A Trip Across the World
December 9, 2015
Junior, Victoria Lopez, shares her thoughts and feelings about the mission trip she took to Romania, the first European country she has ever stepped foot in, accompanied by her fellow church members over Thanksgiving break.
Q1: How is Romanian culture similar/different to American culture?
A1: They [Romanians] dress really nice. Dressing nice for us [Americans] is like dressing casual for them. They also walk everywhere, especially because taxi fare is really expensive; you don’t see many cars. The language was easier for me to understand because of my Spanish background, since Romanian comes from Latin.
Q2: What did you take away from the trip?
A2: Honestly, I learned the importance of prayer and discipleship and to really live like a Christian.
Q3: What is one significant memory from the trip that you will never forget?
A3: I witnessed the residual effects of communism. One of the girls I met, she still remembers being a kid and rationing when communism still existed. Then one of the taxi drivers, while talking to him, he said that he wishes it were back to communism because at least everyone was paid the same. Some people really liked communism because now, like the cab driver, people don’t get paid as much; I got to see the different perspectives.
Q4: How did you recover from the jetlag?
A4: Well I got home like around three in the afternoon and then I fell asleep for like fourteen hours. Going there, you go forward ten hours so it was easy for me to recover from the jetlag but coming back was harder. It took me four to five days to get back to the hang of things.
Q5: Would you ever like to go back to Romania in the future? If so, why?
A5: Yes! I’m actually planning on going back after graduation for three months because I feel like I fell in love with the country. The gypsy family we stayed with were so loving and I felt like I was family.
“I want to improve my writing,” Jimenez said, “not only for high school English, but for college as well.”
Jimenez chose to take AP Language and Composition because she wants to rectify any mistakes she has in her writing before she writes her prompt to apply to college.
“I chose to take AP Language and Composition because I felt with my experience in Honors 10 and the skills I developed that I would succeed in the class,” junior, Victoria Lopez said. “I like to challenge myself.”
Lopez and Jimenez feels comfortable in her AP class because she is surrounded by students who are passionate to learn and motivated to pursue the same goal.
“I like to write and I enjoyed Honors English 10 with Ms. Kasner,” junior, Andrew Bilodeau said, “so an opportunity to become a better writer in a subject I enjoy was to hard to pass up.”
Bilodeau has taken three years of AP/Honors English classes at Downey High School, similarly to Jimenez. AP Language and Composition includes more discussion of themes and broader concepts, making the class more interactive, rather than a traditional English class. In Bilodeau’s and Jimenez’s opinion it is a more productive learning environment.
Jimenez hopes to develop her writing skills on her writing because she believes writing is a central skill of everyday life and will be useful for her in the future.
“Nobody in this school really knows each other,” Fregoso said. “I mean there are so many students now, so I believe it is possible to have them get to know one another by getting to read each others’ stories on Downey Legend.”
If she is able to promote newspaper to the students, then those students can read stories about others’ lives and view them differently.
“Many people, many stories,” Fregoso said, “and when students pass each other without knowing who they're walking by, mainly because of how they dress or how they talk, it's kind of sad, because one can't simply judge a book by its cover.”
She knows how it feels to walk past students and not know who they are. During her freshman year, Fregoso moved to Downey High from St. Emydius, a private middle school, that only had about 250 students.
“That school was so little,” Fregoso said, “almost everyone knew each other.”
During the middle of her sophomore year, former newspaper writer, Akhila Nalamilli, mentioned the Downey Legend newspaper with Fregoso.
“Angelica is a very nice girl,” Nalamilli said. “Her writing is amazingly done and a great use for newspaper.”
Fregoso's love for writing came to her when she was in first grade; as she started taking tests on The Magic Treehouse: Age of Dinosaurs, she loved the idea of being able to write her own stories and include her own characters and make her own world.
It is not really a goal to write those kinds of stories to this day, Fregoso pointed out. Joining newspaper was to become open-minded and to write actual stories of actual people rather than typing fiction.
“Although it seemed interesting to write what I want my characters to say and how I want my world to work out,” Fregoso said, “I think it's better to write what real characters say and how their worlds work.”
Knowing how she had a flowing passion to accomplish this goal, Norma Fregoso, mother of Angelica, agrees that she can do it.
“My daughter has always been a creative writer,” Mrs. Fregoso said. “Ever since she was a young child, she has expressed interest for writing stories.”
Fregoso's writing also inspired her friends to improve on various things like essays and CQTs.
“Angelica's very passionate and puts all her emotions into her work,” Carolina Marin, Fregoso's best friend said. “Not everyone has the ability to express themselves correctly, and I feel that she is capable of conveying her point thoroughly and emotionally without confusing or misleading the reader.”
With much more to experience, Fregoso patiently waits for what stories she will be writing about in newspaper, and to obtain knowledge about the lives of students, teachers, and the citizens of Downey.
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