Category: Personal Writing

Just last weekend, I was gifted a small piece of furniture purchased from a ReStore. This piece of furniture was a small cabinet designed to hold various forms of media, with an unmistakable ’80s fake wood grain decal all over it. Well, that wasn’t the only non-aesthetically-pleasing thing on it, or rather in it. As soon as I turned the cabinet onto its side, I saw a huge network of spiderwebs all over the bottom of it, and tons of spider eggs. I got to cleaning all this nasty old stuff when my finger brushed against something that felt suspiciously… alive. I looked to where my finger had just prodded at and lo and behold, there was a pretty large spider sitting in the corner. I was definitely startled, and then I got to trying to get the spider outside when I noticed something on its back: the telltale red hourglass pattern of a black widow. Now, something you must know about black widows is that their actual level of harm is greatly sensationalized. They are very mild-mannered, and will only bite when they are near death, when they are crushed between you and your clothes, for example. When they do actually bite, you can get pretty sick, sure, but the mortality rate of black widow bites is under 1% – even then, that is almost all people with underlying conditions and very young children. With that in mind, I still freaked out: when media portrays something as if it should be feared, it becomes feared. I sprayed it with pine-sol, which killed it within a minute. I do wonder, though – was that really a warranted response? Just based on fear that has been instilled in us by what has been told to us by the TV when we were young, or what we are told by our friends? Why do we immediately assume the worst of what we don’t have an understanding of? This is not only a story of arachnids and creepy crawlies – this is a story of how we are programmed by everything around us. We don’t have the critical thinking skills to even think of researching something we have been told do hate, either systematically, societally, domestically, or otherwise. Social media makes this much easier to do, and creates an echo chamber where arbitrary biases are confirmed and solidified or placed in one’s mind. This is not a story of a spider (though the aforementioned spider story did happen last weekend) – this is a story of the ideas we carry around and refuse to change. Look into your beliefs, biases, and ideals from time to time – you never know what you may see.

 

This year i got to spend my birthday in another country away from home. This was kind of hard since I haven’t seen my parents in a really long time and since it was my birthday i missed them a little more than i usually do. But besides that, it was a great birthday that i got to spend with my friends. They had many surprises for me and also many gifts. We went for dinner to eat my favorite food which is sushi and that made me really happy, to have my favorite food with my friends. Later my sister had a surprise for me and since i turned 15 and in Mexico that is a big deal, she decorated my room. She filled my room with ballons and she had one of my favorite cakes with candles and gifts. This made me really happy and at the end of the day i got to eat my cake with my friends and the dorm parents. Late at night when i was about to sleep there was another surprise and my best friend from Miami sent me flowers which i thought was a great part and also my parents and sister gave me flowers. At the end of the day this was a great birthday which i enjoyed a lot since it was different than my other birthdays and i am in another country. I was really happy all day and now i have a lot of flowers in my room too.

In this personal writting im going to talk about last summer when i went to the beach, last summer i went to my best friend isabella’s beach house in a beach near mexico city, the beach’s name is acapulco and its a very good place to hangout with your friends in the summer. last summer we went because it was my friends birthday so we went and she invited all my friend group. the first day we went it was a rainy day so we just stayed in the house, but the second day was a sunny day so we went to the beach and the pool and we hangout there all day, then in my friend birthday we went to dinner to a really good place with my friends family, we stayed in the beach one week more and then we went back to mexico city.

This spring break, I went to the UK. Some parts are adorable, also. I love the center of the city, and I enjoy being with my friends and some teachers. I made some friends in my class, but they were so annoying that I also got stressed. The school in the UK is so tiny that we couldn’t do too much; my favorite part of the trip was when I hung out at night with my friends to see the outlets. It was hilarious.

I have supported Chivas all my life, but I actually started being really interested almost two years ago. During the summer, I went to two games in their stadium. The first one was against Atletico de San Luis. I went with two of my friends and my cousin. I enjoyed the game like I had never before in a Stadium because all fans were singing and supporting the team. I lost my voice for about two days because all the screaming and yelling at the players. The game ended 3-1 for Chivas. The second game I watched in the stadium was against Tijuana. Now, I just went with my cousin. That game ended 1-0 for Chivas and was more calm than the first one. I am looking forward to go to many games during next season when I’m finally in Mexico to support my team and enjoy a lot.

Friends come and go, you grow, specifically you grow apart, and you move on. It’s difficult to see someone you thought was your best friend suddenly become someone new, and all of sudden you need to learn this new person’s favourite colour and food, and if the new pieces of them don’t match up with yours the way they used to, the puzzle doesn’t work anymore. Best friends have a comfort you can’t find in the arms of parents. You can tell them anything and you know they wouldn’t put you down for it or look at you differently. I believe that’s why growing apart affects you an incredible amount. Because here’s this stranger that knows everything there was to know about you, and you now walk by them like you have forgotten their middle name, no hello or goodbye, you just keep walking. I believe that everything happens for a reason, people change so that you can let go, things go wrong so you appreciate when they go right, and good things fall apart so eventually better things will fall together. It’s been a year since I last saw him, I woke up to my phone spammed with what I thought was pointless messages, which turned out to be the reason I wish I just stopped sometimes. He had passed away this morning. To think just yesterday I almost stopped in to see him when passing his house, just to see how he is and maybe just give him a hug once again. I’m not sure what stopped me. Maybe I was scared he wouldn’t jump to me the way I would to him, or maybe I was just scared he was doing bad, and I wanted to leave it in a grey area of assumption. I wish I just stopped to smell the roses.

This Saturday was a moment of history, that day we had a game against Coastal, at team located in Vancouver. This was a game that we needed to make a statement to the league. The game started off pretty slow in the first half, but all of the sudden, the opposing team was given a penalty that was totally undeserved, I mean it was not even a penalty. Our goal keeper made a great save, but unfortunately the player converted on the rebound. We were down 1-0 and we knew we had to make a comeback, in the last minutes of the first half my teamate David scored a beautiful freekick while the goalkeeper also midreading it. It was halftime and it was tied 1-1, our team had all the momentum. I had to play better in the second half (which I did). In the second half I scored a penalty and a nice solo goal. We ended up winning 5-1, in other words it was a beat down. I felt very satisfied with my performance because in the second half I was working harder and wanted to win more. Our record as a team is 5 wins, 1 draw, and 1 loss. That means that we are second in the BCSPL, I feel like I am impacting winning because I have 8 goals in 7 games which I am proud of. Our next few games are against tougher opponents, but I am excited for the journey.

It all began on a Wednesday (unsure of the date), when I asked my father if all the parts were ready to be put together. We were planning to build this computer for about a week now, and as soon as I got my confirmation I was overly excited. It was Summertime, meaning no homework, no stress, and the availability of creating big projects began to arrive. Later, that same Week-end my Father and I gone to his work place, where I was surprised to see all the necessary electronics which made up the computer. Back then, I barely knew anything about computers, and so, when my dad told me only I was to build it I was shocked and began to work right away.

While building the computer, I asked my dad all sorts of questions; The age of the computer (15 as of this year), and if I was able to take it home today as well. Of course, he said yes, however, he first told me to assemble it. Being as careful as I could be I started by installing the CPU, which was the Core 2 Quad then the cooler, then the motherboard G33T, an LGA 775 socket with ddr2 ram slots.. This then went into the Silverstone Multimedia case (used for watching movies and being compact vertical wise. After installing the Motherboard in to the system, the earlier mentioned ddr2 ram (which has a maximum frequency of 800mhz) 4gb was installed (then later upgraded to 8gb). Luckily, the case already had a Power Supply, so all that was left was to plug in the Graphics Card (Geforce GTX 650), plug in it’s connector, connect the SSD (Solid State Drive), and boot up the system.

As it turns out, the system worked amazing with Linux Mint installed onto it. This was a major breakthrough in my interest level, and even to this day I open the computer up, clean it, and look for alternatives for certain parts.  In total, at the time of creating the computer the cost was $290. For  the 3d modelling tasks I use the computer for, it works great, however, the lack of speed and modern compon3ents is marked by the unstable or unsupported  apps which every now and then let me know of their existence.

– Iaroslav Serg Pyrozhok

The name wasn’t forgotten but forgotten was the name.

And if you don’t remember what they look like, did they even exist? Did you forget past that point in time? I think so, I can’t remember what they look like, but I can’t recall why I don’t remember, if there was ever a reason. I think maybe I’m so used to this routine, where I only remember those around me for the most part of my life. If you said the name I’d say I know them, because I do, but I can’t remember why, so don’t ask me what they look like. You’d say she has red hair, I thought she had it brown, or did she? I can’t remember. Even if i saw her yesterday, I can’t remember, and I don’t recall why. I don’t think there ever was a reason.

You’d say Bonnie, I can’t remember that name, I can’t recall what she looks like, but I have a feeling I know her. If you asked what I look like, I don’t think staring at my hands would help, I’d need a mirror, or a camera. Sometimes I feel like I can recall things, when I try nothing comes out. The mirror doesn’t feel like its me, the world doesn’t feel real, and during those times I remember, I remember it feels fake. I remember the earth goes round, gravity keeps me in place, then I almost fall over, because I realize we are not on the ground, what is the ground?

And it happens almost everyday, that my brain might be one to look past the tiny circle of a world we live in, I haven’t met many who do so. When I look at my wrist, I see the veins, and I feel sick. Because you could die, if those arteries broke, and its not a matter of losing your hand, but a matter of the pressure. You can get an aneurysm at any time, so who tells you the body isn’t literally glass. I realize, it could happen at any time, and I feel sick, sick to my stomach. When I think about it, I don’t feel safe with my body, what if I am not being gentle enough? What if it breaks, who will come to stop the bleeding?

Does Earth make sense? And before you answer this question I may ask, think about it for a second, because is this our life, or is it mine? How do you know people are real? Because they respond? You can feel them? Yet I can’t help but wonder, how does that define someone? Is it cut down to that they can feel? But you can’t feel what they do, and that scares me. Because one day you might realize, what defines life. Life isn’t just the animals, it is not just earth, not just your experience, but it could be everything, and most importantly something unnameable. It is called life for a reason, there is no word to describe it other than.

Don’t waste it, because when you die there are two options, you live again or never so. It’s a 50/50 chance I wouldn’t test, because either way you won’t be able to tell them, “You are worth it”.

So, the name was me, I remembered my name. But I know this will all happen again tomorrow, and I will forget, then I will remember, a peaceful loop.

One night, my mother asked me to go shopping for clothes together. I was very excited when I heard it. We set off as soon as we finished dinner. When I got off the car, I saw a clothing store. The clothes inside were colorful and beautiful. I took my mother to accompany me to have a look. I fell in love with a yellow dress at first sight. I thought that dress suited me very well, so I asked the shop owner to bring one for me to try on. “It’s so beautiful!” Mom said with a smile. I was also very satisfied and bought this dress.

Since it’s that time for more personal writing, I’ll be providing yet another trip report, with some eventful stories, because what trip would be complete without some entertaining stories? I’ll be diving into my latest trip, to Smithers yet again! For many months after the 2022-23 ski season ended, my excitement for the next ski season was remarkable. In early October of 2023, an Arctic outflow came through the province, cooling down many places, and dusting snow in the mountains, even on the ski hill. However, this was soon to change. The 2023-24 ski season was predicted as an El Niño year, which is a weather phenomenon that makes the ski season exceptionally warm. I tried my best to be optimistic, but the weather simply did not deliver on Vancouver Island. The ski hill was bare, only having a 40cm base for a time. As everyone who was on the ski trip knows, the snow was decent on that day, but things only went downhill from there after the trip. It rained, hard. There was so much rain that over half of the snow base was washed away, and the ski hill had no choice but to close operations entirely, for a period. It snowed a little more which pushed the hill to re-open, but there was simply nothing there. My solution: book a plane ticket to Smithers, and then I could go and fulfill my desires for winter adventures.

I booked my ticket a month prior, and began the wait to go to winter wonderland, probably the best way I can describe it. My dad decided to book tickets for him and my siblings not long after, as he decided that a ski trip sounded epic after all. I booked these tickets conveniently on Family Day long weekend, so I only had to miss a day of school for this 4-day trip. The night before, I packed my bag, and had a short-lived 5-hour sleep, as the flight left at 6:25am, from Victoria (YYJ) of course. I loaded our single suitcase into the trunk, and we headed to the airport, which is about 40 minutes away for me. I arrived at the airport, and made a beeline for the bag drop, as I had already completed the online check-in the day before, where we the bag was checked and sent off on the baggage belt. I made sure to get some of the high-quality boarding passes at the desk as mementos for later, which was essentially a nicer looking, sturdier boarding pass with the signature Air Canada stripe over the top. The self-serve kiosk prints flimsy receipt paper passes, which I learned early on last year when I went through the kiosk. I arrived at TSA, uneventful, other than the fact that I was randomly selected to be hand swabbed. I made my way to Gate 8, which is an interesting gate because the planes can park horizontally to the gate. What this means is that no pushback tug is needed, which speeds up the departure.

I reassured my dad that we did not need to go to the Harbour Walk for a muffin, and instead made the claim that the Tim Hortons in Vancouver Airport (YVR) would be completely fine for breakfast. I messed around with my music until our boarding time came around at 5:55. I walked towards a 7-year-old Dash 8-400, registered as C-GYJZ, in the new 2016 livery. I boarded, and filed all the way down to 20D, quite possibly the least favorable seat I could imagine, as it’s the back of the plane on the aisle. It wasn’t the end of the world for this flight, as it was just a quick hop over the Strait of Georgia to YVR. This flight only has a block time of 32 minutes, with an airtime of just 12 minutes, based on the runway configuration of 09 in Victoria and 08R in Vancouver. I was sat next to an older gentleman, who was off to Orlando, FL, to visit his daughter for her wedding. I made conversation with this fellow for the entire flight, where we talked about air travel, Florida, along with news and such. We taxied out to runway 09, as mentioned earlier, and were airborne on time headed towards Vancouver, with a cruise altitude of just 4,000ft. This route is only 45NM, and when you’re in a plane doing 200kts over the strait, you do reach the mainland quickly.

After just 6 minutes in the air, Vancouver came into sight, as we started our approach onto runway 08R. Our touchdown was right on schedule, where I had a 1hr layover in Vancouver before connecting to Smithers. As we taxied to gate C39, we parked and had the classic “Panic and try and hit as many people as possible with the bags in the overhead bins”. Not actually, but probably the best way to describe how everyone got off. A noteworthy element about the place in the airport I got off at was the fact that Air Canada essentially owns Concourse C. If you look on the departure board for the C gates, it’s all Air Canada. With the return to my claim where I assured my Dad we could get Tim Hortons in Vancouver, I’ll preface the line with ‘I did not think what I was saying through, at all.’ We arrived slightly ahead of schedule, only to be met with a line 70 people long, which shot down my super confident statement of “Everything is 100% okay”. Admittedly, the reference for the Tim’s being totally fine was from when I was there in the summer at 2pm on a Wednesday, which is definitely quite a different comparison which I clearly didn’t think of, so whoops.

My dad still stood strong that he wanted his food, where I said we wouldn’t have enough time. When my dad was about 4 people from the front of the line, the gate agent for the flight called my dad’s reservation to the desk, for an ‘important change’. Of course, because I clearly lacked cognitive thinking abilities from not sleeping, I didn’t just walk myself over the desk and ask what was going on, rather I stayed right where I was. Great decision, (completely not my dad lost his spot in line). Guess what the ‘important announcement’ was? “The seats were going to be moved from row 15 to row 18. Whoa. Long story short, my dad was a teensy bit livid that I didn’t just ask what was going on so he could keep his spot in line. Again, my thinking failed me, twice. I took my entitled self, passport and all, and boarded one zone ahead of my dad and siblings at gate C33, onto yet another 8-year-old Dash 8-400, registered as C-GUJZ, also in the new 2016 livery. I settled into 3F, a window seat on the right of the plane, where I lucked out with a free aisle seat for the short 1hr 20m hop across the Coast Mountains and Tweedsmuir, 650km north. Pushback started shortly after, and we started up both engines right on time for the taxi to runway 08R. This is the moment I saw a plane parked at gate C32. Not just any ordinary Dash 8, but the one where I sat in the pilot’s seat, four years ago. Of course, I had to get a picture, since I recognized the registration as soon as I saw the Dash, C-GGMU. The takeoff was uneventful, but nonetheless we started our climb to our cruise altitude of 23,000ft.

The inflight service started shortly after our initial climb, where I got a water and some Air Canada pretzels. We cruised over the mountains, which slowly turned to the plateau, and soon enough the Nechako Valley came into sight. We began our descent into Smithers over Houston, BC, and were inbound on our approach to runway 15. The town of Smithers came into sight on final, where we cruised over into onto the runway, with the wind, where the plane was set down quite firm. It is unusual to land with the wind, as normally you always land into the wind. However, the reason for this is because Smithers Airport is completely uncontrolled, meaning that there is no ATC, and you simply report your intentions on the Smithers radio. We taxied into Gate 1, which is the only gate, but besides the point. We were welcomed by a brisk -15 with perfectly clear skies. We headed into Smithers Airport (YYD), which is quite modest, as we waited for our singular checked bag. Our bag came around the belt relatively quick, and we were soon in my Grandpa’s truck headed towards Tyhee Lake, where their house is located. After a short 15 minute drive through Smithers, we went through the outskirts down the country roads, until we reached the house. I immediately made a beeline for the lake, which is frozen over in the winter, where I just sprinted as fast as I could, before returning to the house for a hearty breakfast of back bacon, eggs, and pancakes. Soon enough, we headed to the ski hill, where we went to our cabin, which I would say arguably has the best views out of any cabin on the hill, since my Grandpa built it on the top of the hill off of the Green T (For clarification the Green T is a ski lift that tows you with a T shaped bar, and called the Green T since the towers are painted green). The cabin overlooks the Telkwa Mountains, and I can see the whole range from my bed every morning, which is so incredibly satisfying.

After a few runs, we headed back down to the house for the night. A new day came along, where I was welcomed with yet again another hearty breakfast. After my meal, I experimented with the strength of the ice on the lake, to say the least it is super strong. I was able to drive an ATV onto the lake with no issues, if you can see where this is going, I’ll just say doing donuts is so much fun. We and my Omi headed into town for some birthday shopping for me, since I’m not in Smithers on my actual birthday. I went into quite a few stores downtown, before going to Heartstrings, a local gift shop with fresh fudge and clothing. Here, I got myself a Smithers hoodie, and a bag of saltwater taffies, before heading to Mark’s for wool socks and a new belt. Heading up King St, I immediately noticed something different, the paint was washed away! I remember when me and my cousins were biking down that street, on clear summer nights overlooking the mountains. I don’t know what it was about that street, but it just brings back so many indescribable memories that warm my heart. I’m still mentally in Summer 2023, which brings me to some core memories of fishing on Babine, driving around through the rolling hills on a warm summer night, and The Twin. You may ask, what is The Twin? In short, The Twin is this smaller motel on the Northeast side of town, that serves delectable ethnical food. In our family, The Twin was reserved for almost a reward after hard work. You finished cutting all the trees down and making firewood? Good! Let’s go to the twin. You finished making four truckloads of firewood to the skihill, good! Let’s go to The Twin again.

Anyways, after this short adventure, we went up to the ski hill, for another picture-perfect day, with clear skies. I made a couple runs before skiing shortly ended, and I was forced to end for the day. We had made the plan to stay the night at the ski hill, so I did some snowmobiling on Toboggan Hill, before coming back to the cabin for a tasty meal. My dad came up with my other brother to have our meal and brought some cupcakes, and my Omi brought a birthday cake, for my cousin’s birthday, and to recognize mine, since it was happening a week after I returned home. After the commemoration of my birthday, everyone settled down and went home, whilst I stayed and played cribbage with my Omi. A new day arose, where there was a light dusting of snow on the mountain. As I headed to the lodge to grab my pass, my cousins arrived shortly after for yet again another day of skiing on the hill. We went through the terrain park, many times, where we kept trying to hit this specific rail perfect. It somehow must’ve taken me four tries to get it proper. The rest of the day was quite fun, with many runs on the chairlift, an icy face-smashed-in run through the trees, and a backcountry run to Crater Lake with my Dad in the afternoon, where I got many lessons on what not to do when going backcountry with my Grandpa. The mountains were majestic the entire way, and the lake was even better at the summit. After a short-lived day, the sunset took place, and darkness came. We had the final dinner at the ski hill with the family, played a big round of ‘31’ with the whole family, drove the snowmobile around on the hill. There were some neighbours nearby who had the amazing idea of strapping skis to an armchair. Funniest thing I’ve seen all winter, the screams were even better.

I made many runs to the top of the hill on the snowmobile before heading back to the cabin with the little ones. I eventually fell asleep, and I woke up the next morning with that feeling. It was coming to an end. I came to terms with the fact that winter paradise was swiftly coming to a close, and trudged downstairs for my final 2024 winter breakfast in Smithers. I finished my plate and went to make some runs on the Orange T. I made 5 runs that morning, each with appreciation of the mountains. I made my final ski run, and headed back to the cabin, where I packed up and headed to the house around 2pm. The feeling is indescribable, really. I had some cocktail shrimp at the house, and said farewell at 5pm to leave for the airport. Arriving at the airport, something I found interesting is that the baggage drop and screening belt are all one thing, because of the low volumes of traffic through Smithers Airport. Boarding came around at 5:55, where I boarded another 6-year-old Dash 8-400 for the flight to Vancouver. I settled into seat 8F, with another free aisle seat, and we started our taxi out to runway 34.

Upon takeoff, I saw the town, ski hill, and mountains, all in one big sight on a beautiful sunset, which was amazing. We leveled off at 24,000ft for a rather dark flight over the mountains. On our approach to runway 08L, everything was completely fogged in over Vancouver, a good day to have ILS! On our approach seemingly into nothing, the runway came into sight just 400ft above the ground, where it was pouring rain. Taxiing into gate C39, I noticed an interesting coincidence, which was the fact that we arrived at the same gate that we departed from, four days ago. Stepping onto the wet pavement, I was soaked in 50 paces to the doors of the terminal. We had a 2hr 30m layover before our outbound flight to Victoria, so to kill the time, we had dinner at this grill in the upper part of the concourse, before heading to Tim Hortons for a much needed donut. Our flight was operating out of Gate C40, just one over from where we arrived, so there wasn’t much moving in the terminal.

After a lot of scrolling and admiring of the plane in front of me, we were notified that boarding would be delayed, slightly, for a disabled customer. Boarding commenced later than expected at 10:25pm, where we had a relatively full flight. However, as I lurched into seat 14F, I yet again had no one on the aisle! Lucky me. Boarding soon finished up, and we were on our way to runway 08R for our southbound departure. Another pitch black flight unfortunately. I find it so interesting how the announcements for landing come on during this short flight, actually just 4 minutes after takeoff. We went inbound on our approach to runway 09, where we touched down in more rain. At last, we were deplaned and out of the terminal at 11pm. The drive home was silent, everyone was more or less half asleep from the long day. From start to finish, the trip was an absolute success, and I hope to embark on more winter adventures in 2025. (Remarks, I could’ve summarized this into about 400 words, but the massive piece is purely for my enjoyment).

I don’t know if anyone shares the love I have for guns and airsoft, but either way though, I was out for 12 hours on Saturday (VERY PAINFUL) and I went to an airsoft store. I didn’t think there was a store for airsoft but there was, somewhere downtown named “Camouflage” and when I first went in there, it was pretty boring, and there was just shirts and some ammo pouches and grenade pouches. BUT THEN, we went upstairs and oh my god when I say the place was filled with amazing stuff, I MEAN it. They had guns EVERYWHERE and KNIVES, and ATTACHMENTS, it was literally my dream store and I will gladly go there any time. I asked them if I could try the pistols and I tried the Glock17 and the M&P22 and they were perfect. When I ejected the magazine from both guns it was so smooth and putting the magazine back felt like I was in the army. and the handling was pretty light and cocking the gun was the easiest thing ever, it was absolutely beautiful and I really should have bought a gun but they cost $200 or over haha. I was walking around the place and checking the knives and they were actually pretty real-looking. And when the person was teaching me parts of the gun attachments, I knew most of them and I’m actually so happy.  I was even walking around and just naming as many guns as I could hahaha. They had MP5, Fal, M16, M4 Carbine, Glock 17, Mosin, Barret, MP4, FN57, M&P22, Classical hunting rifles, Uzi, Vector, P90, Makarov, Tarkarov, 1911, and even more. I have pictures and they look so good. It was paradise land I look forward to going there again.

Suzhou, located in East China’s Jiangsu Province, is known as the “paradise on Earth”. It is famous for its long history, beautiful gardens and unique water town customs. As my hometown, Suzhou not only carries a rich cultural tradition, but also shows a new look of modern development.

First of all, Suzhou is famous for its rich history and cultural heritage. There are many exquisite gardens preserved in the ancient city, such as the Humble Administrator’s Garden, the Lingering Garden and the Lion Forest, which attract countless tourists with their exquisite garden art and unique design. Walking in these gardens, as if through the ancient paintings, feel the precipitation of history and cultural heritage.

Secondly, Suzhou is also a modern city with a prosperous economy and modern urban construction. Suzhou Industrial Park is the first national-level economic and technological development zone established after China’s reform and opening up, attracting a large number of domestic and foreign enterprises to invest and develop.

As an ancient and modern city, Suzhou shows the perfect fusion of classical and modern, tradition and innovation. It is not only a city with a long history and cultural heritage, but also a modern city full of vitality and vitality. In the future development, I am convinced that Suzhou will continue to radiate its unique charm and become an even better city.

One of the many great parts of Brookes Westshore is its high amount of homework that pushes its students to use their time wisely while still enjoying sports and other activities the school encourages. However, this week I have not appreciated it at all. Compared to all the horrible public schools I have gone to in the Sd62 area, the homework amount placed on students is incredibly lower than any of the grade levels at our school. Never in my life have I felt more stressed about unmemorable sheets of paper that won’t matter to me in less than a month from now. Of course, as many can agree homework can be a reasonable tool to promote learning outside the classroom with students, and this is one of the many reasons why I decided to join Brooks in the first place. Yet when I feel as if I have to stay up till midnight for the past five nights in a row the work can seem a bit dimming to my mental health which is why instead of worrying, contemplating, and thinking of reasons why it feels like I’m the only person who’s having issues with this I will be no longer be participating in such an act as homework for the next following week. I do not recommend anyone else try this method of relaxation unless they are entirely prepared for the consequences of their actions like I am.

Last weekend, I was a part of a pre-festival at Victoria Conservatory of Music. I played the violin, which I have been playing for a few years now. The actual festival is next weekend. The tune I am playing is the first movement of Concerto in D Major by F. Seitz which I have been practicing for a few months. I had to memorise the entire piece otherwise they would not let me play. Next weekend when I play, it is like an exam. I did this last year as well. I will be playing in front of judges, without my music, and they will be marking everything I do. Even if there is rosin on my violin, I get points deducted. It may sound intimidating but it’s actually pretty fun. Afterwards, everyone who participated in the festival celebrates with some snacks.

Reading this book was very confusing from my perspective, many unlucky things happen to the Ancient Mariner because of the sin he committed. 5 main characters are: The Ancient Mariner (the boat), the Wedding guest, a character attending a wedding celebration who is stopped by the Ancient Mariner and compelled to listen to his story. The pilot is the person that is steering the ship around. Shipmates are the people that work on the ship. Hermit, one of the people who save the Ancient Mariner, plus frees the Ancient Mariner of its guilt. The story starts off with the boat being stuck in the Arctic, then in the doldrums where there is no wind. The worst thing happens to the ship when he shoots the Albatross (seagull) with his crossbow, this means he has sinned. He is forced to wear the dead Albatross around his neck as a symbol of guilt. They see another ship in the distance with death and a woman, they play a game with the die, the woman ends up winning, so all the shipmates die. Just because of the Ancient Mariner committed that sin. My argument is that killing an Albatross with a bow is not a sin because he needs to have food to survive. I kill spiders, but I would not consider that a sin, also meaning that killing a seagull is not one either. The Ancient Mariner could have done a million things much worse than that. That was nothing, back then I bet you there were a bunch of Albatrosses.

Reading the 5 stanzas was stressful, but helpful. I am very good at memorizing, the 5 stanzas are talking about what happened when there was wind, they were moving at a good pace. However, when there was no wind and the sails dropped, they were pretty much stuck, it was sad for them. My favourite stanza was the fourth one: “Day after day, day after day, We stuck, nor breath nor motion; As idle as a painted ship Upon a painted ocean”. This was my favourite for many reasons, its telling us what it would be like on a ship without any wind, this for me was also the harderst part to memorize for some reason. During the oral presentation I did a fantastic job for the first 3 stanzas using good memorization, volume and speed, but as I got to the last 2 stanzas I got a little ahead of myself, thats when I needed a little help from Mr. Mackight, in the end I did finish, I will be honest I did make some mistakes. Overall, it was a good experience and I think I did the best I could with the circumstances. The whole book was pretty good too, exploring themes of guilt, redemption, forgiveness, the natural world and the consequences of human actions.

I will be writing about what I like and did not like from this story, I will also be giving my opinions on the different characters.

The main characters of the story are: Dr Jekyll, a well respected scientist. Mr. Hyde, a sinister man and mysterious man. Mr. Utterson, Jekyll’s lawyer and friend. Mr Hyde commits many crimes in London, causing fear from the rest of the people that live there. Utterson tries to investigate the relationship between Hyde and Dr Jekyll. It turns out that they are the same person by the aid of the potion that Jekyll created. In the high point of the story Jekyll turns into Hyde without the help of the potion, he is unable to reverse the transformations. Causing Dr Jekyll to lose his life. I liked the story because it made me think of the both good and evil aspects of a human. Sometimes I want to do something bad, but I can’t because I will regret it and get punished. But with Dr Jekyll/Mr Hyde he does not have any regret or shame for the horrible things he did.

The things that I don’t like about this story were how random the book was. I mean when I got the book I was not expecting to read a book like that when 2 different characters are the same character, that was a little weird, plus unrealistic. Another thing I am not to fond of his how old the book is, as I was reading the book its vocabulary just sounded old. Overall, it was a good book for many reasons that I have listed, but it was not my favourite thats for sure.

The Strange Case of Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde by Robert Louis Stevenson was a surprising story, to say the least, that dives into the duality of human nature. Set in Victorian London, the story follows Dr. Henry Jekyll, a scientist who could hide his inner darkness with a mysterious potion. To be completely honest this book didn’t amaze me how everyone said it would. I found it to be very boring at times with most things being too straightforward for any imaginative thinking to evolve. Having said that it wasn’t as boring as some of the other books I have read in the past, which meant thankfully it wasn’t a complete bore.

A long weekend  

 

This week we had a long weekend, and we did not had school on Friday and on Monday, my friends and I got a lot of time to rest and do many fun activities, In the dorms every weekend thy plan fun activities for us to do, this long weekend we played a lot of pool, and I wasn’t good and I had never played before but I got to practice a lot and got better. We also baked many things, we baked cookies and brownies, and they were really good, we all love baking and trying new recipes, and these were definitely one of the best cookies we have ever baked. To eat the brownies and the cookies, we watched some scary movies, and we had a lot of fun getting scared together and laughing about it. We also got to rest a lot and most of the long weekend we spent it resting and sleeping. We also had a sleepover togther and talked a lot about everything, we went to bed really late and had lots of fun. At the end this weekend was great, we could not do much, but we had a lot of fun, sleeping was probably my favorite part of the long weekend and i hop we can get another long weekend soon. 

Me, Polina, and Eva decided to do something fun for the previous long weekend and I thought it would be a good idea to go to an escape room, and the room we chose was a “haunted mansion” called Rosewood Manor. The story goes that the Rosewood manor had been abandoned and everyone who went inside the house claimed it was haunted by ghosts, the 3 of us had to go in as ghost hunters and free the spirit of a little boy who had died inside the mansion named Timmy. To free Timmy’s spirit we would have to find an object that connects to him in our case it was a teddy bear, but we only had an hour to escape as in an hour the house was rigged to “blow up”. So The 3 of us entered the room with 4 flashlights 3 were normal and the other was a black light when we tried turning on the flashlights mine worked but Polina and Eva had gotten broken flashlights. Suddenly the TV lit up in static and the voice of Timmy started speaking to us about him being scared and lonely, we looked around the room and there was a piano, a desk, 2 large bookshelves against the wall, framed photos everywhere, and big grandfather clock. Polina and Eva looked at the piano while I was opening everything I could get my hands on and commenting about how ugly and deceased everybody in the framed photos looked. Eva found writing on the walls with a blacklight, I found a paper with a “newspaper” printed on it and a book with a code lock on it and Polina found…?. (nothing). Along the way we had to ask for some hints well a lot of hints because somethings were just so random and unthinkable to look for, like we had to align some desk drawers with the tiny grooves in the desk, we then eventually solved every puzzle and the book cases split in half and opened up. Inside the little nook behind the bookshelves was a large locked chest and I toughened up and went inside the nook since everyone else was too scared (I was incredibly scared something would jump out at me, we found the code to the chest on some books and opened it, inside was a ugly raggedy teddy bear with a key attached to it. I plopped the teddy bear down on a chair and unlocked the door, we had escaped with 6 minutes too spare. It was a fun experience and we are most likely going to go again to a different room next weekend!

I have a favorite band like one does, the band’s name is Mickey Darling also known as “the sexiest boy band” I’m not lying that’s their record label name! Mickey Darling has a special place in my heart as for some reason I could never get tired of their music, I first found their music back in 2020 with their song “Protein Shake”, I found the song on my YouTube recommended and at first I thought it wasn’t all that but boy was I wrong! Mickey Darling has helped me through some pretty sad times like the summer of 2023 with their songs: “SOMEWHERE ELSE”, “YOU WERE PERFECT AND I SORRY”, and “SAY THAT YOU MISS ME” as you can see through the titles of the songs I was going through major heartbreak but Mickey Darling through their songs helped me realize that letting go is okay and it’s okay to miss someone who no longer is in your life through their music. Even to this day I still consider Mickey Darling’s music so incredible, their lyrics are so genuine that I could practically sob to it, I mean I did a couple of times and that’s how you know the music is good! I think you should give Mickey Darling a listen especially their collaboration with Kevin Walkman called “OhNo!” 5 stars!!

So yeah,i learned how to do acrylic nails and it’s super fun to do. still trying to like figure out how to shape and smooth the nail because when i paint polish on it, it’s not that smooth. so i’m probably going to buy those electric nail filer things on amazon. i’m going to be so good. but so fun, i usually do them while watching superstore because i heart Dina Fox.  She’s my favourite character and stuff. And mateo obviously. They are the best characters with the best character development. That’s all. Byee

So i have like five or a but more main shows i’m watching. Some of them im rewatching which is the case for most. Top one is Brooklyn 99, and i love this show because it’s so positive and i just love Captain Holt. Top two is Modern family, this show is so nostalgic for me, i used to watch it all the time as a kid when i was in Singapore. Top three is Bojack horseman which i only started watching because someone i liked liked this show so i just had to lol, but now i totally love it. Todd is so me. Top four is Superstore because Dina Fox and stuff. Top five is Hannah Montana because and i don’t know what i mean but it’s so colourful. Byee

Omg guys I’m going to LA for spring break. I know right like omg. so the whole time I’m going to be shopping at stores that we don’t have in Canada. I’m going with my two brothers for a week or two. and its going to be so lit. and also I learned how to do acrylic nails so I’m gonna talk about that in my next PW. stay tune for more. Byee

During last year in the month of May, I decided to take my Mom on a spontaneous trip to Calgary. I did touch on this trip a little during PW #2, but this PW will go into more detail. But all circumstantial, I’m still going to talk about this with more detail, so on with the story! It was surprisingly the first time that I had been on a trip with only my mom, because almost all of the trips that I go on involve my family, because my siblings don’t like being left out, which I totally understand, and it’s just a challenge of having a five person family. For quite a while, I was on about going to Calgary, because the prairies appeal to me quite a bit (said no one ever, but I’m going to say it). Along with this, a portion of my mom’s side resides in Calgary, so I wanted to pay them a visit. After a quick ‘consultation’ with my siblings, both of them didn’t want to come, so I ended up booking some very cheap tickets with WestJet a couple months prior.

Because I’m obsessed with aviation, this was obviously such a feat to be taking a one-hour flight, which was a quick hop over the Strait of Georgia and the Rocky Mountains. May 26, 2023, finally came around, the date that we were supposed to fly out. Props to my mom who made no complaints about our departure time. This departure time was the first scheduled flight out of the airport (YYJ), leaving at 5:50am. This meant we had to get to the airport 90 minutes at 4:20am, which meant leaving the house at 3:20am. We arrived to check-in and clear TSA, in which we were informed that the flight was slightly delayed until 6:00am. Onboard a slightly older 737-800 for this short-ish 800km hop to Calgary (YYC), there was the standard inflight service, with the pretzels that taste excellent. We reached our cruise altitude of 37,000ft, which we only maintained for about a half an hour, before starting our initial descent over the west side of the Rockies. We started our approach onto runway 35L, which is one of my favorites as the approach is set over the skyline, with some great scenery. Unfortunately, I was on the right side, in 12F, so I didn’t get to see the skyline on approach. We arrived in Calgary at 8:17am, MDT (yes, I did record the time we arrived).

We exited into Concourse A, where we found our way to the arrivals. Me and my mom made our way to the street where we found our aunt waiting for us with her vehicle. We got in and hung a left onto Airport Tr. Another remark is that the drivers are really aggressive, and they will honk at any minor inconvenience, which to their credit, they do get where they need to go, but it’s still interesting. After the lef, we headed onto the QE2, otherwise known as Deerfoot Tr. We had a quick 15 minute drive to OEB Breakfast near the city centre, where we had some breakfast links, bacon, and some lukewarm eggs. The breakfast was okay, but nothing remarkable. We carried onto the Calgary Zoo, which had lots of cool exhibitions. I had some fries there, heavy on the average, they were nothing special. Me and my mom got onto the Blue Line towards downtown, which was a very quick 5 minute ride onto 7 St SW, where the trains run along the street like streetcars. It kind of reminded me of San Francisco in a way, but without the streets on big inclines.

Carrying onto the Calgary Tower, I went up a 45 story elevator until we reached the tip, which had great views of the city. I bought some ridiculously priced maple toffee ($15!), and hopped onto the Red Line with my mom to take another quick train ride to Kensington, a smaller market area where my aunt was located. She lives in a rather small apartment, but I found a place. She brought out some pizza she ordered from downtown, and we caught up with her. We must’ve talked for almost 2 hours before my aunt had the idea to go and visit one of our relatives, who lived over in the west side of Calgary near the city limits. We headed in and had another long conversation, because we hadn’t seen him in a few years, since this was the first time I had been to Calgary. After we talked to him, we made our way a few streets over to visit one of my Grandpa’s close friends, who I hadn’t seen since I was only a year old. The thing was that my aunt didn’t tell him that me and my Mom were there.

Our car arrived at his rather sizable condo, where we went in and gave his door a knock. He first saw my aunt, who he was expecting, and then me and my mom, who he definitely wasn’t expecting. Long story short, he was so excited to see us for the first time in 13 years. It was really wholesome, and it is a memory that has stuck with me for a long time. We must have talked for almost 3 hours. Afterwards, everyone said their farewell’s, and we drove back to my aunt’s apartment. On the second day, I woke up to my aunt bringing out a box of pastries from her favourite bakery in the city, a great way to start the day. I had ambitions to go to one of the larger malls in the south side of Calgary, as well as spending time with my cousins that live near Okotoks. CF Chinook Center. We got back into the car and headed through downtown and onto Macleod Tr, where there was piles of traffic. We arrived at the mall, did some clothes shopping, and went to this fancy bakery store, which had very high price points. Unsurprisingly, we left that store with only a tin of shortbread and chocolate almonds, which still came to a total of $90. Believe me, it wasn’t my idea to get $60 lemon shortbread, but I still got a good laugh out of it.

We carried on to Okotoks, on Highway 2X, with a stop to pick up one of my older cousins from a sleepover. After the short detour, we yet again got back onto the highway, and continued, before exiting onto the 552 eastbound. We pulled up to my cousins house, which is in the middle of nowhere, and it essentially has prairie on all four sides of the house. On a clear day you can see all the way to the Rockies from the house. I went into the house with my cousin we picked up, and it was announced that we would be having pineapple pulled pork for dinner, which to say the least, it was really good. Afterwards, I went out into my cousins spacious yard to go on their trampoline which overlooked the rolling hills. They have two dogs which are both energetic, it can be chaotic at times, but a good chaotic, if that makes sense. We did our classic trampoline games while the dogs freaked out below and ran around the trampoline, and it was pretty entertaining. In the prairies, the sunsets are majestic. On a clear day, it has some of the best sunsets I’ve ever seen. Luckily, it was a perfectly clear night, which unsurprisingly, because Calgary is the sunniest city in Canada. On average, they receive an impressive 335 days of sunshine a year, compared to the 260 days a year Victoria gets.

My cousins and me filed back into the house and into their basement, which was nicely furnished and cozy. I made some popcorn with their popcorn machine, and we sat on their large couch and watched Percy Jackson. However, I was getting tired, and I only made it about 30 minutes into the movie before I passed out onto the couch, which has to be the most comfortable couch I’ve ever slept on. I was awoken to the sun in my eyes through the basement window, and I trailed upstairs to be met with Costco cinnamon buns, which were delicious. After my cinnamon bun, my cousin brought me back downstairs and we played some Star Wars on his Xbox, until about 11am. The ambition for the day was to make a trip to Sheep River, a provincial park 40km west of the house. I did touch on this a bit in PW #2, but I’ll go into more detail here. We piled into their Pathfinder and got on the road, first towards the Saskatoon Farm, where we had a nice breakfast overlooking the river. Afterwards, we headed to Okotoks, where we filled up the car before doing the drive towards Sheep River. Proceeding on Highway 7, we drove through Turner Valley, and Black Diamond, where the prairies turned to mountains. We reached Bighorn Lookout, where we got out of the car, took a short walk, and arrived on this large mountainous lookout, with spectacular views. After taking in all the scenery, and many pictures from my mom, we loaded the car back up, and headed eastbound, back to Black Diamond. We stopped at this diner on the main strip called Marv’s, which was a retro 80s style diner, again briefly mentioned in PW #2. I had an ice cream, as well as an Oreo flavoured cow-tale. I don’t know how to describe what a cowtail looked like, it was sort of an Oreo flavoured fondant with the cream in the middle.

We headed back to the house, and once we arrived both me and my cousin beelined downstairs to play some more Star Wars, before my aunt came to pick us up to bring us back to the city, as it was a Sunday and my cousins had school the next day. We got onto the QE2, and headed northbound to the Four Points hotel near Calgary Airport. My aunt graciously offered to take me and my mom for dinner at Joey’s, a burger joint off of Barlow Tr. We took a short 5 minute drive back to the hotel, and chilled out for a few hours, before briefly going out in 50 km/h winds to get Tim Hortons in the same plaza, where they were out of literally everything. They had only had one type of muffin, and zero chocolate chip muffins. Quite saddening indeed. We went back to the hotel and I fell asleep around 11pm again. A new day arose, and I was up at 6am, even though the flight didn’t leave until 11:30am. There was a free airport shuttle that came around every hour from the hotel, so we booked an 8am shuttle at the front desk. The guy pulled up, right on time at 8am, in his wonderful Four Points branded Dodge minivan (this is sarcasm, but it was still entertaining).

We made one stop at a sister hotel, and we continued along Barlow Tr towards the airport. My mom met a nice fellow in the shuttle, who was friendly and off to Salt Lake City for a business trip. We finally arrived at the airport after 15 minutes at the domestic terminal. Exiting this mom car and going into the airport, we printed our boarding passes at the self-serve kiosk. I guided my mom to TSA checkpoint C, where our flight was departing from. The line was massive. It was almost 90 minutes that we waited, but on the plus side we met a nice grandmother from Sudbury, ON. She was with her granddaughter in Calgary simply for fun, and to explore the city. After the tedious TSA line, we made our way to concourse C, while we waited for yet another 737-800 to arrive for our outbound flight. About 45 minutes later our inbound plane arrived and we boarded shortly after. Pushback was right on time, where our flight attendants introduced themselves with elevator music, I don’t know why, but it added a nice touch to the short journey. We took off on runway 17R, where I got a perfect view of the skyline, everything I was dreaming of and more. We hung a right before climbing to our cruise altitude of 35,000ft over the east side of the Rockies, with more in-flight service. This time, I went with the Celebration Cookie, which was fantastic. Just like the flight into Calgary, we were only at cruise for about a half an hour, before starting our initial descent over Vancouver on the RNAV 09 Y approach plate, near Mt. Tuam on Salt Spring Island. We were soon on final, and we landed at 12:03pm, PDT. As we taxied to the gate, I nerded out on being impressed about the short landing roll. I also saved the flight path for future reference. I was home on a Monday, so I got to skip the remainder of the school day. We were home on May 29, after the magnificent and eventful trip. Kudos to anyone who reads this whole story, because it’s super lengthy.

Chivas is my favorite football team, and today I will talk about their starting eleven players. First of all, the goalkeeper is Raul (Tala) Rangel. He is very young, but is really good. He still makes some mistakes, but I am sure he will fix them soon. Then, the defenders, Chiquete Orozco and Pollo Briseno, are really good defenders, and they save the team from losing many times. My favorite Chivas player is Pollo Briseno because he is a natural leader and a really good defender. The right back of the team is Alan Mozo. He is in my opinion the best right back in Mexico right now because he is a fast, strong player who contributes in defense and attack. Then, the left back is Mateo Chavez. He just played his first game in first division this season, but he has won a place in the starting eleven because he is explosive and wins the ball a lot of times. He still makes mistakes, but he is 17 years old, so as I said before, he is on his way to fix them. Moving to the midfield, we have Fernando Beltran. He is a really strong midfielder and his strong points are dribling and long shooting. Next we have Erick Gutierrez. He is the best player in the team right now. He played in Netherlands in PSV. Now, he is in chivas contributting in the defense but mostly in attacking. This season, he has scored 3 goals although he is a midfielder. Moving on we have Pocho Guzman, the captain of the team. He is really good at short and long passes, and he is a great leader for the team too. Next up is the left wing of the team, Cade Cowell. It is his first season in the team, and he is already in the starting eleven because of his speed, dribbling and shooting. He is really good at creating chances to score, but has to work on his crossing. The right wing of the team is Roberto Alvarado. He is a really strong player and good at dribbling and crossing. He is really funny and really good at the sport too. Lastly, Ricardo Marin, the striker of the team. He is a really fast player who shoots really good and scores with his left leg normally to the right side of the goal. In conclusion, Chivas’ starting eleven is really good, and althouh they have to keep working on some areas, they have many chances of winning the league this season.

My friends and I where so excited about this game, Tigres in one of the best teams in Mexico, after chivas and America, a lot of my friends were wearing the shirt of the team of tigres or the Mexican National team or the shirt of Chivas, Bruno and I, we got into the corner shot to be able to see the players up close and we were able to take a lot of photos. I took a picture with Gignac and they didn’t give Bruno anything or a photo but they didn’t give anything and I was laughing.

Yesterday, after a long day filled with an Exam, and some other tiring subjects, I sat in the car with my Siblings and my Father. My Father had to take work to a Dental Lab, so we kind of sat there and did nothing. After a bit of time, we heard somebody tapping on our trunk, and upon me turning around, I was met with the sight of my now new PC (Personal Computer), which my dad has gotten from the owner of the Dental Lab (I believe). Since my other computer is 11 years old, having a computer that’s younger is always a pleasure (it is from the 2010 s). It has a Core 2 Duo E7300, which is faster than a Core 2 Quad (Q6600) I used to have. Despite this being nearly rocket science to you (since you fail to understand the terminology and why I am excited for getting such an old pc) I will only have to say that since I grew up with low powered and weak computers, the best I could do is learn about them and try to create one which would suit my needs. Despite having a Dual Core CPU (Central Processing Unit) it has a Download speed over 36 times faster and Upload 8 times faster than my Old Computer. I am very thankful to that Person, and now I am planning to create a sleeper Steampunk Build with this new piece of old technology.

-Iaroslav Pyrozhok

It was a sunny weekend afternoon and my friends and I decided to go for a ride in the park. We rode along the path around the lake and enjoyed the beautiful scenery. However, at this moment, I suddenly discovered that my rear tire was flat. So we all got out of the car and planned to find a nearby car repair shop. However, we walked along the lake for about half an hour without finding a car repair shop. At this time, a friend of mine suddenly remembered that he had learned how to repair a bicycle, so he decided to use local materials, his own tool box and some items found in the park, to try to repair my bicycle. We found a thick branch and some wire. My friend first removed the tire and then made a makeshift tire tool out of the branch and wire. He cleverly slipped the tool over the tire and secured it with wire. Then, he slowly pointed the tire valve at an air pump and began to inflate my tire.

I know how it feels to be stuck at home for a week. It can be frustrating and boring, especially when you’re used to being out and about with no care in the world. One of my friends was in this situation recently when they caught a cold and had to stay home to recover. They couldn’t go to school, meet friends, or do any of the usual activities they had planned on doing. They felt constantly isolated and restless, but they tried to make the best of this burden by catching up on reading, binge-watching TV shows/movies, and connecting with friends online that they hadn’t talked to in a while. They took the time to rest and take care of themselves, which was important for their recovery, one of the many things they hadn’t done often. Nonetheless, after a week, they of course were feeling much better and were ready to get back to their normal routine. With this, they learned that sometimes being stuck at home can be an opportunity to slow down and take a break from the hustle and bustle of everyday life. This person was me!