Poetry Class

Today I woke up happy because it’s Friday. My leg was getting better; it wasn't hurting as much no more.  After three days that I haven’t eaten breakfast, I finally ate breakfast this morning. We were not going to have a class lesson today, so I was happy for that too. Achy was not going to come today, she didn't tell us why. She only told us that we were going to have a poetry workshop with a teacher name Britteney. That Kemi was going to come in the morning, but Britteney was going to be charge of the class.

I went down to the Dining Hall, happy that finally I was going to eat. When I entered the Dining Hall Alexa and Oyin were coming out. We said hi and bye to each other. When I was done eating, I walked to my class. I arrived to my class and I started working on my personal story. Then Kemi stepped into the room, she told us to start working on our journal.  I was writing about the first time I went to Disneyland with my family. 

Then, Britteney came in to the class and introduced herself.  She has been writing poetry since 3^rd grade. She also told us that she was advanced in school and she was smarter than the others students. The others students used to made fun of her because of that. Then she decided to not speak to no one at school. Then they put her in special education, so she can be able to let her emotions out because she wouldn't speak. Then, the teachers from the special Ed class wanted her to talk. She didn't speak a word to them. She said that she didn't speak for six months. Then they gave her a paper. They told her to write down how she feels. She thought this was the opportunity to express herself to them. Then she wrote her first poem. The teachers then recognized how smart she was and started a poetry club. Then she joined the club. At age sixteen she started teaching poetry.

I decided to take a picture of the Midway

Then, Britteney read two poems about people describing their body. Then she told to write ten things to describe our body. After that, she told us to write ten thing of how you would describe your perfect partner. She also, made us write down three people with the ideal body. She gave us three options to write down a poem. First, describe your body, write down about your perfect partner, and write a letter to your ideal person. She gave us thirty minutes to work on it. I wrote about my perfect partner. Then she let us out at 12 PM to get lunch and come back at 1 PM. I went to get lunch. When I finished I went to my room and take a thirty minute nap. I put my alarm to go off at 12:45 PM. My alarm went off, I put my backpack on. I started walking to class. When I arrive at my class, when I everyone was in the class, Britteney started another workshop. She gave us a paper that had two poems one in the front and back. She said we were going to read reverse poems. Reverse poems are poetry that you can you read it from top to bottom and vice versa. I liked the first poem name, “Lost Generation,” by Jonathan Reed. I thought it was really great poem and what shocked me was that a fourteen years old kid wrote it. Our next workshop is to come up with a reverse poem. It needs to be at least six lines or more. I wrote about my community. When she told us to stop we needed to share one of our poems that we wrote. I shared my community poem. When everyone was done reading, she let us go.

The end of the Midway next to International House

I came to my room, started to work on my personal story. Then, I needed to get ready to go meet Pamela. I walked to International House, I was in a good mood because two days ago I had lost my camera case in the fifth floor. I had checked the fifth floor for two days straight, no sign of my case. Today I went up and looked for it again. My eyes couldn't believe what I was seeing my camera case was there lying down in the couch where I had left it two days ago. I got so happy because inside my case I have the charger for my camera. Finding my camera made my day.

Pamela and the beautiful water fountain.

When I arrived to International House, Pamela was waiting for me outside her office already. She asked me the same question that she asks every day, “Where you want to work today?” I always tell her outside because the yard is so beautiful in there, it has a water fountain. Today we worked on my personal essay that I had sent her in the morning by email. She marked all the errors down that I had on my essay. She told that we going to focus on my verbs ending, verb tense, comma splice, and prepositions. She went over them, but it was up to me to go back and fix it. She gave me feedback on things that I should add in the story and take out. Also, she told me where I need to be more specific, so my reader can be able to follow my story. Whenever I had a comma slice, she made me read the sentence. She also told me why it was called a comma slice. It’s when a writer put commas where it takes the job of a period. With the verbs ending she made me read the words some needed the –ed at the end, with others I needed to change the word to a past tense verb. We finished the whole story that wasn't done, but it was going to be done by tonight.

The girls playing card

I walked back to my room, left my backpack, came down to the Dining Hall to eat dinner. I met up with Alexa and Oyin, we sat down together to eat. I would have like to stay there with them but I needed to finish my story, so I went upstairs to my room. When I got to my room, I was tired; I decided to take a thirty minute nap. When I woke up from my nap I started working on my last paragraph of my story. When I was done with my story, I went down to Halperin Lounge to join the girls. They were playing cards and I joined them. Later, we started working on our blogs and when we were done with it, we’d go to sleep.