Personal Growth

During our two week fall break, even if it was somewhat tiring and boring, I had some personal growth through an experience in an event. The event was the Filipino American Festival(FilAm) held annually at Paradise Hills. This year, some of my friends and I decided to volunteer at the event and at first, we just went to get community service hours for school but in the end, for me, I actually learned many things. My friend and I had two shifts, one from 3AM-7AM and the next one from 11AM-3PM, so 8 hours in all. We all woke up around 2AM and we were all tired from the sleepless night. We set up tables and canopies and we tried to watch the sunrise but we wrong timing but it was great to spend time with my friends and friends that I did not get close with until the set up early in the morning. For our next shift, we just greeted people coming into the festival. It was nice seeing people smile because of our greetings. We pretty much did that for the whole day going back and forth to both entrances of the festival. At the end of the day, I was very tired and of course, very very sore. I pretty much did not sit for the whole day and being out in the sun made me darker. My growth during this festival was the sense of culture and traditions. The theme for this year's festival was "growing up Filipino" and since I grew up here, I kind of got away with my sense of culture. It was nice seeing many things in the festival that related to my Filipino culture. Another growth that developed was the growth of friendship. Many of us OHS students volunteered at the festival and it was cool meeting some people who go to your school but you do not even know them and even people from other schools at well when we are volunteering. It was also nice seeing friends I haven't seen in years and I got to reconnect with them. The festival was tiring yet it was fun for me because I met new people and learned the sense of culture!