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| I arrived back from Mali (in West Africa) yesterday after being there for 15 days. I went there with Building with Books, a nonprofit organization that builds schools in developing countries and has community service clubs in high schools throughout the USA. The trip was called a "Trek for Knowledge". It's when Building with Books chooses 1-3 students from each school that has a BwB club in their hub cities (for me, Philadelphia) and send them for two weeks to a village in a developing country to help begin building a school. It is easily the best experience of my life so far.
I lost my journal (although I'm still convinced someone had to have put it in their bag by mistake) so I'm going to try to write a long xanga entry so I'll at least have some written form of recollection. I really wish I still had that journal though.
My team was about 14 kids from Philadelphia are, Joanna (the Philadelphia Trek Coordinator), Monica (a coordinator from Chicago schools), and Greg (director of development for Building with Books at its headquarters in Stamford, CT). We first flew to Paris and then from Paris to Bamako, the capital of Mali. We slept in a hostel the first night. I still remember how hot it felt that first night. Mali is pretty close to the equator and at night the temperature can still be 80-90 degrees. During the day it can go all the way up to 110.
Saturday March 15After that first night we all rode in one van to Segou, the capital city of the region where we started to build our school. It took about 6 hours to drive there. Along the way we would stop at random villages whenever we had to go to the bathroom and they would show us to their latrines. While there we had to drink 8 liters of water a day (8 nalgene bottles), so we really did have to pee a lot. Whenever we got to a checkpoint little children would come up and try to sell us things through our windows like peanuts or drinks or fried dough. In Ségou we went to the Building with Books office there and ate lunch. We also got our Malian names there from our one translator named Issiaka. My Malian name is Yoro Cissé. We had two other translators on the trip as well: Issa, who stayed with us the whole trip, and Moussa, who traveled between our village and the villages where the Trekkies from Chicago and San Franciso were.
After lunch we drove for a few more hours until we reached our village, which is called Blombadougou. When we first started driving from Bamako we were on a paved road. Then, we turned off onto a rode covered in a sort of clay dirt that made it obvious what was the road and what wasn't. When we got about 30 minutes from our village of Blombdadougou, we turned off that road and went on a completely dirt (or should I say sand?) road. While Bamako is slightly tropical, Blombadougou was farther to the north, so it was about 75% desert, especially during the dry season (which was when we were there).
When we reached the village right before ours, someone on a scooter drove in front of us to go tell our village that we were almost there. We were all very anxious to finally see our village. We drove up and the whole village was there to greet us in this big open area they have in their village next to the mosque and a big tree. Everyone was cheering and wanted to shake our hands. It was like we were some huge celebrities. Everyone from little kids to 50 year old women were trying to shake our hands and greet us. As in their culture the elders are supposed to be greeted first, we made our way over to them. When shaking hands with people you want to show great respect to in Mali, you are supposed to support your right arm with your left to show it is a great weight to meet them and then touch your heart with your right hand after shaking. We did this for the chief, the chief's brother, the imam, and a few other elders.
After we were done greeting everyone, villagers told us to sit down. The ceremony started with a group of women and teenage women playing the calabash (a big, hollow bowl made out of a gourd with sea shells around the outside) and dancing. They then told us to stand up and we danced in a circle with them. This one man (who I later found out was the leader of the youth) grabbed my hand and danced with me for the whole time with a big smile, saying things to me in Bambara that I couldn't understand. It wasn't a stereotypical dance in which every single person in the village dances and there are a bunch of drum players (I didn't see one drum in my whole village), but I was fine with that. The dancing died off after a little and then they told us to sit back down. This is when our translator Issiaka started the rest of the ceremony. He translated the greetings of a few of the elders and the chief and then allowed us to each tell the whole village our names (Ne togo ye Yoro Cissé) and how we felt about coming there. I told them something about how I hope the school will help them and how I want to get to know them all very well. The ceremony was a nice way to first meet the villagers. At the end it was beginning to get dark, so we met our host families and were brought to our houses.
My host father was the chief's brother Seku Dicko, whose compound was separated from the rest of the village along with the chief's compound by about 500 feet. A compound is basically just a few houses and other buildings clumped together. I walked down there with him and the chief, who insisted on carrying my bag. All the guys were put in this compound. My house had two rooms. There was a bigger room which is the one you first walked into and then there was a smaller one connected to it with loose dirt all over the floor. The smaller is used for storage and the big one is more for sleeping. In the corner of the small room there were about 4 chicken eggs. We also had a walled in yard where me and Dion slept, as it was too hot to sleep inside. After we put our stuff inside our house, we walked back to the rest of the village to have dinner with the trekkies. This was our first experience with sitting on mats. In the village they had really nice straw/plastic mats which you essentially treated like furniture. You weren't supposed to step on them while wearing any footwear. You had to take your shoes off before sitting on them.
While we ate there lots of kids watching us. At first this made us feel bad because we assumed they were hungry and did not get enough to eat. Later on, however, we realized that it's just because they are curious and want to watch us and most of them do get enough to eat. After dinner was our first real experience with interacting with the village kids. We started by showing them our Bambara phrase books and saying random words in it so they could correct our pronunciation and show us the word meant (such as moving their arm like a snake for the word saa). We also tried to ask their names (yi togo ye?) and how old they were (I think it was yi si ye san joli ye?). I don't know if we just said the how old are you one wrong or if they didn't understand because many of the kids answered yes or no (or should I say awo and aye?). We then progressed to playing games with the kids. First, after trying very hard to get them to copy us, we taught them the chicken dance. They then showed us a dance in which four girls hook legs in the middle of their circle and then jump and clap singing a song (I really wish I got a video of it). All the kids smiled and laughed so much during all this. The last thing we taught them was ring around the rosy. It was very hard for us to get them all to whole hands in a big circle, but we finally did. When we all fell down they thought it was hysterical. The older boys watching us thought it was funny too, but in the "I'm-too-cool-to-do-that" way. It was getting pretty late so we said good bye to the kids (we didn't really know any other word but I ni ce then, which means hello, good bye, and thank you).
When we got back, we set up or mosquito nets. In our walled in yard we had a foam mattress and a hammock. As it was going to be hard to put the mosquito net around a hammock and it wouldn't be that comfortable for sleep, both me and Dion had to sleep on the foam mattress. I was kind of freaked out that first night because in one corner of our yard a chicken slept with 7 chicks and in the other corner there were about 6 guinea hens. When I was tucking the mosquito net under the mattress the chicken with the chicks barked at me. Even though it was night, there was a good amount of light coming just from the moon. I never realized before how much light the moon actually makes. It was hard getting to sleep that night because my host father had his radio on loud. I wasn't sure if they just forgot to turn it off or if they like to fall a sleep to it. At about 11:30pm I went over to try to lower it. My host father told me I could just turn it off, so I did. I felt kind of rude but I don't think that they really minded.
The rest is going to be really hard to write without my journal because I'm not going to be able to remember the sequence of what we did. Luckily, I sent a message to fellow trekkies on facebook and they are hooking me up with general events to spark my memory.
Sunday March 16I'm pretty sure our first full day in the village was a Sunday. Sundays are market day, meaning most of the people go to the market in a nearby town and buy what they need for the next week. This meant that many people were not in the village that day. We got to sleep into 9, which was very good as everyone was tired from flying and traveling so much. Also, when we were at the hostel in Bamako we didn't really get everything we had to get done by 2AM, and we had to wake up at 6AM, so it didn't really work out too well. Even though we could sleep in because we had to be at breakfast at 9, I felt rude sleeping in too late because my host family was up and working and I thought it would be insulting for them to be doing all this work while I'm sleeping in their plain view. I'm pretty sure I got up at about 7:30am and did things such as straighten out my bag. This was our first day of eating rice porridge, which was easily the worst food of the trip. As we weren't supposed to complain during the trip, I evented the 3-5 scale (like it to love it) with rice porridge being a 3 (although some said it was a 2.999).
After breakfast it was our first time that we had to pump water. The water pump in the village was just built in January by Millennium Promise and the Earth Institute at Columbia University. It is a metal pump with a cement base. They also built a cement washing area about 20 feet away from it where most people wash their clothes (and themselves). Millennium Promise also helped pay for either 1/3 or 2/3 of the school house being built in Blombadougou as part of its push for education. Using the metal pump was the easy part about pumping water. The hard part was filtering it. We used a ceramic katadyn water filtering. It's not that it was too hard to pump the water through the filter, it's just that the water slows very slowly out of the filter and thus it takes a pretty long time to filter it. After our first water filtering session, we went to the big tree next to the mosque in the open area where we had the welcoming ceremony and talked with the elders. They showed us which tools they used for farming and how they sprinkled seeds on the ground and covered them. We talked to them about the school and the responsibilities of the leader of the youth and the chief. The leader of the youth essentially makes sure that teenagers do their work and if they don't he fines them. A person becomes chief by being the oldest male in the bloodline of the man that first settled the land. Blombadougou is 88 years old and the chief is chief because his ancestor settled the land. It makes sense that he is chief as he techincally owns the land. All the other people who live in the village have to ask him permission to build their house there. We sat on mats while talking to the elders and we did learn a lot from that session.
The session ended when we had lunch. The children watching us at the session with the elders picked up the mats and chairs (and some of our things as well) and carried them to our meal spot for us, where they continued to watch us. After lunch we pumped water more, journaled, and then had free time. I don't think I really did that much. At 5PM we had dinner. Afterwards, at 6PM, we basically had free time for the rest of the night. I'm pretty sure this is when I first met Amadou and Moro Dicko, two of my host brothers. They were getting water out of the well by tying the donkey to the well's rope, and I was curious so I came over to watch. The rope of the well was just long enough that when the donkey walked to a certain spot the bucket holding the water would come up. Amadou (about my age) was in charge of getting the bucket and pouring it into a bigger barrel that their cows (about a dozen or two) drank while Moro (about 8) was in charge of hitting the donkey to make it trot. It was pretty interesting to me as I never saw someone hook a rope to an animal to get water from a well. I also got them to let me try getting water out manually, as I saw kids in other villages doing it when we drove by. It was definitely not as easy as it looks. I'm not sure what else I did this night so lets just say I went to sleep nice and early.
Monday March 17Today was the day of the groundbreaking ceremony for the school. We had to wake up at our normal time to be at breakfast at 7AM. Even though breakfast ended at 8AM we had to sit around awhile until we were told we were supposed to go to the work site to to be in the groundbreaking ceremony. We were given front row seats under the canopy made from cut branches with leaves held up by long, thick pieces of wood. The ceremony was very long and involved lots of talking. A bunch of different BwB people in Mali gave speeches and for many things Moussa (one of our translators) would either translate after every sentence or, more likely, sum up what the person said very briefly. I felt bad but as we were drinking so much water, we had to all leave the ceremony a bunch of times at different periods to go to the bathroom behind a big tree about 100 feet away. We were all given a chance to speak about the school and the chief also talked as well. Another problem with the ceremony is that as we were in a hot country, in the shade, and sitting down, it was very difficult to stay awake. It was a nice ceremony, but it was very long and hard to concentrate on (it was even hard for the Malians who understood all the Bambara to sit through) so I was glad when it was finished. We were supposed to start working on the work site that afternoon, but it got very windy after the ceremony, causing a dust storm which cancelled all work that day.
We all sat in one house next to our meeting point for lunch, journaling, Bambara lessons, and chat circle. There were two rooms. The first room has chairs around the whole edge, and the back room had a few mats on top of each other on one side and a few chairs near the door. It was very hot, uncomfortable, and cramped being in that building. Bambara lessons were pretty good as we asked about a lot of useful phrases for the work site and life in the village, such as asking "Can I take over?" (N'bi la bi?). At one point I was sitting on the mat with my shoes off inside the house and had to put my shoes on to go to the bathroom, but decided not to tie my shoes. When I walked out I passed the chief and a few other men and he laughed at me for not tying my shoes, so I pretended I didn't do it on purpose and tied them for him. He was a good guy.
We were dismissed at about 4pm and given free time until dinner. I went to the bath room before getting my stuff to leave. When I was about to re-enter the house, however, I was stopped by a man who was telling me to go down the path out of the village with him. I saw there were a bunch of guys there, so I felt kinda weird going with him, but I didn't want to be rude so I did. We went in front of the big tree next to the washing area and they gave me a chair to sit down. There were about 50 teenage and older men there. They also had a stereo and were trying to get their generator to work. I was sitting there for about 20 minutes awkwardly. One guy was making fun of my shoes and got me to try on his flip flop. I couldn't really communicate with them, so that made it very awkward sitting with them and not saying anything. I tried to flag other trekkies walking by down so that they could give me an excuse for leaving because I didn't want to be rude. I wasn't successful though. After a while they finally got music playing. I thought everyone would dance but they all just kind of sat there. Eventually about 3 or 4 guys got up and started to dance a little. They tried to pull other people up to dance but they were all too bashful. After a little they asked me to get up and dance and, as I wanted to get in with the villagers and wanted them to like me, I decided I'd stand up and dance with them. All the men thought it was very funny that I was dancing. This one guy taught me this one dance move where you tap eachother's right foot, then left foot, then twist your right foot around your left leg, and end by hitting the outer side of your left foot together. It was hard to initially learn but I got pretty good at it. They danced much different from here but I liked it. Eventually Coco, Olivia, and Erin came over, saw us dancing and eventually got sucked in. I sweat so much and got so hot from dancing in the sun. It was definitely a great ice breaker. From this point in trek and on, suddenly a bunch of random guys knew my name was Yoro Cissé.
When we were done dancing we had dinner. After that we found out that the guys had so much fun they wanted to have a dance that night at 9pm next to the mosque and big tree. I went back to my compound and asked some of my host siblings if they were going. Amadou told me he was and he even gave me a ride on his donkey cart up to the village at about 8:30PM. I sat with my fellow trekkies outside the building we were in during the dust storm and we chatted it up until it was time for the dance. The dance was a lot of fun. It wasn't like a dance here where everyone dances. Almost the whole time they formed a circle and people would go in the middle to show off their dance moves. I felt bad because although there were a lot of kids from about 5-10 there, they weren't really allowed to dance. I learned a bunch of cool new dance moves and all these guys kept saying my name because they wanted to see my dance moves. I'm still not sure how much of their enthusiasm was because they thought I could dance well and how much was because they thought it was funny to see a white guy dance like I did. I really did try to mimick their moves! A bunch of us tried to teach them Cotton Eye Joe and other dance moves, but it was fairly complicated. All in all, the dance was a pretty good time, and this was the first night of the trip that actually didn't really have any trouble falling asleep.
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...okay so I just realized I wrote the same thing for 2 days in a row and didn't even realize it. Here is a second version of the stuff that happened Monday (it should hopefully be the same haha)[[[[After breakfast we sat around for a while we waited to be told that the
groundbreaking ceremony for the schoolhouse we were there to build was
about to start. I'm pretty sure I had already drank 2-3 liters of water
by then (around 9am), so I think I had already peed about 3 times just
waiting to go to the ceremony. Around 10 they told us to go. The path
we took went out of the main part of the village and through a brief
area of shrubs until it came to a large opening (which was about 200
feet from my compound and visible from it) where the school was going
to be built. They constructed a canopy of leafy branches held up by
long pieces of wood which everyone was sat under. On one side there
were many mats and most of the women and children were sitting there.
Next to them there were some men. In front of them there was open space
and at the edge of the open space there was a microphone and speakers
accompanied by a few BwB staff from Mali who would be running the
ceremony. Passed this open space was a row of chairs we were told to
sat on. Both the villagers and us were facing each other. Behind us
there were some more men who sat on chairs and benches.
The
ceremony started about 15 minutes after we had arrived. It began with
various Malian BwB staff (such as the man who oversees the construction
of schoolhouses throughout the Segou region in Mali, where we were)
giving speeches about the benefits of the school and the responsibility
of the village to build it and send their children there. Also, the
villagers must agree to send girls and boys to school equally. The
ceremony went on for a very long time. As everyone was drinking so much
water, we all had to go to the bathroom a lot. Therefore, we would
sneak out of the ceremony (even though we were in the front row facing
the villagers) to go to the bathroom behind this huge tree about 100
feet away. I think I went two times during the ceremony. I felt really
rude but hopefully they realized that we had to drink so much water.
The ceremony was hard for us also because it was in Bambara. For
example, a man would talk in Bambara for about 10 minute and then our
one translator Moussa would tell us what happened in about 1 minute.
So, most of the time we were sitting there clueless of what was
happening. It makes sense that it was mostly in Bambara, though, as the
ceremony is truly for the villagers as it is their school that we are
giving them. Similar to the opening ceremony, at this ceremony every
trekkie had to walk up to the microphone and say something about the
school. I don't really remember what I said, but I know it was
something about hoping the school will truly help the village. After we
talked eeryone there had to sign the covenant (including us), which was
an agreement saying we'd help with the construction of the school,
whether it was helping construct the school (which the men and trekkies
did) or bringing water to mix cement and bringing food (which the women
did). As almost none of the villagers were literate, they would put
their fingerprint on the paper. Anyone who could write, which was all
the trekkies and maybe a few other people, would write their name on
it. After this the ceremony was finally over. Near the end of the
ceremony it had begun getting windy, which caused a slight dust storm.
We had to cover our faces so we could get back to where we would eat
lunch. I now understand why men would wrap their faces up. We ate lunch
inside as there was so much sand.]]]]
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Tuesday March 18Let's just say today started off as a great day. This is solely because it was our first day of having doughnuts for breakfast instead of rice porridge. They weren't the American round doughnuts with a hole in them that you are probably picturing, but basically clumps of fried dough. I know they have these kind at Chinese food restaurants too. Anyways, they were sooo good. We also were given boiled water today so we could make instant coffee or hot cocoa. We were basically living the life.
Today was our first day on the worksite as yesterday the dust storm cancelled what was supposed to be the first day. I was on the morning shift so I got to actually be in the first group that went to work. We stood around at the work site for a little waiting for the building coordinator to came and then we got down to business. The only thing done so far was that the outline of the school's foundation was carved into the sand. The first thing we had to do was take pick axes and break up the earth in between the foundation lines. This was easily the hardest work I had to do in trek. As we were in a semi-desert area and it was the dry season, the ground was so much harder than what it is here. It was almost like pick-axing rock. Also, as this was our first day, we were all pushing overselves to the max and trying to do the work as long as we can, not realizing that we would blow ourselves out. The villagers were able to work much faster than us so we kind of stayed at one little part while they worked on the rest. Another problem with pick-axing was that 20 people hitting the ground with pick-axes caused lots of dust, and unluckily for us we were down wind of everyone else. Also, everytime you hit the ground with the pick-axe dirt shot right up at you. I kept my sun glasses and hat on, with other people covering their faces with bandanas.
After the ground was pick-axed enough, people whose job it was to shovel would shovel all the dirt out of the foundation, and then you'd pick-axe again. Work started at 8am, and at 9am we switched jobs. I'm pretty sure I went in and helped mix cement for bricks.
One thing with building the school that might surprise people is that everything had to be made without any type of machinery. To make the bricks you began with sand, cement, and gravel if the bricks are for the foundation (which are almost all the bricks that we made while there). A few people with shovels would take the piles each and mix them together. You would make a crater in the middle of the pile and someone would pour water into it. You would then mix everything up with the water, and it would be repeated until it was a homogenous blend. After cement was properly mixed, you would shovel cement into the brick mold (which was a metal rectangular prism with no top and handles on each side). After the mold was 80% full you'd have to pick up the mold and hit it against the ground a few times to compress the cement. You would then shovel more in until it was overflowing the mold. With the mold filled you'd hit the top and smooth it out. Another person would then take the mold and flip it quickly up-side-down. The person would slide the mold off and, voilà (Malians love saying this word), you'd have a brick. The shoveling was the easiest part not to mess up. Shoveling into the mold was about the same. Flipping the mold, however, was hard. They got me to do it a few times and both times I didn't flip it fast enough and the cement poured out. It was really heavy, I was too afraid I'd hit an already made brick when flipping it. Although brick making is pretty hard, it was much better than pick-axing.
The last thing I did on the worksite was make rebar squares. Rebar is metal bars used for support in the school. They had logs with four metal pikes that held the straight 1 inch thick rebar in place. You then took a hollow pole and put it over the edge of the rebar. Using the pole you'd bend the rebar to make a 90 degree angle. Once that's done you pick the rebar up and move it to create the next corner. This was by far the easiest job to do on the work site. I was pretty slow at first compared to the guy who was helping me (by holding the bar down while I bend it) but I got better at it.
We were so exhausted after that first day of work that we practically collapsed when we were able to sit for lunch. I ate a lot of rice, too, from doing that work. I got a few blisters on my hand and one ripped open. All the villagers were so worried when they saw it. Thankfullly, we really didn't do too much in the afternoon. We had some Bambara lessons and pumped water, but other than that nothing much really happened. After dinner I went back to my compound and Greg (BwB fund raising guy) sat on mats in front of my house and talked to my host father Seku Dicko through the translator Issa, who also stays in our compound. I showed him pictures of my parents and of snow and a snow fort I made once. He was shocked when we told him that there are poor people in the United States. We explained to him that although people do I have a lot more money in the United States there are so many things that you have to pay for so most of the money you earn you have to spend. He had no idea where the United States was located. He told us which way was west and east from where we were sitting and we told him it was in the west. The next part absolutely amazed me. Issa told us that Seku Dicko was confused as he thought that we were saying The United States borders Senegal which is the farthest west country from Mali and borders the Atlantic. He had no idea that the American continents even existed. We explained to him that there was a huge ocean and we had to travel thousands of miles to get to Mali. Seku Dicko then told us that he hopes we have a good stay in Mali and return home to our country safely and that may God take care of us. I would have never been able to fathom before that a fully grown and obviously intelligent person would have no idea that the continent I live on even exists. I really wish I brought them a world map so that they could see where everything is located. My host father was also shocked by the idea of homelessness. Just as I would have never thought that there are people that don't know that North and South America exists, he could not believe that in a country that is so rich as the United States that we have people living on the streets without homes. I have to say that this was really the most I got to talk to my host father the whole trip and it was probably one of the best conversations that I had in the entire trip. At about 9:30PM we all went to sleep.
I can't remember the sequence of the rest so I'm going to wait until I can get someone to use their journal to tell me the big events of each day so I can finish this. I'm hoping that's soon!
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| While I haven't put food in your bowl for 3 months, and there are cobwebs in your water bowl, I want you to know that I really do care about you lil' xanga. Sure, you might be starving, but you have to realize I've had some pretty good reasons (sorta). I've had Building With Books on many Saturdays and get too much homework on weeknights to go on the computer. I just haven't had the time to update you.
I just went to Spain two weeks ago, but I'll talk more about that and put pictures and things up for that hopefully later this weekend.
I guess I better update you on school. It started a few months ago. My first semester is much harder than my second semester. I feel like this year my second semester is the end of school. I have my three major classes first semester and Spanish while second semester I only have English, a period of easy AP Gov/Pol., and Spanish as true classes, so it is going to be a walk in the park. My schedule for first semester is as follows:
1st Block: Honors Geometry with Mrs. Inverso
This is my least favorite class as well as the class I work the hardest in as well as the class I have the lowest grade in. I don't really like Mrs. Inverso's teaching style. I'll admit I am learning the stuff pretty well, but in a not so pleasant way. The subject matter isn't even that hard, she just seems to over complicate it. She doesn't teach us things sometimes because she wants us to figure it out, but that can be annoying. I think about 75% of the time I spend studying is on this class and 50% of my homework time.
2nd Block: AP Government/Politics with Mrs. Kennedy
This class is way too easy. We've had one real test for the first quarter and I didn't even take it. At one point I had a 106% in this class. Mrs. Kennedy is a pleasant teacher and I do learn somethings, but I get the feeling I might be better off studying the textbook and then just asking her questions about it as the class is not all too rigorous. I wouldn't care that this class is so light on work if it wasn't for the AP test. I think I'll just buy a study book during second semester and study that.
3rd Block Period 5: Concert Choir with Mrs. Benglian
As this is my first time in in-school Concert Choir, I like it more. Last year I basically had to teach myself all the songs as I came into choir halfway through the year and everyone had already learned the songs I didn't know. I usually eat lunch during this class. It's tough being a Bass 1 with most of the Bass 1s in Encores are in after school choir as there is really no leadership. She only briefly goes over the notes so it is hard for us bass 1s to get through.
3rd Block Period 6 and 4th Block: Honors Physics with Mr. Miller
I love this class. Mr. Miller is a teacher who acts like he doesn't really care about us, but that actually makes him a batter teacher than those who pretend to care about us. He teaches in a really simple way and tells all sorts of stories. The class is two hours long but I really don't notice it. This is the class I study for behind geometry but only about half as much as I have to for geometry.
5th Block: Honors Spanish III with Sra. Dotson
I always thought that after you pass Spanish I and II, Spanish III was supposed to get much harder and intensive. It even says in the year book that the whole class is supposed to be conducted in Spanish. I take Spanish because I want to learn to speak Spanish, not to look good for colleges, so what bothers me about this class is how easy it is. The class is barely ever in Spanish and it honestly feels the same as an accelerated class if not a little lower. I'm hoping Spanish IV will be more intensive as it'll be another teacher (who is from Argentina). Otherwise, the next time I go to a Spanish-speaking country I'm just going to have to sound stupid until I learn enough to speak easily.
Next semster I have English, Spanish IV, AP Gov/Pol., Choir, Ceramics, and Phys. Ed/Health. I really cannot wait for that.
See ya.
Mike
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| So, summer is just about over. I've been trying to get myself to finish my summer reading, debating with myself whether I should finish Great Expectations, considering I already read it last year in school. I also need to thoroughly clean out my room. I've been meaning to move boxes of stuff out of my closet to somewhere else for a few years and promised myself I'd do it this summer. I better get cracking.
I guess the most interesting events in my life recently have been my birthday (and birthday party) and getting my driver's permit on my birthday. My party went much better than last year. Going for my permit was not as fun. There was a big line at the place, but luckily most of the people were there to get ID cards and such so they just called for people to come and take the permit test. I honestly studied the driver's manual really hard, writing notes on every page, and just passed with an 15 out of 18 questions right. One question I got wrong was an easy mistake (I chose the railroad crossing sign instead of the sign put near a railroad crossing), and another I got wrong because I didn't understand the wording of the question, and I don't even remember the third wrongly answered question. I've only gone driving twice so far and I already feel pretty comfortable on low traffic roads. Yahoo! My mom isn't really keen to letting me get my license for a while, though.
I'm very excited for this school year. I can't wait for a bunch of my classes (crossing my fingers that I get the right classes), and to be an officer in a few clubs. What I already know is I am the VPof Global Education for Building with Books and actual vice president for Schools for Schools, a club just starting this year created by Invisible Children to raise money for schools in Uganda. Go to the web site for Invisible Children (http://www.invisiblechildren.com). Every time I look at it I think about how it is a model web site for all non-profit organizations. It's very cool, you won't regret it! Hopefully a lot of people will join the club. I'm going to make sure we publicize the club as much as possible. As well as being an officer for Building with Books and Schools for Schools, I might be an editor for the Acorn as well, depending on if I will be able to nab a spot or if I will have the time.
I'm looking forward to the school year and the coming cold weather!
Mike
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| All these cool stuff is coming out on my birthday this year. Ugly Betty Season 1 is coming out on DVD and the new Rilo Kiley CD Under the Blacklight, which I've been waiting for about three years. Rilo Kiley is also coming to the First Unitarian Church September 25th with Grand Ole Party and Art in Manila (I've never heard of either of them).
I'm a little nervous about the new album. All three of their previous albums has been a mixture of indie, country, and folk, but this album is more like 70s dance music. the R5 Productions' website (the company that runs the shows at the Unitarian Church) have three songs up from the new album. The first single of the album is Moneymaker, which I didn't really like at first, but it has grown on me. If I heard this song on the radio I probably would have thought it was a side project and not Rilo Kiley. The second song, Dreamworld, doesn't really do anything for me from what I have heard, but I have not listened to it that deeply. Thankfully, I instantly loved the third song, Silver Lining. Out of all three of the songs, this one seems to blend their old style and new direction the best. It felt more familiar than the other two songs because it is more of the Rilo Kiley I know. I don't want to be one of those crotchety fans who expects a band to make the same kind music for ever album, I just think it'll take me a little bit to get used to their new style.
If anyone wants to get me the CD or tickets to their show or Ugly Betty on DVD for my birthday, I wouldn't mind it =]. I haven't sent invitations out for my birthday party yet because I am waiting for someone to tell me when they will be away so I can know when to schedule. I'm trying to straighten that out today but we will see how it goes.
I'm going to the shore today until next Sunday, but I promise I'm going to get my photo xanga up and running when I get back I have this whole month free so feel free to hit me up.
See ya!
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| I've had xanga for 1,059 days. I've been a neglectful owner lately. It's because I've had summer stage every week day 9am-430pm that I haven't had as much time to do internet stuff. I'm so behind on facebook stuff and my email and xanga. I'm glad I'm distancing myself, though, because I used to spend too much time on social networking sites and such.
Summer has been great. I've spent lots of time with Fredrica, just got down my first show for summer stage (High School Musical, which was pretty good), and I've just started rehearsing for Charlotte's Web. I think I'll like Charlotte's Web more because the cast is much smaller and less bothersome. In High School Musical I played Ripper (the guy who plays the cello in Stick to the Status Quo). I had a singing solo out of my range and 2 lines. I always had to cross my fingers during my solo, it was way too high for me. The highest note was a G# (3 leger lines up off of the bass clef, so it'd probably just be put in in the treble clef). I got it mostly, but it really sucked sometimes. For Charlotte's Web I am the Gander (a male goose, which I have to say every time I say my character name). It's a mediumish sized part, I'd say. I have about 20 lines and a few singing solos. I have a wife, the Goose, and we are supposed to act like the stereotypical couple that has the perfect lawn, etc. We both have a speech impediment that makes us repeat ourselves, so in a lot of our lines we do that (e.g. A wonderful, wonderful, wonderful day for - day for the - day for the fair!). Some lines I have to say at the same exact time as her, which I don't really like doing, but it'll work out.
I saw Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix yesterday. I'd say it is the best or second best HP movie yet. The one thing that they took out that bothered me the most, however, was Harry and Cho Chang's date. I wanted to see that so bad!
I am so pumped for the last book. When I was watching the movie, I was explaining to Fredrica some of the storyline later on, and then I realized that in a week I'd have my questions about it answered. Yahoo!
Is it bad that I just want to play maple story all day?
-Mikey P
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