Hi everybody! Today I will be doing my Trimester 1 Portfolio. For the portfolio, I have to choose 4 of my best pieces of work from the first trimester. I’ll include all of them to this post so I hope you enjoy my best work!

My first piece of work is going to be my essay for language arts. We had to write our own chapter to a book called seedfolks. I got an A on this essay so I want to present it here.

As a kid, nature was never my thing. All the kids played in the hot California sun while running in the tall green grass while I played inside with the other kids just doing our thing. You know playing video games, or watching tv. It was what we enjoyed and no one can change us. But the one thing that can change us is ourselves. As I graduated from high school I still didn’t know what I would do as a living so I moved to where my best friend Mark moved to. Cleveland! He wanted to be closer to his family there and as his best friend, I decided to support him.

Mark was that one guy that could do literally everything and be absolutely amazing at it. Sports, academics, video games, and way more. If I needed help on homework he was always there for me or if I couldn’t pass a level in Super Mario Bros he always helped me. I was extremely jealous because the only thing I can actually do is tech-related things. Mark went to Cleveland State University to pursue his dream of becoming an I.T. but at the same time being closer to his family. I worked at the local Dunkin Donuts and was paid minimum wage. It was quite boring getting told what to do by the customers all day long and not even getting any appreciation. Mark was that one person that always cared for me and told me to never give up. I was about to quit my job once and Mark convinced me not to because he is a good friend. We were roommates in this tiny two bedroom apartment on Gibb Street. Gibb street was quite mixed cultured and always had something interesting going on. The locals advertising their goods or even just a small neighborhood fight it was always interesting.

Four years later Mark started to work at an office far from where we lived and he became an I.T. That was about the time when I quit my job and just stayed home most of the time. I was either watching tv, playing video games, or just sleeping. I was extremely lazy and I just didn’t want to do anything. Mark paid for our rent, electric bill, water bill, and food. This went on for a few months until the company Mark worked for shut down. We were in big distress because we couldn’t pay for anything. That’s when Mark decided to create his own business. He needed someone to help him and I was that person. For a good few months, we made so much money to the point where I and Mark moved out into a bigger apartment near our office. We were living the life!

More work came in day by day and I got lazier day by day. I decided to just quit my job and let Mark do everything. I regret this so much. Mark immediately told me to move out. I just packed up my things and left. Mark’s family knew about this so they contacted me and asked if I would want to move in temporarily. I couldn’t take down this offer so I moved in for a few months until I had enough money to move into a new apartment. I decided to move back into Gibb street and live a normal life.

I have noticed that Gibb street has grown. The vacant lot that used to be there now has a nice little garden. I also see my old neighbors walk down there and tend to the garden on a daily basis. This was a lonely time in my life so I decided to do something. I went to the store and bought some bell pepper seeds. Bell peppers were me and Mark’s favorite vegetable to eat and I decided to do something new in my life and plant the bell peppers. I lived in a family that did everything for me so I have no clue how to garden. I saw one of my old neighbors, Wendell, tending the garden so I went down to him and asked him what I should do. I used to run into him occasionally in the halls when I lived here and he seemed like a pretty gloomy guy. When I talked to him he was extremely passionate about this topic and he helped me a lot.

Wendell also told me about his past and how he was born on a farm in Kentucky and how his wife and son died. “I always like to think I wouldn’t be here right now having a great time without my past,” Wendell told me. This sentence stuck with me for a few weeks because me being here right now is destiny. All my past events led to this very moment and I am very grateful for it. Wendell was my go-to friend to get life advice from because he has gone through so much. Yes, Mark also has good advice but he is still experiencing life when Wendell has lived through so much already. You can say the wise man has more power over the smart man.

As a few months passed by gardening became my daily routine. It relieved all my stress from work and life in general. I wake up, eat breakfast, and walk down to the garden to talk to my new friends or tend to the garden. I started hanging out with Ana and that’s when she told me to talk to Mark again. I told her about what happened between us and she started engaging in my life and giving me advice. She was so curious to the point where she was about to talk to Mark herself. I decided to make a basket that contained all of our favorite foods and give it to Mark as an apology gift.

Weeks passed by with no response from Mark. I started losing faith and when all was going wrong Mark comes in and talks to me about how he is extremely proud of me for trying something new. I also found out his company is booming and that he wants to donate $5,000 to the garden for any further improvements that we might need. That wasn’t the last of Mark, he came in a few times every month to tend his own garden and just to say hi to our friends. When all is down the one thing that will comfort you are friends.

My next piece of work is from Social Studies. We had to write a review on a movie we watched in class and I think  I did pretty well on this review so enjoy!

Given the honor of going to Hawaii to spread the word of god to foreigners, Reverend Hale along with his newly wedded wife Jerusha took the privilege. Christianity was the only religion that the Americans knew and coming to Hawaii was quite risky because of their lifestyle. Even though the missionaries came to convert the Hawaiians into Christians they also had to adapt to their style. Many of the Hawaiian cultures were against many of the Christian cultures so the missionaries either had the choice of adapting or leaving. The arrival of the missionaries created many problems with the Hawaiians but with those problems, the Hawaiians gained more knowledge and fears.

I liked all the different plot twists there were in the movie. They were all quite unexpected and were kind of shocking. Living in Hawaii, this gave me a brief history of what it felt like for the missionaries arriving in Hawaii. I was scared when I first moved here I can’t imagine what it felt like for completely different foreigners. I would like the creators of this movie to create a sequel because that will definitely be interesting.

I did not like some parts of the movie because of how unclear they made it sound. They would talk about a certain subject and not give enough detail of it. This movie kind of made the Christians look like terrible people when at some points they were but, in reality, they weren’t that bad because they didn’t know better. I didn’t like how time past by so fast in the movie without a proper transition. Now this made the movie kind of boring.

I give this movie a ⅗. It had a great story but the transitions were terrible and badly placed. It’s not a perfect 5/5 but it still wasn’t as bad as a ⅕. The plot was really interesting, and the characters were just great but there were some flaws that just held it down. This was a tough decision but I think its good. For an old movie, it was actually pretty good.

For our trimester 1 math project, we had to answer questions and provide statistics on marine debris and ocean pollution. It took a lot of time to do this with my partner but we got a good grade so here it is. Enjoy!

The Presentation

For my final piece of work, I’ll be presenting our ocean ecosystem that we worked in class. We had to make a sustainable ecosystem for two or three shrimp in a plastic bottle. Our shrimp are the only one that are living out of the 18 there were. Enjoy!

I hope you guys enjoyed my best pieces of work because I worked hard on all of these this past trimester. I ended it with a 3.94 GPA which is a big accomplishment so thank you!