nydailynews.com/news/world/2010/01/31/2010-01-31_american_baptists_with_haitian_orphan_rescue_mission_detained_in_haiti_for_child.html

First Semeter Reflection

I have learned many things during the first semester. I have learned how to write thesis statements, along with learning what Q.C.V.I’s are. I learned about Aboriginal culture, the Rwandan genocide and participating in cultural events


When writing a paper, the thesis is an important part to the introduction of a paper. I learned that this gives the reader a preview of what your paper is like. It is just a simple statement that could be nothing more than a sentence long. In the beginning of the school year, I had a very hard time writing these. For some reason, I just didn’t understand how to do it. Looking back at my inability to write a simple thesis seems almost humorous.


I have found that Q.C.V.I’s have been a very useful strategy in understanding complicated articles. Q.C.V.I stands for question, connection, vocabulary and interesting/important information. Now, whenever I get an article that is above my reading comprehension level, I use Q.C.V.I’s to help me better understand what the article is saying. In my opinion, the easiest and most helpful part of Q.C.V.I’s, is the vocabulary. This is because you just have to find a word you don’t know, write it down along with the definition and then use it in a sentence. This has helped me learn many new words such as malaise and ramifications and demise. I’m glad I was able to learn about Q.C.V.I’s, and I think I will always be able to use this strategy.


Before taking this class, I had no idea, nor did I care to know, about the native people in Australia. Now after watching the movie Rabbit Proof Fence and reading the novel Walkabout, I am very interested in the native Aborigines of Australia. I have learned many things about their culture and the thing I find the most fascinating, is the fact that Aborigines live day by day. I think this is a neat concept. People today have such scheduled and structured lives I think it would be a good experience to be an Aborigine.


The Rwandan genocide was completely foreign to me. I had never heard about this horrible event in history. Now I cannot believe how uninformed I was. There were thousands of innocent Rwandans brutally slaughtered for no other reason than who they were. In Rwanda, the MRND (a military group) broadcasted to the country telling the Hutu citizens to kill their Tutsi neighbors. I was able to get a glimpse of this tragedy through the movie Hotel Rwanda, which we watched in class. As realistic as this was, I still couldn’t imagine going through what the people of Rwanda went through.

I really enjoy getting to do cultural events, more than I ever thought I would. I like them because it gives me an opportunity to participate in events that I normally wouldn’t think twice about. Already this year, I have been to a Greek Festival, a leadership conference and Little House on the Prairie, the Musical. These were all great learning experiences that I would never have thought to go to if not for Global Ed. I find myself planning ahead and thinking of what I could do for my next cultural event. I’m glad we are required to do this because it is nice to learn about new things. My favorite format out of the three is the creative display. I have found in high school that we don’t get to be creative often so it’s cool we can use the creative display as a cultural event. My least favorite format is the speech because I get nervous talking in front of people. I’m hoping by the end of the year to be able to improve my public speaking skills.

An Aborigine?

I would want to be an Australian Aborigine.

I think the Aborigines in Australia had the best life out of all four scenarios. I think this because there is the least acts of violence done against the Aborigines. The prejudice against aborigines mainly consisted of segregating the Aborigines from the white settlers. The Europeans built a along fence, enclosing the Aborigines in a small portion of land. The Aborigines were not murdered like those in Rwanda nor were they forced to live on tiny reservations like the Native Americans in North America.

The Aborigines, although they were fenced in, were able to live their normal lives. They were still able to practice their religion and keep their traditions alive. The term Aborigine means first, or earliest know. Indigenous. They have been peacefully living in Australia for thousands of years. They lived day by day and personally I think this would be less stressful then current life in America. Today, we keep schedules and we plan ahead for almost everything we do. I think it would be an interesting experience living like an Aborigine.

A Famous Boy and Some Paper!

“At 9:30, is your next chance to win Justin Bieber tickets for December 21st. Keep listening to 98.7 AMP radio.” In second hour, Mr. Johnson lets us listen to the radio while we do our artwork. On this particular day, the guy at 98.7 had just announced the next chance for tickets to Justin Bieber's concert. I had been trying to get tickets for days and out of the hundreds of times I had called, I got through a total of 4 times. All 4 times, unfortunately I was never the 98th caller. When I heard they were giving away tickets at 9:30, I silently tried to figure out a plan. I decided I would just hide my phone in my sleeve and call in 3rd hour. Ally and Olivia both agreed this would be a good plan, until we thought of one minor detail. What if I did get through? How was I supposed to talk on the phone in Mrs. Bergeski's without her noticing? And what if I won the tickets? I would start screaming and I'm almost positive Mrs. Bergeski would not appreciate such a distraction during her class. Well, I guess I could call at lunch I thought, maybe they will be nice and give me tickets?! Yeah not the case.

I was distracted until the lunch bell rang and Olivia and I literally sprinted to the bathroom. We locked ourselves in stalls right next to each other. We both called. And called. And called, until we decided it was useless and gave up. I resisted the urge to call during the rest of the day, well at least I didn't call again until the end of 6th hour. In 6th hour, we had a sub and he was giving us free time. So I sneakily snuck my phone out of my pocket and put it into my sleeve. Again I called, and called and called. I couldn't believe it. At 2 o'clock in the afternoon, the line was busy. Like honestly, how many people call during their 6th hour? I decided to give it a break. After school, I texted Ally and told her about how much I wanted these tickets. She decided to try for tickets too. After a full day of calling the radio station I fell asleep as soon as my head hit my pillow. As soon as we got to school, Olivia, Ally and I pulled out our phones and called. I got through once and they said I would have to wait. Well I told the guy that I was about to go to class and he just said “oh well.” How rude I thought and hung up. I was aggravated and I just went to class and decided not to call anymore during the school.

That night, I was listening to the radio, trying to figure out when the next time to call was and then the radio announced they had gotten the 98th caller. Wow! The lady that won tickets sounded so familiar but I couldn't figure out who it was. The lady who was talking said that she wanted tickets for her daughter, Ally. Then they told her she had just won 2 tickets! After they told Ally's mom that she had just won tickets, I heard a loud scream in the background! I realized it WAS Ally! She called me right away to tell me her good news! For a few minutes we talked and Ohmygoshed over her going to see Justin Bieber!

A few days later, Ally texted me and she said “hey i have something to tell you.” I asked her what it was and she replied “oh its just about a famous boy and some paper!” Then she told me that she wanted me to come to the concert with her! I literally couldn't talk- I was just so excited! I asked my mom if I could go, and thankfully she said yes! In 10 days, me and Ally will be at Justin Bieber's concert! Our plan is to get there early and push our way up to the front row and get as close as possible to JB and the stage! In 10 days at 7:00 p.m., we will be singing along to “One Less Lonely Girl” and “One Time” and staring at his beautiful face! Ahhh I can't wait!!!