Create a story about a high school student from the states going somewhere new for a mission trip to help the locals there, nervously leaving behind his family for 3 weeks. The stu
writing test / quiz prep
Create a story about a high school student from the states going somewhere new for a mission trip to help the locals there, nervously leaving behind his family for 3 weeks. The student is nervous and can’t wait to see what the trip has in plan for him. He meets new people on this trip and sees new places that possibly remind him of the people and places from back home. Also he struggles on this trip with adjusting to the new languages, food, people, and simply the different lifestyle that he is shown and now has to help. On other hand he creates great relationships with new people he meets and also the students he came with, creating lifetime memories and lessons during his time on his mission trip with his school.
This story/memoir should examine your understanding of your identity markers. How can you help readers understand how this connects to others? What do you want readers to learn, not just about you, but maybe also about themselves?
Setting and scene are so important for stories. Rather than tell your story, how can you show your story? What details and context are necessary for readers to understand? This can be challenging because we know our stories in ways that others cannot, but I would invite you to consider the following:
-Are there concrete details that might help a reader understand what a place feels like? The colors of a wall, the texture of a carpet, the smell of a particular meal or dish as it’s prepared?
-Are there specific details about a person that might help us to imagine them a bit better? Do they always tap their foot while waiting for the bus? Do they wear a particular color? Did they have a cadence to their speech when they got excited?
BE CREATIVE (Names, Places, Situations, Adjustments)
This story/memoir is text-based, but you can still find ways to use images.
Would it help your story to have images? Would readers benefit from a picture? A map?
Requirements: 5-7 pages
Create a story about a high school student from the states going somewhere new for a missiontrip to help the locals there, nervously leaving behind his family for 3 weeks. The student isnervous and can’t wait to see what the trip has in plan for him. He meets new people on this tripand sees new places that possibly remind him of the people and places from back home. Alsohe struggles on this trip with adjusting to the new languages, food, people, and simply thedifferent lifestyle that he is shown and now has to help. On other hand he creates greatrelationships with new people he meets and also the students he came with, creating lifetimememories and lessons during his time on his mission trip with his school.??This story/memoir should examine your understanding of your identitymarkers. How can you help readers understand how this connects toothers? What do you want readers to learn, not just about you, but maybealso about themselves???Setting and scenes are so important for stories. Rather than tell your story,how can you show your story? What details and context are necessary forreaders to understand? This can be challenging because we know ourstories in ways that others cannot, but I would invite you to consider thefollowing:??-Are there concrete details that might help a reader understand what aplace feels like? The colors of a wall, the texture of a carpet, the smell of aparticular meal or dish as it’s prepared???-Are there specific details about a person that might help us to imaginethem a bit better? Do they always tap their foot while waiting for the bus?Do they wear a particular color? Did they have a cadence to their speechwhen they got excited???BE CREATIVE (Names, Places, Situations, Adjustments)??This story/memoir is text-based, but you can still find ways to use images.??Would it help your story to have images? Would readers benefit from apicture? A map?
Moving to Jordan
The curtain’s accordion fold whisks alongside its cold stark glass as I sit on my new but rented couch, pomegranate seeds in a bowl on the edge of its cushion waiting for me to move the wrong way and spill over onto the reflective hardwoods. What was I doing? Could I do this? Why me?, questions stemming from my ADHD flash in my head one after the other, sometimes simultaneously. As I sit and ponder, eating seed by seed, unaware this was not a meal, I watched the clock as it ticked, slower and slower by each second, waiting until my parents would wake up in North Carolina. As it seems I live now on the 16th floor in a skyscraper in Al-Webdei, Amman, Jordan. Just three days prior I had been living in Hebron, Palestine, learning a language I stuttered in answering why exactly I was studying. My 17th birthday came and went, pondering how I had done so much on my own and the now depressive state that had come with little to no energy nor interaction from the bustling street. I watch as the garbageman comes around, cats darting from over, under, and out of the big green rusted cargo bins. Three days of a teenager’s supposed dream, walking around my apartment in nothing but a robe, eating random veggies and mac and cheese, and watching cartoons I wondered why it wasn’t fulfilling. It is two weeks to the day that I left Palestine, experiencing an attempted kidnapping that I had yet to feel the trauma from, and start moving East. The amount of growth I had experienced in these months was astounding, coming from a small countryside town to a country such as Palestine, I became aware of not only other cultures but the oppression and brutality towards Palestinians. I had begun to love Palestine, with its rolling hills, no street laws, and kind-hearted people, to be completely honest it was a world opened up to my close-minded mentality living back home. Before now I had had a host family in Heileel (Hebron), or at least that was what it was advertised as. Living with a cold woman in her mid-thirties by the name of Marwa. I had built up anxiety just going into the kitchen these days. Sabah el heir ya Belle sho bidek akel alyom? I muttered, uhh akel? Asfa I don’t know what that means. She rolled her eyes storming out as she screamed to her nephew who was currently eating the cookies left out from the night before. It had taken me months to accustom my body to this schedule, drinking espresso before bed, waking up early and catching taxis to class, and sitting in a room where cats entered freely and it was never quiet. I grew to love it however, taking weekend trips and talking to locals and foreigners I was overwhelmed by education. It was in these classrooms my ego had been broken down though, by a kind woman just into her 20s by the name of Beesan. I had yet to know how sweet of a friendship we would have in the coming years, but at the moment, she made me feel as though I couldn’t learn the simplest of things. You will learn in Arabic she repeated day after day but how if I don’t know Arabic? she signed each day giving me a KitKat and muttering this is why we have never had students under 20. This inability to adapt was tiresome for me, taking for granted my previous studies, graduating a year early, and getting my associates all while overseas. Flashbacks of being put in cages on my way to and from cities within Palestine educated me whether I wanted it to or not, of the treatment Palestinians recieved. I felt helpless, looking around me as children my own age held assault rifles how could it be that those the same age as me suddenly had power over those who were 50 years old. I knew that it was mandatory in Israel to go into the military at 18, but to first hand see them as me, I felt as though I had truly understood the power trip they had. It was in this chaos, situated across from a soccer stadium where I struggled studying Arabic where I met Sharan, a 22-year-old from Singapore, with kind eyes and an even kinder soul. It had been Sharan who built up what little courage I had as a 17-year-old alone, to move to Jordan where it was safer and well-traveled. Though she had no need to, nor benefit from it, she guided me and helped me in those tougher months of Palestine. We had gotten jobs at the local gym, her teaching yoga and me, boxing, finding fulfillment when we were not incredibly confused by locals. Sharan had studied at Yale, she was and still is one of the most intelligent people I know and my admiration grew. On my way back from Jerusalem on a Saturday evening, I found myself in a taxi with three men, turning down a street before mine it turned into an attempted kidnapping. The breeze flowing through my dress as I ran home, tears soaking my face I ran into my host sisters arms. With no license plate number and no indenitication there was simply nothing I could do. On the night of my attempted kidnapping, Sharan had a similar experience with her host father. It seemed as though that night we were five-year-olds, scheming a plan on how to get out, whispers lingering in the room as she taught me not only that it was my choice but how and where we would leave. The following morning we said our goodbyes, to Orshi, a Hungarian litigator who belly danced on the weekends, to Lucy a polyglot from Paris who seemed unphased and intelligent beyond comprehension, Charlie, an oxford graduate from the UK who always seemed uncommunicable even when locals thought he was native, and Hannah, a 50-year-old mother who seemed someone else booked this trip for her and she was along for the ride. As we set off Sharan went south, down to Aqaba to then backpack up to Amman, Jordan. I had decided to go North, with hesitation of course as I had only spent one night in a hostel with Sharan and experienced sleeping in a room with 16 other people. I remember distinctly my father on the other end of the phone I thought it was a typo for Hotel, You’re telling me you willingly slept in a room with strangers? My God I am a supportive father but you’re going to make a man go bald at this rate!. As I backpacked up to Nazareth it was as influential, if not more, as a huge milestone in my life. Typing into my apple maps Near Me I didn’t know what was ahead of me nor could remember the fever dream of where I had gone. Certain people stuck out, those I still facetime and later on stayed with, such as Ian. A dutch man from Rotterdam, Ian was and still is one giant smile as a face. I remember sitting in the common area wondering what was in store for the day when he came over to introduce himself. As it turned out, he had the day off too and we went on a hike up to a random basketball court situated on the side of a hill during sunset. As we came back down from our day of laughing and sweating, we were met with a one shekel beer night hosted by our hostel. Ian stayed up until 3 am that night, talking of life as if he was a long-lost brother and nothing more. In the following days, I made my journey to Amman. And here I was, eating pomegranates in my robe, watching the trashman, and waiting for my parents to wake up or a text from Sharan. Seeing the people on my social media only reminded me of my loneliness, meeting people and attaining friends already in the big city, I wondered what I was doing wrong and why I had been made an introvert. It was two days after this that I began going to a local language school named Misbah, meeting other people and confiding in my new teacher Diana who had the kindest voice. Each day I attended Diana seemed to catch on, Keyfk ya habibti(How are you?) I searched in my dessert of a brain to find an interesting answer and I answers I went grocery shopping alone for the first time!… or I broke my washer and my underwear fell off the clothesline of my window onto my neighbor’s garden consolidated into one sad and weird lifestyle in this new terrain. It was not a week of classes when Diana asked me to hang out, grabbing hamburgers at the local mall she sat and talked with me. Ever since then, we went to our local coffee shop in the morning before class where I met Adnan. Adnan was a Syrian refugee, living in Jordan, with a quirky smile and a laugh that made you think he may have been faking it. Over time another teacher named Ma??an joined us, and I quickly gained a small family in the heart of Misbah. It was only a few weeks before Ma??an asked me out on a date. Standing in my mirror now I looked over my outfit; whereas in Palestine this was appropriate, Jordan had french women in tube tops and styled hair and makeup, of which I had neither. As we went to the restaurant we sat down for only 10 minutes before there was a commotion in the street. Ma??an excused himself to go look and my eyes tried to follow his big hair through the crowd wondering what had happened. A sign of distress across his face surprised me as he came back frantic, my uncle, my uncle he was hit by a car, that’s my uncle. In utter disbelief, I ran out with him and watched as my date rushed to the hospital alongside his kin. Adnan came to my rescue asking if I was okay, he took me home and I sat, discombobulated on the same couch I had been eating pomegranates days before. My phone lit up as Ma??an??s WhatsApp photo circulated on my phone, I picked up to hear a panting man unaware of his uncle’s condition. He explained what had happened and said he was only minutes from my apartment. A respectful man he asked if there was any way he could crash on my couch as his home was 40 minutes away, I agreed and he came over to get the key. In this state of alarm, I had not been worried to have him sleep over, seeing as he had been to my apartment, I had a spare room, and my master suite had multiple locks on it. Hours passed and it was now 3am, I rolled over struggling to fall asleep after the night had gone so poorly. Around 7am I woke up to the sun drilling a hole into my forehead, unlocking my door I looked around, everything pristine in the place I left it. Puzzled I looked into the guest bedroom to see the bed nearly made, wondering if he had even come. Unphased I went into the kitchen to make breakfast, great I thought as I realized I had nothing but toast, getting dressed and making sure to grab everything I needed I sent Ma??an a text asking if he was alright. In my disarray of the night before what I had yet to realize as I pulled on my door handle was that once locked from the outside as Ma??an had done, there was no way to unlock it from the inside. After having a mental breakdown I slumped on the couch, unable to leave my apartment I had chosen to stay inside days before my mind took me to uneasy circumstances. What if there was a fire? How would I get out? What if he doesn’t come back for days? The small check mark stayed on one as I constantly checked my phone, meaning he wasnt on wifi or the internet to check messages. I frantically called reaching voicemail and texted all of our friends as they replied cluelessly as to what I could do. When it was finally mid-day I called my father who only heightened my worrying, What if he’s copying your key now, how could you do this??. Unconsciously, I piled up chairs in front of my door as if that would change anything. Just as I finished around 5 in the afternoon, I heard a knock on the door my savior, whom I was currently furious with. He came to the door with a smile that baffled me, happy to see me, whereas I was not as happy to see him. I started crying how could you, I didn’t know that I would be locked in here?! His face dropped as he realized what type of lock it was, his demeanor consoling and his apologies endless. As I made my way out of the apartment with Benny and the Jets blasting in my ear, the wind comforted me, an appreciation for being outside of my thick walls I had yet to be grateful for. When I came back into my apartment, there was a sense of anxiety that released, this had been little to nothing of what I had signed up for. Prior to getting on a plane and getting lost at multiple airports, this idea of going over to Palestine, which ended up leading to Jordan had been a future accomplishment initially. When people asked what I would do upon graduating I held my head high as I boasted Ohh im going over to Palestine to study Arabic which always got an astounding response. It seems everyone asks when I begin to describe this part of my life, the why. It had never really been a why to me, moreso an area I was unfamiliar with that I wanted further understanding. Arabic in high school felt like math, it was intricate, like cursive but illegible to the unfamiliar mind. When I first started looking at what to do after graduating I honestly didn’t even mean for my studies to be in Palestine, I had thought their website looked prettier than others and decided to message them. It feels embarrassing to myself now in Jordan, what a small-town-minded way of looking at things; yet it was through this embarrassment I was able to be okay with being humbled, the not knowing and the listening of others. When I had made up my mind to go I had taken up three jobs, the first as a sales associate in a small outdoor store, the second, a busser in a beautiful steakhouse, and the third a dishwasher in another quaint small restaurant, all while being a full-time student and nanny. I look back on those days now and wonder how I ever did it, that while sitting on my couch in Jordan I could barely bring myself to make breakfast which led me to feel lazy and irresponsible. With age and with experience these feelings rose and fell which only shaped me more, learning it was okay to be ignorant if that was followed by learning, knowing it was okay to not know and to always ask for help. The real hurdle of my adventures, however, didn’t stem from not understanding the transit systems or language barriers but actually when I came home. To have received an educational boot camp on the Middle East and the western ideas towards them seemed to have created an activist side to me. It was coming home that it was revealed as my former friends asked questions such as did you have to wear that towel on your head? or it must have been so hot living in the desert when I had gone in the fall. All of these questions seemed to reside in me, but instead of taking it as a learning experience for them, it resulted in anger within me. In my naive brain, I had yet to become what others had became for me, I was not patiently teaching or educating my friends on what I had seen, but instead getting furious at their ignorance and misunderstandings. Coming from a small military town there was still plenty of rasicm, and ignorance, it revealed itself quite evident, some would ask and be intrigued as to what I had learned, and others, ignored the fact I had even gone. It was over time I realized this short-rooted anger and thought of the people who had not gotten upset at my ignorance, knowing I came from a small town, it was then that I was able to start seeing my mistakes and opening up to people about their misconceptions in a polite, humble way.
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