A peculiar day

    It was  a Friday morning in my school. It was the most peculiar day I ever had. It was one of those days when you laugh so hard your stomach hurts. One of those days you will probably remember for a long time. I can describe that Friday as no other word but “peculiar”. It was strange, out of common, but a very hilarious day.

   Like I said it was in the morning, and seventeen students out of twenty-seven arrived that they at my class. The class seemed very empty. We were all desperate, because we are only missing 3 weeks of school to finish our junior year. None of us wanted to receive any of the classes, and we weren’t receiving many assignments, since almost half of the class didn’t arrived that day.

    Anyway, like I said, we were sleepy. My best friend Juan Pablo and me began to make a bed out of desks. There wasn’t any teacher in the class period, and don’t ask me why. We line up 5 desks in a row. Our school desks, are those desks that have the chair already glued to the table, so we made it, we had “beds” for us. Like I am a little short, not as everyone always bothers me, but just a little below normal, I had to use the chairs, and Juan Pablo the tables.

   We were there resting, not doing anything interesting at all, when Rossil arrived to the classroom. What was Rossil doing in the middle of a class period in the classroom anyway? He doesn’t even belong to our section, but like said; it was an uncommon, out of normal day.  Rossil wanted to rest at our bed to, so I got up to let Rossil enjoy the bed, but Juan Pablo disagreed. Juan Pablo refused to get up of the bed, and this is when the fun part began.

     Juan Pablo was too tired to even get up of our bed. Kathy, Camila, and Silvia were there too, along with Rossil, Juan Pablo, and me. Kathy turned around, and looked at me. We connected at that moment, “OH YESS”, we had the same idea. We both got on top of Juan Pablo and started jumping. Of course we weren´t standing up on top of his back, we were just sitting in his back. We were singing songs Juan Pablo always sang, mocking him, and causing pain! SPRING BREAK! SPRING BREAK! That was the song we were singing on top of Juan Pablo. He was yelling and shouting STOP! PLEASE!

   Then Juan Pablo manages to get up, he was suffocating, and Kathy and me were laughing very hard. Then, I had the worst idea of all and lay up in our bed. What a great idea? I don’t think so. Out of knower Juan Pablo grabbed a rim, and started rolling it all over my head. My head was practically bouncing over the desk, and I was laughing so hard I couldn’t even pronounced the word “STOP”.  Meanwhile Juan Pablo was creating a brain damage to my head, Camila took Rossil’s shoe and put it in the middle of the outside of the window, in a way Rossil couldn’t reach it very easily.

So picture this, my head smashing with the table, Juan Pablo looking like a crazy man throwing the rim on top of me, Rossil was trying to grab his shoe with a ruler, Camila, Kathy and Silvia were laughing their buts out, and that’s were I began to think. I was laughing so hard I could even speak, and my head was still bouncing on the desk, but I was disconnected. At that particular and peculiar moment, I began to realize how happy I really am. I have the best friends I could ever ask for, the one’s that make the silliest and uncommon things. Where did Juan Pablo found a rim anyway?

     Still, at this very precise moment I knew that we often complain about many things. We don’t want to go to school because it is really boring, but it is up to us. That moment when my head and my brain where turning into little pieces, I realized we are the ones that choose how we are going to spend the rest of our lives. We can either take no advantage of our day, complaining how boring and ordinary it can become, or you can laugh, make the craziest thing it can occur to you, and make the best of it… It all depends on you after all. Life is to short to be complaining, so live it! 

Not going to be defeated

EXTRA CREDIT:

    The worst feeling of all is to feel defeated. A defeated person is the one that doesn’t know the word “success”. In order to be a successful person, you have to know its meaning. Success means going beyond. Looking far away from where you are. Being successful means to have dreams and aspirations.  Making everything possible in order to make your dreams come true. I have a dream. I want to me a doctor when I’m older.

     I spent all this past months making research of the best medical schools in the world. I even watched a movie called Gifted Hands. This movie talks about Dr. Carson’s life, and how he succeeded from being a black boy with no money, to the best neurosurgeon in the whole entire world. He is a real inspiration. In the movie, you can see how his mother used to tell him that he can do anything everybody else does, only that he can do it better. What really defined my career as paediatrician was a medical trip I had with organization called Helps International.

     Turns out medical careers are really expensive. You need to have either a scholarship in a good university, or have a lot of money in order to pay all the expenses a medical career can bring. I always thought my parents would support me in anything I wanted to become. Just like in the movie. I always pictured my dad and my mom telling me that I can be anything I wanted to become, as long as I make an effort in it. Turns out it has been nothing like that. I don’t have the support of none of my both parents, and even one of them believes I can be successful as a doctor. After various fights with my mom, she told me that she doesn’t have the money to get me into the UFM, the greatest university of medicine in Guatemala, and that she was not going to let me enter the public university, which is good to, because it is to dangerous for me to enter a public faculty.

     I know my parents, and I can see that they both think I am not going to succeed. I know them both well enough to know, that for the first time, they think I am going to fail in my medical career. What they don’t know is how bad I want to become a doctor, and how I can achieve to get a scholarship in the university they cant afford. Not to be vane, but I make no effort at all in the school I am, and I still have annual average of ninety percent. I love science, chemistry, math, biology, and I can’t see a reason why I cannot make it. Maybe it is because I am a woman, or because they simply believe that I am going to fail.

       I am not defeated yet. I will get in the university I want, and I am going to be successful. I may not have the money to pay all the expenses, but I will find a way. When you want something so badly, specially when we talk about our OWN future, we can make huge things happen. I am young, and I have enormous dreams and aspirations for my future. If I want to be a doctor, I will be one. The only thing between success and failure is myself. Maybe they are testing me to see if I really want to study medicine. If being a doctor is my dream. I will put my heart and soul in order to succeed.

    I’m not saying I don’t need my parents support, because of everything, it is one of the things I need the most. But I discovered that the sixteen years I have lived with them, they don’t know me completely. I have a dream, like every single teenager has. I don’t have my parents support, but I have the determination and the strength to get through all the obstacles. If I say I want to be a doctor, is because I will. I know the sacrifices being a doctor brings. I know I have a long journey yet, but am not ready to give up.

Who said older sisters are always right?

EXTRA CREDIT:

       It was ten years ago, when my sister and me were riding the bus to our school. We were on the front rows of the bus, looking at the grey sky, listening to the rain and lightning-bolts, and having a very mature conversation. We were talking about chocolate. I was six years, and my sister had approximately eight. We were discussing how delicious it would be to have at least one little piece of chocolate for each one of us. We were there, in the bus, sitting with our lunch boxes in our legs, looking at the window, and having a very huge appetitive for chocolate.

   Ever since I was a little girl, I always had admiration for my oldest sister. I always copied what she does, or at least I tried. The cloth she put on one week, I put it the next week. I think every kid who has an oldest brother or sister can understand my feelings toward her. I believed everything she used to tell me. I even listened to the music she liked, and her favourite TV shows, were my favourite to.

    Back to the bus ride, we were still talking about chocolate. We began to discuss how chocolate was created. She looked down the window and pointed a pool of soil, created by all the rain. She told me “Gaby, can you see that pool of soil over there? Well that’s how chocolate is created”. I was so impressed about how ignorant I had been my past 6 years of life. I had chocolate everywhere! Believe it or not, I really though this discovery was one of the greatest of all.

       She began to explain to me how when the rain and the soil mixed in the ground, chocolate was created. It depended on how sweet you wanted the chocolate to be, the amount of sugar you were going to add it. It all sounded very logical. I even thought of how selfish chocolate sellers were by not revealing their delicious secret to anyone. Anyway, we continue discussing my sister’s huge secret about chocolate. We were just arriving at school, when she told me not to tell anyone THE SECRET about chocolate. If I did, everybody will eat the soil and water mixture, and chocolate will somehow ran out.  I spend my whole day thinking how powerful I was to discover the mystery of chocolate.

     Finally, I arrived home, but there was no rain. I waited a whole week for the rain to come down the sky, so that I could make my delicious and mysterious chocolate bar. Until finally one day, just arriving from school, it started raining. I went secretly to the back yard of my house, with a cup of sugar in my hand. I looked for the most abundant pond of soil and rain mixture. When I found THE POND, I started spreading sugar on top of it. There was a problem, because I forgot my spoon. I didn’t have any time to get back and grab a spoon. What if my sister was secretly watching me and ate my chocolate?

        I was there, sitting at the wet grass, on my knees, and with my both hands I grabbed a pile of my personalise chocolate. It sounded glorious. The type of glory, when a light comes randomly from the sky illuminating everything, and the song Alleluia starts sounding. I thought how stupid people were all this time while I was approaching the pile of sand in my mouth.  Yes, I did it…

      I ate a whole pile of sand, with sugar on it. It tasted nothing like chocolate for my surprise. I began crying and went running back to my house, with my hands and mouth full of dirty soil. I went with my mom, and I explained to her my misfortunate event. She laughed, and told me that my sister was lying to me. Turns out chocolate cannot come out from soil and rain mixture. I can only say this was a lesson for me. Ever since that day, I no longer believe anything my sister tells me. For my disappointment, she is not always right.

Changes

        Not everyone has the opportunity to live in different countries.  Not everyone thinks moving from one country to another, is an opportunity.  Changes can be either defined as a crisis, or as an improvement. Whenever people see a change in any part of their life, the word ‘’crisis’’ rapidly appears in their mind, but they have to learn that sometimes, changes are improvements in our lives. Changes sometimes happen for a reason. We don’t have to see changes as a crisis, but as a way of improvement, to overcome ourselves. When you make a change from one country to another, the changes you feel the most are the weather, the people, and the landscapes each country posses.

     When I was ten years old, my dad was asked to move from Guatemala to Costa Rica for business. Guess what? Crisis came to me. I couldn’t even have the thought of leaving all my family and friends.  It wasn’t not only that, but the idea of having to change everything. Suddenly, the word “change” began to appear in every single place I used to go, when months before I used to barely say that word. Change of house, friends, bedroom, food, school, cars, furniture, phone number, address, because every single thing I had was going to change. The problem was that I had only ten years old, and what can a ten-year-old girl do to picture all of these changes at once.

     We did it, we moved from one country to the other. This was where the real changes began. My first impression was the weather. You can see Guatemala as a cold country. The weather is both hot and cold, which makes the perfect weather combination. In the summer, Guatemala becomes lightly hot, and in the winter it rains a lot, and it gets very cold. The perfect climate to take a hot chocolate and watch a movie, but usually it has a “perfect climate”. On the other hand, Costa Rica has a permanent hot weather, which is beautiful, because the sun is always raised up above.  Whether it is winter or summer, you will never be cold. The ideal weather to take a tan, and a long swim at the pool.

       Another first impression was the people. In Guatemala, we have two types of people. People who work in restaurants, stores, and any other places, are usually very nice, are aware of your concerns, kind, sympathetic, and generous persons. On the other hand we have the insecurity, which comes from the Guatemalan people who are dishonest, impolite, dangerous and violent. Both types of Guatemalan people are usually very short. If you compare Guatemalan people to the people who live in Costa Rica, the people who live in Costa Rica, and work in the restaurants and any other places, aren’t as polite as the Guatemalan people. What Costa Rica has that Guatemala doesn’t is that in Costa Rica, you can take a walk at whatever time you like, in whatever place you like, security is everywhere.

      The biggest impression of all, are the landscapes. Guatemala’s landscapes include volcanoes and mountains. Guatemala is defined and recognized as a place that is surrounded by mountains and volcanoes. You can see the sunset hiding in the back of the mountains at six o’clock in the afternoon. Guatemala posses eternal spring, flowers are everywhere at anytime. All with their different types of colors, smells, and shapes. Costa Rica’s first impression to me was that green areas surrounded it. You could see green everywhere.  The streets, the houses, and any place, is surrounded by trees and plants that makes Costa Rica a tropical, and beautiful place.

     You have these two beautiful places, unique in their own forms, which make each one of them beautiful as they are. That change from Guatemala to Costa Rica, stopped being a crisis to me, the moment I arrived Costa Rica. Guatemala and Costa Rica are magnificent places to live. I didn’t have any reason to worry. I knew that both places where different, but beautiful in their unique way. It wasn’t a crisis, it was an improvement, because I learn to live and adapt in both different places, and live a happy life in both of them. Whenever you see a change in your life, take the bright side, and enjoy that change. The change is there for some reason, you just have to learn to enjoy it. :)


“Nobody can go back and start a new beginning, but anyone can start today and make a new ending.”- Maria Robinson

The Most Important Person.

       Everyone admires or are suppose to admire a person that posses many principles and values, but what if the person I value the most doesn’t posses any principles or values, or even any humbleness at all? What if the person that is one of the most important influences in my life doesn’t fit with the pattern of an admirable person? They say that smart people learn from their own mistakes, but the smartest, learn from other people mistakes.

      You have this beautiful good-looking girl, with long blond hair, burnet skin, short, brown eyes, skinny, who has the best cloth, the biggest house, and that has everything she wants and more. That type of girl every guy wants to hang out with, the one that all high school girls want to be best friends with. She is supposed to have everything. Doesn’t she? She turns out to be my best friend. She lives in Panama City, and seems like she has all the money in the world. It is funny, because I wonder how a girl like me, middle-class, not complicated when it comes to fashion or anything at all, ends up being best friends with someone as glamorous as she is. When I lived in Panama I used to hang out with her every single day, in school and after school.

        She took me to parties, she lend me all the dresses that after the first use, she didn’t wanted to use anymore, she invited me to every restaurant or movie we went to see, and she sometimes even bought me cloth. It sounds amazing how can a 15-year all girl seems to have everything in the palm of her hand. She was outgoing, funny, and she got along with every single person she met. I wanted to be like her. Who wouldn’t wanted to be like that anyway?

      It is not because of that the reason why she made an influence in my life. It is because after discovering the real life of the girls that seem to have everything and more, I started valuing my simple and not complicated life. She did had all the material stuff she wanted and didn’t need, but after getting so close to her, and her family, I could see how material things, money, fashion, and being popular, really makes your life much more complicated than what it is supposed to be like. She had a materialistic and vanity perspective of her life, and everyone’s life.  Her family became so distant; they fought for ridiculous, not important things. Her arguments where about money, or that she didn’t had any dress to wear, when she had an entire closet, exclusive for dresses.

       How can a girl like that be one of the most important person in your life? The truth is, that all her life, in all different aspects, made me realize how lucky I was.   She taught me that the simpler you were, the fewer problems you’ll have. She always said to me how lucky I was to have the life I had, and she was true. She made me treasure my family, the most important thing in life. Family is the gift God gave to you, the most valuable of all things a person should have. Maybe I don’t posses the biggest house, or the best cloth, or even the perfect personality, but thanks to her I realized, I don’t need any of that in my life to be happy.

      Truth is, human beings will always want more than what they can have in their lives. Nothing seems ever to be good enough for us. Until suddenly, we have to learn that emotions, feelings, love, and family are the things that should be in our concerned. Maybe she is the type of person you superficially want to be like. Maybe, if you get to deeply know her life, you will start valuing yours as well. She is my best friend, maybe she doesn’t posses any values or principles an admirable person should posses, but she will always be the person who taught me the most important lesson in my life. Not only lesson, but a way of living, simple and free.

Humility does not mean thinking less of yourself than of other people, nor does it mean having a low opinion of your own gifts.  It means freedom from thinking about yourself at all.  ~William Temple