All my life i have been dependent on my parents. Whether it be money for food, going out, cleaning my laundry and my dishes. The transition to living alone was not too smooth, as you can imagine. the first couple of weeks in my apartment the laundry machine never turned on, the sink was piled with dishes and i havent cooked one meal for myself. This past month i received a job and finally have became semi finically independent. I pay for 75% of my rent, most of my food and all of my alcohol. My laundry is done every tuesday and Thursday by me and my roommate does the dishes after we both cook dinner. i have learned how to manage my time efficiently with school and work. This is only the beginning of my life alone and i am already loving it. ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Transitioning from High School to College has been by far the biggest adjustment of my life.  I remember waking up the morning I left and leaving behind my beautiful home and neighborhood on Long Island to come to New York City to study at Baruch.  It was a beautiful summer morning and my mothers car was crammed with clothes and supplies for my dorm room packed the night before.  I didn’t know what to expect upon arrival, I was nervous and uncertain of what is to come in my future.  I already knew my roommate and a few teammates from playing basketball over the summer but i was still worried about meeting new people.  As we all know Baruch is primarily a commuter school, so the dorms are very nontraditional and unlike a regular college.  My biggest concern coming here was having a hard time meeting new friends.  When I finally arrived at my new home and finished unpacking all of my supplies I realized I wouldn’t have a hard time at all.  The building did not only consist of Baruch students but also students in other schools from all over the world.  Coming from a town that is predominately all one race to living in an extremely diverse community has defiantly changed my perspective on people.   I’m now close friends with people of almost every race I can imagine.  Coming to Baruch has exposed me to many different types of people and has taught me a lot about stereotypes.  Living alone and not having my mother and father clean up after me and make me nice meals every night also made me realize how fortunate I was growing up.  For the first time in my life I had to do laundry and really take care of myself.  I no longer had anyone telling me when to come home and when I had to wake up.  Living alone and not on a traditional college campus has matured me faster and has given me a taste of what it is like to live alone without my parents.

With all my heart and might I attempted to pull myself up, but was left with nothing but failure. Frustrated, embarrassed and disappointed with myself, I kicked the floor and watched the dust slowly fall back down to the ground. I was unable to do a single pull up. Tall, skinny and scrawny is what most would describe me as in my childhood days. My chest was so small that my stomach would pass it. My wrist, forearm, bicep and shoulders all had the same width. Cousins would call me “skin and bones”, and classmates would address me as “skeleton”. Day after day, my confidence along with my self-esteem would go down the drain. I decided to take those remarks and instead of ignore them, use them to my advantage. The discouraging remarks in my head fueled my motivation and hunger to achieve my goals. I took it upon myself and made it my mission to change who I was. Not only did I strive to become stronger physically, but mentally as well. I quickly got into my new routine, devised a schedule and organized a diet that would ultimately help me achieve my goals. Calisthenics became my new obsession. Everyday after school, I would run off the bus and straight to the park I went. The monkey bars were my wake-up call. It was right in front of me all along. All I had to do was put my mind to it. I would not consider it a successful day unless I surpassed the number of repetitions from the day before. I was in competition with no one but myself. Each and every day, I was simply trying to be better than the person I was yesterday. I would push myself, and if I could not perform an exercise I would motivate myself remembering that it is mind over matter. For the first time in my life, I had witnessed something so rare to me- improvement. I witnessed myself get stronger as the days passed and found it hard to believe. Not only were the physical parts of my body improving, but so was my personality. Slowly, I transformed from the quiet and scrawny boy in the corner, to a man who was finally proud of himself. My skin and bones were quickly compacted with well-earned, lean muscle. Social life was no longer foreign to me. I unraveled the code with speaking to girls and was no longer self conscious about myself everywhere I went. No longer was I embarrassed of being the center of attention, but I have learned to embrace it. Monkey bars have taught me that one simply gets out what one gives in. The harder one works, the more pleasurable ones results may be. They taught me I could do anything I put my mind to as long as I am dedicated and committed. My ambition and work ethic stuck with me through out my high school career. I will carry these motivators on the rest of my journey, wherever it may be. I have learned that there is no challenge I am scared to conquer and no obstacle I can not solve. The strongest force in this world is you will and motivation to achieve success. It can make you a millionaire or a world champion body builder. It depends where you chose your powers to guide you, and the powers lay within my hands. I dream big, but work harder. I told myself that I would not continue life with a four inch bicep. Telling is only have the equation, doing is what gets the results. The monkey bars will lead me anywhere I desire.

I love college.

I’ve started to realize even more of what an amazing opportunity this is. A lot of people cannot attend college but for each their own reason. Whether it be for financial reasons or because they need to stay home and support their family, they do not have the same opportunity that we have today.

The more I think about this, the more I realize how much of a privilege this is and the more I realize that this experience isn’t something that should be taken for granted. This experience…It’s only been two months since the start but, I feel like the college experience has already changed me so much.

Looking forward, I want to use this opportunity to better myself, my family, and I hope that I can get to help the people that were not given this life changing opportunity in the future in some way.

My thoughts in the hallway are the product of the machinations of my mind,

Mind you it will never be a simple multiplication problem, I muse in Calculus

Because the halls of Baruch, the blessed vestibules of the secretary of Jeremiah

Has become the maze which I must go higher and higher for this education

From floor eight to eleven, where I become learnt in the vernacular of the business law

But the law of gravity is applied when I come back down to floor two

To take part in two free slices of pizza

Subs to Student life, who provided for the brother, or what my LC family likes to call “the hub”

Center for the life of the student, CollegeBoard definitely couldn’t have made a handbook for this.

I could not have prepared for an institution which mandates

A date I partake in a break from class every week to take action with clubs for a hour or three?

But then again there’s no disadvantage.

Some very astute vantage points proven to me that if I squad up, these clubs basically have to amount to a justice league of highly skilled individuals.

My thoughts led me to Sigma Alpha Delta, just call us the Auto-bots of Bernard.

We will roll out on your butt if you don’t pay attention, so don’t sleep on us and our 3.5’s

And keep your attention to another posse of mine

We are NABA, the national association of not just, but mostly, black people

I have to say that Baruch is definitely filled with beautiful men, but to me the women take priority

Around noon on a good day I can fall in and out of love around two to three times,

But the girl with the gorgeous eyes knows she has my heart, I see her at least once in my 24/7.

Remember this is a good day. That means it’s a Wednesday.

And I only have to put up with thinking about the BS coming out my mouth for 3-8 more hours

Excuse my abbreviated French, lord knows my heart.

Noon on Wednesday means it’s time for Sociology.

And I love that class man.

I love that class man.

You ever ask a question so serious

You know its funny,

And get half of the lecture hall to laugh with you?

I got to stay awake somehow.

But real talk, there are but so many ways you can tell someone “you are an individual,

But still a social statistic in the massive game we call ‘Life’.”

But no matter how I roll the dice, my friends and I will definitely be residuals.

I, the hottest Negro on the floor before the schmoney,

He, the Bengali with the hobby to play Tetris in the lobby,

She, the Chinese woman who dislike halal but loves soul food,

And the rest of the crazy cats from day 1. We are the data you can’t put a box around.

The colorful people of the Baruch discourse community.

Being here at Baruch, I can definitely say I have gained a newer perspective.

If I stand in the center and look up and down this path, I have to say

There is so much more to life.

But this is not the next rap song or the next poem with a powerful motivation

These are just my thoughts in the hallway.

For many people, moving from one place to another is difficult for them to adjust the new environment. For my family, it was even more difficult because we moved from one country to another. I remember getting off from the plane and seeing all these foreign people. It was no doubt a big change in my life. I realized I had to learn a new language, make new friends, adjust a completely new environment and culture, and most importantly, take a lot more responsibilities in the family.

Although moving to the U.S. was definitely a big challenge for me, what really changed is the way i look at my parents. When I first came, I was afraid to speak English to anybody because I thought people would laugh and make fun of me. Once, my family and I were out shopping, and we had a question about the item we were buying. My dad wanted me to ask the seller, but I didn’t want to embarrass myself by speaking my “poor” English. However, my father went straight up to the guy and started speaking Mandarin and showing him some gestures and body languages. That moment, I thought to myself, even my dad, a guy who doesn’t speak English at all, can go up and do that, I should’ve been the person trying to ask. My mind was empty for a second, and I pulled my dad back and tried to talk to the guy. Luckily, the seller was nice and we got what we wanted.

I think what really matters is that my dad set up an example for me such that you don’t have to worry about how others see you, especially these strangers who you’re probably never going to see again.

Just go straight up and ask for whatever you want, say thank you and leave.

A little less than two years ago, i decided to change my physical appearance at least what could control like my weight. On my birthday i took my first gym membership and started lifting weights to gain weight.At that time, i did not like being being skinny and that was the solution. That decision changed me and  i believed not to be the same person, it changed me for the better.Patience was one of the quality that i developed; getting the body that you want is not an overnight process  it takes a lot of time and it ask you to be patient, dedicated.One of the requirements is to push yourself if you want to see change.Many times you are tempted not to go workout and to simply enjoy yourself avoiding that pain.But after a while, i started loving that pain because it indicates me that i’m on the good track towards achieving my goal, it felt good.Working out make you stronger physically and mentally. You are after an ideal that require from you to get out of your comfort zone.In life i use the same attitude of not giving up every time things get harder. Pain is temporary but the rewards will last longer.You have a dream, an ideal it will certainly not be easy to get there but eventually giving yourself the right tools like hard work, patience and dedication will make you get where you want to be.

The most transformative thing in my life was becoming a feminist. Sometime during my senior year of high school a friend of mine was applying for a very basic job at a retailer store. After applying and accepting the job offer, she was told that the store would be taking back their job offer because they found a more qualified person. Upset, she spoke to me about it and I asked her who she lost the job to. She proceeded to rant about how she lost the job to a guy who was much less qualified. At the time I had no understanding of everyday sexism and inequality, so her story had very little importance to me.

That same day, I was grouped with some of my male classmates for an English project. The three of them argued for about 10 minutes on which book to pick and how to split the work. I figured I would give my opinion on how to split the work and they could decide which book to read. Immediately after stating my opinion I was immediately shot down with the statement, “Alright no need to be bossy” and followed by, “Shouldn’t women be back in the kitchen?” Now, I knew what he had said was offensive but I couldn’t state in words why.

I gave it thought and looked it up online. Was this maybe just a onetime scenario or did this happen all the time? Turns out it happens all the time. Every woman has been in some way either been harassed or disadvantaged by a male, even if not all men have harassed or disadvantaged a woman. Even if it was something as miniscule as having an adult chuckle at you as a kid for wanting to join a workforce predominantly run by men, to getting catcalled in the street. Maybe somewhere there’s a group of women who have not been subjected to this.

I’m aware that simply saying you are a feminist labels you as an extremist which can tell you whether or a not a problem exists. Regardless when asked, I will most definitely firmly stand behind my belief of feminism.

It’s our last day in Italy and my last day as a minor. There is only 5 minutes left in the day and our flight is in 5 hours. My friend messaged me to meet her at the beach in front of the hotel. As soon as I reach the water, I hear people start singing “Happy Birthday to You…Happy Birthday to You”. I turn around and in front of me stood all my friends with big smiles by a bonfire. It is then that I reminisce my first day of high school. And it scares me. It scares me because it was a time where I didn’t know any of these people that stand before me . It was a time where I didn’t have a single clue on how high school worked. Is the work more demanding? Are the classes harder? Who would I sit with at lunch? But the crazy thing is that I would soon experience this all over again in the next four months. It will be my first day of school and I will be labeled as a freshman again.  Turning 18 is just the beginning of my adult life and my college life. I would have more responsibilities and more work along the way. My friends will be moving away to their dorms and I will be continuing my life at Baruch. Everything is happening so fast. I feel like I can’t keep up. But never mind that for now, it’s my 18^th birthday.

              I grew up in a small, suburban town called Katonah.  It was like my own little bubble from the rest of the world.  I had never traveled further west than Buffalo and can probably count the number of states I’ve been to on my hands.  Sophomore year, my friend, Hope, asked me to go on a community service trip with her.  She’d done this once before and talked me into it right away.  It took a little convincing for my parents to get on board, but once they were, they couldn’t have been more for the idea of me going.  For this service trip we would travel, with a small group, to Nicaragua for a little less than two weeks.  In those two weeks we would build houses and latrines for two families. 

                  As I said early, I’ve never left the country, so I’m not going to lie to you guys, I was pretty sheltered.  I had this picture in my head of where those families lived: their homes would be on dirt roads, run down and falling apart.  When I was thinking of the term “homes”, though, I was thinking of an actual structure, with walls and windows and a floor.  I was absolutely shocked when I saw the “homes” these families were living in.  It was essentially four walls and a roof made out of black plastic, with no floor.  The family I got assigned to lived at the bottom of a huge hill.  This meant every time it rained mud would rush right under that plastic tarp. 

               We began by digging the foundation for the house and the latrine, then built them up out of cinder-blocks and cement.  This was probably the hardest I’d ever worked in my life, but the end result was worth it.  Just to see the smiles and the gratitude these family’s had.  The parents were at a loss of words and crying, they were so happy. 

               This experience really changed my perspective on the world.  It made me realize how truly amazing our lives are.  I wanted to stop taking everything in my life for granted-this started with my 40 minute showers.  In Nicaragua, at the end of each day we’d get a five gallon bucket, filled with water, and a bowl.  Going on that trip made me grateful for everything I was given in life.  It popped my Katonah bubble.