Jack

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I Believe in Trying New Things

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This was a essay I wrote at the end of 5th grade about our world trip. I hope you enjoy!

Have you ever taken a road trip in Morocco? Seen the great pyramids of Giza? The Roman Colosseum?

I believe in trying new things. And I feel really lucky that I have the opportunities I have.

When I was ten years old during the summer before 5th grade, my family and I decided we were going to take a trip around the world to learn about different cultures, and spend more time as a family. We had been saving and thinking about this for years, but it never expanded into reality until last year, the great year before corona.

We all had our doubts about it, but I think I had the most mixed feelings about the whole big idea. I didn’t want to leave my friends and life, because I had always loved Seattle. I was worried my friends would forget about me and life would never be the same when we got back.

I didn’t want to get out of my comfort zone, the things that I am used to in everyday life, like my house, school, and friends. I imagined the trip would be exactly opposite, having to constantly pack up and move, and living out of a suitcase.

Finally I realized that maybe I should do it because it would be a fun once in a lifetime experience. I wouldn’t say it was easy leaving. Since we were going to rent out our house while we were away, we had to remove everything from it and throw those things in a storage unit. And trust me, we have a lot of clutter.

We (99% my dad) removed furniture, trinkets, food, books, beds and more in only one week. During this, there was a lot of chaos, excitement, and franticness, while everything was both cluttered and organized in its own way. We were as busy as an army of bees. I was worried and psyched to leave, I really did not know what to think between the two. But finally, we got out of the house in a hurry, and flew to London for our first adventure.

We got to learn many new things by traveling the world. We learned that millions of people in South Africa are living in tiny shacks crammed together to this day. (Post apartheid millions of people are still living apart in poverty) We tried new delicious foods, learned about fascinating cultures, listened and inspected numerous animals on safari, and most of all just experienced doing stuff I had never thought of doing in my time.

Everybody always asks me “what was your favorite place?”, but I always respond that “I don’t know”. Ok, there were a lot of places we went to, but I’ll talk about one place that really made our travels come to life.

Atlas Studios is a film studio nestled deep in the deserts of Morocco, a place where a whole bunch of famous movies were filmed. When we toured here, we got to see a whole fake town, and a ginormous castle, filled with scaffolding. Even though the castle (used for the city of Meereen in the Game of Thrones) was all artificial, I liked it because we were allowed to walk and climb it unlike the precious old forts we saw elsewhere. I have always wanted to walk a towering fortress wall, or mock a gladiator fight in an arena all to my self. If I hadn’t got out of my comfort zone to go on the trip, I probably wouldn’t have been able to see and experience Atlas.

Our whole adventure was like a jumbled eight months of learning and trying new things, because it was totally something we had never experienced before. I am really amazed that the whole thing is now just in the past, and that it is over.

Now that I’m back from those eight months, I’ve had a lot of reflecting to do. Before we did it, I would’ve said that I was never going on a world trip, and that I always wanted to stay in Seattle at school with my friends. I used to value things like friendship, education in a real classroom, and recreation. But now, sitting here after, I’ve realized that it’s good to take on new things even if you don’t know what they hold.

I’ve also figured out that adventure, new friendship, and most of all, family are essential to me as well. Spending ten months with family has made me realize how important they are. Even that was a new experience for me that I wouldn’t have gone through if we hadn’t gone away on our adventure. (scratch that, everyone is spending more time with family in quarantine, we still would’ve had extra time together.)

There were the times when I was sad, wanted to go home, wanted to see my friends, or was frustrated with schoolwork or bored, but those times were very few. Overall we had a great trip, we learned, watched, felt, and tasted the world. This is why I strongly believe in trying new experiences, because even the things you doubt the most about them could turn into new exciting adventures.

To learn more about our trip:
– Blog posts: https://worldschool.travel.blog/
– YouTube Channel: https://www.youtube.com/c/OnTheRoadWithLJ
– Video we made from Atlas Studios: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Hy5MpkkMbsc

Thanks so much for checking those out and reading my essay!

– Jack

Greek Mythology: Olympians and Demigods

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Welcome back to another blog post!

I’ve been reading these books by a writer named Rick Riordan and I got really interested in some of the Greek myths included. So after reading and doing so much research, I wanted to share some of these myths with you…

Short Story of the Greek Deities

So it all started with the creator god Chaos, who cast down Mother Earth and Father Sky. Earth was called Gaea, and the sky was called Uranus- yeah, the planet was named after him! Anyways, these two presences developed human appearances and eventually had kids called the Titans.

The Titans: Kronos, Iapetos, Hiperion, Koios, Coeus, Thea, Rhea, and Okoanos (pronounced Oceanus, and the sea was named after him!)

As Gaea and Uranus had more children, Uranus started to hate most of them, tossing them into the underworld, which the creator Chaos had also cast down after Mother Earth. That is, except for the Titans. Gaea eventually ordered the Titans to kill Uranus, but nobody would do it. The youngest named Cronus finally agreed because Gaea promised him to be be king of the cosmos if he did it. A few of the Titan brothers helped bring down Uranus with the first weapon, a scythe, which Gaea had created earlier. To kill the original sky lord, the Titan brothers would hold down their father as Cronus sliced and diced him with the scythe. After father Uranus was killed, the Titans started to rule, Cronus being king, as he was the one to kill their cruel father.

But then Cronus had kids with Rhea, the Titan goddess of motherhood, comfort, and fertility. The children where named Hestia, Poseidon, Hades, Zeus, Hera, Demeter, and Cheiron (a centaur, or half man half horse). Cronus heard form a prophecy, that one of his children would over overthrow him as king. So he literally started swallowing them whole one after the other. I bet you can already tell that Cronus was a bad king, and father. But Crocuses wife, Rhea, hid the youngest child, named Zeus, On an island of the coast of Greece, called Crete. Zeus eventually overthrew Cronus and the rest of the Titans (after a childhood on Crete) with the help of his siblings. You thought they where swallowed! But no, because Zeus made Cronus cough them up with some poison. Then he married Hera and had children, including Ares the god of war, and Hephaestus god of craftsmanship. Hephaestus married Aphrodite though Hephaestus was ugly and Aphrodite was the most beautiful of the gods- being the goddess of love. Zeus also had the twins Apollo and Artemis with Leto, one of the Titans. The immortal gods ruled over the world, created humans, who had an empire in Ancient, Greece. Yes, these are the Greek gods and titans we’ve been talking about this whole time! Now we will explore the names and powers of some of these main gods…

The 12 Olympians

The Greeks invented so many gods, that they had to create a council of 12. And so these deities were the main, and most often worshiped gods for the Greeks.

The gods originally just had Greek names, but when the Romans invaded Greece, they changed most of them. So I am going to list these gods with a Greek name, and then add their Roman names too.

The Council of 12, the 12 Olympians:

1. Zeus: King of the gods, lord of the sky, married to Hera, wielder of lightning, Brother of Hades and Poseidon. Roman form: Jupiter (yes, the planet was named after him!)

2. Hera: Queen of the gods, married to Zeus, goddess of marriage. Roman form: Juno.

3. Apollo: Son of Zeus and Lito, lord of the sun, god of music, poetry, archery, brother of Artemis. Roman form: Apollo.

4. Artemis: Daughter of Zeus and Lito, sister of Apollo, a goddess of the wild, the hunt, the moon. Roman form: Diana

5. Aphrodite: One of the most ancient of the gods, goddess of love, mother of Cupid, wife of Hephaestus. Roman form: Venus

6. Aries: god of war, son of Zeus and Hera. Roman form: Mars

7. Athena: goddess of wisdom and battle, daughter of Zeus, protector of Athens. Roman form: Minerva

8. Poseidon: Lord of the seas, earthquakes, brother of Hades and Zeus. Roman form: Neptune

9. Hephaestus: God of blacksmiths, lord of fire, married to Aphrodite, son of Hera, he had no dad. Roman form: Vulcan

10. Hermes: Messenger of the gods, god of merchants, travelers, and thieves. Weirder of the spear caduceus (usually winged and with two snakes coiled around, now know as the symbol of medicine). Roman form: Mercury

11. Dionysius: god and lord of wine. Roman form: Bacchus

11. Hestia: goddess of the central hearth and family. Roman form: Vesta

12 Demeter: goddess of farming and crops, mother of the famous Persephone. Roman form: Ceres

The reason I put Dionysius and Hestia together on number 11, is because I can’t figure out which really is an Olympian. The myth maybe goes that Hestia was originally the 11th Olympian, but then gave up her throne for the newcomer, Dionysius. So I could say Dionysius is the Olympian here, But Hestia was the originally deity! Should Hestia or Dionysius be the 11th Olympian? Give your opinion in the comment section below ⬇️

Other gods

Hades: Lord of the underworld, Brother of Zeus and Poseidon. Roman form: Pluto

Why is Hades not an Olympian?

Hades is the lord of the underworld, and he already has a palace and kingdom in the underworld. Also, Zeus does not want his dark, gloomy character at Mount Olympus. So that’s why Hades is usually not allowed at Mount Olympus, or considered an Olympian.

Janus: Double headed god of doorways, passages, endings, and time.

Hercules/Heracles: Son of Zeus and princess Alcmene, raised by Amphitryon the Greek general, and Alcmene.

Who is Hercules and why is he so famous?

Heracles is his real name, since that was his Greek original name until the Romans changed it to Hercules. So basically, Amphitryon the general and princess Alcmene where married, until Zeus came down from Olympus, and had a kid with Alcmene. So Zeus kinda cheated with Alcmene, but he eventually left Alcmene to deal with the baby. Yep you guessed it! Hercules was this baby. How did Alcmene’s real husband Amphitryon feel about this, I don’t know. Amphitryon and Alcmene did have another child though, so Hercules had a stepbrother. Hercules is really famous and many movies were made about him. That’s ‘cause he’s slayed the most monsters, and fought the most wars (Like fighting against the giants, sons of Gaea and Uranus, who emerged from Uranus’s blood when Cronus killed him). Also, Hercules murdered his family, but the Greeks mostly blamed it on the goddess Hera, who hated Hercules. Hercules was originally half god half human. But after being killed from poison, Zeus took pity on him, and made him a immortal- though not an Olympian deity. He became a minor Greek god.

Britomartis: Also known as Diktynna, lady of nets, and sometimes traps.

Cupid: god of love, supposedly the son of Aphrodite, husband of the hero Sike

Cupid’s real name was Eros, before the Romans changed it to Cupid. He has two wings like angels, and holds a bow which has the power to make people fall in love, if they are shot by one of his arrows. He is depicted as a baby with wings and an bow, but he didn’t originally actually look like that.

Persephone: Daughter of Demeter and Zeus, goddess of flora, and of spring, queen of the underworld part time.

This myth is the most famous, I think, other than Hercules. While picking flowers one day, Persephone was abducted by Hades because she was so beautiful. And because of eating a third of a pomegranate in Hades’s realm, a curse was inflicted on Persephone. She started having to stay 1/3rd of the year in the underworld. When Persephone is away in the underworld, her mother, Demeter gets angry for her being there, and so forces crops not to grow, creating winter. When Persephone is in the over-world, Demeter is no longer mad, making the world warm again to form summer. Now that is the Ancient Greek way of thinking about the seasons.

Nike: The winged goddess of victory, daughter of the Titan Pallas and the goddess Styx.

Thanks for reading the blog, there is so much more to say, but I’m not going to make this blog 1,000 pages long! But if you want more, there is a really funny and awesome book where you can learn more about the Greek gods, by pressing this link you can find it: Rick Riordan explains it a thousand times better than me.

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Thank you for reading, follow us, comment if you have something to ask or say about the post, make sure to give your opinion on the 11th Olympian thing, and get ready for the next post!

  • Jack