Youth and Government Intern Essay. Yus.

The hardest thing for a child to do is to make a monumental decision and endure the emotional sting of leaving his friends without saying a simple see-you-later or a goodbye. I experienced this eight years ago, when I made the choice to leave Phillipines to head out for the States, where many consider is a huge mansion with many doors and windows open for opportunity.

My first three years here would be something I would call my transitional phase. Even though I had my aunt, cousin and mother (who has stayed in the States three years prior to my arrival) to help slowly integrate me in the American society/culture, I felt that it wasn't enough as every choice came down with me and every choice came down with a result whether it was a good one or a bad one.

My very first year in the States in seventh grade, I was the stereotypical immigrant Asian kid: The perfectionist, the one with the straight A's, and only knew basketball as a sport. Because of these three traits combined, I was often taken advantage of whether it was borrowing my basketball and returning it to me after a long period of time (three days maximum), or being the next best answer source since google for a problem that is as simple as "5 + x = 9, what is X?".

Because of this problem, I either had to just take it day by day and tolerate it, or totally change my routine. I picked the latter. I chose to be the stereotypical immigrant Asian kid, minus the basketball because I realized that I was no good compared to these people, and I was too homesick with my friends who were the reason as to why I started in the first place. This is why instead, I found a new group of kids, one that had obsessions with MegaMan and Gameboys who hang out at my math teacher's room during lunch. Thinking about it as I am writing this, I truly have no regrets hanging out with a dorky crowd, because I didn't really care or knew about the caste system of popularity that went on. I stuck with the option of being myself, and even though I was getting my end kicked at MegaMan, it was all worth it: I got to play my GameBoy during lunch, and kept my academic standard up, pushing for a 4.0.

If we are birds flying around this huge mansion of opportunity with many windows and doors open, we have the privilege to perch up on a window and see what's inside it, but never forget that we still are birds and still have the ability to fly and explore if we ever felt like it and find something better.