What I Did This Summer

Summer’s slipping away, and within a week or two, most Inland Northwest teens will be back in class, daydreaming about how they spent the last three months.

Teens throughout the region kept busy this summer. They traveled. They worked. They played. And here’s what a few have to say about their experiences:

D.C. is hot, hot, hot

I spent my summer in the cradle of American Government, at the cornerstone of an Empire, and I witnessed liberty in action.

Not really.

I did, however, go to Busch Gardens, where they have some really great roller coasters.

I spent a good part of my summer in Washington, D.C., where I thought I’d see the federal government in action. However, I did not — except for the black helicopter that dive-bombed me. It was pretty obvious that since the federal government acts like schoolchildren, they get the same calendar.

I walked around downtown D.C. and scuttled into various national museums (national means free), partly to learn about these United States and also because they have air-conditioning. Outside, it was hotter than the surface of the sun — with humidity.

Sure, I saw some very interesting exhibits, like the Hope Diamond and the real Oscar the Grouch puppet. But for every good exhibit there were several bad ones, like the really, really old rocks exhibit and the Modern Art Museum. (Does anyone get modern art?) I also visited the National Cathedral, which for some reason made me want to play hide-and-seek. Mount Vernon, just to the west or east or whatever of D.C., reminded me of some sort of bizarre amusement park, while Gettysburg, Pa., has a bunch of stone monuments. It also has a very nice tourist-based economy, where I actually ate lunch in a restaurant named after a Union general killed in battle.

But it’s the people of northern Virginia and Maryland I will remember. For example, they have the highest percentage of stupid customized license plates in the world. I saw one that said “NUHIP,” not as in “I’m new and hip!” but as in “I just got a replacement hip.”

You may find this peculiar, but it’s not as weird as the fact that fireworks remain legal in these parts. That is unfair. Here, in a place that is annoyingly safety-conscious, you can jog on down to Costco and buy $80 worth of fireworks.

Now, as I sit on a plane bound for my connecting flight home, I reflect on the purpose of these last six weeks. What was my goal? I can think of only one answer: To write this article.

Dani Peterson, Mt. Spokane

Fun without the adventure

Summer’s nearly over and school’s about to start. It’s just about time for the inevitable “What I Did This Summer” report.

I don’t have a lot of exciting stuff to spice up that report. No summer jobs. No visits from a long-lost, movie-star cousin. Nope. I don’t have a lot to say that will fascinate most people.

But I can say I had fun, regardless of the fact I stayed home. There’s plenty to do right here. I’m a little too old for the traditional vacation Bible school, but I had a lot of fun volunteering. Little kids are great if you take the time to know them. And helping out at Bible school knocked a week off the time I might otherwise have been bored. This year’s Bible school had a Hollywood theme — what more could a person want?

There’s an endless supply of summer movies, as well as a couple libraries full of books to read. And then there’s the little-projects-that-I-never-find-time-to-do list, which is largely what I did this summer. I worked on a movie script that I still haven’t finished. I created a side-kick site for my Web site, www.christianmp3.org/~got-jesus/. Maybe it wasn’t exciting, but I had to get to that list sometime.

The most important thing about a summer at home is that I had time to think. About life. About what I want to do when I grow up. About whether I really want to grow up. About my relationship with God.

I may not have gone anywhere, but I certainly wasn’t bored. I did things I’ve wanted to do for years. Everybody needs a laid-back summer once in a while.

- Daniel Bigler, Christian Heritage

Trip to Japan great experience

Leaving the familiarity of home right before finals’ week for a culture thousands of miles away might sound like a nightmare to some. But for me, it was a fantastic reality.

I spent six weeks this summer as an exchange student in Tokyo, Japan. My typical day started in front of the television, watching cartoons with my 10-year-old host brother. The stereotypically fussy American mother yelling at her children to play outside doesn’t happen in Japan. My family watched at least eight hours of television a day.

After a breakfast of toast, sausage and salad (salad being strictly a breakfast food), I sprinted 100 feet to the nearest bus stop. My wait prepared me for the upcoming mental and physical strain of the bus ride.

Riding the city bus to school was like being involuntarily drafted into the 1960’s phone-booth-stuffing craze - complete with giggling, uniformclad schoolgirls and stern-faced businessman. Luckily, most of the crowd drained out within two or three stops, and I could breathe again. After the ride came a 20-minute walk down a busy, smoggy thoroughfare to Waseda University High School.

Depending on whom you ask, Waseda University is the second- or third-best university in Japan. Three high schools are linked to the university, and my host school was one. Despite Waseda High School’s top-notch reputation, my Japanese peers seemed as lazy as American students. Every class had at least one sleeper and a minimum of seven guys staring blankly out the window. They were all male because, much to my dismay, Waseda High School is an all-boys school.

I spent most of my hours away from school with family and friends. My kindly host family planned all sorts of activities for me, including visits to temples and museums.

When I had free time, I took the subway to Tokyo’s more famous shopping districts like youth-oriented Shinjuku and high-tech Akihabara. I browsed music stores for songs I’d seen on Japanese music television. I went with friends to one of Tokyo’s ubiquitous video game arcades or scoured shops for trinkets.

But nothing compared to karaoke. I once heard someone say that while Japan doesn’t have a major religion, karaoke comes close. You pay a fee and are led to a small, dimly lit, soundproofed room. You choose songs from a thick catalog and program them into the karaoke machine via a funky remote. The songs - minus vocals - spew from the machine and the lyrics are displayed on a screen. After some prodding, I managed to croak out the Red Hot Chili Peppers’ classic “Under the Bridge” and Billy Joel’s “We Didn’t Start the Fire.”

In the end, my six weeks zipped by, and I sadly left friends, a second family and a home in Japan. The trip left a permanent mark on my psyche, and I hope to return soon. Anyone with a chance to visit Japan or another country should jump at it. It’s an experience that shouldn’t be missed.

- Brian Thorpe, Ferris

Summer job taught me a lot

Since I hit high school, I’ve spent my summers working on my patented reverse sleep schedule - go to bed at 9 a.m., get up at 6 p.m., and spend gloriously excessive periods of time reading, playing my guitar and surfing the Internet.

But no longer. This summer I took a full-time job as an asbestos survey assistant for a local environmental science and engineering firm. No, I didn’t wear a funny little space-man suit. In fact, I didn’t deal directly in asbestos. My job was to bring labeled sandwich baggies to my boss, Bruce, so he could put little pieces of Sheetrock and things in them. I wrote down what the samples were and where we got them. Back at the office, we shipped the samples to a laboratory in Oklahoma to find out if they contained asbestos.

According to Bruce, there were other, more important aspects of my job, such as making sure there was a good tape in his truck stereo and always walking around with a clipboard so that we looked important.

Eventually, I ended up working in the office typing reports. At that point, I realized to my horror the company used Macintosh computers. Now, I’m not Bill Gates’ biggest fan, but Windows does hold a certain allure for me and most of America’s tech-savvy population - just don’t tell my boss. I hadn’t used an Apple Computer with any regularity since the hard drive was invented. Despite all my hard-won computer literacy, it took me two days to figure out how to turn the computer on.

After a few weeks on the job, I found myself grateful for things I hadn’t been before, such as the chemistry teacher who gave less than full credit for any assignment that wasn’t anal-retentive perfect. My job was similar, only instead of grades at stake it was lawsuits against the company, not to mention my job.

The best part of my work was all the people I met. There was the lady who asked if I’d leave my phone number so her son could call me when he got back from boot camp. (Trust me. I didn’t.) And the maintenance guy who told me I should change my pronunciation of the word “caulk.” (Trust me. I did.)

But my job taught me a lot more than how to say “caulk.” I learned that a lot of the seemingly stupid things they make you do in high school actually have a point, that sometimes going to bed before midnight can be good, that coffee is an inevitable part of working in an office building and that the comic strip“Dilbert” contains many great truths. And that maybe Macintosh computers aren’t so bad after all.

- Kathy Bula, East Valley

Conference was trip of a lifetime

I had an amazing adventure this summer.

I traveled to the East Coast for a conference sponsored by Hugh O’Brian Youth Leadership program, or HOBY. The program, founded by actor Hugh O’Brian, works to help young people become catalysts for change in their communities.

My adventure first began when I was chosen to represent Cheney High School at the Eastern Washington HOBY seminar. I then was selected as an alternate Eastern Washington representative to the World Leadership Congress, which meant I needed a sponsor to attend. I contacted the Cheney Kiwanis Club, which graciously helped pay for my trip to Washington, D.C. Then I emptied my piggy bank for the plane ticket, and was off.

I spent the first part of my trip with family friends in Newark, N.J., who showed me the sights. I saw Ellis Island and the Statue of Liberty from Liberty State Park. I spit off the top of the Empire State Building. I saw the Jersey Shore, which I won’t soon forget.

But that was just the beginning.

I rode a train to the capital, where I stayed at George Washington University - the site of the conference. I made friends with many dynamic personalities throughout the weeklong seminar. If anything about the trip changed me for the better, that was it.

Besides meeting people, I learned a lot listening to speeches from several prominent figures. My personal favorite was Sam Donaldson.

I visited the Capitol, met several senators and representatives, and toured the White House. I saw war memorials and presidential memorials, including Ford’s Theatre where Lincoln was shot. I watched the Marine Corps Sunset Parade in front of the Iwo Jima Memorial.

Now, as I look back at my summer, I know the nine days I spent at the conference were the most interesting and instructional. I have to admit I was reluctant to go home. I met so many inspirational people who were my age. I experienced what many people never will. I loved every minute of this learning adventure, which proved to be the trip of a lifetime.

- Riley Palmer, Cheney