GRAPES

History Of Me!

Written and Reported by Jasmin R. Alvarez

(G)eography

In April of this year, I went to visit El Salvador, my family’s home country.
My mother wanted to visit her aunt and other loved, who stayed behind
when she journeyed to the U.S., so we went for an entire week during
spring break. It was one of the best experiences I have ever had in my
entire life. It was also very humbling. We visited many houses, all of which
were so small, with no more than 1-2 bedrooms and lots of chickens and
fields to pick from as a source of food and income for most of the
population. I rode a horse up an entire mountain and hiked an extremely
difficult wet terrain down to river, and it took all day. We rode the horses
back down the mountain in the dark, and we still had to walk back to my
mom’s aunt’s house. Even though everyone was on the verge of poverty,
they still gave us so much and were so kind. It was overall the most
beautiful adventure I have ever been on.

(R)eligion

The religion I”m a part of is Christianity. I go to church
each Saturday and Sunday, occasionally on Thursday for
Bible Study. We don’t celebrate specific holidays for our
religion, but we do have services for Christmas and
Easter to celebrate their real meanings. We are also not
allowed to partake in Halloween or the activities. Every
first Sunday of the month, we have a holy dinner, for
everyone 13 and older. We also have Sunday School,
which I proudly teach, and baptisms as soon as we
become the age 12.

(A)chievements

An invention that has improved my life greatly and I
can’t live without is electricity. It has improved
everybody’s life greatly and mny things would change,
creating a sort of catastrophe. We wouldn’t have any
phones or computers or even lights! There wouldn’t be
any water systems for hoses and sinks or baths. We
wouldn’t be able to cook food with ovens or stoves or
grills anymore. Almost everything in the world is run on
electricity, and humanity would very much be back at
square one.

(P)olitics

In my house, we have basic regulations. Not exactly
rules, but things we know we are supposed to do. If we
do not do what we are supposed to do or get
disrespectful, we get punishments, such as spanking. As
I became older, I became less prone to get in trouble, but
when I do, i usually get my phone taken away rather
than getting spanked. The rules have somewhat
changed and become stricter since I am older, but I
handle them with ease.

(E)conomics

In the house, I have many chores to do, such as sweep,
vaccum, mop,, clean the rooms, including the bathroom,
wash dishes, do laundry, basically organize and deeply
clean every corner and piece of clothing and object in the
house. I somewhat enjoy it though,because we laugh with
each other, have entertaining conversations and listen to
music as we clean. Although I don’t earn money now, in
the future, I’d like to become an English professor at a
prestigious university. That’s because since I was young,
I’d always enjoy helping people and teaching, so I feel like
I would fit right into it and love doing it very much.

(S)ocial Structure

My family consists of four people; my mother, Daysi, my
father, Ever, my little sister, Sophia, and I. I have 2
grandparents from my mom’s side and 1 aunt, 2 uncles.
From my father’s side i have 1 grandpa and 2 aunts, 2
uncles. My grandmother from my father’s side sadly
passed away 6 years ago. My family is a bit different
from others because we do a lot of crazy, risky things
most families would not do with their children. For
example, we went white water rafting inside the Grand
Canyon in Arizona for my tenth birthday. Just last
summer, we went to Seqouia National Park and jumped
off of huge rocks into an ice cold running river. We may
do scary things and dispute occasionally, but we all love
each other very much.