Language

French Class. The vocabulary is getting harder and harder an I don't feel like I'm learning much. French is easier for me to understand compared to other students in my class. That is because I am already a fluent Spanish speaker. A lot of the vocabulary is similar. I love knowing three languages but I feel that during this year my knowledge of French hasn't developed.
I'm trying really hard to be able to make it to HP French next year. I really liked my French teacher last year. This year I fell that my teacher wastes a lot of time on nothing. This is my third year of French and my second year of high school. I was planning to take French all four years and so far I haven't changed my mind. I want to be fluent in French. If it's necessary, I will take three more years after high school to be good at it. I want to be able to sound like a native French speaker. I want to be able to be as good as I am in English.
I really want to learn more than just French. I want to be able to travel to many countries and be able to communicate with the people there. It would be the greatest thing in the world for me to learn five languages. I would like to learn more than that but I wouldn't want to forget my first languages.
I'm already forgetting Spanish and that is one of the worst feelings. I was born here in the U.S. and my first language was Spanish, but I love speaking french because I love the accent. All my family speaks Spanish and it's weird sometimes because I can't get my thought across. I feel really embarrassed when this happens. I feel like I am loosing a big part of my heritage. I feel like my family doesn't like it either. They know that I speak mostly English at school but of course they wouldn't want me to forget their language.
I would love to be a world translator. I like the thought of being able to talk to people from many other places in the world in their own language. Language is something very interesting to me. So far I have two languages down and I'm working on developing my third one. There will be more to come and that's for sure.
I have friends that speak many different languages and I think it would be cool to talk to them in their original language someday. I think learning many different languages would make me feel like I actually achieved something more important. That is one of my goals. I don't know how many more languages I will learn but I know that I don't want to forget my first one. That one will always be the most important. It won't matter where I live or who I'm married to or what languages my friends speak. I don't want to ever think about not being able to tak to my own family.That would be the worst thing in the world.

My Crisis of Faith

My crisis of faith happened about three years ago when my cousin Tony died. Other people of my family had died before him but none hit me as much as his. It was because I grew up with him. He was only eighteen when he passed away. I was thirteen. I still remember the night he left and never came back. He was at home with his girlfriend Teresa. Some of my cousins and I were playing Uno outside his house when someone came looking for him. The guy was short. He didn't have a shirt on and he had many tattoos. He scared me. He went into my cousin's house and came out with my cousin. I asked my cousin where he was going and he said he was just going to the store. He asked one of my other cousins, his brother, if he wanted to go too. My cousin said yes but he saw that his girlfriend made an angry face to his answer so he stayed. If he had gone then there would've been two deaths in our family. Hours passed and my cousin still hadn't come home. Everyone was worried. It seemed like his girlfriend didn't even care. It was around nine o'clock when my parents said it was time to go home. Some of my cousins and Teresa were outside. Teresa was talking on the phone saying something about a car accident and a hospital. When I heard that I had a really bad feeling. I couldn't sleep. I was so worried. I really had no idea what she was talking about but I had a strong feeling.
The next morning I realized that I had slept but I didn't know how long. I went straight in the shower as soon as I was fully awake. I had only been in the shower for about ten minutes when my mom came in crying telling me to hurry and get out because we needed to go. That hit me. Even though I wasn't sure of what I thought I was scared. I got out very fast and threw my clothes on.
My thoughts were confirmed when we got to my grandma's house. During the ride there nobody talked. I didn't want to ask questions. At my grandma's house everyone was quiet. Everybody was waiting for my grandma to come back from the hospital to tell us what happened. When she came into the house she looked like she was in shock. My mom was sitting on the couch and my grandma sat down next to her and started crying. My mom hugged her and then my grandma said, "Se nos fue nuestro nino Rosa. Nos dejo nuesro nino. Se fue. Se fue." Which means our boy left Rosa. He left us. He left. He left. My grandma was yelling that. Everyone had started crying. My cousin Alejandra was right next to me. Tony, my cousin who got in the accident, was her oldest brother. I tried my best to console her though it was kind of hard because I was also crying. That day was the July 3, 2007. 4Th of July will never again be a happy day for my family.
When that happened a question came into my head. "Why didn't God help him. Why did he let him die?" It was horrible. I started questioning my own belief. If God is good then why did he let people die? Why did he let innocent people suffer? We were good people. Why put us through all this pain? If he has so much power then why doesn't he use it to help us? I was and still am very religious but at that time I didn't know what to think. I started thinking "If he is real then why haven't I seen him or heard him or felt his presence. Why, if he knew what pain it would cause us to lose a family member? Why didn't he stop it?" I didn't know what to believe.
When it was time for the ceremony God was not in my head at all until the Father said that all our family had to go up to the altar to say a prayer. I really didn't want to do it. I just didn't have faith in God anymore. The Father said that the prayer would help my cousins spirit. I didn't want to leave my cousins spirit with God. In the end of the discussion with myself I ended up going up to the altar. It wasn't until the Father said the prayer that I felt safe; he said something like, "He is now with God. In a better place where no more harm will come and that one day we would see him again." That made something happen inside me.
After the Father finished his prayer I went back to sit on a bench with my family. I still had tears in my eyes but I now believed that cousin would be fine. Yes he wouldn't be with us anymore but the thought of meeting with him again reassured me. This is what I learned growing up and I do believe it. Others have different beliefs but I know now that I truly believe this. My crisis of faith lasted a while. It was a time when I didn't understand what kind of world we lived in. I didn't know what to feel, how to act, what to say or what to think. After the ceremony I started to think straight. Yes I still cry myself sometimes thinking about my cousin but I know that it had to happen sometime. I still don't understand why it happened so soon. All I know is that God wanted it that way. I haven't had any more crisis. Now I feel more sure of my beliefs. Yes there will be more moments like this one but I learned that after the sadness comes understanding.
As for the guy who took Tony that day, I never saw him again. He was sent to jail. He tried apologizing to our family but no one wanted to talk to him. We never found out what happened the night of the 3rd of July but we knew that it was caused but the guy with all the tattoos. This is one memory that I will never forget.

Technology

A few years ago I didn't have a phone nor an I-Pod. I was happy. Ididn't feel like it was neccassary to have those things. Well things changed. Now I have both and I can't live without them. I love music and I love talking on the phone.

I can't go a day without listening to my I-Pod. I go to sleep with it too. Things have changed a lot. I didn't have an I-Pod when everyone else had one. I had to wait for one because my parents thought I didn't need one. They ended up getting me one anyway. I know that they didn't regret giving me one because they saw how happy I was.

I got my phone a lot sooner. The only reason why I got a phone was because I was going on to middle school and I would need to be calling my dad to pick me up. If it wasn't for that big change I probably wouldn't have a phone now. At first I got in trouble a lot for wsting too many minutes. Later I got in trouble for not using it enough. I don't know what they epect. This month I'm for sure going to get in trouble. I used up all of my minutes and wasted most of the rollover minutes. The worst they can do is take my phone away but I don't want that to happen.

My mom understands that I'm attached to my things. I know she wouldn't like to take them away but she will do what she thinks she has to do. Even if it makes me unhappy. If ever she did take them away I don't know how I would take it. I wouldn't be able to live without them for long. They are a part of my daily life now.

Valentine's day is coming up. That me...

Valentines day is coming up. That means that my sister's birthday and my cousins birthday is coming up. My sister's birthday is on the 13th and my cousin's is on the 15th. None on valentines day but close. We haven't planned anything for my sister's birthday. That's just the way my family is. We do a lot of our things last minute and I don't like that. I like knowing what's going to happen. I hate being rushed. That's one of the reasons why I didn't want a birthday party last year. My sister is turning eleven and my cousin is turning fourteen.
For my cousin that means one more year until her big celebration. Right now she doesn't know where she wants to have or if she's going to have it at all. Her mom, my aunt, hasn't really talked about the subject and that is not a good thing. I wouldn't want the sane thing that happened to me to happen to her. I want everything for her celebration to be planned and organized. I don't know what I can do for her but I'll find something.
It's scary for me watching my little sister grow up. I know that it is inevitable for her to change but I don't want her to.In two years I'm probably going to be out of my house and I wonder what problems my sister will give my mother. My sister has an attitude. I wouldn't want my mom to have to deal with an even bigger attitude when my sister reaches her teen years. I'm not really worried about my dad because I know he can handle it.I I don't want to think about what kind of person she'll be when I'm gone. If she keeps doing what she's doing nobody will stand her any more.
Well, I love my sister and of course she has a good side. I don't know what I would do without her. I love my cousin too. I don't get to see her as much as I would like to. That's one of the reasons why I want to celebrate her birthday this coming up Sunday along with my sister. I would've liked to celebrate it on Saturday but my parents are going dancing. February is a special month because of all the birthdays. That's why valentines day makes me happy.

Sisters

"If you don't understand how a women could both love her sister dearly and awant to wring her neck at th same time, then you were probably an only child." - Linda Sunshine
I completely agree with this quote. I have a younger sister. I'm five years older than her and we have completely different personalities. I love her. I tell her everything. A lot of my cousins know a lot about what goes on with me but my little sister knows all the details. Sometimes I wonder if I bore her with all my talking. It seems like he likes to listen to me. I like coming home on a bad day and talking to her.
Yes we do have our fights like any other siblings. Our fights are always over something small. I can't be mad at her for too long. When we do fight she doesn't holdback. I think it's because she knows I wouldn't hurt her. Sometimes I just want her to get out of my life, but as soon as that thought comes in my head another thoght follows, "What am I thinking." It scares me to think that one day I will never see her again, or that one day she will never see me again.
I always think about how my relationship is with her. I know that whenever I have problems she is always there even if she can't give me advice on what to do. She is very mature for her age. My brother is only one year younger than me and she is more mature than him. They say that girls mature faster than boys but there is a four year difference between their ages.
As I said before I love my sister. In ten years I still see myself coming to talk to her about my problems. By then I'm pretty sure she's going to have many problems of her own and I'm going to listen and give her advice as she does for me now.