Zykia

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As a child, I went on many family vacations. My family loved to travel. For three years in a row, we went on three different cruises for Thanksgiving. The years we didn’t go on a cruise, we went to Disney World. We also went to Los Angeles, Miami, Las Vegas, Washington D.C, and San Francisco. I could go on and on but those are the places that stood out to me the most. I know that I have been to more places than an average adult and child and I’m only seventeen years old. I’m also not going to stop here either, I will continue to travel until I leave the earth. Even though I have been on many trips, my favorite vacation would have to be the first time I went to Disney.
The first time I went to Disney World, I was four years old. This trip was a little more special to me because it was with the people I loved the most. I went with my mom, my dad, and my favorite brother Zaius. Usually, when my families go on trips, it’s over 30 family members, but this particular time, it was only my close family. I think we went on a secret trip without the rest of the family. This trip was my favorite because it was a surprise. We thought that we were just visiting my uncle and Dallas when we got in the car. But the ride was long and we both fell asleep. When my mom woke up me and Zaius, we were right in front of the “Welcome to Disney World” sign. It was absolutely beautiful. I enjoyed meeting all of the characters I watched on television and spending time with my loved ones.

A deep fake is a type of technology that can change your face to someone else’s face and it looks realistic. It works by making the same motions and gestures as the person you’re trying to be. If the background seems blurred or if there are awkward-looking shadows, then those are signs that the videos are fake. The voice of the person is also a dead giveaway of the videos being fake. Many false videos that are giving wrong information are on the horizon for detection. We should address this issue by making these videos illegal unless it’s used for movies or things of that sort.
In my opinion, this technology is cool and all but it’s overstepping its boundaries. It’s good for movies or things we actually need them for but it’s not cool to use as a joke for serious matters. These videos should not be used to make someone else look bad. I feel like the most we should be able to do is use social media filters but not all of this extra stuff. Noting more, nothing less. Why would anyone want to act like someone else, to begin with? It just doesn’t make sense. Honestly, technology is only going to get better. When technology comes out with a new version of deep fakes, it’s going to be more challenging to tell the deep fakes apart from real parties.

What is my best memory from last year? Last year was definitely like no other. In my lifetime, no other can top the year 2020. Although I talk about this year a great deal, my best memories were during the quarantine. The new idea of COVID was a hard pill to swallow, but I definitely had some of the best memories during this time. I loved how I got to spend time with my family over this crazy period of my life. All of this was very much unexpected, but I honestly wouldn’t change a thing about it. I got to spend so much time with my brother who was supposed to leave for college in May of 2020. Instead, he reported to college in September of 2020. That gave me plenty of time to spend with my brother.

Growing up, I always thought about how much different my life would be when Zaius left for college. It was something that always stayed in the back of my mind. My brother is literally my other half, and I love him so much. We are literally twins that are two years apart. With that being said, if it wasn’t for the quarantine, the change would have been way too drastic for me. The quarantine allowed me to spend more time with my brother than I expected. Being that he was not able to report to campus due to COVID, I was able to create memories with my brother that I would never forget. In a way, I tend to think that was God’s way of showing me that he did understand how much my brother meant to me. I believe that is why God gave me some much time with him.

If you die right now, will you have any regrets? No, I would not have any regrets. If I did something, most likely I have done it for a reason. I don’t just go around doing crazy things for no reason at all. I try to live my life with no regrets. I also try not to be hard on myself for some things I have done. I say that because in a few years it will only be a memory. It would probably be something that I look back and laugh about. We grow from our mistakes so it’s no point to regret something.

Despite not having any regrets, I do apologize for what I think I’ve done wrong. I wouldn’t ever want to be disrespectful to anyone for something I’ve done wrong. For example, If someone hit me and I hit them back, I won’t apologize because you shouldn’t have hit me in the first place. I also wouldn’t regret that. But if I hit someone and they get mad, then I would apologize because that was rude. But I still wouldn’t regret it because apparently, I hit you for a reason. I would never hit someone for no reason. All and all, I will continue to live my life with no regrets.

What can you do now that you couldn’t do at the beginning of English III? As I think about this question, I go way back to the beginning of the school year. My whole school year has been pretty wild. I’ve been at home for most of my junior year. Honestly, I have to say that I don’t think that I improved much during that time while being at home. But being at school for about 2 weeks now, I’ve realized that I improved a lot in English. Just being in the class helped me get a sense of English again. I finally feel complete and that I am ready for anything.
Being back at school helped me get back in gear. I’ve caught up on many assignments and I also developed a pretty decent schedule for reading. Being that I came back to school when we had to do a group project, it definitely helped me with my group communication skills. I realized that I had to get it together quickly because I was not only working for myself, but I was working for my group as well. Even though I only read half of the book my group read, I still researched the topic I was given. Although it wasn’t a lot that I could do at the beginning of the year, I still see improvement in English from being back at school.

What is the difference between you and most people? In my opinion, I am very different from a lot of people. As a teenager, I’ve realized this more. Some things that others get excited about, I just don’t get excited about. Now, I’m not trying to sound like a dark person or anything, but I feel like I’m very mature for my age. For example, a lot of people my age worry about having a friend group or having many friends but for me, I don’t worry about any of that. Most of them talk about each other anyways and the love is never real. I chose quality over quantity in this situation. Most people want to fit in but I just want to have people that genuinely care about me. I want friends that I can trust and that I can learn from.
Overall, I have about 2 good friends. They are very solid. I would choose them over a group of friends any day. I picked up on this at a young age. When I was in middle school, I only had 2 friends. Even though I was considered popular, I still didn’t let that get in the way of way me getting a friend group. I never cared about popularity. Most teens want popularity but I just want real friends. Friend groups always have drama and I’m not that type of person. I can’t keep with drama because I hate negativity. I love to be around positive people who want the best for themselves unlike most people my age. That is why I believe that I’m different from other people around me.

The book that I chose to read was Freshers, I chose to read this book because before I know it, I will be in college. Before started to read this book, I didn’t know much about college. Even though my brother is a Freshman in college right now and he tries to tell me about college life, I still couldn’t seem to understand. But reading this book gave me a girl’s perspective of college. Just from the first chapter, I was hooked. I realized that I and the main character Phoebe had so much in common. As a character, Phoebe was very shy but she was willing to make new friends. Just like me, I’m not very social but I’m always willing to make new friends. She also changed completely when she got to college. Which is something I planned on doing in college. I want to change for the better and open up when I get to college. Reading how Phoebe started and how she turned out at the end of the book gave me many ideas of I how I wanted my college life to be.
I also read half of the book Run Rebel. This is the book that my group read as well. Unlike Freshers, Run Rebel is more about a teenage girl trying to find herself after going through trauma. For my project, I researched the topic of the effect trauma has on teens. After informing myself on this topic, I understood Amber more. Amber had so much pressure from her father’s expectations of her. She wanted to run track but her dad had other plans. He felt as if women should not do those “manly” things. This is why she wanted to fight for her freedom as well as her mother’s and sister’s freedom. Amber and I are similar because we both seem to fight for what we want. She also encouraged me to never give up, no matter who’s trying to stop me.

My future is something that I think about all day, everyday. My future is the reason why I try to work so hard now. It’s also impossible for me to not think about my future. Future is anything that’s not present. So if it’s morning time and I’m thinking about what I’m going to do later that night, I’m basically just thinking about my future. Another good example is if it’s a Thursday and I start to plan out what I’m doing over the weekend, that’s also me thinking about my future. But actually, that isn’t the future I’m talking about. I often think about my life after high school, college, or even my life after I have children. These thoughts run through my mind daily.

So, the question I have for myself is how would I describe my ideal life? Even though I should be able to answer this question very easily, it’s still hard for me to answer it because I have so much that I want for myself. But I will answer it as best as I can. To start off, I would like to be well off. As for my profession, I would like to be a OBGYN doctor. I’ve always wanted to be a doctor. I also would like to find my soulmate, a person who is meant just for me. I also would like to marry this man, and have healthy children. I want my children to go to private school to get the best education. I want to spend quality time with my family and travel with them. I want a life that I’m proud of. I want live a stress free life doing what I love. I could go on and on about the goals I would like to reach. Although life isn’t perfect, I still want to make the best of it. That is why I always think about my future because I only get one life and I don’t want to waste any time.

As I watched the video, there were many connections that I could make to Say Nothing, but the topics of religion and segregation stood out to me the most. During this time, religions were very different between separate regions, which led to more of a separation between the people. In both the video and the book, it mentioned how there were many protests that took place between the Protestants and Catholics. Due to people having separate religions, it was imperative to the religious community to discover and figure out what side they wanted to fight for. They only had to figure out what side they wanted to fight for because nobody’s life was spared. These people did not care whose lives they took or put in harm’s way with their acts.
In Belfast, the capital city in Northern Ireland, violence was very common. The Ireland’s Republican Army wanted to get rid of everyone who was not on their side. Everyone seemed to be against someone and it was hard to trust people. Ireland’s Republican Army would send people undercover to secretly kill off those who used to side with them. Honestly, during this time, people just wanted to live their lives safely. They only wanted to do fun everyday things with their family. This was also impossible because being that they were so used to living in fear, it started to be hard for people to do what they wanted. Although the video and Say Nothing had many connections, the topics of religion and segregation were the most interesting to me.