Travel essay

http://www.michaelbehar.com/kiteboarding/laventana.pdf

The article is by Michael Behar and is called, “My Trip: La Ventana.” The article is from his 2008 Kiteboarding magazine. The exotic location and the fact that kiteboarding is involved greatly intrigues me. The article also included magnificent pictures that drew my attention. It sounded daring, thrilling, and exotic so I decided to read on.  Behar is practically advertising the small town of La Ventana, Mexico with support from his own experiences of the place. He gives a list of different sports people can do, and where they can do them. One sport that he mentioned in which I have a great passion for is scuba diving. Behar also gives contact information on the instructors for the various sports and the nice hotels and restaurants. Behar also creates the feeling that La Ventana is very quiet and serene, since not may people know about it. After reading the article, I was convinced that I needed to go and experience this wonderful place for myself. For a traveler it is very informative. I would have liked to see him mention some of the things that are not so wonderful, but then again it seems his focus is to lure people into visiting the village.

Draft # 2

I love the song “On-line” by Brad Paisley. It goes like this “I work down at the pizza pit, and I drive an old Hyundai, I still live with my mom and dad, I’m five foot three and overweight, I’m a sci: fi fanatic, mild asthmatic, Never been to second base, but there’s a whole ‘nother me, that you need to see go check out Myspace. ‘Cause on-line I’m out in Hollywood, I’m six foot five and I look damn good…” Brad Paisley goes back and forth comparing his real self to his identity online. I find it quite hilarious, witty, and playful. Maybe I see it this way, because he is just a harmless country singer trying to be comical with his work. The song shows no cruel intentions to misuse his false identity. Sadly, there are people out there who would abuse this sort of situation, and cause stomach-turning harm to others.

For those of you who do not know what a Myspace is I shall explain. It is an online profile page, to advertise yourself to other people. It is a great way for artists and bands to make a name for themselves. I view Myspace as your own personal billboard, but more detailed. I feel that you take similar actions when you drive past a billboard, and view a Myspace page. Not everyone will stop to look at it, and for the people who do look at it you usually do not know who they are. You can post up pictures, videos, blogs… almost anything you want. There is the option where you can set your profile to private, but once you become friends with someone, they have access to all of your information.

            Now let us think for a second. What if we replaced Brad Paisley with another person? If we made that person a sexual predator, a harasser, or murderer, we would have a problem on our hands. There are more than 29,000 registered sex offenders on Myspace. Unfortunately, there are these troubles in having a Myspace. It is not as innocent as Brad Paisley’s laughable song. To predators and harassers, the invention of Myspace is like lifting a big weight off their shoulders. Information that may have taken months or years to find from their victims can now be obtained in minutes just by a click of a page. With the heavy burden of the weight it took longer to move about, now they can move at the speed of whatever Internet connection they have.

You may be wondering how a predator can get this information, and especially if the profile is set to private. A predator could easily make a “fake” profile, just like in Brad Paisley’s song. Let us say the predator is interested in a 13-year-old girl from Albany, New York. He could make a profile page of a 13-year-old boy from Albany, and put up fake pictures, and information. Now lets say the girl is a little hesitant about adding him as a friend. The predator could add some of her friends who do not have private profiles. She might then look at this and say to herself “Oh, well he is friends with people I know, so I will add him, besides he is cute.”  Once he is her friend, the predator will know all of her information. Even if there is not a lot of information on the girl’s profile, he could easily figure things out. The girl may think her profile is well protected, but there could be little things she did not realize. Let us say one of her friends leaves a comment with her last name or something personal like, where the girls may be hanging out that night. Even though the information was not intentionally stated in her profile, the predator now has access to that information. There are many little peep holes that a predator can sneakily slip through, to find all of his details.

It can be hard to tell who is who on Myspace. It is like trying to pick out the false advertisements on a billboard. Unfortunately, some people do not have this skill, or have yet acquired it. I feel that the majority of the people without this ability are those who are young teenagers. Many of them are still naïve about the idea of a predator, or harasser. I believe that the story of Megan Meier should be told to these still raw and young teenagers. The story is quite tragic. Megan was a 13-year-old girl who did not have much confidence in herself. She suffered from depression and an attention deficit disorder.  When she met “Josh” on Myspace, she was thrilled. They both admired each other and were becoming close. One day “Josh” decided that he did not want to be friends with her anymore and said she was a slut and fat, and that the world would be better off without her. The next day Megan killed herself. It was believed that it was because of Josh. It is heartbreaking to know that Josh did not even exist. The parents of an old friend in her neighborhood created “Josh”. They did it so they could see what bad things Megan might be saying about their daughter. This story should make people realize how real these fake identity problems are, and how severe they can become. This story did not have a sexual predator, but a predator of mental torture. The more naïve someone is about this identity problem the shorter the path they are creating for the predators to cross.

             Not only is there the possible danger of a predator, there are harassers. These harassers can even be old friends. You could have a friend who hates your guts, and wants to get revenge. They could make up rumors about you, tell lies, or they could go as far as making a false Myspace profile. Since they already have the information, it would be easy to post a few embarrassing pictures, and make a false site with all of those juicy facts. You may not even realize that the site is up, but slowly they could be damaging your reputation. You may think to yourself that you are the kind of person who would just ignore that and laugh. You should take it seriously, because it may affect your future. Employers may have access to that site, so it may not affect you now, but it could affect your opportunities in the future. Gene Fishel is from Virginiaand educates students on on-line safety. Fishel stated “At James River High School, Fishel also warned students about the permanence of what they put on the Internet, and how information posted today can come back to haunt them when they’re applying to colleges or looking for jobs” (Sampson).                                                                                                                             

                                   I believe that precautions should be taken when dealing with Myspace. Parents should be monitoring their young teenager’s Myspace when ever possible. Some parents do not take extra time to check up on their young teen’s on-line behavior. That is why young teenagers should be educated on the topic of protecting their identity on Myspace and in the Internet world.                                                                                          

Virginiais the first state to make Internet safety classes mandatory in public schools (Sampson).Other states are beginning to pass Internet safety laws but they do not have these mandatory classes. Corporations such as Verizon and Symantec will provide Internet safety classes free of charge to children between the ages of 11 and 16. The classes held in Virginia also help the parents of these children. Tammy McGraw, who is the director of the Virginia Department of Education’s office of educational technology, educates parents about the Internet, and “including encouraging families to use filtering software and put their computers in parts of the house where they can be easily seen” ( Sampson).

I think that everyone should take advantage of these lessons, and that we should push for the education of the Internet to be mandatory in classes especially with Internet being such a big obsession in today’s world.  You may think it unnecessary, and that these youngsters should know better by now, but in reality, they do not. If they did know, better then why would there be so many assault cases with young teenagers? If you search the Internet for Myspace harassment cases, you will find endless results. It is horrifying, and if we do not take slow steps to protect ourselves those number will go up. Sampson made a good point as to why young children need to be educated. In his article Sampson sated,  “Others, like 16-year-old Kyle Rackley, still feel they’re bulletproof, that they won’t become an on-line predator’svictim. “I feel pretty safe about it,” Kyle said.That feeling, Attorney General Bob McDonnell says, is precisely why young people are vulnerable.No one wants to curb teens from using Facebook and MySpace, he said, but in the Internet age, it’s necessary to reinforce the old warning: “Don’t talk to strangers” (Sampson).                                                                                                                                 

We should take these precautions not because we don’t trust these young teenagers, but because they are most likely still naïve and impulsive thinkers to certain situations. Your brain develops in spurts. The second spurt you have happens at about the age of 17, and  at this time, “the frontal lobes of the cerebral cortex are the focus of development”(Bee 94). That area of the brain controls logic and planning ( Bee 94). Young teenagers lack in these skills which make them more vulnerable to harassment and abuse on-line. Thus as models of more mature cognitive development we should educate these young teenagers, and give them the best support available.

            I would advise you to stay away from Myspace all together,  but if you don’t take my advice at least be aware of the dangers and risks that come along with it. The site is like a permanent billboard, your information will remain there even after it has been replaced with a new add. Down the road anyone could just peel away and find your information, and you may not know who  they will be. There is too much uncertainty in having a Myspace. You never know what sticky situation you might be in. It takes  a lot of responsibility to run something as complex and uncertain like Myspace. Even if you think you are old enough, and no sexual predator would want to bother you,  there are still the dangers of murders, and harassers. You should be worried every time you log on, you never know who may be down the road watching your every move, because there was a little too much information on your  page. It isn’t as humorous and innocent as Brad Paisley’s song, it is as dangerous and horrifying as the case of Megan and many others, who may have experienced the unspeakable. Is it worth putting your self at risk?

 

 

 

 

Revised Review

The “Nisei Daughter” is a memoir of Monica Sone’s life. Sone grew up in an immigrant family in Seattle, and she talks about her experiences with her friends and family. She is a Japanese American writing about very sensitive periods in her life. Sone wrote the memoir not too long after the Japanese were let out of the internment camps, after the Pearl Harbor attack. The book first came out in 1953. Sone and her family first arrived in the concentration camps in 1942, and some of her family stayed until the camps closed in 1946.  Sone gives her first hand account on the unpleasant experiences the Japanese faced in the internment camps. It is a good read to learn about the ways of life for the Japanese before, during and after the camps. It gives a great history on the lives of the Japanese and American Japanese. Sone describes the struggles that the Issei (Japanese born/ first generation) and Nisei (American born Japanese/ second generation) have during those though times. Sone is lost in a struggle of finding her true identity. In the beginning of the memoir she describes being Japanese and American as being a freak with two heads. Monica Sone stated, “And now Mother was telling us we were Japanese. I had always thought I was a Yankee, because after all I had been born on Occidental and Main Street. Montana, a wall- shaking mountain of a man who lived at our hotel, called me a Yankee. I didn’t see how I could be a Yankee and Japanese at the same time. It was like being born with two heads. It sounded freakish and a lot of trouble” (Sone 18-19).  Towards the end, Sone has had many life altering encounters with the Japanese and their culture that she has come to realize that two heads are better than one. It is interesting to see Sone slowly grow up and become a stronger person through out her memoir. One way Sone shows the cultural differences between Americans and the Japanese is by comparing foods. There are many descriptions of various foods, both American and Japanese, through out the memoir. If one was not interested in the historical aspect of the novel the descriptions of various foods is quite fascinating. If the historical portion of the book was particularly intriguing to the reader, a great book to read along with Sone’s novel would be “A History of Asian Americans: Strangers from a different shore” by Ronald Takaki. Takaki’s piece is a great narrative history of not only the Japanese, but also other Asian Americans including the Chinese, Korean, Filipino, Indian, Vietnamese, and others. A great Memoir to read on the Chinese and the clash between American born Chinese would be “The Woman Warrior” by Maxine Hong Kingston. If one were interested in reading about Koreans versus Korean Americans a great read would be the “Native Speaker” by Chang-Rae Lee. All of the novels I listed share the same captivating theme of self-identiy.There are many interesting themes in Monica Sone’s memoir to analyze. You could really dig at the themes of racism, shame, citizenship, immigration, segregation, culture values, and filial duty. Nisei Daughter is like a fun history book, because it includes exciting first hand experiences along with factual historical information.

Personal Essay #3

I love the song “online” by Brad Paisley. It goes like this “I work down at the pizza pit, and I drive an old Hyundai, I still live with my mom and dad, I’m five foot three and overweight, I’m a sci: fi fanatic, mild asthmatic, Never been to second base, but there’s a whole ‘nother me, that you need to see go check out Myspace. ‘Cause online I’m out in Hollywood, I’m six foot five and I look damn good…” Brad Paisley goes back and forth comparing his real self to his identity online. I find it quite hilarious, witty, and playful. Maybe I see it this way, because he is just a harmless country singer trying to be comical with his work. The song shows no cruel intentions to misuse his false identity.

For those of you who do not know what a Myspace is I shall explain. It is an online profile page, to advertise yourself to other people. It is a great way for artists and bands to make a name for themselves. I view Myspace as your own personal billboard, but more detailed. I feel that you take similar actions when you drive past a billboard, and view a Myspace page. Not everyone will stop to look at it, and for the people who do look at it you usually do not know who they are. You can post up pictures, videos, blogs… almost anything you want. There is the option where you can set your profile to private, but once you become friends with someone, they have access to all of your information.

            Now let us think for a second. What if we replaced Brad Paisley with another person? If we made that person a sexual predator, a harasser, or murderer, we would have a problem on our hands. Unfortunately, there are these troubles in having a Myspace. It is not as innocent as Brad Paisley’s laughable song. To predators and harassers, the invention of Myspace is like lifting a big weight off their shoulders. Information that may have taken months or years to find from their victims can now be obtained in minutes just by a click of a page. With the heavy burden of the weight it took longer to move about, now they can move at the speed of whatever internet connection they have.

You may be wondering how a predator can get this information, and especially if the profile is set to private. A predator could easily make a “fake” profile, just like in Brad Paisley’s song. Let us say the predator is interested in a 13-year-old girl from Albany, New York. He could make a profile page of a 13-year-old boy from Albany, and put up fake pictures, and information. Now lets say the girl is a little hesitant about adding him as a friend. The predator could add some of her friends who do not have private profiles. She might then look at this and say to her self “Ohh, well he is friends with people I know, so I will add him, besides he is cute.”  Once he is her friend, the predator will know all of her information. Even if there is not a lot of information on the girl’s profile, he could easily figure things out. The girl may think her profile is well protected, but there could be little things she did not realize. Let us say one of her friends leaves a comment with her last name or something personal like, where the girls may be hanging out that night. Even thought the information was not intentionally stated in her profile the predator now has access to that information. There are many little peep holes that a predator can sneakily slip through, to find all of his details.

It can be hard to tell who is who on Myspace. It is like trying to pick out the false advertisements on a billboard. Unfortunately, some people do not have this skill, or have yet acquired it. I feel that the majority of the people with out this ability are those who are young teenagers. Many of them are still naïve about the idea of a predator, or harasser. I believe that the story of Megan Meier should be told to these still raw and young teenagers. The story is quite tragic. Megan was a 13-year-old girl who did not have much confidence in her self. She suffered from depression and an attention deficit disorder.  When she met “Josh” on Myspace, she was thrilled. They both admired each other and were becoming close. One day “Josh” decided that he did not want to be friends with her anymore and said she was a slut and fat, and that the world would be better off with out her. The next day Megan killed her self. It was believed that is was because of Josh. It is heartbreaking to know that Josh did not even exist. Josh was created by the parents of an old friend in her neighborhood. This story should make people realize how real these fake identity problems are, and how severe they can become. This story did not have a sexual predator, but a predator of mental torture. The more naïve one is about this identity problem the shorter the path they are making the predators cross.

             Not only is there the possible danger of a predator, there are harassers. These harassers can even be old friends. You could have a friend who hates your guts, and wants to get revenge. They could make rumors about you, tell lies, or they could go as far as making a false Myspace. Since they already have the information, it would be easy to post a few embarrassing pictures, and make a false site with all of those juicy facts. You may not even realize that the site is up, but slowly they could be damaging your reputation. You may think to yourself that you are the kind of person who would just ignore that and laugh. You should take it seriously, because it may affect your future. Employers may have access to that site, so it may not affect you now, but it could affect your opportunities in the future. Even though Myspace may have some good intentions there are just as many or ever more bad ones.

…………….

 

Book Review

The Nisei Daughter is a memoir of Monica Sone’s life. She is a Japanese American writing about a very sensitive period in her life. Sone wrote this book not too long after the Japanese were let out of the internment camps, after the Pearl Harbor attack. Sone gives her first hand account on the unpleasant experiences the Japanese faced in the internment camps. It is a good read to learn about the ways of life for the Japanese before, during and after the camps. It gives a great history on the lives of the Japanese and American Japanese. Sone describes the struggles that the Issei (Japanese born/ first generation) and Nisei (American born Japanese/ second generation) have during those though times. She her self-if lost in a struggle of finding who she really is. From the beginning of the memoir she describes being Japanese and American as being a freak with two heads. Towards the end, Sone has had many encounters with the Japanese and their culture that she has come to realize that two heads are better than one. One way Sone shows the cultural differences between Americans and Japanese is by food. There are many descriptions of various foods, American and Japanese, through out the memoir. If one was not interested in the historical aspect of the novel the descriptions of various foods is quite interesting.  There are many great themes in her memoir to analyze. You could really dig at the themes of racism, shame, citizenship, immigration, segregation, culture values, and filial duty. Nisei Daughter is like a fun history book, because it includes exciting first hand experiences along with factual historical information.

Music

It was 1993, and just another slow summer day. Some of my family came over to just hang out, and listen to the new cassettes they just bought. My mom tossed a brand new polish cassette into the bright pink, mini sized boom box. The flamingo pink radio was probably from the 80’s. I thought it was cool because it had a radio and a cassette player all in one pink box. As soon as the music boomed through my house, my cousin Michelle and I started dancing crazily around the house. The grown ups stayed in the living room dancing and singing. I looked over and saw my dad. Still dancing he shouted over the loud music, “This is a good cassette! I need to buy this one!” Everyone shouted back something different agreeing to his examination. His face was beat red from dancing, singing, and shouting. I am not sure why he decided to further show his appreciation for the music at that time but he did. Michelle and I were about 5 years old. We both shared the same first and last names, but our personalities were very different. She was out going, and I was shy, but when it came to dancing to old cassettes, we both went wild. We shook our tiny hands viciously around in the air as if they were a separate part of our tiny bodies, just flowing to the music. When we decided that we did not want our hands floating like jellyfish in a violent sea, we would hold on tight to each other’s hands swinging around in untamed circles. When we got into the sunroom, Michelle stopped and scratched her short curly blond hair. She said, “What is that funny box in the porch? It is empty?” I said, “I don’t know Michelle…” We both looked into each other’s tiny brown eyes with much mischievousness, and adventure. “Let’s dance in it!” my cousin blurted out as if she knew I was thinking the same thing. We both threw our small bodies into the enormous box. The polish music still blaring through the house even louder, making the countless windows in the sunroom vibrate. We clapped our little hands and stomped our little feet with great force, dancing around in the brown cardboard box. It was as if the box made us one body and one soul. It was a group experience; everyone in the house went wild together, listening to the same cassette. Like the box, the house made us one body. With one cassette, one day, and one experience we just created a memory that would last a lifetime. In that box, my cousin and I used our imagination to create our own music phenomenon.

iPods

It is the beginning of the year 2008 and it seems as though ipod’s have been around for decades. It was only 7 years ago when the ipod was introduced into our society.  Little did we know how much an Ipod would change the world of music in just 7 years. The ipod is a small delicate sort of CD player. It can fit into the palm of your hand or your pocket. It has its benefits in size. You cannot really stick a CD player in your pocket, for easier storage. You could stick the CD player in you pants if you were just as out of date as that kind of technology, wearing parachute pants. Our parents and grandparents probably looked at the CD player as a very high tech invention. They had to carry around vinyl records to their friends’ house, or bulky cassette tapes. Even though it may seem like we have an advantage in technology with the ipod I feel we are really missing out on a lot. The technology devices of the past, allowed music to be “everyone’s music.” They would sit together and listen to records and cassettes. It was a group thing; everyone usually listened to the same music, and shared the same experience. I felt that they were better connected in the music world. With ipods, we usually do not call our friends and say, “hey lets listen to your ipod today”, or “everyone bring over your ipods so we can listen to music”. Listening has become more of an individual activity because of this frightful invention. There are even pillows, bras, jackets, book bags, and teddy bears, which will play your ipod music. They even have Ipod shuffle hair clips. I do not think music could become more individual and absurd than that. Their logos are usually blacked out people dancing by themselves with their ipod, buds in ears. What will be the next invention? Chips programmed into our heads with music, so that no one but us can hear our songs? Will it become more of an individual activity? Today music with the technology of Ipod’s defines music as “my music.” Everyone has different music on his or her ipod; it is not just one CD or one record that we could share one experience with. I feel that there is a connection missing in the music world with this new kind of technology. It seems that each music device gets diminutive in many ways. It is too late to make any changes, our society is becoming more fast pace and demanding when it comes to technology. The only thing we can do is hold on to those old records and cassettes, to show the future that music was something more.

 

Questions:

-Why is technology always improving?

-Will we ever be satisfied with the technology we have

-What will happen to the old technology?  Won’t old technology be desired or preferred by some   

 people? Such  as records vs. an ipod, Muscle car vs. a Hybrid car…etc What controversies will arise?

-How has technology change our life styles?

10 second essays

1. A crooked log can make a straight fire
2. Everyone thinks they have the most weight on their shoulders
3. How short will my last day be if everyday seems to be getting shorter?
4. Don’t spit in the wind
5. Love is like peeing in your pants, everyone can see it but you only get the warm feeling.
6. Hearing a lie is like drinking a cup sour milk
7. Beautiful flowers grow from ugly, little, seeds
8. Don’t hoard all your eggs in one basket
9. Envy is destroyed by a loving friendship
10.  Food is a character that forms us
11.  I am a rock, everyone else is the dust that forms me
12.  My heart determines how my body moves
13.  We are all small town people until we experience the world
14. The lie is a dangerous weapon
15. When born our mind is like a natural spring of water
16. One life, many destinations, many missions
17. Too be nice is sophisticated, to be too nice is just naive
18. A closet full of skeletons, is a scary thing
19. If you don’t look at a mirror long enough you loose your reflection
20. A still river never finds the ocean
21. Don’t change camels mid-desert
22. We all have a secret smile =)
23. A tunnel is darkest towards the end
24.  Slow is smooth, and smooth is fast
25. An elephant can’t rid of its trunk

Grandma

My Grandma was sitting in one of her old-fashioned wooden chairs in her little kitchen. The beautiful wooden chair was covered in one of those ugly and unusual flower patterned chair covers. There were so many of those flower-covered chairs crowded around one small table. The aroma of the various polish foods she was cooking was quite delightful. The stove was completely filled with pots and pans of food and the oven jam-packed. That holiday, Thanksgiving, is why there was so much food. I noticed she was a short little woman, barley 5 feet tall, but it made me love her even more. She was somewhat plump. Her plumpness just showed how much she loved eating the wonderful foods she would make. Her hair still had natural shades of jet-black, and was still very thick. The white only sprinkled on top of her jet-black hair like powdered sugar. I thought my grandma was very lucky to have such lovely hair at the age of 65. She was wearing one of her many flowered “grandma” vest aprons. They matched the funny covers on the chairs. I can’t even think of a time when she was not wearing one of those aprons while working in the kitchen. She also always wore the same big, black, circular glasses. I saw that the round glasses connected to her personality. Everyone she knew she loved her family equally, and it was like an undying circle of love, it would last forever. One could not help but admire that little Polish woman. The aroma of the food got stronger, and made my mouth water. I knew that my grandma’s little hands had put a lot of hard work into making all of that wonderful cooking. Her tiny hands still had a little powder on them from rolling the pierogie dough. They appeared wrinkled, tired, and worn-out, unlike her youthful looking hair.

A Family Scene

           I walked into my warm house after an hour and a half of track practice in the snow. I just started middle school, and was trying to find my true self. I would try so many crazy activites  and sports until I decided that track was the easiest and safest choice. I was so exhausted after a day of school and practice, but I was glad to be home, to tell my mom about the 100 I got on my math test. I was always horrible at math, so this was big. This was like one of the two times in my life I recieved a perfect score on a math test. When I went to go talk to her, I noticed she was on the phone speaking Polish with her mother. Her and her mother never got along and I could tell by the tone of their voice that they were arguing. I cannot understand Polish.  I would always try to figure out the kind of conversation my mother was having by the tone of her voice. I looked at my mom to let her know I was home. She gave me a look back that said, “Get out of my face right now.” I always hated that look. My dad was in the living room, we had out short greeting then I headed to my room. My dad and I never really had a close relationship. We never fought, and loved each other. We just did not have a strong father daughter bond.  I went to my room to put all of my stuff away. I then heard my mom get off the phone. I headed over to talk to her but she was already in the living room talking to my dad. Of course, it was in Polish, and I just felt this wall building up in front of me as they spoke. I always thought it was rude and impolite that they never spoke English in my presence knowing I could not understand Polish. I felt a great distance with my parents when they did. I sat down on the couch, maintaining a far enough distance to allow them to finish their conversation. As soon as they did, I felt them come back into my world and my existence. I still felt a bit frustrated that I would have to be left out of their world when they spoke Polish, so I started asking questions. Mom, why can I not speak Polish? I told her that I have always wanted to and she would just never take the time to teach me. She told me speaking horrible English “When you little kids used make funny you when you speak Polish, so you told us you only want to learn English.” I did not find that a good enough answer so I asked, “Why can’t you teach me now?” She said, “Ok, I will, maybe you can take class or buy CD, or dictionary to learn.” My dad was just sitting there watching TV; he was kind of a ghost in the family. Sometime we forgot he was there. I did not say anything to him, but was satisfied with my moms answer. I forgot about the math test.

            So I am a now 19 years old sitting in my little apartment thinking about how unfortunate it is that I never connected to my family with our language. I still feel as if I am sitting behind a giant wall and my parents are on the other side. I am still waiting for them to teach me Polish. When I sometimes come home from college on the weekends, I always see my mom sitting on the couch watching TV. I then always wonder why she cannot take that extra time to make me closer to my family and heritage. Isn’t that important to her?  Maybe if I stopped concentrating on all of my college work I could use the extra time to learn my own language. Maybe all these years I have put the blame on my mom. She had to learn English on her own, so why can’t I learn Polish. Maybe I am the one putting up this ”wall”.