Kelly Hartigan was born in Long Island, New York, but now finds herself in the capital of Florida state. This is her journey. Kelly has said before that she is not a “very exciting person” yet has done a very daring and brave thing that has changed her life. Moving to college is always an exciting thing, but how about moving almost 1200 miles away from family and friends. It all starts in her birthplace of Long Island where her father, the vice president at a paper company, and mother, the regional manager of most north-eastern schools, raised Kelly in the same family home all her life. When she was in elementary school she picked up dance, which she would continue to do all the way through high school. When Kelly reached the sixth grade she found inspiration in art, she admired and began to create her own masterpieces in the form of paintings. Her grandfather was a big influence in this art as he was a long-time painter who gifted her painting supplies and techniques to help her create more. Family would always play a big role in Kelly’s life, over everything that kept her going, family was always there. Kelly played softball through middle school in her free time of dance and art but found that she didn’t have enough time to continue it through high school as she began to expand on dance more. While in high school Kelly got a job at a local Target outlet that she still works at today. Every time she visits home she is always welcomed back to her job. But one project in high school may have changed what Kelly was going to do with her future. She did research and explored the idea of going to Florida State University post high school, something that seemed like a dream. It wasn’t until she visited her older sister who had moved to Alabama, just a drive away from the restless campus. She took the leap to visit her dream school and knew that one day she would be back. Her next struggle came in facing her family whom she loved with all her might and telling them that she wants to leave her safe home for the adventures of college. After some convincing she accepted her enrollment into Florida State University and hasn’t looked back. Entering school, she only knew a single person from her old town that also attended the university. No other family or friends were there, a difficult position for some but Kelly adapted. Her friend that had come with her to this new experience eventually went back home and left the university leaving Kelly to make new friends in her new home. Her roommates and suitemates are nice but it’s hard to find new best friends in such a cluttered and wild place. Regardless Kelly continues to excel in school and show why she was able to attend the university in the first place. After this courageous move to Florida, she still continues to visit her family on breaks and will pursue Florida State until she has finished her degree.
On August 14th, 1999, Ava made her appearance in a small town in New Jersey. She was born into a family with two older brothers, one currently 21 and one 23. When Ava was entering elementary school, she attended Conover Road Elementary school and spent a lot of her time participating in dance and soccer as well as watching movies and tv shows with her mom. Her favorite movie to watch was the Disney movie, Moana. When Ava was entering middle school, at just 12 years old, she found out something about her family life that she hadn’t previously known. Her and her mother sat down one gloomy afternoon to watch Avas favorite television show together, American Idol. This was her favorite show at the time. It was a show were people would audition in front of 4 famous artists and would sing for them. Mid way through the television show, her mom abruptly paused it. She started to make conversation with Ava and went on to tell her that she has a half-sister. She told her that her sisters name is Lauren and that she is 21, now 27, and living in Nebraska. Shocked at first, Ava stormed away. She was very confused by this and how she did not know about Lauren for the first 12 years of her life. Ava had always dreamed of having a sister so when she found out she had one that she didn’t know, she was upset. As Ava got a little older, she began questioning her mom more about her sister. It wasn’t until she was entering high school when her mom decided that she could meet Lauren. Her sister flew out to New Jersey to meet Ava and to sit and have lunch and talk about their lives. Ava was now attending Redbank Catholic High School, a school where she had a very big involvement with her volleyball team. During her summers in high school, Ava would set sail on the ocean for 3 weeks at a time. She did this for 3 summers and became very fond of boats. While in high school, Ava had her hopes on attending FSU, and if she did not get in, she planned to attend University of Arizona. She wanted to go somewhere warm, in order to have a change of scenery from her past 18 years. Luckily, she got into FSU where she would spend at least the next 4 years of her young adulthood. When she got to FSU, she was thrilled with the diversity and the many opportunities to get engaged with on campus. She got a job at a local bar, Pots, rushed a sorority, Delta Gamma, and set her focus on her major, Hospitality. Ava desires to work specifically in the hospitality business with yachts when she is older because she got a lot of experience with boats from a job she had in high school. Ava loves FSU and hanging out with her friends, but she also loves going home once in a while to spend time with her family. Her sister Lauren and her still keep in touch and she flies out to New Jersey every so often to meet up with Ava and just chat.
I had the privilege of interviewing Kristin Piotrowski. Kristin is from Winter Park, Florida. Winter Park is right in between Tampa and Florida. Kristin is the youngest of 3 children. Her siblings already have children and she already is an Aunt to a niece and two nephews. Kristin’s favorite color has always been pink. In high school Kristin worked as a office assistant, and to add to that she could also be listed as a babysitter because included in her job sometimes was babysitting the bosses child. Kristin is good at making tacos, and enjoys to make them because they are simple. Her favorite show to watch is Grey’s Anatomy, the medical drama series. Growing up, Kristin loved cheerleading. She cheered all of high school and loved what she did. One time during a summer cheer camp she got a serious black eye that stuck with her for a good while. A memory was when her cheer squad took the road out to one of their biggest rivalry football games of the season. Kristin sat on the team bus anxiously waiting the game and the atmosphere awaiting them. Her really good friend was the quarterback on the team, Brad. Brad’s dad was also the head coach of the football team, and a math teacher at Winter Haven! So with lots of reputation on the line and people to impress, the whole town knew this game would be one to remember. The opponent was the Lakeland dreadnaughts, a neighboring school. The stadium was packed, and Kristin witnessed it all on the shoulders of her teammates, chanting “De-fense” as the blue devils pushed for victory. Her confidence pushed out of the sky during halftime when she succeeded in landing 20 front flips in a row! The place went nuts and the entire Winter Haven side of the field was feeling very confident. That was until the final drive. Kristen stood tall cheered as hard as she could. The blue devils scored a touchdown to bring them down 1 point in the remaining seconds. The place was electric as a critical decision was needed. Should the blue devils kick a field goal to try tying the game? Or should they go for the 2 point conversion to win it all. Brad and the offense ran back on to attempt the game winning conversion. They did not get the extra 2 point conversion. The game was over and Kristin’s entire night had taken a sudden turn for the worst. Her best friends were named Ana and Allison. They loved hanging out and having fun in their free time. So much that even today all three go to Florida State together and still hang out. Kristin recently purchased a new puppy. Phoebe, now just 4 months old, has been trained and is a very well rounded pup. With her major, Kristin looks to become a elementary school teacher. She is great with children and hopes to teach kids in the kindergarten to third grade range.
Julianne Hyunseung Lee was born on Christmas in July in 1999 in Miami Gardens. Given the opportunity to move when she was a little older, Julie was adamant about staying in the same house in Cooper City where she grew up even though the move was just across town. Including herself, Julie’s family of four consisted of two overprotective parents and her annoying little brother that she loves. Julianne’s father owns a successful whig business which was one of the first in the country ran by Julie’s grandfather. Every time her father comes home from a business trip, he would trap little Julie in his arms. He was arguably the most protective parent when Julie became of age to date, as any father would. Little Julie’s first language was Korean which she learned from her family who lives in Korea that she goes to visit every summer. Growing up in an American public school, she was picked on a lot because she was different. It wasn’t until high school that her English was perfect without an accent. Her elementary and middle school years she struggled more than her classmates and peers with the classes and material. In the fifth grade, Julie took an anatomy test which all her classmates failed. Julie, however, aced it and was inspired to begin her studies in science and eventually becoming a doctor. Throughout her years in high school, Julianne started devoting more and more time to the band where she played the flute. She became so strong in her band program that she began taking serious leadership roles at Cooper City High School Band Program. It was nice for Julie to have this as an outlet but, it was time to let go and focus on her next chapter in life, Florida State University. Another outlet Julie turned to in times of stress was her cardio workouts. She loves to run, no matter what was going on, Julie always made time to put on some motivational hip-hop or rap music while her size six and a half sneakers hit the pavement. Her studies were another important thing to Julie. Although she was strong in all subjects, all classes relating to the medical field interested her. Florida State was a safety school for Julianne and Ruckers in New Jersey was her first choice but, she continues to find her place in her new home and each month that goes by, another club shows up on her resume. Smart, beautiful, involved in the community, and a great friend, Julianne Lee has got it all figured out. What a lot of people don’t know about Julianne is that it took her a lot of hard work and dedication to get where she is now. Recently at Florida State, Julie applied for an office position for a prestigious medical club and ended up becoming the vice president as a freshman. In order to make it official, she just needed to put together a quick speech describing who she was to her new club members and why she choose the medical route in her education. Every person’s heart in the room went out to Julie as she explained her story of how she knew that the medical field of study was the right path for her. She then explained her goal to attend graduate school and he plans for the future. Needless to say, if anyone deserves the vice president position in her new club, it should be Julie for she is the most driven and passionate. Little Julianne Hyunseung Lee continues to work hard in life at Florida State for now with hopes to become Doctor Julianne Hyunseung Lee in the future.
I got to interview Molly Hauser. Molly was born on April 25th, 1999 in South Florida in Hollywood. As a kid, she attended Hollywood Hills Elementary. When she was young, she liked to partake in activities like dance and gymnastics and did these two things for most of her childhood. Many of her friends also did the same and it was a great activity for all of them growing up. She has an older sister who attends University of Florida and she is 21, so they are a good age gap of 3 years apart. Of both of her parents, she is closer to her mom and considers her mom her best friend. During her time in high school, she attended the University School where most of her childhood friends also went. At this time though, unlike her friends, she switched over to playing lacrosse. She played both high school and club and travelled widely to play the sport she loves. During the college application process, she applied to University of Florida and Florida State University, along with a few other schools. When Molly heard back from University of Florida, her number one school, she was devastated. Unlike her sister, she did not get accepted and now had to rethink all of her decisions when it came to attending college. A little while after, she got accepted to Florida State University and decided that this was the school she was going to attend. She was reluctant at first since many of her childhood to high school friends would be attending University of Florida and not as many kids that she was closest with would be joining her in Tallahassee. Deciding to attend Florida State University, she went through the recruitment process. After going through it, she ended up in the sorority Kappa Alpha Theta. One day she wishes to live in the house with all of her closest sisters. Her closest friend is also in Kappa Alpha Theta who is Wendy. Currently, she lives in the dorm Dorman and plans to live in Copeland with other sisters for her sophomore year. She is studying to be a speech pathologist at Florida State and plans to attend grad school. Her favorite place to go out is Tenn at the Strip and her favorite frat to go with is Alpha Epsilon Pi. Outside of her academics and other activities, her favorite artists are Khalid and Quinn XCII. She has gotten to see Khalid in concert and says that it was one of her favorites. Molly’s favorite show to watch is One Tree Hill and she was rewatched it several times because of how much she likes the plot line and certain characters like Lucas. The thing she likes most about Florida State is meeting all new people and having so many new opportunities on campus to do, which she didn’t have as freely and commonly back home. The thing she dislikes most is the taking away of frat parties and living in a dorm.
Andrew Dearing Dorsey was born on September 15th, 1998. Born and raised in Pensacola Florida, he lived in a small city called Gulf Breeze. Living in a secluded city, everyone knew everyone. It is like everyone is one big family. Andrew has two older brothers and one sister, being the youngest of four. Being a sports-oriented family, Andrew grew up playing sports. In elementary school, he played golf. Not a huge fan, and kinda feeling forced, during middle and high school at gulf breeze, he played soccer and football. Towards the beginning of his senior year, Andrew found out about a very important mission trip that his church was going to take part in. Being super involved in his local church, Saint Ann Catholic, Andrew was invited and had an amazing opportunity that he couldn't resist. For preparation, they held local bake sales as a fundraiser and did toy drives to collect items to donate to the children of Granada. The trip was going to be from July 8th to the 15th and to distract himself from the rush and excitement that he had for the upcoming trip, he took his academics during senior year very seriously. He ended his high school years top of his class with a 4.7 GPA. High school was a lot of fun, having many close friends and partying a lot. He spent a lot of time helping people by putting a smile on their face and studying to be successful. But, for Andrew, senior year went by very quickly. By the time he realized, it was time for him to go on his first airplane ride and land in Granada, an island in Nicaragua. When he arrived, he was a little skeptical, especially since Zika was very prevalent during this time. But by the time he left the airport and saw the island, he knew it was going to be an experience of a lifetime. Andrew and his 19 other volunteers spent their time at Saint Georges University, constructing houses, building out houses, and repainting schools. He also got the opportunity to get to know the kids that belonged to the school and spend quality time with them, playing soccer and drawing. One day out of the week, they got the chance to go site seeing. He spent his day on a boat where he got to go snorkeling. This trip gave him a sense of clarity and allowed him to be connected to god, feeling safe and excited for the next chapter in his life that he was about to embark on: college. College for Andrew is somewhat easy and somewhat difficult. Finding the time to cook a meal, or even remembering to lock the door when he leaves for the day, is the hardest part about his college experience. However, Andrew, who lives with his two best friends, loves going out on the weekends to college Ave, or just hanging with the boys. Academics are a main priority, being the only one of his four siblings to go to college not for sports. Andrew loves Florida State University.
Alex Lizano was born 21 years ago and has lived in West Palm Beach his whole life. He has 2 older brothers, an older sister, and 1 younger brother making him the middle child. Growing up, Alex and his family weren’t always in a good place financially. He grew up not so well-off for a majority of his life and he believes that the event that changed all of that was when his father started up his own company. His father had started up a Drug and Alcohol Abuse Treatment facility that would help save the lives of many. For a while his family wasn’t seeing results with the company, but as time progressed they started to see the company explode with success and their lives started to improve. The company started to grow the most as Alex entered high school. This was a crucial for Alex because he was able to focus 100 percent on his studies and his athletics without worrying about his family’s financial situation. Ever since he was a kid he enjoyed watching and playing basketball. His favorite NFL team to watch is the Dallas Cowboys and his favorite NBA team is the Miami heat. When Alex entered high school, he would go on to play for his high school football team and his high school basketball club team. He was an outstanding player on both. With his life starting to become stress free, Alex was able to get a good GPA in high school and go on to attend Florida State University. At FSU, Alex studies entrepreneurship in hopes of following in his father’s footsteps of starting up his own business. He hopes to one day open up a business in Real Estate Investment. While at school, Alex has been able to explore some new hobbies. He loves to play video games and watch Netflix. Some of his favorite video games consist of sports games such as 2k. More recently he has been playing the game PUBG. He prefers this game over the game’s rival Fortnite because he feels PUBG is more realistic due to the fact that it isn’t animated like Fortnite, and he feels it is a more competitive game. Some of his favorite shows to watch on Netflix consist of crime dramas and “The Office”. When asked who would be the most boring fictional character to meet in real life, he named Toby from “The Office”. His favorite movies are “Scarface”, “The Wolf of Wall Street”, “Good Fellas”, or any movies that have a theme of gangsters. Alex believes that his father. He believes that his father's choice to start up the company was not only big for him and his life, but for his entire family. They are all now able to live a happier stress-free life and focus on the things they love to do as well as all spend quality time together. Alex hopes that he will one day provide the type of life for his family that is full of endless possibilities just as his father has.
Sydney Denkert was born with soccer in her blood on September 19th, 1998 in Miami, Florida. When Sydney was young, she attended Coral Reef Elementary, where she started playing soccer. She started to become more advanced in soccer throughout middle school. After she finished eighth grade, summer rolled around and she began training harder than ever knowing that making the high school team will not be easy. Sydney and her older sister, Shelby, seemed to always bicker and fight, which drove her parents crazy. Their mom calls out from the kitchen, “I can’t wait for you guys to go back to school so I don’t have to hear you fight anymore!”. “I can”, Shelby says knowing that Sydney will be joining her in high school this year. As summer comes to an end, the girls pack their backpacks and lay out their clothes for the first day back to school. “Don’t forget to take your sister to school!”, their dad says to Shelby as Sydney is scrambling to get ready. Sydney sits in her first period class as the morning announcements come on. She mostly tunes the dull intercom voice out until the speaker makes the announcement for tryouts for the girl’s soccer team. Knowing Shelby would be absolutely annoyed, Sydney decides to go to tryouts knowing she will make her high school’s team with her many years of prior experience. As Sydney walks onto the field ready for tryouts, the soccer coach announced that Shelby has made team captain. Now that Shelby is captain, Sydney knows she will have a hard time making the team, she has to play her absolute best. Sydney nails all of the drills and dribbles, catching the coach’s eye, she earns a first string position on the varsity team. Shelby’s filled with rage, “my 14 year old sister is on varsity...with me? You must be joking!”, she says to herself. The sisters spend so much time together at home, school, and at soccer practice. They still have the occasional disagreement, but as the season progressed they began to bond over the sport they both love. Sydney began to look up to her older sister and take her advice at practice in order to better herself. The sisters notice how happy their parents are seeing them getting along on the field and at home. The team has been practicing hard for the past couple of weeks because of their high school rivalry game. Game day arrives; the sisters are playing and cooperating better than ever. The game is tied with 20 seconds left on the clock. Shelby passes the ball to Sydney and she kicks it the first opportunity she gets. “GOALLLLL! THE DENKERT SISTERS WIN IT FOR THE TEAM!”, the announcer booms over the loudspeaker in the stadium. Sydney and her sister embrace in a hug. “I love you”, they say to each other. After Shelby graduated and moved away for college, Sydney followed in her sister’s footsteps and continued to pursue soccer. Sydney’s senior year, she made captain and received offers from many different colleges to play soccer for them!
Matt Middlebrooks is a freshman who is attending Florida State University and it is his third semester here. His journey here at Florida State began in June of 2017 when he attended the Summer C session. Why did he choose to attend Florida State? Well, Matt says that Florida State was simply just "the best school" in his opinion. He was also very fond of the football team, the basketball team, and the beautiful campus. His love for sports influenced him to pursue a major in Sports Management. Growing up, Matt played basketball and football. Basketball was the sport that he played all four years of high school, but he only got to play football the first two of his four years. Shattering his arm while playing football lead him to have surgery where metal rods got put into his arm, which he still has in today. After the injury, he had to go through surgery and physical therapy. The doctors told him that he would no longer be able to play football because he could only play non-contact sports from there on out. It took an entire year for him to recover from this injury. Even today, when he is going to go on an airplane he has to have documentation regarding the metal rods in his arm to get through airport security. He resided in Jacksonville for ten years until his family relocated up north. In February of 2010, Matt Middlebrooks life was forever changed. Moving so far away was not exactly something that an eleven-year-old in fifth grade would want to do. Going from a beach town to a suburban jungle was a culture shock for Matt, his parents, and his younger sister. He was not quite sure how he would adjust to the change, but it ended up not being the worst thing. Moving in February, they arrived in the prime of the cold weather. Today he says that he prefers to live in Pennsylvania over Florida because he is a big fan of the cold weather. Keep in mind, he had never seen snow before in his eleven years of living and when he arrived in Philadelphia it was snowing. Matt ended up liking the colder weather a little more than he thought he was going to. Matt was feeling nervous about the move, he was not sure who he would meet. He also was worrying about finding a group that he would "fit in" with. Being as into sports as he was, he was able to make friends pretty quickly. The friends he made when he first moved are still some of his best friends till this day. Although he moved on to a new life and made these new friends, he did not forget about all those that he left behind in Jacksonville. In the beginning, he was worried about how he would keep in touch, but over the years social media and cell phones have helped him out a lot to communicate with his Florida friends. Now as he is back in Florida, he has to keep in touch with those friends from up north because he was the only one from his high school to ever attend Florida State. Majority of his friends currently attend Penn state. He enjoys visiting them as much as he can, but it is not the easiest because he has to fly from Florida to Pennsylvania.
December 26th, 1998 was not your typical Saturday, today marked the birth of Lauren Gordon. Lauren was born in Plantation, Florida, she was the best gift any parent can receive the day after Christmas. Both of her parents were born in Jamaica, so she was raised in a Jamaican home that would teach her many important values. Values that would shape how she lives her life and important morals that will stick with her for the entirety of her life. Lauren has been living in the Weston and Davie area for all her life, she attended pre-k and elementary school in Davie, Florida but then she attended Tequesta Trace park middle school in Weston, Florida. This is where she found many of her friends and was able to express one of her many talents, singing. During her time in middle school, she showed her talent of singing by singing the national anthem before a basketball game. The same year she performed her first singing act, her younger brother was born, which brought joy to Lauren. After her middle school years, she had a burning passion for singing and becoming a neurosurgeon. When Lauren entered high school, she found a different passion, marketing. Lauren put the dream of neurosurgery to the side and focused on the next goal in her life, which was marketing. She joined a prestigious business club that is known around the world, DECA. DECA was a business club that encompassed every aspect in business. The club had a competitive side to it, there were district, state and national competitions. Lauren would spend the majority of her time in high school, competing and broadening her knowledge on marketing. But, during her senior year something drastic was going to happen. It was a cloudy day in Weston, Florida on November 8, 2016. Lauren woke up with excitement because the presidential election was taking place that evening. November 8, 2016 was going to be a historic day, either the first woman president was going to win, Hillary Clinton, or an unexperienced bigot, Donald Trump. Unluckily, she was born on December, 1998 and was not 18 years of age so she could not vote. She believes that voting is a privilege and not a right in this country and trusted the nation’s people to vote with their conscious. Lauren and many other people were anxious about this presidential election. The two candidates were very unique. On one side we had an experienced leader with bad reputation and on the other we had a business man with no political background and a man that has accused of sexual misconduct. Anyone looking from outside the country would say that the experienced leader was going to be win but in reality it was a close race. The time has come and now all voting polls have been closed, the numbers are starting to come in. After, a couple hours Lauren finds herself in shock and disbelief, Donald Trump was going to be the 46th president of the United States. Lauren was in shock and couldn’t believe the results, it took a couple of days for her to realize the truth. To try to overcome this drastic news, she worked hard and was able to attend the DECA national competition in Tennessee, in which she placed 3rd place in the world in her category. Although, Trump won the presidency, her 3rd place position in the national competition was able to numb the pain for a short time.
Before starting college at Florida State University Max Berlowitz lived in Miami, Florida, where his family still lives and he goes back to often. While growing up in Miami, Max played a variety of sports and in High School said he played about every sport his school, Miami Country Day, had to offer. His favorite sport to play is basketball and to watch is football. Growing up Max has always had a passion and interest for all kinds of sports and followed local teams such as the Miami Dolphins, Miami Marlins, Miami Heat, Florida Panthers and now the Florida State Seminoles, even more since he now attends the university. With his desire for sports, Max is pursuing a degree in Sports Management here at Florida State University. He hopes that one day he could become a Sports Agent and could possibly represent some of his favorite players or teams. The process of starting college was a big factor in Max’s life thus far. During his senior year he had to decide between either Florida State University or Indiana University, which both have degree programs for Sports Management. Max ultimately made his decision to attend FSU, obviously, with factors that relate to family. He wanted to stay closer to home in Florida, where his family resides, and not travel multiple states up North where it would be more difficult to visit home whenever he pleases. The beginning of Max’s college years is also the beginning of his adult life, where he would have to start caring for himself instead of relying on his parents to do house work like cook him meals, do laundry, take out the trash, you get the point. Now, it’s technically Max’s third semester here at FSU (started during Summer C) and he has mostly, if not fully, adjusted to growing into an adult by buying groceries, doing laundry, time management and more. Making friends and talking to new people comes easy to Max, as that contributed when he rushed, pledged, and became a brother for the Fraternity Alpha Epsilon Pi (AEPi) during the Fall semester and will be living with some of his new brothers next school year in an off-campus house, where, even though he will have to share a bathroom with someone, Max will have his own kitchen and living room area. Sharing a bathroom with one of his roommates shouldn’t be a problem for Max because he currently already does so at Southgate Campus Centre. June of 2017 started a new journey for Max as he packed up his belongings and traveled nearly eight hours from Miami to Tallahassee to begin his life at Florida State University, and so far it has all been good from that point and will continue for the best. In May of 2021, maybe sooner, we will see Max Berlowitz graduate from FSU with a degree in Sports Management and have a career lined up for him to become a Sports Agent, something he is dreaming of, and I would not doubt it.
I interviewed Charlene Forti. She was born on January 18, 1999 in Davie, Florida and lived there until she was four years old. Her mom is originally from the Philippines and her dad is from New York, so she is Italian, Polish, and Philippine. Since her mother is from the Philippines, Charlene and her family would often take family vacations to the Philippines because they still had family in the Philippines. She took one of her first trips to the Philippines when she was 4 years old, and it was one of the most eventful trips. When she drank some of the Philippine water, she began to get sick and had horrible stomach problems. She even got dehydrated from vomiting so much. Afterwards, anything she ate or drink would not stay down and her Aunt, Uncle, and parents knew that this was because she had drank the water that her body was definitely not used to. As the night went on her parents and family grew more and more concerned and eventually took Charlene to the hospital. From where they lived, the nearest hospital was about a 30 minute drive to a city called Naga. She became scared at the hospital because they had to use needles and IV and she became queasy just thinking about this years later. She stayed in the hospital overnight and she was so comfortable there that she did not want to leave. After being released from the hospital Charlene and her family made sure that nobody drank any water for the duration of their vacation. Growing up, she had no brothers or sisters and she had a cat for sixteen years, even though her and her mother are allergic to cats. After her cat passed away, she found a lizard while out one day and her and her mom brought it to the pet store where they were told it would die out on its own, so Charlene and her mom decided to keep it as their new pet. Charlene and her family eventually moved from Davie to Coral Springs, Florida because they had a better school system. After moving to Coral Springs, she joined the local swim club. She continued to swim in high school and began playing Water Polo. She loved Water polo because it was the first team sport she did and she liked it so much she did not even mind going to 6 am practices. When she came to Florida State in the fall she joined Delta Zeta after meeting some of the members of the sorority through a mutual friend. While taking an astronomy lab in the fall, her TA and other friends constantly mentioned how fun rock-climbing was for them and she wanted to try it. Now she goes to the Tallahassee rock gym several times a week, and eventually wants to be able to rock climb outdoors on mountains. She is a Human Resources Management major, though she may switch to a Philosophy major after debating whether or not that was what she wanted to do coming into Florida State, and she is hoping she can figure out what exactly she wants to do after college.
Charlize has lived in Florida her entire life so, seeing snow is a passion she hopes she can accomplish in her future. She wants to get that feeling of throwing snowballs at her brother, Nick, or learning to build a snowman without it falling everywhere. When she was a kid, she attended five different elementary schools where she got the chance to meet abundant of new people. Since she was always going to the YMCA after school, Charlize started playing softball in elementary school. Playing softball allowed her to feel free and play a sport that she cherishes. She was one of the best on her little league team and since she enjoyed the feeling of hitting homeruns and catching pop flies so much, she continued to play her whole life. Moving from elementary school to middle school, a tragic event occurred in her life. Her mom passed away when she was only eleven. Being so young when this happened in her life, she decided to follow in her stepmom’s path and go to a sleepaway camp hoping this could relieve some pain. Traveling to North Carolina where the camp was taken place, she was very nervous and unsure if this will actually help her. But, as she interacted with other campers and counselors and watched them talk about their personal issues, she saw how comforting everyone was towards each. After observing and listening to others open up, she realized how welcoming and comforting all these people where. She was able to talk about personal stuff she thought she wouldn’t have shared with these people and she was extremely appreciative of how caring every individual at the camp was towards her. She felt this camp made a huge impact on her life and she is glad she took the chance to try something different for herself. After returning home from this three-week life- changing experience, Charlize decided she will return again next summer and many more summers to relive the amazing experience. When her senior year had finally arrived, she got her first car. Flashing around the neighbor in her white jeep, she was ecstatic to be able to drive to school everyday and park in the senior lot with all her friends. Senior year is when you get to apply to colleges and find out where you want to go for your future. Her number one choice was the University of Georgia which was an out of state college. Out of state colleges are very expensive and instead she was staying in Florida and attending her number one school in Florida, Florida State! Her experience here has been an enjoyable one. She goes out with her friends to Pots whenever she gets the chance. She enjoys going out to eat and trying new places all across town. Living in a dorm she can basically walk everywhere while getting in her workout for the day. She enjoys eating Reese’s cup and basically can live off them. When she’s taking a break in between classes or relaxing when she’s not going out, she’s watching Netflix and always searching for new movies and shows to watch. She really enjoys watching crime shows because she’s majoring in criminology and hopes to become a police officer and follow in her family’s footsteps!
I had the opportunity to interview and get to know David Ryber. David is an eighteen-year-old student here at Florida State University. He is a very interesting person with a bright future filled with important goals in his future. David was born just a few minutes away from the Detroit area. He spent his childhood and teen years in the small suburb of Troy. He grew up as an only child and still has no siblings. As a child, David played baseball and enjoyed hanging out with his friends and family. He has always loved to watch football and basketball. His favorite teams are the Detroit Pistons, Detroit Lions, and the Michigan State Spartans. David also thoroughly enjoyed going to the Detroit Tigers home baseball games. Transitioning to high school, he became heavily involved in the cross-country team and also the golf team. He always was around friends who had similar interest in running and cross country. He always maintained exceptional grades throughout school and knew that he could get accepted into nearly any school of his choice. Towards the end of his junior year of high school, David came to the realization that he was ready for a change in environment, so he and his family set off on a mission to find the perfect school and living area for him. He quickly grew tired of the cold weather back home in Michigan, so one of the main criteria he was looking for in a new school was a school in a more southern state with much warmer weather. David and his parents visited various schools ranging from The University of Alabama, Clemson, The University of Florida, and finally Florida State University. He instantly fell in love with the campus, weather, and surrounding area of Tallahassee. He decided to leave his home, friends, and family and pursue his further education at Florida State University. He admitted to me that the transition has not been the easiest of tasks. He often misses the life he left behind and is still very thankful for his time in Michigan. Now, instead of driving down the street or meeting up with his friends or family, he has to take a three hour flight to be able to see them. Not only has David committed to moving to the Tallahassee area, his parents are also planning on moving here as well. They are currently looking for homes near David and are finishing their career obligations back in Troy. Despite the difficulties in moving so far from home, David still remains focused on his academics and life in Florida as he understands that this decision to move across the country will have extremely positive impacts on his future. He now happily lives at an on-campus dorm and he is taking classes at FSU. He plans on pursuing a finance major where he can later on in life enter the field of investment banking. He hopes to graduate in three years and start a successful career.
Today I had the opportunity to interview myself and get to explore my past a little more. My name is Samantha Rios and I was born December 1st 1997 at 10pm in Kendall Regional Hospital. For this reason I believe that I am a night owl. As soon as I was born all of my aunts and uncles came to visit me in the hospital and I had my first experience meeting my huge Cuban family. I was born into a very cuban family actually making me the first generation to be born in America, but one can say that living in Miami is basically Cuba part two. I later went on to elementary school where I was one of the first kids to start reading. When I was in Kindergarten I was able to read the level 10 books while most people were on level 1-5. In elementary school I went onto having some of the most AR book sores and would always get stickers everytime I finished a new book. Soon enough I had a little sister names Vicki who is 2 years younger than me. Vicki is cool but we have always had extremely different personalities which caused us to fight a lot in grade school. One of the biggest events that occured in my life was the birth of my baby sister Zoe. Zoe Bella was born December 3, 2007. That's almost exactly 10 year age gap between us.The day she was born my entire family got up at 4:30am to get to the hospital for her early delivery since it was scheduled to be a cesarean section. For hours my sister and I waited in the living room for notice on when we could go into the room to see our new baby sister! But a few hours after my mom was checked into the hospital I saw my dad rushing past the room we were waiting in with a team of doctors all huddling around a cart with my baby sister. I could tell something was wrong because when I asked my dad to see her my cousins held me back as I could see my dad fighting the tears. About an hour later someone from my family had decided told me that something was wrong with the baby but they only told me she was born with a tiny ear. The next day I found out that there had actually been complications at birth and Zoe was helicoptered over to Miami children's hospital where my dad had accompanied her. It was then I knew something wasn't right. The following day I was able to visit by baby sister in the newborn ICU unit better known as NICU where she spent the first 1 and half of her life at. Throughout the years Zoe has always had to go to a lot of doctors appointments to see specialized and primary care physician regarding her conditions. She has a nurse 24/7 since she cannot be left alone and received therapy weekly at home. Seeing all the health professionals that have helped her accomplished so much and be where she is today as inspired me to do so for others. For this reason when I graduated high school I felt like a new world had opened up to me. I went on to attend the Florida State university where I decided that I would be on the premedical tract so that I can pursue my dream of helping others as a physician. My love for my baby sister and passion for the field has allowed me to excellent in all of my classes so that I have earned a 3.81 GPA. I have slowly learned that school comes first and my future means everything to me now. I have goals of becoming a doctor and as of now nothing is stopping me and my baby sister Zoe is my biggest motivation.
It was a Monday night during the fall of 1999. The streets were buzzing with laughter, people were out drinking and enjoying themselves, its Miami, Florida. This night would mark the beginning of Gloria Chae’s life. Gloria was born on August 16, 1999 in Miami, Florida. She visited Korea to visit her family around the age of 7. Growing up her parents were strict, specially her mother, she was strict because she wanted her daughter to succeed and go in the right path. She is one of four siblings, she has an older brother that’s around the age of 24 and lives in Los Angeles, younger brother that is 13 and a sister that is 16.Gloria was only 12 years old when she experienced something unimaginable. This experience was the death of her dog named Gemmy, her mother was the one that broke the news to her. Her heart stopped as soon as she heard the news, all she could think about was her dog and their life together. She always wanted a dog but her father was never into the idea of getting one, until one day he changed his mind. When deciding to buy a dog, her father’s only condition was that he would name the dog. They decided on a beautiful husky mix, the dog was golden brown like caramel, one eye was light blue like the ocean, and the other was half brown and blue. Her father named the dog gemmy, he chose this name because he said the dog is a gem. She got the dog at an early age, it was a great friendship from the start, they immediately clicked. The two were inseparable, Gemmy would sleep at the end of her bed at night and would wake up when she was heading to school. They grew up together, Gemmy was just a pup when they got her and Gloria was only a few years old. As the dog got older, it became sick, by the time they took her into the veterinarian, they had found out the Gemmy was going to pass away. Gloria was not there the day that they put Gemmy down but she knew that she was going to lose her best friend. With the losing of her best friend, she was extremely saddened and was upset that something like this could happen to her and her beautiful dog. Her father, although he did not want a dog initially became very close to Gemmy and was a big loss for the whole family. After this event she took on dancing at an early age, any type of dance that existed, she knew how to dance it. She would dance with elegance and great finesse, dancing was her life. Unfortunately, she had an ankle injury around the age of 14 that put a halt to her dancing. Music became her new interest, playing the piano was something she loved doing and it would help her get away from things. As she grew up, her interests grew too with dying her hair, putting on eye shadow(make-up), and likes any attire that is comfortable. She attended Miami Killian High school, when deciding what to do after high school, she applied to schools that were a decent distance away from home because she wanted to become more independent. Florida State University was the place she chose to study at and gain better knowledge. She is only a freshman at FSU, she really enjoys that campus and the people. When she first got to the university, she really enjoyed going out and having fun, but now she likes to stay in and have girl’s night. She plans on staying at Florida State for her undergrad, and plans to study up north for her graduate school. Teaching music to kids is something she is passionate about and hopes to pursue it, once she gets her music degree.
Wendi Jade Halpryn came into existence on a hot winters day on November, 5, 1998, in Mount Saini Hospital, Miami Beach, Florida. Wendi was born into a family of two sisters and one happy couple. Wendi ended up being the youngest of three girls, Samantha being the oldest and Nicole being the middle child. Samantha, Nicole, and Wendi all grew up in the same house all their lives in Miami Beach, Florida, and went to the same grade schools growing up until college. As a child, Wendi attended a small co-ed private school called Lehrman Community Day School in Miami Beach from Kindergarten to sixth grade. She also attended another small co-ed private school called Miami County Day School where she spent seventh grade all the way through 12th grade just like both of her sisters did before her. She played sports growing up, but she always had an itch to manage a team. So, in high school she was the manager of her school’s cross-country team and did very well at her volunteering job. Before her closest sister left for college, in 2014, they got really close. They would talk about drama in their lives and other sisterly talk that only them two know about. However, one specific event stuck out to Wendi and it was Nicole’s trip to Poland and Israel and how that trip changed her point of view on life and her spiritual life. Nicole had the biggest influence on Wendi growing up, so, naturally, Wendi wanted to do everything Nicole did. Before applying for college, Wendi already decided she wanted to join Nicole at Florida State University and someday go into law like her influential sister is ensuing. Nicole also influenced Wendi on wanting to participate in the same trip she went on called March of the Living. This would lead Wendi into pursuing more information about the journey and her parent’s permission to go on this once in a life time experience, just like Nicole did before her. Wendi was very excited to go on the adventure but felt alone since she would be separated from her family and her home. Despite feeling alone, she found out her summer camp friends from Canada and New York would be joining her on the two-week expedition to Poland and Israel respectively. Wendi’s group first visited Poland, where she explored museums, memorials, graveyards, and deserted concentration camps to examine the roots of intolerable prejudice and hatred towards the innocent people of the Jewish religion in the mid 20th century. While touring the concentration camps, there was one survivor of the camps and was narrating his memories to Wendi’s group. While she listened, she became speechless as she imagined herself in his shoes during the time he was a prisoner and how terrified she would be. All groups went on the March of the Living, which consisted of walking from Auschwitz to Birkenau concentration camp in remembrance of the lives lost. After that week, Wendi flew to Israel for a week. In Israel, she visited multiple attraction sites and had a very spiritual experience. Throughout the two weeks, she gathered many souvenirs to remind her of her once in a lifetime experiences.
Tarren Pearson was born in a small town in Virginia called Fort Myer. From there, he moved to Oregon, then moved to Washington, and finally wound up in South Florida, near the Boca area. His moving around was due to his dad being in the military and getting stationed at all these different places, along with going back and forth to visit his mom in Washington. When I interviewed him, I asked him how he felt about moving so much throughout his life, and he said there were mixed feelings that came along with it. Exploring new towns is fun, but it’s challenging to start new schools and form new relationships every time. Even though he had to experience the struggle of starting new schools, through clubs and sports like soccer, class government, and leadership he was able to make his high school experience more enjoyable than most. He told me that a lot of people hated high school, but he actually loved it, getting to interact with different people through these extracurriculars. With the obvious stress of making new friends and adjusting to his new homes, also came the ability to experience new environments, ranging from snowy Virginia winters to hot South Florida summers. Doing this has made him more excited to travel and seeing what’s out there in the world, encouraging him to eventually want to go overseas, outside of North America. In terms of family, Tarren has 2 step siblings, both younger than him, and two half siblings, both older than him. We talked about being the middle child, and he said he enjoyed the dynamic of learning from his older siblings and teaching to his younger siblings. He splits his time between spending time in the nice and rainy state of Washington and the hot and sunny state of Florida, though mainly living in the latter. The diversity of these climates allowed him to learn snowboarding and skiing, but also be able to experience hot summer beach days, while most people are only lucky enough to get stuck with one or the other. He decided to attend FSU as a criminology major in light of this, but is planning to go back to Washington over our next break from school. He’s excited to be back with his friends, who also go to school far away from home. It’s hard to leave your friends and start a whole new life once, let alone multiple times. He first travelled alone when he was 6 years old, going on his first solo plane ride. Traveling at such a young age is scary for most kids, but has made Tarren more adventurous in life. Now, going away to college is somewhat easier for someone like him, as opposed to those who are just moving for the first time. The traveling in his life has made him more open to new experiences, in turn letting him see all the beautiful sights that not many can say they’ve seen, such as the ever so exciting Tallahassee, Florida.
A New Jersey native, Travis Ardin was born in Denville on March 1st, 1999. He grew up in Rockaway, a town with a little over six thousand people, where his father served as the chief of police and his mother as the payroll manager of a propane company. Travis moved from his home in New Jersey to Florida at the end of this past summer and now pays in-state tuition. When his father retired with a pension as the chief of police, his mother decided she did not really need to work either and so they decided to move down to Florida, closer to their family. Travis was in his junior year of high school when he found out about the decision but knew his family would be keeping the house until the end of the summer after he graduated so that he could enjoy one last summer with his friends. Unfortunately, the house sold quicker than expected and Travis and his parents had to move out in May. As his older sister was already enrolled at UCF at the time of the move, she was not as affected as Travis was, seeing that she had already made friends and lived in Orlando. Travis was completely against the move and the Monday night he had to leave the house to temporarily live in a condo for two months, he cried remembering all the memories he had had in the house he had grown up in. Travis took pictures and videos of each room of the house as well as the backyard and the pool because he didn’t want to ever forget what it looked like. Travis’ house was his favorite place to be and him and his friends would always hang out there; it was more than just a house, it was his home. His dad was in charge of most of the moving process and took the eighteen hour long drive in the moving truck down to their current residence in Port Charlotte, on Florida’s west coast. When it came time to decide on a college to attend, Travis knew he did not want to go to a smaller school for the next four years of his life and so he applied to the University of South Carolina, as well as other larger universities. However, USC did not get back to him as quickly as Florida State University did and that brings us to Travis’ current life here at FSU. Despite having a car here on campus, Travis prefers to deal with the daily parking hassle as little as possible and thus walks to all of his classes. Residing in apartment-style McCollum Hall on the west corner of campus with three other roommates, Travis is majoring in Accounting, a subject he is comfortable with and knows he will have a secure future in. Ideally he would like to work as the general manager of a baseball team and is looking into double majoring in Sports Management as well. Although Travis is not currently in any clubs, he is involved with and passionate about his fraternity’s IM softball team. Regarding his decision to join Greek life, Travis sought to build lasting friendships seeing that he was from New Jersey and a freshman in college. The fraternity of Beta Theta Pi is where Travis found his new brothers, the people he felt most at home with. Travis’ best friends are scattered amongst various schools in the country and they do keep in contact regularly by texting and through FaceTime. However, when his friends return to New Jersey during the school breaks, it is now difficult for Travis to see them and hang out. Travis would like to visit there often but would feel bad staying at his friends’ homes and does not want to put that on them.
Diego Mendoza was born on October 22, 1998 in Lima, Peru. He has a twin brother named Alonso and a thirteen-year-old sister who gets spoiled so often. You can tell Diego apart from Alonso because he has these two, specific small birthmarks on his face. Also, they have different personalities that you can tell apart from. A couple of times the Mendoza twins have swapped classes with each other and would not get caught or noticed. At nine years old, Diego had to leave everything behind in his country, Peru. The reason he had to move was because his parents wanted a better life for him, his brother, and sister. When Diego first reached America, he was in awe of the super shiny cars and the buildings. Diego really liked how in New Jersey, where he had lived for five years, pretty much everything was walking distance, which he was used to in Peru. Starting over in New Jersey was difficult, and after five years, Diego's family moved to Cooper City, Florida. Even though it was another transition, Diego was able to make friends and got along with everyone nicely. It took some time and adjustment, but things were getting better. Growing up, Diego’s father was really strict because he had to work two jobs. However, it was for the best because his father wanted to support the family and make sure everything was intact. Diego’s mom could not work because she did not have all of the correct papers. This Diego also loves soccer, which he has been playing since he was in kindergarten. His favorite food is Lomo Saltado, which is a Peruvian dish. Just like any other individual, Diego really enjoys Chipotle. Diego's love for Peru is so big that he wants to get a tattoo of the Nazca lines of Peru. Actually, Diego usually goes to Peru every four years with his family and coincidentally ends up going during the same time as the World Cup was occurring. Diego truly misses his dog a lot. Back when Diego lived in Peru, he had a pure-bred Schnauzer. He would let the dog outside every day and it would end up coming back, but one day, the Schnauzer did not come back. After looking for him for a long time, he came to conclude that the dog most likely got stolen, which is common. Diego also played the trumpet from fourth to sixth grade. He enjoyed it and had his fun with it, but later he realized it was time to drop it because it was not really his thing. Currently, Diego attends Florida State University. With his love for math and science, particularly calculus and physics, Diego is studying electrical engineering, but wants to change it to computer engineering. When it comes to clothing, he is not really picky, but it pretty much has to be comfortable. A lot of comfy shorts can be found in his closet! His favorite shoe brand is Nike. This is Diego Mendoza.
Lexi McLellan was born in Arizona on June 13th, 1999. Throughout her entire childhood, her family moved around a lot since her dad was in the military. Her dad would be gone for long periods of time for duty when she was younger. She recalls this one time that her dad come back with a mustache and she had no idea who this strange man was. But as time passed, she got used to the way things were which left gaps in their relationships but also brought them closer than ever because they could fully appreciate the time they did have together. Lexi and her dad are still close today. When Lexi was about two years old, she moved to Virginia, North Carolina at three, Texas also at three, Alabama at seven, back to North Carolina at 13 and finally Germany when she was 16 years old. In North Carolina, she met one of her closest friends named Dom whom she still keeps in touch with regardless how far they are from each other. Lexi was an active girl in her childhood years and even today as a college student. She played soccer, flag football, and many other sports as well. In particular, she was really good at soccer. She wasn’t able to see her dad that often but when they did, they would always make time to go running together and it was their way of bonding and catching up with each other. Because of this, she was always really active and decided to continue her talents throughout high school and even in college. She played soccer in high school and has picked up a couple different intramural sports at Florida state. Apart from her athletic abilities, she remembers watching spongebob with her dad and sister and it was special to her because her mom didnt like spongebob so it was another way to bond with her dad and sister. As a high school student, lexi was a rebellious, spontaneous, mischievous kid that who wasn't afraid to break rules once in a while. One night, her and her friends decided to sneak out and travel around Germany before their parents woke up the next day. Lexi was very cautious when she was sneaking out so she turned on the fan so her parents wouldn’t hear her and the house keys so that she could get back in later. She successfully snuck out and went to train tracks, friend’s houses and random places around Stuttgart, Germany. When it was around 4 a.m., the time that her dad gets up for work, she headed back home and snuck back into bed and even woke up the next day prepared to go to school. In the same week that Lexi snuck out, her sister was cat sitting the neighbor’s cat. The next morning when her sister was heading over to feed the cat, she realized that she couldn’t find the house key. Lexi then remembered that she grabbed the wrong house key the night before but the worst part is, she lost the key when she snuck out. Her sister ended up getting in a lot of trouble and surprisingly, the cat was still alive after not being fed for a couple of days. As a college student, she channeled her ambitious qualities into ROTC where she recieved a scholarship for. Although it was a las tminute decision to attend Florida State, Lexi really ended up loving it here. She is currently a psychology major but hopes to serve in the military after she graduates.
Kamaren Sandhu was born in Chicago Illinois, and he spent the first seventeen years of his life there until moving to Orlando Florida his senior year of high school. This was a big move for him and his family, and it required a lot of getting used to. When I interviewed Kamaren Sandhu, he talked about how much his life changed after moving to Orlando Florida from Chicago Illinois. The biggest hurdle for him was meeting new people, because he came to Orlando not knowing anyone. One aspect of Florida that he preferred was the warmer weather and no snow, which was a big change from the harsh winters of Chicago. This allowed him to play golf year-round, which is his favorite thing to do when he has free time. What he misses the most about Chicago is family, friends, and the food. Specifically, he misses a lot is the amazing food Chicago is known for. The deep-dish pizzas and Chicago style hot dogs were some of his favorite foods. He is struggling to find a good replacement for them since most places in Florida don’t make it as good as back home. He still keeps in touch with friends and family back in Chicago, and he tries to visit when he finds time. Another part of Chicago that he misses was how close it was to the water. Chicago sits on the bottom of Lake Michigan and provides a beautiful backdrop for the city. It also allowed him to have a fun place to hang out or relax that was relatively close to home. Although, he does really like Florida’s beaches and the ocean, he has to drive farther to get to them than he did in Chicago. Right now, Kamaren is nineteen years old and a Freshmen at Florida State University. When originally deciding on where he wanted to attend college, he thought about going to schools back in the Chicago area, but chose not to. He is currently an Exploratory major, but is interested in either the Computer Science or STEM programs at FSU. School is a top priority for him, so he always makes sure that he stays on top of his school work. Kameren’s parents are from England, and he still has family that lives there. He also has an older brother. In his free time, he really enjoys playing golf and can be found at the FSU course almost every day. He has experience playing in competitive golf with hopes to be a walk on for the FSU golf team one day. Kameren likes watching basketball, soccer, and golf when he can, and is a huge Golden State Warriors fan. He does not watch a lot of TV, but when he does he usually watches The Game of Thrones. Although, he struggles sometimes to keep up with all episodes that come out. He also likes to play Xbox, and usually plays either 2k or FortNite. His favorite music genres are hip hop and pop, some of his favorite artists are Kanye West, Kendrick Lamar, Post Malone, Drake, and Future.
Alonso Mendoza was born on October 22, 1998 sharing the same birthday as his twin brother Diego and his favorite rapper 21 Savage. He grew up in Lima, Peru, the capital and largest city in the country. The beach was a huge part of his youth, and he loved watching surfers out on the water. In elementary school, he discovered his love for soccer, and spent his free time from school playing the sport with friends. However, Alonso's family moved to New Jersey when he was about 8 years old. He was terrified to move to a new country with a new language, new people, and new perspectives. That transition into American culture and customs was tough, but his move from New Jersey to South Florida was even tougher. He had to abandon his days of parkour with his close friends in a neighborhood they called Sumo Village and left a place that made him more aware of the person he is.
Now, his first impression of Florida was that it was extremely hot, and he hated that. Fortunately, a couple months down the road, he met a girl named Valentina that played on the girl's team of Weston FC. They had shared passion for the sport of soccer and fell for each other almost instantly. During high school, Alonso attended Cooper City High School, but Valentina went to Cypress Bay in Weston. They’ve been dating for 5 years now, and their favorite soccer team is FC Barcelona. For their anniversary last year, Alonso took Valentina to the International Champions Cup finals at the Hard Rock Stadium in Miami, Florida. Barcelona beat Madrid in the final match with a score of 3-2. The couple celebrated the win with other fans in the stadium and with dinner in Brickell. Fast forward to present day, Valentina attends Georgia Tech and Alonso goes to FSU. However, they have never been better.
Soccer has always been a huge aspect of Alonso's life, and his favorite memory even involves the sport. During his junior year at Cooper, Alonso tried out for the soccer team and made it with ease. Cooper City High School's athletics has been coined as an underdog amongst other schools, especially in soccer. At the time, they ranked 230 out of all high school soccer teams in Florida. The abundance of support the team received from their coaches and families helped them persevere despite others not believing in them. Thus, Alonso and his teammates made it their goal to make it to States. At the end of Alonso's junior year, his team made it to District Competition and played against Western High. Cooper City won the game by a landslide. According to Alonso, it had been 29 years since the last time Cooper City had won, "so the win felt even better." Although the team did not make it to States, Alonso and his teammates were extremely content with the fact that they won for their "underdog school." This is most evidently the reason Alonso claims he peaked in high school.
After given a great opportunity to interview one of my classmates Alex Pedraja, I got to learn a lot of cool things about him. Alex was born in Hollywood, Florida and attended Western high school. Growing up his favorite sport to play and watch was football. Sadly, his favorite team to watch in the NFL is the miami dolphins. I only say sadly because they will of course suck again this upcoming year. After asking him who his favorite football player to watch, he said Jarvis Landry. I remember him saying that even though he is on a different team now, he is still my favorite player to watch on T.V. After I asked him what kind of food would he willingly eat for breakfast, lunch and dinner everyday, he chose a piece of chicken because of its high protein and amazing flavor.After applying to colleges, he was choosing between FSU and UCF. After visiting both he had a really hard decision on where to go to school. He finally came to a realization that he likes FSU more than UCF. Now that he is a freshman in college, he is still trying to become passionate about something because he does not know what to pursue when he is older. The next step in order to become passionate about a job is switching into that major. So what Alex did recently was he switched into the engineer major at FSU. it came to my attention that his “big event” is just like mine. Coming to college without anyone, on your own is very hard. He said it was very hard to adjust to the fact that he was not with his family anymore and on his own. He said the hardest part was going to publix and having to vend for yourself. This includes doing laundry, cleaning, etc. Alex’s change from highschool to FSU made him realize that this was the beginning of his adulthood. Making friends for alex has not been hard at all. Even though Alex told me he has zero clue what he wants to pursue when he gets older, I know that he loves sports and would love to become a sports agent but he said there is really not a lot of job opportunities in that field of work. Choosing FSU decided Alex’s adulthood and it seems like he is very happy with where he is at right now im his life. He is doing just fine in school and being on his own and wishes to continue to thrive.
Kelly Hartigan was born in Long Island, New York, but now finds herself in the capital of Florida state. This is her journey. Kelly has said before that she is not a “very exciting person” yet has done a very daring and brave thing that has changed her life. Moving to college is always an exciting thing, but how about moving almost 1200 miles away from family and friends. It all starts in her birthplace of Long Island where her father, the vice president at a paper company, and mother, the regional manager of most north-eastern schools, raised Kelly in the same family home all her life. When she was in elementary school she picked up dance, which she would continue to do all the way through high school. When Kelly reached the sixth grade she found inspiration in art, she admired and began to create her own masterpieces in the form of paintings. Her grandfather was a big influence in this art as he was a long-time painter who gifted her painting supplies and techniques to help her create more. Family would always play a big role in Kelly’s life, over everything that kept her going, family was always there. Kelly played softball through middle school in her free time of dance and art but found that she didn’t have enough time to continue it through high school as she began to expand on dance more. While in high school Kelly got a job at a local Target outlet that she still works at today. Every time she visits home she is always welcomed back to her job. But one project in high school may have changed what Kelly was going to do with her future. She did research and explored the idea of going to Florida State University post high school, something that seemed like a dream. It wasn’t until she visited her older sister who had moved to Alabama, just a drive away from the restless campus. She took the leap to visit her dream school and knew that one day she would be back. Her next struggle came in facing her family whom she loved with all her might and telling them that she wants to leave her safe home for the adventures of college. After some convincing she accepted her enrollment into Florida State University and hasn’t looked back. Entering school, she only knew a single person from her old town that also attended the university. No other family or friends were there, a difficult position for some but Kelly adapted. Her friend that had come with her to this new experience eventually went back home and left the university leaving Kelly to make new friends in her new home. Her roommates and suitemates are nice but it’s hard to find new best friends in such a cluttered and wild place. Regardless Kelly continues to excel in school and show why she was able to attend the university in the first place. After this courageous move to Florida, she still continues to visit her family on breaks and will pursue Florida State until she has finished her degree.
ReplyDeleteOn August 14th, 1999, Ava made her appearance in a small town in New Jersey. She was born into a family with two older brothers, one currently 21 and one 23. When Ava was entering elementary school, she attended Conover Road Elementary school and spent a lot of her time participating in dance and soccer as well as watching movies and tv shows with her mom. Her favorite movie to watch was the Disney movie, Moana. When Ava was entering middle school, at just 12 years old, she found out something about her family life that she hadn’t previously known. Her and her mother sat down one gloomy afternoon to watch Avas favorite television show together, American Idol. This was her favorite show at the time. It was a show were people would audition in front of 4 famous artists and would sing for them. Mid way through the television show, her mom abruptly paused it. She started to make conversation with Ava and went on to tell her that she has a half-sister. She told her that her sisters name is Lauren and that she is 21, now 27, and living in Nebraska. Shocked at first, Ava stormed away. She was very confused by this and how she did not know about Lauren for the first 12 years of her life. Ava had always dreamed of having a sister so when she found out she had one that she didn’t know, she was upset. As Ava got a little older, she began questioning her mom more about her sister. It wasn’t until she was entering high school when her mom decided that she could meet Lauren. Her sister flew out to New Jersey to meet Ava and to sit and have lunch and talk about their lives. Ava was now attending Redbank Catholic High School, a school where she had a very big involvement with her volleyball team. During her summers in high school, Ava would set sail on the ocean for 3 weeks at a time. She did this for 3 summers and became very fond of boats. While in high school, Ava had her hopes on attending FSU, and if she did not get in, she planned to attend University of Arizona. She wanted to go somewhere warm, in order to have a change of scenery from her past 18 years. Luckily, she got into FSU where she would spend at least the next 4 years of her young adulthood. When she got to FSU, she was thrilled with the diversity and the many opportunities to get engaged with on campus. She got a job at a local bar, Pots, rushed a sorority, Delta Gamma, and set her focus on her major, Hospitality. Ava desires to work specifically in the hospitality business with yachts when she is older because she got a lot of experience with boats from a job she had in high school. Ava loves FSU and hanging out with her friends, but she also loves going home once in a while to spend time with her family. Her sister Lauren and her still keep in touch and she flies out to New Jersey every so often to meet up with Ava and just chat.
ReplyDeleteMolly Hauser
ReplyDeleteI had the privilege of interviewing Kristin Piotrowski. Kristin is from Winter Park, Florida. Winter Park is right in between Tampa and Florida. Kristin is the youngest of 3 children. Her siblings already have children and she already is an Aunt to a niece and two nephews. Kristin’s favorite color has always been pink. In high school Kristin worked as a office assistant, and to add to that she could also be listed as a babysitter because included in her job sometimes was babysitting the bosses child. Kristin is good at making tacos, and enjoys to make them because they are simple. Her favorite show to watch is Grey’s Anatomy, the medical drama series. Growing up, Kristin loved cheerleading. She cheered all of high school and loved what she did. One time during a summer cheer camp she got a serious black eye that stuck with her for a good while. A memory was when her cheer squad took the road out to one of their biggest rivalry football games of the season. Kristin sat on the team bus anxiously waiting the game and the atmosphere awaiting them. Her really good friend was the quarterback on the team, Brad. Brad’s dad was also the head coach of the football team, and a math teacher at Winter Haven! So with lots of reputation on the line and people to impress, the whole town knew this game would be one to remember. The opponent was the Lakeland dreadnaughts, a neighboring school. The stadium was packed, and Kristin witnessed it all on the shoulders of her teammates, chanting “De-fense” as the blue devils pushed for victory. Her confidence pushed out of the sky during halftime when she succeeded in landing 20 front flips in a row! The place went nuts and the entire Winter Haven side of the field was feeling very confident. That was until the final drive. Kristen stood tall cheered as hard as she could. The blue devils scored a touchdown to bring them down 1 point in the remaining seconds. The place was electric as a critical decision was needed. Should the blue devils kick a field goal to try tying the game? Or should they go for the 2 point conversion to win it all. Brad and the offense ran back on to attempt the game winning conversion. They did not get the extra 2 point conversion. The game was over and Kristin’s entire night had taken a sudden turn for the worst. Her best friends were named Ana and Allison. They loved hanging out and having fun in their free time. So much that even today all three go to Florida State together and still hang out. Kristin recently purchased a new puppy. Phoebe, now just 4 months old, has been trained and is a very well rounded pup. With her major, Kristin looks to become a elementary school teacher. She is great with children and hopes to teach kids in the kindergarten to third grade range.
Julianne Hyunseung Lee was born on Christmas in July in 1999 in Miami Gardens. Given the opportunity to move when she was a little older, Julie was adamant about staying in the same house in Cooper City where she grew up even though the move was just across town. Including herself, Julie’s family of four consisted of two overprotective parents and her annoying little brother that she loves. Julianne’s father owns a successful whig business which was one of the first in the country ran by Julie’s grandfather. Every time her father comes home from a business trip, he would trap little Julie in his arms. He was arguably the most protective parent when Julie became of age to date, as any father would. Little Julie’s first language was Korean which she learned from her family who lives in Korea that she goes to visit every summer.
ReplyDeleteGrowing up in an American public school, she was picked on a lot because she was different. It wasn’t until high school that her English was perfect without an accent. Her elementary and middle school years she struggled more than her classmates and peers with the classes and material. In the fifth grade, Julie took an anatomy test which all her classmates failed. Julie, however, aced it and was inspired to begin her studies in science and eventually becoming a doctor. Throughout her years in high school, Julianne started devoting more and more time to the band where she played the flute. She became so strong in her band program that she began taking serious leadership roles at Cooper City High School Band Program. It was nice for Julie to have this as an outlet but, it was time to let go and focus on her next chapter in life, Florida State University. Another outlet Julie turned to in times of stress was her cardio workouts. She loves to run, no matter what was going on, Julie always made time to put on some motivational hip-hop or rap music while her size six and a half sneakers hit the pavement. Her studies were another important thing to Julie. Although she was strong in all subjects, all classes relating to the medical field interested her. Florida State was a safety school for Julianne and Ruckers in New Jersey was her first choice but, she continues to find her place in her new home and each month that goes by, another club shows up on her resume.
Smart, beautiful, involved in the community, and a great friend, Julianne Lee has got it all figured out. What a lot of people don’t know about Julianne is that it took her a lot of hard work and dedication to get where she is now. Recently at Florida State, Julie applied for an office position for a prestigious medical club and ended up becoming the vice president as a freshman. In order to make it official, she just needed to put together a quick speech describing who she was to her new club members and why she choose the medical route in her education. Every person’s heart in the room went out to Julie as she explained her story of how she knew that the medical field of study was the right path for her. She then explained her goal to attend graduate school and he plans for the future. Needless to say, if anyone deserves the vice president position in her new club, it should be Julie for she is the most driven and passionate. Little Julianne Hyunseung Lee continues to work hard in life at Florida State for now with hopes to become Doctor Julianne Hyunseung Lee in the future.
I got to interview Molly Hauser. Molly was born on April 25th, 1999 in South Florida in Hollywood. As a kid, she attended Hollywood Hills Elementary. When she was young, she liked to partake in activities like dance and gymnastics and did these two things for most of her childhood. Many of her friends also did the same and it was a great activity for all of them growing up. She has an older sister who attends University of Florida and she is 21, so they are a good age gap of 3 years apart. Of both of her parents, she is closer to her mom and considers her mom her best friend. During her time in high school, she attended the University School where most of her childhood friends also went. At this time though, unlike her friends, she switched over to playing lacrosse. She played both high school and club and travelled widely to play the sport she loves.
ReplyDeleteDuring the college application process, she applied to University of Florida and Florida State University, along with a few other schools. When Molly heard back from University of Florida, her number one school, she was devastated. Unlike her sister, she did not get accepted and now had to rethink all of her decisions when it came to attending college. A little while after, she got accepted to Florida State University and decided that this was the school she was going to attend. She was reluctant at first since many of her childhood to high school friends would be attending University of Florida and not as many kids that she was closest with would be joining her in Tallahassee. Deciding to attend Florida State University, she went through the recruitment process. After going through it, she ended up in the sorority Kappa Alpha Theta. One day she wishes to live in the house with all of her closest sisters. Her closest friend is also in Kappa Alpha Theta who is Wendy. Currently, she lives in the dorm Dorman and plans to live in Copeland with other sisters for her sophomore year. She is studying to be a speech pathologist at Florida State and plans to attend grad school. Her favorite place to go out is Tenn at the Strip and her favorite frat to go with is Alpha Epsilon Pi.
Outside of her academics and other activities, her favorite artists are Khalid and Quinn XCII. She has gotten to see Khalid in concert and says that it was one of her favorites. Molly’s favorite show to watch is One Tree Hill and she was rewatched it several times because of how much she likes the plot line and certain characters like Lucas.
The thing she likes most about Florida State is meeting all new people and having so many new opportunities on campus to do, which she didn’t have as freely and commonly back home. The thing she dislikes most is the taking away of frat parties and living in a dorm.
Andrew Dearing Dorsey was born on September 15th, 1998. Born and raised in Pensacola Florida, he lived in a small city called Gulf Breeze. Living in a secluded city, everyone knew everyone. It is like everyone is one big family. Andrew has two older brothers and one sister, being the youngest of four. Being a sports-oriented family, Andrew grew up playing sports. In elementary school, he played golf. Not a huge fan, and kinda feeling forced, during middle and high school at gulf breeze, he played soccer and football. Towards the beginning of his senior year, Andrew found out about a very important mission trip that his church was going to take part in. Being super involved in his local church, Saint Ann Catholic, Andrew was invited and had an amazing opportunity that he couldn't resist. For preparation, they held local bake sales as a fundraiser and did toy drives to collect items to donate to the children of Granada. The trip was going to be from July 8th to the 15th and to distract himself from the rush and excitement that he had for the upcoming trip, he took his academics during senior year very seriously. He ended his high school years top of his class with a 4.7 GPA. High school was a lot of fun, having many close friends and partying a lot. He spent a lot of time helping people by putting a smile on their face and studying to be successful. But, for Andrew, senior year went by very quickly. By the time he realized, it was time for him to go on his first airplane ride and land in Granada, an island in Nicaragua. When he arrived, he was a little skeptical, especially since Zika was very prevalent during this time. But by the time he left the airport and saw the island, he knew it was going to be an experience of a lifetime. Andrew and his 19 other volunteers spent their time at Saint Georges University, constructing houses, building out houses, and repainting schools. He also got the opportunity to get to know the kids that belonged to the school and spend quality time with them, playing soccer and drawing. One day out of the week, they got the chance to go site seeing. He spent his day on a boat where he got to go snorkeling. This trip gave him a sense of clarity and allowed him to be connected to god, feeling safe and excited for the next chapter in his life that he was about to embark on: college. College for Andrew is somewhat easy and somewhat difficult. Finding the time to cook a meal, or even remembering to lock the door when he leaves for the day, is the hardest part about his college experience. However, Andrew, who lives with his two best friends, loves going out on the weekends to college Ave, or just hanging with the boys. Academics are a main priority, being the only one of his four siblings to go to college not for sports. Andrew loves Florida State University.
ReplyDeleteAlex Lizano was born 21 years ago and has lived in West Palm Beach his whole life. He has 2 older brothers, an older sister, and 1 younger brother making him the middle child. Growing up, Alex and his family weren’t always in a good place financially. He grew up not so well-off for a majority of his life and he believes that the event that changed all of that was when his father started up his own company. His father had started up a Drug and Alcohol Abuse Treatment facility that would help save the lives of many. For a while his family wasn’t seeing results with the company, but as time progressed they started to see the company explode with success and their lives started to improve. The company started to grow the most as Alex entered high school. This was a crucial for Alex because he was able to focus 100 percent on his studies and his athletics without worrying about his family’s financial situation. Ever since he was a kid he enjoyed watching and playing basketball. His favorite NFL team to watch is the Dallas Cowboys and his favorite NBA team is the Miami heat. When Alex entered high school, he would go on to play for his high school football team and his high school basketball club team. He was an outstanding player on both. With his life starting to become stress free, Alex was able to get a good GPA in high school and go on to attend Florida State University. At FSU, Alex studies entrepreneurship in hopes of following in his father’s footsteps of starting up his own business. He hopes to one day open up a business in Real Estate Investment. While at school, Alex has been able to explore some new hobbies. He loves to play video games and watch Netflix. Some of his favorite video games consist of sports games such as 2k. More recently he has been playing the game PUBG. He prefers this game over the game’s rival Fortnite because he feels PUBG is more realistic due to the fact that it isn’t animated like Fortnite, and he feels it is a more competitive game. Some of his favorite shows to watch on Netflix consist of crime dramas and “The Office”. When asked who would be the most boring fictional character to meet in real life, he named Toby from “The Office”. His favorite movies are “Scarface”, “The Wolf of Wall Street”, “Good Fellas”, or any movies that have a theme of gangsters. Alex believes that his father. He believes that his father's choice to start up the company was not only big for him and his life, but for his entire family. They are all now able to live a happier stress-free life and focus on the things they love to do as well as all spend quality time together. Alex hopes that he will one day provide the type of life for his family that is full of endless possibilities just as his father has.
ReplyDelete-Kamaren Sandhu
Sydney Denkert was born with soccer in her blood on September 19th, 1998 in Miami, Florida. When Sydney was young, she attended Coral Reef Elementary, where she started playing soccer. She started to become more advanced in soccer throughout middle school. After she finished eighth grade, summer rolled around and she began training harder than ever knowing that making the high school team will not be easy.
ReplyDeleteSydney and her older sister, Shelby, seemed to always bicker and fight, which drove her parents crazy. Their mom calls out from the kitchen, “I can’t wait for you guys to go back to school so I don’t have to hear you fight anymore!”. “I can”, Shelby says knowing that Sydney will be joining her in high school this year. As summer comes to an end, the girls pack their backpacks and lay out their clothes for the first day back to school. “Don’t forget to take your sister to school!”, their dad says to Shelby as Sydney is scrambling to get ready.
Sydney sits in her first period class as the morning announcements come on. She mostly tunes the dull intercom voice out until the speaker makes the announcement for tryouts for the girl’s soccer team. Knowing Shelby would be absolutely annoyed, Sydney decides to go to tryouts knowing she will make her high school’s team with her many years of prior experience.
As Sydney walks onto the field ready for tryouts, the soccer coach announced that Shelby has made team captain. Now that Shelby is captain, Sydney knows she will have a hard time making the team, she has to play her absolute best. Sydney nails all of the drills and dribbles, catching the coach’s eye, she earns a first string position on the varsity team. Shelby’s filled with rage, “my 14 year old sister is on varsity...with me? You must be joking!”, she says to herself.
The sisters spend so much time together at home, school, and at soccer practice. They still have the occasional disagreement, but as the season progressed they began to bond over the sport they both love. Sydney began to look up to her older sister and take her advice at practice in order to better herself. The sisters notice how happy their parents are seeing them getting along on the field and at home.
The team has been practicing hard for the past couple of weeks because of their high school rivalry game. Game day arrives; the sisters are playing and cooperating better than ever. The game is tied with 20 seconds left on the clock. Shelby passes the ball to Sydney and she kicks it the first opportunity she gets. “GOALLLLL! THE DENKERT SISTERS WIN IT FOR THE TEAM!”, the announcer booms over the loudspeaker in the stadium. Sydney and her sister embrace in a hug. “I love you”, they say to each other.
After Shelby graduated and moved away for college, Sydney followed in her sister’s footsteps and continued to pursue soccer. Sydney’s senior year, she made captain and received offers from many different colleges to play soccer for them!
Charlize Couto
Matt Middlebrooks is a freshman who is attending Florida State University and it is his third semester here. His journey here at Florida State began in June of 2017 when he attended the Summer C session. Why did he choose to attend Florida State? Well, Matt says that Florida State was simply just "the best school" in his opinion. He was also very fond of the football team, the basketball team, and the beautiful campus. His love for sports influenced him to pursue a major in Sports Management. Growing up, Matt played basketball and football. Basketball was the sport that he played all four years of high school, but he only got to play football the first two of his four years. Shattering his arm while playing football lead him to have surgery where metal rods got put into his arm, which he still has in today. After the injury, he had to go through surgery and physical therapy. The doctors told him that he would no longer be able to play football because he could only play non-contact sports from there on out. It took an entire year for him to recover from this injury. Even today, when he is going to go on an airplane he has to have documentation regarding the metal rods in his arm to get through airport security.
ReplyDeleteHe resided in Jacksonville for ten years until his family relocated up north. In February of 2010, Matt Middlebrooks life was forever changed. Moving so far away was not exactly something that an eleven-year-old in fifth grade would want to do. Going from a beach town to a suburban jungle was a culture shock for Matt, his parents, and his younger sister. He was not quite sure how he would adjust to the change, but it ended up not being the worst thing. Moving in February, they arrived in the prime of the cold weather. Today he says that he prefers to live in Pennsylvania over Florida because he is a big fan of the cold weather. Keep in mind, he had never seen snow before in his eleven years of living and when he arrived in Philadelphia it was snowing. Matt ended up liking the colder weather a little more than he thought he was going to.
Matt was feeling nervous about the move, he was not sure who he would meet. He also was worrying about finding a group that he would "fit in" with. Being as into sports as he was, he was able to make friends pretty quickly. The friends he made when he first moved are still some of his best friends till this day. Although he moved on to a new life and made these new friends, he did not forget about all those that he left behind in Jacksonville. In the beginning, he was worried about how he would keep in touch, but over the years social media and cell phones have helped him out a lot to communicate with his Florida friends. Now as he is back in Florida, he has to keep in touch with those friends from up north because he was the only one from his high school to ever attend Florida State. Majority of his friends currently attend Penn state. He enjoys visiting them as much as he can, but it is not the easiest because he has to fly from Florida to Pennsylvania.
December 26th, 1998 was not your typical Saturday, today marked the birth of Lauren Gordon. Lauren was born in Plantation, Florida, she was the best gift any parent can receive the day after Christmas. Both of her parents were born in Jamaica, so she was raised in a Jamaican home that would teach her many important values. Values that would shape how she lives her life and important morals that will stick with her for the entirety of her life. Lauren has been living in the Weston and Davie area for all her life, she attended pre-k and elementary school in Davie, Florida but then she attended Tequesta Trace park middle school in Weston, Florida. This is where she found many of her friends and was able to express one of her many talents, singing. During her time in middle school, she showed her talent of singing by singing the national anthem before a basketball game. The same year she performed her first singing act, her younger brother was born, which brought joy to Lauren. After her middle school years, she had a burning passion for singing and becoming a neurosurgeon. When Lauren entered high school, she found a different passion, marketing. Lauren put the dream of neurosurgery to the side and focused on the next goal in her life, which was marketing. She joined a prestigious business club that is known around the world, DECA. DECA was a business club that encompassed every aspect in business. The club had a competitive side to it, there were district, state and national competitions. Lauren would spend the majority of her time in high school, competing and broadening her knowledge on marketing. But, during her senior year something drastic was going to happen. It was a cloudy day in Weston, Florida on November 8, 2016. Lauren woke up with excitement because the presidential election was taking place that evening. November 8, 2016 was going to be a historic day, either the first woman president was going to win, Hillary Clinton, or an unexperienced bigot, Donald Trump. Unluckily, she was born on December, 1998 and was not 18 years of age so she could not vote. She believes that voting is a privilege and not a right in this country and trusted the nation’s people to vote with their conscious. Lauren and many other people were anxious about this presidential election. The two candidates were very unique. On one side we had an experienced leader with bad reputation and on the other we had a business man with no political background and a man that has accused of sexual misconduct. Anyone looking from outside the country would say that the experienced leader was going to be win but in reality it was a close race. The time has come and now all voting polls have been closed, the numbers are starting to come in. After, a couple hours Lauren finds herself in shock and disbelief, Donald Trump was going to be the 46th president of the United States. Lauren was in shock and couldn’t believe the results, it took a couple of days for her to realize the truth. To try to overcome this drastic news, she worked hard and was able to attend the DECA national competition in Tennessee, in which she placed 3rd place in the world in her category. Although, Trump won the presidency, her 3rd place position in the national competition was able to numb the pain for a short time.
ReplyDeleteBefore starting college at Florida State University Max Berlowitz lived in Miami, Florida, where his family still lives and he goes back to often. While growing up in Miami, Max played a variety of sports and in High School said he played about every sport his school, Miami Country Day, had to offer. His favorite sport to play is basketball and to watch is football. Growing up Max has always had a passion and interest for all kinds of sports and followed local teams such as the Miami Dolphins, Miami Marlins, Miami Heat, Florida Panthers and now the Florida State Seminoles, even more since he now attends the university. With his desire for sports, Max is pursuing a degree in Sports Management here at Florida State University. He hopes that one day he could become a Sports Agent and could possibly represent some of his favorite players or teams. The process of starting college was a big factor in Max’s life thus far. During his senior year he had to decide between either Florida State University or Indiana University, which both have degree programs for Sports Management. Max ultimately made his decision to attend FSU, obviously, with factors that relate to family. He wanted to stay closer to home in Florida, where his family resides, and not travel multiple states up North where it would be more difficult to visit home whenever he pleases. The beginning of Max’s college years is also the beginning of his adult life, where he would have to start caring for himself instead of relying on his parents to do house work like cook him meals, do laundry, take out the trash, you get the point. Now, it’s technically Max’s third semester here at FSU (started during Summer C) and he has mostly, if not fully, adjusted to growing into an adult by buying groceries, doing laundry, time management and more. Making friends and talking to new people comes easy to Max, as that contributed when he rushed, pledged, and became a brother for the Fraternity Alpha Epsilon Pi (AEPi) during the Fall semester and will be living with some of his new brothers next school year in an off-campus house, where, even though he will have to share a bathroom with someone, Max will have his own kitchen and living room area. Sharing a bathroom with one of his roommates shouldn’t be a problem for Max because he currently already does so at Southgate Campus Centre. June of 2017 started a new journey for Max as he packed up his belongings and traveled nearly eight hours from Miami to Tallahassee to begin his life at Florida State University, and so far it has all been good from that point and will continue for the best. In May of 2021, maybe sooner, we will see Max Berlowitz graduate from FSU with a degree in Sports Management and have a career lined up for him to become a Sports Agent, something he is dreaming of, and I would not doubt it.
ReplyDeleteAlex Pedraja
I interviewed Charlene Forti. She was born on January 18, 1999 in Davie, Florida and lived there until she was four years old. Her mom is originally from the Philippines and her dad is from New York, so she is Italian, Polish, and Philippine. Since her mother is from the Philippines, Charlene and her family would often take family vacations to the Philippines because they still had family in the Philippines. She took one of her first trips to the Philippines when she was 4 years old, and it was one of the most eventful trips.
ReplyDeleteWhen she drank some of the Philippine water, she began to get sick and had horrible stomach problems. She even got dehydrated from vomiting so much. Afterwards, anything she ate or drink would not stay down and her Aunt, Uncle, and parents knew that this was because she had drank the water that her body was definitely not used to. As the night went on her parents and family grew more and more concerned and eventually took Charlene to the hospital. From where they lived, the nearest hospital was about a 30 minute drive to a city called Naga. She became scared at the hospital because they had to use needles and IV and she became queasy just thinking about this years later. She stayed in the hospital overnight and she was so comfortable there that she did not want to leave. After being released from the hospital Charlene and her family made sure that nobody drank any water for the duration of their vacation.
Growing up, she had no brothers or sisters and she had a cat for sixteen years, even though her and her mother are allergic to cats. After her cat passed away, she found a lizard while out one day and her and her mom brought it to the pet store where they were told it would die out on its own, so Charlene and her mom decided to keep it as their new pet. Charlene and her family eventually moved from Davie to Coral Springs, Florida because they had a better school system. After moving to Coral Springs, she joined the local swim club. She continued to swim in high school and began playing Water Polo. She loved Water polo because it was the first team sport she did and she liked it so much she did not even mind going to 6 am practices.
When she came to Florida State in the fall she joined Delta Zeta after meeting some of the members of the sorority through a mutual friend. While taking an astronomy lab in the fall, her TA and other friends constantly mentioned how fun rock-climbing was for them and she wanted to try it. Now she goes to the Tallahassee rock gym several times a week, and eventually wants to be able to rock climb outdoors on mountains. She is a Human Resources Management major, though she may switch to a Philosophy major after debating whether or not that was what she wanted to do coming into Florida State, and she is hoping she can figure out what exactly she wants to do after college.
Travis Ardin
Charlize has lived in Florida her entire life so, seeing snow is a passion she hopes she can accomplish in her future. She wants to get that feeling of throwing snowballs at her brother, Nick, or learning to build a snowman without it falling everywhere. When she was a kid, she attended five different elementary schools where she got the chance to meet abundant of new people. Since she was always going to the YMCA after school, Charlize started playing softball in elementary school. Playing softball allowed her to feel free and play a sport that she cherishes. She was one of the best on her little league team and since she enjoyed the feeling of hitting homeruns and catching pop flies so much, she continued to play her whole life. Moving from elementary school to middle school, a tragic event occurred in her life. Her mom passed away when she was only eleven. Being so young when this happened in her life, she decided to follow in her stepmom’s path and go to a sleepaway camp hoping this could relieve some pain. Traveling to North Carolina where the camp was taken place, she was very nervous and unsure if this will actually help her. But, as she interacted with other campers and counselors and watched them talk about their personal issues, she saw how comforting everyone was towards each. After observing and listening to others open up, she realized how welcoming and comforting all these people where. She was able to talk about personal stuff she thought she wouldn’t have shared with these people and she was extremely appreciative of how caring every individual at the camp was towards her. She felt this camp made a huge impact on her life and she is glad she took the chance to try something different for herself. After returning home from this three-week life- changing experience, Charlize decided she will return again next summer and many more summers to relive the amazing experience.
ReplyDeleteWhen her senior year had finally arrived, she got her first car. Flashing around the neighbor in her white jeep, she was ecstatic to be able to drive to school everyday and park in the senior lot with all her friends. Senior year is when you get to apply to colleges and find out where you want to go for your future. Her number one choice was the University of Georgia which was an out of state college. Out of state colleges are very expensive and instead she was staying in Florida and attending her number one school in Florida, Florida State! Her experience here has been an enjoyable one. She goes out with her friends to Pots whenever she gets the chance. She enjoys going out to eat and trying new places all across town. Living in a dorm she can basically walk everywhere while getting in her workout for the day. She enjoys eating Reese’s cup and basically can live off them. When she’s taking a break in between classes or relaxing when she’s not going out, she’s watching Netflix and always searching for new movies and shows to watch. She really enjoys watching crime shows because she’s majoring in criminology and hopes to become a police officer and follow in her family’s footsteps!
Sydney Denkert
I had the opportunity to interview and get to know David Ryber. David is an eighteen-year-old student here at Florida State University. He is a very interesting person with a bright future filled with important goals in his future. David was born just a few minutes away from the Detroit area. He spent his childhood and teen years in the small suburb of Troy. He grew up as an only child and still has no siblings. As a child, David played baseball and enjoyed hanging out with his friends and family. He has always loved to watch football and basketball. His favorite teams are the Detroit Pistons, Detroit Lions, and the Michigan State Spartans. David also thoroughly enjoyed going to the Detroit Tigers home baseball games. Transitioning to high school, he became heavily involved in the cross-country team and also the golf team. He always was around friends who had similar interest in running and cross country. He always maintained exceptional grades throughout school and knew that he could get accepted into nearly any school of his choice. Towards the end of his junior year of high school, David came to the realization that he was ready for a change in environment, so he and his family set off on a mission to find the perfect school and living area for him. He quickly grew tired of the cold weather back home in Michigan, so one of the main criteria he was looking for in a new school was a school in a more southern state with much warmer weather. David and his parents visited various schools ranging from The University of Alabama, Clemson, The University of Florida, and finally Florida State University. He instantly fell in love with the campus, weather, and surrounding area of Tallahassee. He decided to leave his home, friends, and family and pursue his further education at Florida State University. He admitted to me that the transition has not been the easiest of tasks. He often misses the life he left behind and is still very thankful for his time in Michigan. Now, instead of driving down the street or meeting up with his friends or family, he has to take a three hour flight to be able to see them. Not only has David committed to moving to the Tallahassee area, his parents are also planning on moving here as well. They are currently looking for homes near David and are finishing their career obligations back in Troy. Despite the difficulties in moving so far from home, David still remains focused on his academics and life in Florida as he understands that this decision to move across the country will have extremely positive impacts on his future. He now happily lives at an on-campus dorm and he is taking classes at FSU. He plans on pursuing a finance major where he can later on in life enter the field of investment banking. He hopes to graduate in three years and start a successful career.
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ReplyDeleteToday I had the opportunity to interview myself and get to explore my past a little more. My name is Samantha Rios and I was born December 1st 1997 at 10pm in Kendall Regional Hospital. For this reason I believe that I am a night owl. As soon as I was born all of my aunts and uncles came to visit me in the hospital and I had my first experience meeting my huge Cuban family. I was born into a very cuban family actually making me the first generation to be born in America, but one can say that living in Miami is basically Cuba part two. I later went on to elementary school where I was one of the first kids to start reading. When I was in Kindergarten I was able to read the level 10 books while most people were on level 1-5. In elementary school I went onto having some of the most AR book sores and would always get stickers everytime I finished a new book. Soon enough I had a little sister names Vicki who is 2 years younger than me. Vicki is cool but we have always had extremely different personalities which caused us to fight a lot in grade school. One of the biggest events that occured in my life was the birth of my baby sister Zoe. Zoe Bella was born December 3, 2007. That's almost exactly 10 year age gap between us.The day she was born my entire family got up at 4:30am to get to the hospital for her early delivery since it was scheduled to be a cesarean section. For hours my sister and I waited in the living room for notice on when we could go into the room to see our new baby sister! But a few hours after my mom was checked into the hospital I saw my dad rushing past the room we were waiting in with a team of doctors all huddling around a cart with my baby sister. I could tell something was wrong because when I asked my dad to see her my cousins held me back as I could see my dad fighting the tears. About an hour later someone from my family had decided told me that something was wrong with the baby but they only told me she was born with a tiny ear. The next day I found out that there had actually been complications at birth and Zoe was helicoptered over to Miami children's hospital where my dad had accompanied her. It was then I knew something wasn't right. The following day I was able to visit by baby sister in the newborn ICU unit better known as NICU where she spent the first 1 and half of her life at. Throughout the years Zoe has always had to go to a lot of doctors appointments to see specialized and primary care physician regarding her conditions. She has a nurse 24/7 since she cannot be left alone and received therapy weekly at home. Seeing all the health professionals that have helped her accomplished so much and be where she is today as inspired me to do so for others. For this reason when I graduated high school I felt like a new world had opened up to me. I went on to attend the Florida State university where I decided that I would be on the premedical tract so that I can pursue my dream of helping others as a physician. My love for my baby sister and passion for the field has allowed me to excellent in all of my classes so that I have earned a 3.81 GPA. I have slowly learned that school comes first and my future means everything to me now. I have goals of becoming a doctor and as of now nothing is stopping me and my baby sister Zoe is my biggest motivation.
It was a Monday night during the fall of 1999. The streets were buzzing with laughter, people were out drinking and enjoying themselves, its Miami, Florida. This night would mark the beginning of Gloria Chae’s life. Gloria was born on August 16, 1999 in Miami, Florida. She visited Korea to visit her family around the age of 7. Growing up her parents were strict, specially her mother, she was strict because she wanted her daughter to succeed and go in the right path. She is one of four siblings, she has an older brother that’s around the age of 24 and lives in Los Angeles, younger brother that is 13 and a sister that is 16.Gloria was only 12 years old when she experienced something unimaginable. This experience was the death of her dog named Gemmy, her mother was the one that broke the news to her. Her heart stopped as soon as she heard the news, all she could think about was her dog and their life together. She always wanted a dog but her father was never into the idea of getting one, until one day he changed his mind. When deciding to buy a dog, her father’s only condition was that he would name the dog. They decided on a beautiful husky mix, the dog was golden brown like caramel, one eye was light blue like the ocean, and the other was half brown and blue. Her father named the dog gemmy, he chose this name because he said the dog is a gem. She got the dog at an early age, it was a great friendship from the start, they immediately clicked. The two were inseparable, Gemmy would sleep at the end of her bed at night and would wake up when she was heading to school. They grew up together, Gemmy was just a pup when they got her and Gloria was only a few years old. As the dog got older, it became sick, by the time they took her into the veterinarian, they had found out the Gemmy was going to pass away. Gloria was not there the day that they put Gemmy down but she knew that she was going to lose her best friend. With the losing of her best friend, she was extremely saddened and was upset that something like this could happen to her and her beautiful dog. Her father, although he did not want a dog initially became very close to Gemmy and was a big loss for the whole family. After this event she took on dancing at an early age, any type of dance that existed, she knew how to dance it. She would dance with elegance and great finesse, dancing was her life. Unfortunately, she had an ankle injury around the age of 14 that put a halt to her dancing. Music became her new interest, playing the piano was something she loved doing and it would help her get away from things. As she grew up, her interests grew too with dying her hair, putting on eye shadow(make-up), and likes any attire that is comfortable. She attended Miami Killian High school, when deciding what to do after high school, she applied to schools that were a decent distance away from home because she wanted to become more independent. Florida State University was the place she chose to study at and gain better knowledge. She is only a freshman at FSU, she really enjoys that campus and the people. When she first got to the university, she really enjoyed going out and having fun, but now she likes to stay in and have girl’s night. She plans on staying at Florida State for her undergrad, and plans to study up north for her graduate school. Teaching music to kids is something she is passionate about and hopes to pursue it, once she gets her music degree.
ReplyDeletediego mendoza
Wendi Jade Halpryn came into existence on a hot winters day on November, 5, 1998, in Mount Saini Hospital, Miami Beach, Florida. Wendi was born into a family of two sisters and one happy couple. Wendi ended up being the youngest of three girls, Samantha being the oldest and Nicole being the middle child. Samantha, Nicole, and Wendi all grew up in the same house all their lives in Miami Beach, Florida, and went to the same grade schools growing up until college. As a child, Wendi attended a small co-ed private school called Lehrman Community Day School in Miami Beach from Kindergarten to sixth grade. She also attended another small co-ed private school called Miami County Day School where she spent seventh grade all the way through 12th grade just like both of her sisters did before her. She played sports growing up, but she always had an itch to manage a team. So, in high school she was the manager of her school’s cross-country team and did very well at her volunteering job. Before her closest sister left for college, in 2014, they got really close. They would talk about drama in their lives and other sisterly talk that only them two know about. However, one specific event stuck out to Wendi and it was Nicole’s trip to Poland and Israel and how that trip changed her point of view on life and her spiritual life. Nicole had the biggest influence on Wendi growing up, so, naturally, Wendi wanted to do everything Nicole did. Before applying for college, Wendi already decided she wanted to join Nicole at Florida State University and someday go into law like her influential sister is ensuing. Nicole also influenced Wendi on wanting to participate in the same trip she went on called March of the Living. This would lead Wendi into pursuing more information about the journey and her parent’s permission to go on this once in a life time experience, just like Nicole did before her. Wendi was very excited to go on the adventure but felt alone since she would be separated from her family and her home. Despite feeling alone, she found out her summer camp friends from Canada and New York would be joining her on the two-week expedition to Poland and Israel respectively. Wendi’s group first visited Poland, where she explored museums, memorials, graveyards, and deserted concentration camps to examine the roots of intolerable prejudice and hatred towards the innocent people of the Jewish religion in the mid 20th century. While touring the concentration camps, there was one survivor of the camps and was narrating his memories to Wendi’s group. While she listened, she became speechless as she imagined herself in his shoes during the time he was a prisoner and how terrified she would be. All groups went on the March of the Living, which consisted of walking from Auschwitz to Birkenau concentration camp in remembrance of the lives lost. After that week, Wendi flew to Israel for a week. In Israel, she visited multiple attraction sites and had a very spiritual experience. Throughout the two weeks, she gathered many souvenirs to remind her of her once in a lifetime experiences.
ReplyDeleteAndrew Dorsey
Tarren Pearson was born in a small town in Virginia called Fort Myer. From there, he moved to Oregon, then moved to Washington, and finally wound up in South Florida, near the Boca area. His moving around was due to his dad being in the military and getting stationed at all these different places, along with going back and forth to visit his mom in Washington. When I interviewed him, I asked him how he felt about moving so much throughout his life, and he said there were mixed feelings that came along with it. Exploring new towns is fun, but it’s challenging to start new schools and form new relationships every time. Even though he had to experience the struggle of starting new schools, through clubs and sports like soccer, class government, and leadership he was able to make his high school experience more enjoyable than most. He told me that a lot of people hated high school, but he actually loved it, getting to interact with different people through these extracurriculars. With the obvious stress of making new friends and adjusting to his new homes, also came the ability to experience new environments, ranging from snowy Virginia winters to hot South Florida summers. Doing this has made him more excited to travel and seeing what’s out there in the world, encouraging him to eventually want to go overseas, outside of North America. In terms of family, Tarren has 2 step siblings, both younger than him, and two half siblings, both older than him. We talked about being the middle child, and he said he enjoyed the dynamic of learning from his older siblings and teaching to his younger siblings. He splits his time between spending time in the nice and rainy state of Washington and the hot and sunny state of Florida, though mainly living in the latter. The diversity of these climates allowed him to learn snowboarding and skiing, but also be able to experience hot summer beach days, while most people are only lucky enough to get stuck with one or the other. He decided to attend FSU as a criminology major in light of this, but is planning to go back to Washington over our next break from school. He’s excited to be back with his friends, who also go to school far away from home. It’s hard to leave your friends and start a whole new life once, let alone multiple times. He first travelled alone when he was 6 years old, going on his first solo plane ride. Traveling at such a young age is scary for most kids, but has made Tarren more adventurous in life. Now, going away to college is somewhat easier for someone like him, as opposed to those who are just moving for the first time. The traveling in his life has made him more open to new experiences, in turn letting him see all the beautiful sights that not many can say they’ve seen, such as the ever so exciting Tallahassee, Florida.
ReplyDeleteA New Jersey native, Travis Ardin was born in Denville on March 1st, 1999. He grew up in Rockaway, a town with a little over six thousand people, where his father served as the chief of police and his mother as the payroll manager of a propane company. Travis moved from his home in New Jersey to Florida at the end of this past summer and now pays in-state tuition. When his father retired with a pension as the chief of police, his mother decided she did not really need to work either and so they decided to move down to Florida, closer to their family. Travis was in his junior year of high school when he found out about the decision but knew his family would be keeping the house until the end of the summer after he graduated so that he could enjoy one last summer with his friends. Unfortunately, the house sold quicker than expected and Travis and his parents had to move out in May. As his older sister was already enrolled at UCF at the time of the move, she was not as affected as Travis was, seeing that she had already made friends and lived in Orlando. Travis was completely against the move and the Monday night he had to leave the house to temporarily live in a condo for two months, he cried remembering all the memories he had had in the house he had grown up in. Travis took pictures and videos of each room of the house as well as the backyard and the pool because he didn’t want to ever forget what it looked like. Travis’ house was his favorite place to be and him and his friends would always hang out there; it was more than just a house, it was his home. His dad was in charge of most of the moving process and took the eighteen hour long drive in the moving truck down to their current residence in Port Charlotte, on Florida’s west coast. When it came time to decide on a college to attend, Travis knew he did not want to go to a smaller school for the next four years of his life and so he applied to the University of South Carolina, as well as other larger universities. However, USC did not get back to him as quickly as Florida State University did and that brings us to Travis’ current life here at FSU. Despite having a car here on campus, Travis prefers to deal with the daily parking hassle as little as possible and thus walks to all of his classes. Residing in apartment-style McCollum Hall on the west corner of campus with three other roommates, Travis is majoring in Accounting, a subject he is comfortable with and knows he will have a secure future in. Ideally he would like to work as the general manager of a baseball team and is looking into double majoring in Sports Management as well. Although Travis is not currently in any clubs, he is involved with and passionate about his fraternity’s IM softball team. Regarding his decision to join Greek life, Travis sought to build lasting friendships seeing that he was from New Jersey and a freshman in college. The fraternity of Beta Theta Pi is where Travis found his new brothers, the people he felt most at home with. Travis’ best friends are scattered amongst various schools in the country and they do keep in contact regularly by texting and through FaceTime. However, when his friends return to New Jersey during the school breaks, it is now difficult for Travis to see them and hang out. Travis would like to visit there often but would feel bad staying at his friends’ homes and does not want to put that on them.
ReplyDeleteDiego Mendoza was born on October 22, 1998 in Lima, Peru. He has a twin brother named Alonso and a thirteen-year-old sister who gets spoiled so often. You can tell Diego apart from Alonso because he has these two, specific small birthmarks on his face. Also, they have different personalities that you can tell apart from. A couple of times the Mendoza twins have swapped classes with each other and would not get caught or noticed. At nine years old, Diego had to leave everything behind in his country, Peru. The reason he had to move was because his parents wanted a better life for him, his brother, and sister. When Diego first reached America, he was in awe of the super shiny cars and the buildings. Diego really liked how in New Jersey, where he had lived for five years, pretty much everything was walking distance, which he was used to in Peru. Starting over in New Jersey was difficult, and after five years, Diego's family moved to Cooper City, Florida. Even though it was another transition, Diego was able to make friends and got along with everyone nicely. It took some time and adjustment, but things were getting better. Growing up, Diego’s father was really strict because he had to work two jobs. However, it was for the best because his father wanted to support the family and make sure everything was intact. Diego’s mom could not work because she did not have all of the correct papers. This Diego also loves soccer, which he has been playing since he was in kindergarten. His favorite food is Lomo Saltado, which is a Peruvian dish. Just like any other individual, Diego really enjoys Chipotle. Diego's love for Peru is so big that he wants to get a tattoo of the Nazca lines of Peru. Actually, Diego usually goes to Peru every four years with his family and coincidentally ends up going during the same time as the World Cup was occurring. Diego truly misses his dog a lot. Back when Diego lived in Peru, he had a pure-bred Schnauzer. He would let the dog outside every day and it would end up coming back, but one day, the Schnauzer did not come back. After looking for him for a long time, he came to conclude that the dog most likely got stolen, which is common. Diego also played the trumpet from fourth to sixth grade. He enjoyed it and had his fun with it, but later he realized it was time to drop it because it was not really his thing. Currently, Diego attends Florida State University. With his love for math and science, particularly calculus and physics, Diego is studying electrical engineering, but wants to change it to computer engineering. When it comes to clothing, he is not really picky, but it pretty much has to be comfortable. A lot of comfy shorts can be found in his closet! His favorite shoe brand is Nike. This is Diego Mendoza.
ReplyDeleteGloria Chae
Lexi McLellan was born in Arizona on June 13th, 1999. Throughout her entire childhood, her family moved around a lot since her dad was in the military. Her dad would be gone for long periods of time for duty when she was younger. She recalls this one time that her dad come back with a mustache and she had no idea who this strange man was. But as time passed, she got used to the way things were which left gaps in their relationships but also brought them closer than ever because they could fully appreciate the time they did have together. Lexi and her dad are still close today. When Lexi was about two years old, she moved to Virginia, North Carolina at three, Texas also at three, Alabama at seven, back to North Carolina at 13 and finally Germany when she was 16 years old. In North Carolina, she met one of her closest friends named Dom whom she still keeps in touch with regardless how far they are from each other. Lexi was an active girl in her childhood years and even today as a college student. She played soccer, flag football, and many other sports as well. In particular, she was really good at soccer. She wasn’t able to see her dad that often but when they did, they would always make time to go running together and it was their way of bonding and catching up with each other. Because of this, she was always really active and decided to continue her talents throughout high school and even in college. She played soccer in high school and has picked up a couple different intramural sports at Florida state. Apart from her athletic abilities, she remembers watching spongebob with her dad and sister and it was special to her because her mom didnt like spongebob so it was another way to bond with her dad and sister. As a high school student, lexi was a rebellious, spontaneous, mischievous kid that who wasn't afraid to break rules once in a while. One night, her and her friends decided to sneak out and travel around Germany before their parents woke up the next day. Lexi was very cautious when she was sneaking out so she turned on the fan so her parents wouldn’t hear her and the house keys so that she could get back in later. She successfully snuck out and went to train tracks, friend’s houses and random places around Stuttgart, Germany. When it was around 4 a.m., the time that her dad gets up for work, she headed back home and snuck back into bed and even woke up the next day prepared to go to school. In the same week that Lexi snuck out, her sister was cat sitting the neighbor’s cat. The next morning when her sister was heading over to feed the cat, she realized that she couldn’t find the house key. Lexi then remembered that she grabbed the wrong house key the night before but the worst part is, she lost the key when she snuck out. Her sister ended up getting in a lot of trouble and surprisingly, the cat was still alive after not being fed for a couple of days. As a college student, she channeled her ambitious qualities into ROTC where she recieved a scholarship for. Although it was a las tminute decision to attend Florida State, Lexi really ended up loving it here. She is currently a psychology major but hopes to serve in the military after she graduates.
ReplyDeleteKamaren Sandhu was born in Chicago Illinois, and he spent the first seventeen years of his life there until moving to Orlando Florida his senior year of high school. This was a big move for him and his family, and it required a lot of getting used to. When I interviewed Kamaren Sandhu, he talked about how much his life changed after moving to Orlando Florida from Chicago Illinois. The biggest hurdle for him was meeting new people, because he came to Orlando not knowing anyone. One aspect of Florida that he preferred was the warmer weather and no snow, which was a big change from the harsh winters of Chicago. This allowed him to play golf year-round, which is his favorite thing to do when he has free time. What he misses the most about Chicago is family, friends, and the food. Specifically, he misses a lot is the amazing food Chicago is known for. The deep-dish pizzas and Chicago style hot dogs were some of his favorite foods. He is struggling to find a good replacement for them since most places in Florida don’t make it as good as back home. He still keeps in touch with friends and family back in Chicago, and he tries to visit when he finds time. Another part of Chicago that he misses was how close it was to the water. Chicago sits on the bottom of Lake Michigan and provides a beautiful backdrop for the city. It also allowed him to have a fun place to hang out or relax that was relatively close to home. Although, he does really like Florida’s beaches and the ocean, he has to drive farther to get to them than he did in Chicago. Right now, Kamaren is nineteen years old and a Freshmen at Florida State University. When originally deciding on where he wanted to attend college, he thought about going to schools back in the Chicago area, but chose not to. He is currently an Exploratory major, but is interested in either the Computer Science or STEM programs at FSU. School is a top priority for him, so he always makes sure that he stays on top of his school work. Kameren’s parents are from England, and he still has family that lives there. He also has an older brother. In his free time, he really enjoys playing golf and can be found at the FSU course almost every day. He has experience playing in competitive golf with hopes to be a walk on for the FSU golf team one day. Kameren likes watching basketball, soccer, and golf when he can, and is a huge Golden State Warriors fan. He does not watch a lot of TV, but when he does he usually watches The Game of Thrones. Although, he struggles sometimes to keep up with all episodes that come out. He also likes to play Xbox, and usually plays either 2k or FortNite. His favorite music genres are hip hop and pop, some of his favorite artists are Kanye West, Kendrick Lamar, Post Malone, Drake, and Future.
ReplyDeleteAlonso Mendoza was born on October 22, 1998 sharing the same birthday as his twin brother Diego and his favorite rapper 21 Savage. He grew up in Lima, Peru, the capital and largest city in the country. The beach was a huge part of his youth, and he loved watching surfers out on the water. In elementary school, he discovered his love for soccer, and spent his free time from school playing the sport with friends. However, Alonso's family moved to New Jersey when he was about 8 years old. He was terrified to move to a new country with a new language, new people, and new perspectives. That transition into American culture and customs was tough, but his move from New Jersey to South Florida was even tougher. He had to abandon his days of parkour with his close friends in a neighborhood they called Sumo Village and left a place that made him more aware of the person he is.
ReplyDeleteNow, his first impression of Florida was that it was extremely hot, and he hated that. Fortunately, a couple months down the road, he met a girl named Valentina that played on the girl's team of Weston FC. They had shared passion for the sport of soccer and fell for each other almost instantly. During high school, Alonso attended Cooper City High School, but Valentina went to Cypress Bay in Weston. They’ve been dating for 5 years now, and their favorite soccer team is FC Barcelona. For their anniversary last year, Alonso took Valentina to the International Champions Cup finals at the Hard Rock Stadium in Miami, Florida. Barcelona beat Madrid in the final match with a score of 3-2. The couple celebrated the win with other fans in the stadium and with dinner in Brickell. Fast forward to present day, Valentina attends Georgia Tech and Alonso goes to FSU. However, they have never been better.
Soccer has always been a huge aspect of Alonso's life, and his favorite memory even involves the sport. During his junior year at Cooper, Alonso tried out for the soccer team and made it with ease. Cooper City High School's athletics has been coined as an underdog amongst other schools, especially in soccer. At the time, they ranked 230 out of all high school soccer teams in Florida. The abundance of support the team received from their coaches and families helped them persevere despite others not believing in them. Thus, Alonso and his teammates made it their goal to make it to States. At the end of Alonso's junior year, his team made it to District Competition and played against Western High. Cooper City won the game by a landslide. According to Alonso, it had been 29 years since the last time Cooper City had won, "so the win felt even better." Although the team did not make it to States, Alonso and his teammates were extremely content with the fact that they won for their "underdog school." This is most evidently the reason Alonso claims he peaked in high school.
Lauren Gordon
After given a great opportunity to interview one of my classmates Alex Pedraja, I got to learn a lot of cool things about him. Alex was born in Hollywood, Florida and attended Western high school. Growing up his favorite sport to play and watch was football. Sadly, his favorite team to watch in the NFL is the miami dolphins. I only say sadly because they will of course suck again this upcoming year. After asking him who his favorite football player to watch, he said Jarvis Landry. I remember him saying that even though he is on a different team now, he is still my favorite player to watch on T.V. After I asked him what kind of food would he willingly eat for breakfast, lunch and dinner everyday, he chose a piece of chicken because of its high protein and amazing flavor.After applying to colleges, he was choosing between FSU and UCF. After visiting both he had a really hard decision on where to go to school. He finally came to a realization that he likes FSU more than UCF. Now that he is a freshman in college, he is still trying to become passionate about something because he does not know what to pursue when he is older. The next step in order to become passionate about a job is switching into that major. So what Alex did recently was he switched into the engineer major at FSU. it came to my attention that his “big event” is just like mine. Coming to college without anyone, on your own is very hard. He said it was very hard to adjust to the fact that he was not with his family anymore and on his own. He said the hardest part was going to publix and having to vend for yourself. This includes doing laundry, cleaning, etc. Alex’s change from highschool to FSU made him realize that this was the beginning of his adulthood. Making friends for alex has not been hard at all. Even though Alex told me he has zero clue what he wants to pursue when he gets older, I know that he loves sports and would love to become a sports agent but he said there is really not a lot of job opportunities in that field of work. Choosing FSU decided Alex’s adulthood and it seems like he is very happy with where he is at right now im his life. He is doing just fine in school and being on his own and wishes to continue to thrive.
ReplyDeleteMax Berlowitz