Yani Ye's Blog

 With summer starting, the school year has slowly come to end. This was my first year in high school, and definitely taught me a lot. Honestly, this school year has taught me much more about myself and how to act in certain environments and situations. One of the greatest challenges I faced this school year was balancing my school work and grades with my demanding figure skating practices. Although it did take some effort of change on my hand, I think I have figured out a good balance between the two. Also, other extra curriculars, such as volunteering and being a junior coach, took up time as well. Once in a while I had to remind myself to take a day break from all the chaos and just relax. Along with all of the stressful moments, this school year held many fun school events and meeting a lot of new people. Coming from a different school district, I was afraid that it would be difficult to find friends that were not already in a set group. However, I was pleasantly surprised to fi...

 Recently, I arrived home from my month-long China trip! After visiting 4 different cities, exploring the different life, and of course, staying with family, I was pretty tired. We visited Shanghai to tour around the city, Suzhou, my dad's hometown, a small city in the province of Fuzhou, my mom's hometown, and Xiamen, with my mom's side of the family to tour.

 Earlier this week, I arrived home from my first ever trip without either of my parents. I went on a week long trip to different places on the East Coast with my school, and had an amazing time. Although it did take some adjusting at first to be without my parents, after a little, everything worked out just fine. All in all, it was an amazing experience for me, and was a lot of fun to see my friends once again before high school.  Our trip took place from June 18-25, all starting at my school. All students attending this trip met at my middle school and met up with our chaperones and groups for the trip. Then, after our goodbye's to our parents, our large group of around 80 people headed to the LAX airport.  After checking all our luggage in, and getting our boarding passes, we all went through TSA together. For some reason, the guard did not scan my backpack the first time, so I was pulled off to the side while the rescanned it. Anyways, we then all walked a long way to ...

 Just the other week, finishing up my middle school years, I promoted! I am now going into high school! I am very excited to move onto a new chapter of life, yet will miss the middle school experience and environment. My school's promotion ceremony was held at a local high school, and to me was much nicer and more "formal" than my elementary promotion. Although my promotion was a fun expierence, it was pretty boring I will admit. Especially for all of the parents, who had to sit in the sun for  In the Americas, a caste system based on race and color emerged…white supremacy and enshrine enslavement as a permanent and hereditary status.” Like stated, during the peak of slavery in the North, most people of color were viewed with very low standards and public status. In some cases, depending on both parties' sides, some of the colors were completely mistreated, being referred to as not even human, and being dehumanized. Unfortunately, though most will not want to admit it...

 In just a couple of days, I will be finishing my 8th grade school year, and middle school! This school year has felt extremely long, yet also very short. I have learned a lot of things, made new memories, and had a good final year before things will truly affect my future. The foreign policy which I feel was most important for America as a whole during the presidency of Jefferson was the Louisiana Purchase, and how it allowed American citizens to gain access to more resources. According to The University of Maryland, “...nearly doubled the land area of the nation…secured permanent access to the Mississippi river…obtained vast natural resources for the economy…” All of these benefits that came from this one foreign purchase nearly cancel out all the negatives that come from owning a vast amount of land. First, by buying Louisiana from France, we gained control over the entire Mississippi River, which has now become one of America’s main waterways and water sources. Also, most obvio...

 Just earlier this week, I had my 3rd competition of the season! My coaches and I feel like I have made a good amount of progress, especially from my last competition, and have begun to become more solid with my program. This competition was at Irvine ice rink, and this was my first time skating on this rink. Despite that, I quickly adapted to my new environment, and adjusted my program to better cover the surface of this larger rink. For my technical elements, I skated a single axel, single lutz, double salchow, sit spin level 2, double salchow loop axel sequence, choreographic sequence, single lutz loop combination, and combo spin level 2. I am very happy with myself for getting a level 2 on both my spins, with enough revolutions and difficult positions. For my jumps, my first axel got the most positive points, but I unfortunately popped my first double salchow. I am aware of the mistake I made, and hope to land this next competition. However, I am very glad I clutched my second ...