peresonal narrative

    Life itself is full of so many possibilities. It is important to let go of negative memories from the past so that we may have more space to remember future experiences. I am more than sure everyone has memorable experiences they have from the past, including myself, but to choose one out of all experiences/memories is a difficult task. This may be a cliché memory but I am only 15 years old and it was the first to pop in my mind.
    When I was younger I wasn't the 'girliest', nor did I want to be, I was brought up with sports. At a very young age use to take my sister and I to baseball games,at times my family and I would go to the park to play some basketball, or just go to batting cages for fun. My parents always encouraged us to be as active as possible as kids. When I was about five years old or so my mother wanted me to try swimming. my first thought was, " WHY?!" but then I thought about it and agreed...somewhat. My mother took my sister and I to the indoor pool at YMCA. We got our membership and met our instructor. Everything became too real, I was either going to drown and die or learn how to swim. I was really nervous that day,I think I had started to cry, I was not ready.
      Reality finally kicked in, I had to get in the pool.

reflections

My portfolio is filled with so many different assignments, although they're all different they all have a similar tone. Since the first writing assignment of last semester I would say I have improved in a sense I would say. I have become a little more comfortable with creative writing and now it's not as stiff, the words flow. My work has varied I have some assignments that are great and there are some that weren't the best. I guess my most favorite works has to be one the most recent assignments I did.

mla citation

Brown, Jennifer; Little, Brown; Hate List


    Let's set the scene; investigators at Garvin highschool are trying to figure out what happened. Left many wounded and 6 students dead, Valerie Leftman, was the last victim before the gunman, Nick Levil shot himself. (p.3-4)

Found Poem

We have to learn things the hard way sometimes,
life gives us options, or in this case guavas.
We see a firm and bumpy guava and imagine how it would have such exotic flavors and textures,
but you wouldn't know if it is quite ripe yet til of course you try it.
So, you do,
you bite into the not quite ripe guava and feel its strange texture,
in your head it taste like if it were sour yet bland,
your mouth forms somewhat of a cringe.
That is when you learn,
you see a different guava, and you imagine that it would taste exactly the same,
You think about walking away from it but you don't,
you want to make the guava worth your calories.

750 word essay on theme

        Although both of these essays were written by two different authors, they both had the same concept in mind. The first story which is An American Story, was written by Anthony Lewis, a journalist for The New York Times. The second story, which is, Hunger of Memory was written by Richard Rodriguez. Both, An American Story, and Hunger of Memory, have the topic which is based on the struggles that immigrants have to face in order for immigrants to be able to come to America.

         In the first story, Anthony Lewis describes his experience from discussing with, and hearing an immigrant's story. Lewis shares a story of a Vietnamese boy that arrived as a refugee, his name is Viet Dinh. Viet traveled with his mother, four sisters and one of his brothers. The way Lewis tells about Viet's story is in a very compassionate way. "There is no country that has taken so many people from so many places and cultures, and gained so much in the process."(Lewis, p.125). Lewis writes about how he got the first letter from Viet, and how he still receives letters now, keeping Lewis updated on how Viet is continuing to make so much progress, since he arrived from Vietnam. In one of Viet's most recent letters, he mentioned that he had already graduated from Harvard. "I graduated from the Harvard Law in June and am now a law clerk for Judge Lawrence H. Silberman of the U.S Court of Appeals in Washington. Next year I clerk for Justice Sandra Day O'Connor at the Supreme Court."(Lewis,p.155). It is inspiring to hear that a person that had to face so many obstacles got so far and is continuing to succeed.

         As for the second story, Hunger of Memory, Richard Rodriguez is talking about how he personally had to face immigration; he based this story off of his life story.

As a boy he saw he’d always see his parents finding difficulties when speaking English because it was a foreign language to them. For Rodriguez living a life with immigrant parents was kind of tough because he wished that his parents would sound like “los gringos”, or fluent when they had to speak the foreign language.

Descriptive essay

      Winter break might seem like one of the most fun times of the year, with all those holidays in between, here in la there is lots to do.LA is a city that is quite festive during the holidays. Although there may not be the "white winters", it does get quite cold here. But anyways my winter break was memorable, I do have to admit.
       On the last day of school I stormed out of my last class, and had a 30 minute drive back home, when we finally got there I was glad I did not have any school the next Monday. As Christmas came closer and closer,I realized that we still hadn't gone christmas shopping, of course we were so last minute.So we headed out to the mall, and it was terribly crowded. Being the claustrophobic person I am, I hated it, but there was nothing I could possibly do,so I spent the rest of the day freaking out aside from shopping for gifts. 

        On Christmas eve I visited all my relatives up in Palm Springs, I was excited to see them. We waited several hours for the clock to strike twelve. Once it was time we all started hugging one another, saying "merry Christmas". The party continued after all the hugs were given and a few hours later it was already 4 o'clock in the morning so my parents drove to one of my relatives' house, since we were planning to stay over. On Christmas day we went up to the mountains to go to the snow. Being the Californian I am, I could not stand those type of temperatures. I was so cold but somehow I managed to last a few hours. But it was fun,and I awfully sad to go back to my aunts house because the snow was so pretty to look at.

           As soon as christmas was over we drove back home,and new years was right around the corner. the year seemed to go by so quickly, I was surprised that we were already starting a new year in such short notice. My family and I spent that day at home just watching movies til about 4 in the morning. After that the days went by so quick, I was happy to go back to school. On the night before school I did my best to sleep early to get a good night's rest to wake up not so tired, and that was the end of my winter break.