My Trip to NY

I’ve been back from NY for a week or two now and just haven't had time to write about it until now. While I was there I saw so many amazing things and I really had a great time-for the most part... the only problem was, instead of going there for a family vacation, I had to go with HCC (Houston Children's Choir) and it was very...restricted. We were all in groups of 5-7 people and in my group were; Evelyn, Vivian, Valeria, Alice, and Jahnavi. They were all very friendly, other than Vivian that is, and I was very glad that I got to get to know them all.
If you ever go to NY, be prepared to spend almost 3x as much money on almost everything you buy! Everything is so overpriced, even when I split a meal it was still more money than what we would pay in Houston!!! We went to planet Hollywood (which was super cool!) and the food was hideously over-priced (in my opinion anyway), my chaperone said that we were paying for the décor and when the bill came; I definitely thought she was right! There were such cool things to see, but I only took 1 picture-the prom dress and tuxedo from twilight, I wanted to take a picture of all of the titanic stuff, but there were too many people in the way, so I decided not to. I also saw Robert Patterson’s hand print and compared it to mine, his hands are HUGE! The gift shop, like all of the other ones was very, very, VERY pricey! The t-shirts were all $20-$30 and all they had on them was “planet Hollywood”! I also found a tiny, metal replica of the empire state building and it was $20! So yeah, the prices were ridiculous.
We got to go to the top of the empire state building and let me tell you, the view was incredible! You could see miles and miles of NY, it was so cool! We were there around evening time and when the sun set it was one of the most beautiful things I’ve ever seen. I paid for one of those telescope looking things where you can see everything magnified/closer and was able to see things with so much more detail, it was definitely worth 50 cents and if you ever go there make sure you bring change because it is by far worth it.
We saw the Broadway play called “Mary Poppins” and I actually don’t really care for the movie, but I would see the play again in a millisecond! We weren’t allowed to take pictures while the play was going on (the flashes would probably distract the actors/actresses), but I was able to take a picture of the Broadway stage before the play started and it was magnificent. The embellishment and just all the details were so beautiful; I probably couldn’t describe it if I tried. It was such a great experience, the only down-side was that it lasted until very late and we weren’t able to be in bed until about 1:00-2:00 and we had to get up around 5:30 the next morning. Needless to say most people fell asleep during rehearsal, I almost did a couple of times, but I was able to keep myself awake (probably because I was right in front of the director…).
On the last day there we went to the statue of liberty! We got there on a ferry, and the ride was very enjoyable-it was fun to see NY from that view. Originally we were going to go up in the statue of liberty in the torch, but then we found out it would take a lot longer than we had expected so Mr. Steve/our director told us that we would have to do me back to NY with our parents and go up with them. It was really cool to see it, I knew it was huge, but the size of it still shocked me! It was amazing to see such a big part of our history and how it represented freedom-it was so old, when I looked into another one of those telescope looking things I was able to see the details of it and how long it had been there. After I looked at it for awhile and took some pictures I went to the gift shop and picked out a souvenir, but of course the line took forever and when I was about to pay, one of the older girls made me get out of line because the boat was loading so we had to run to get there in time-we made the boat, but I was not happy to have left my souvenir at the gift shop. We were going to go to Ellis Island now, again I enjoyed the trip and when we arrived at the island we went to this old museum. This was where immigrants came and tried to become citizens and where they were checked to make sure they had no contagious, foreign diseases (the hospital where they would go to be treated was across from the museum). My chaperone had to take care of something so my group had to join another one. The problem with this was that their chaperone insisted on telling about everything herself, instead of letting us quietly read the information for ourselves. This wouldn’t have been so bad if she hadn’t made everything sound as boring as possible, but sadly she was not the nicest chaperone, or one who ever showed any emotion (other than when she yelled and was mad…). She finally let us go to the gift shop because it was a unanimous vote towards that rather than learning more facts. In the gift shop I was able to get small gifts for my family, some homemade strawberry jam for my parents, and a really cute peace sign key chain that said Ellis island on the back of it for my sister (I also got a bag for myself that said different things about NY all over it).
Last but not least, my performance at Carnegie hall. Surprisingly, compared to Broadway the décor was very simple. It was huge though; there was enough seating area for thousands of people! I would say a little more than half of the seating area was full, so our outcome was pretty good! It was very stressful because Mr.Steve was giving us what he would consider a “pep talk”, but I would call it something entirely different. I say this because instead of making me feel ready and excited, it depressed me and made me scared to go on because he basically told us we weren’t living up to his INCREDIBLY high standards, it’s ridiculous how perfect he expects us to be sometimes, and I am NOT overreacting at all. The best compliment he’s ever given us was saying “great”!!! Let’s just say he’s very hard to please. Our performance did turn out very well though, and it made me feel proud.
I will be coming back to NY someday, that’s for sure!

Schools Out

Well, its official-I graduated 5th grade and I’m no longer in elementary school. It’s weird...every summer before this one I’ve been so happy that I have 3 months to do whatever I want, not worry about homework, grades, and not having to wake up at 6:30 every morning (Monday Friday anyway) but this one is different. It dawned on me that I’d never answer, "I go to mark twain" ever again. Next year, I won't be at the top of the food chain-I’ll be at the bottom. I know that I will visit mark twain to see everyone again, but whenever I walk into that school, instead of being a student there, I’ll be a visitor...I’ll never be a student at mark twain again, just a former student. I’m so excited for middle school, but honestly, I’m really scared too. Not many of my friends are attending Lanier with me and what if the ones that are, aren't in any of my classes? Or don't have the same lunchtime as I do? What if it takes ma a long time to make new friends? Or even worse, what if I don't make any new friends? These are the kind of questions keeping me a awake at night...I want to be grown up and even more so I want to do grown up things, but at the same time I’m still that 7 year old too afraid to go in the deep end of a swimming pool. Back then I loved swimming and I wanted to go deeper, but I didn't until I was ready and when I was, despite my fear of drowning I was able to tread water and I was ok. Maybe that's how it will be with middle school, but maybe not...I just can't help worrying about it, it's just how I am I guess.