The Beginning of My ILC Journey

I woke up at exactly 7:10 AM today and I had my whole day planned ahead. I planned to leave my house at 7:50 AM yet I left at 8:00 AM, 10 minutes late from the time I was supposed to leave at. At De Anza High School, everyone arrived on time and we started the tutorial at 8:35 AM and then we ran into a problem. Very few people could actually use the internet and the computers. I could not go on any other site except for Google and Blogger; actually I could only access my email and the edit page on Blogger. 

When we were given the task to blog, I had no idea how to do it despite having the instructions in front of me. I am not a writer nor a blogger. I like to draw and that’s as close as anything will get to express my feelings. But blogging for the ILC is not about expressing my feelings. It’s about showing the world what I am experiencing and letting them feel the things they can’t feel. It’s all about giving back. 

Made by Deborah ('15 Columbia)

Sun peaking through

After two hours, Don let us go outside to practice taking pictures. I had no idea about what I should take a picture of and I am not a photographer. I am the type of person who likes to keep memories in my head instead of taking pictures. So there will probably be a lot of the pictures that will turn up bad and I am sorry if that happens. But practice makes perfect right? Hopefully, I will have a lot of time to practice when I am in UPENN. 

In the last 45 minutes of the session, Don showed us (on the projector) the things he could loan us and I thought "Man, I might need to borrow almost all the things on the projector)."I do feel bad about borrowing things from people because I am afraid that I might lose or damage the item(s). The item he pointed out the most was the laptop lock and he wants us to protect our laptops at all costs. He emphasized how important it was to have one of those locks and how hard it is for people to cut the lock. I have never used one but we will see how well it works. 

Overall this was a very fun experience and very informative. Thanks Don! And now it's time for me to work on my essays. Almost there, we can do it! Ganbatte （がんばって）! Jia you (加油）! That's how we say "hang in there" or "you can do it" in Mandarin and Japanese.