Finals Part: 1

When I was in the 7th grade, I experienced true terror. Near my neighborhood, there was a firearm incident. I'd hear the gunshots as I was sitting at home and playing games. Terrified, I froze. The more I would hear, the closer it would get. I hid under the blankets hoping for the best. As I started to smell gunpowder, I began to panic. I thought a group of mobsters were going in each house killing for their entertainment. No one was in the house except me. As the gun shots began to calm down, everyone from the neighborhood went outside to check out what had just happened. On the ground was a middle aged Caucasian man riddled with bullets. Luckily he was still alive. As I watch this poor man agonize in pain, I felt weak. As the neighbors try to call the ambulance and tend to the wound, I stood there horrified by the scene. This is an experience one cannot forget. Seeing a near death middle aged man told me that my life could be ended sooner than expected.

poem

"Night" by Elie Wiesel

Don't cry

Don't waste you tears

They take me for a madman

You wouldn't believe

The famous cruelty

The week of Passover

The shadows beside me

Abandoned streets

I had been afraid

Dead had passed

And unexpectedly

Disappeared 

Descriptive Essay

The first three days of winter break, I went to a winter retreat with my church. We went to a place called Thousand Pines Christian Camp. It is located at the top of a mountain. It was very cold but there wasn't any snow. During the retreat, we got into groups and played many activities/games. we spent most of our time talking with each other and getting to one another better. Well, for me it was. My least favorite part of the retreat was the skit. Since i wasn't close to many of the church members, it was really awkward for me to do the skit. But I would say the skit went well. On the last day of winter retreat, I was kind of disappointed. I wished that I would have talked to more people during the retreat and have more fun. But those three days went by to quickly. I wanted to stay at the retreat a little long. But I was tired so I really wanted to go home, too.  We had to wake up at 6 in the morning and sleep around 1 to 2 A.M. So when I got home, I went to sleep. After all the resting, I had nothing to do so I just played games all day. Most of my vacation consisted of staying home and playing games. It was around the middle of the 2nd week of winter break when I started going out more. That was when I first learned to play some bowling and billiards. I didn't like bowling as much as billiards. Bowling hurt my arms. But billiards were a completely different story. While I was learning how to play, I fell in love with the game. It just felt right. It felt like it was meant for me. But when I was playing bowling, I got frustrated. The ball would go in the gutter. But as I hung out with my friends, I got better at both bowling and billiards. But I loved billiards so much that I would go with a couple of friends to just practice. For Christmas and New Year's, I stayed home and played games. I didn't go meet my family or anything. Besides playing games all day, I watched a show on Netflix called "The Office." It is my favorite show and I re-watched it more than 3 times.

Autobiographical Narrative

I was born in Korea and came to America in the 3rd grade. Going to school was a problem for me because I didn't know any English. But luckily, a new school opened up and there were many Koreans that didn't know English just like me.  But making new friends was still a problem because I was really shy. I was able to make only 2 to 4 friends because they didn't know English. As the year went by, by my 5th grade, I was capable of having a full conversation in English and was able to make more friends then before. I got comfortable speaking English and I ended up befriending all of the 5th graders in my school. But my elementary days didn't last very long. As I transitioned into middle school, all of us went to separate schools. I had to start fresh again. I knew absolutely no one in my school and had to spend a few week by myself. As time went on, I made more friends just like elementary but this time, I made enemies along with friends. They would use me as entertainment and whenever they needed to copy something, they would come to me. At first I thought it was normal to do that since we were in middle school. But then I realized that it wasn't. I realized it as soon as I got into high school. I started to avoid my so-called "friends" and tried to make new friends. But it wasn't going as well as I though it would be. I've made about 6 friends during my freshmen year but they ended up moving schools in the middle of the school year. As the year went on to my sophomore year my so-called "friends" got expelled for not coming to school so I had a little more breathing space in the school. Nothing was different in my sophomore year and my freshmen year. But my current junior year is totally different. I joined leadership and this forced me to be more outgoing. I've started to make more friends and I became less anti-social. Joining leadership has really changed my life. Although I'm bombarded with work, I don't really mind. Leadership has made me realize who my real friends are. They make me feel like I have a second family. These people are all new to me but they mean everything in my life.

EPT Essay

In the media nowadays, celebrities have been promoting products. You can see all types of promotions everywhere. On the internet, on the T.V., and on your phone. In Jozui's argument, she says that celebrities promoting a certain product can be misleading. If a celebrity is promoting a new car, everyone is going to assume that they ride that car and buy it. That goes with all of the other products. Lets say that a celebrity comes out on a condom commercial. All of the people who saw that commercial are going to start buying that condom just because a celebrity was there. People don't listen to the product information. They care about who use it and how they use it. If a celebrity reveals that he uses a condom as a balloon, people are going to start using condoms as balloons. In modern days, people care more about the trends. If they don't follow a certain trend, then they are considered an outsider by their friends or family. Just like the Harlem Shake for example. As soon as your friends start doing it, you have to do it too. This may be known as bandwagon. Bandwagon is when one decides to do stuff because of either peer pressure or because they want to fit into the community. The more you know about the latest trend the more you fit into the internet community. This may not seem like a big deal but then it is. We use technology every single day. Our lives are based on technology nowadays. You are using the internet to read this blog right now. Everywhere you go someone is using their phones to check their social medias.

What is an American?

What is an American? Well, they're people. Americans are people are people who live in America. Just as all of the other races, Americans have different personalities as  well as "status." First, there are the rich Americans, Then, there are the poor Americans, Lastly, there are the traveling Americans.

The poor Americans are usually farmers or factory workers. these people work about 16 hours a day and don't get payed enough to feed their family. After work, they only have 2-4 hours of sleep/rest before going back to work. You can say that their life is like an iPod on replay. Its the same thing over and over until they die. A farmer's life is different though. They grow food for companies but the thing is that they can't grow anything they want. They have to grow one specific crop to sell to the companies. If they don't grow the crops in time, they either get payed less or the companies don't buy from them anymore.

The diverse Americans are usually the rich Americans. Note that this is an example from the 1700s to the 1800s.  These Americans usually own plantations or they are of royalty.  When their child is of age, they usually send them to marry a different ethnicity. That way they can get more bond. With more bonds, they can get more money.

The Americans that likes to travel are usually in between the wealthy and the middle class.  These people go around the world since they got nothing better to spend money on. They would buy everything that seems interesting to them and would still have enough money to go to 5 different countries.

There are many types of Americans around the world. After all, we are all just people. We make the same mistakes and we also may have the same interests despite our ethnicity. Our ethnicity only separates us from the cultures but in the end, we are still the same people. Despite being an American  or not in the end, we are still people.