Kalypso The Odyssey

Well, so far, the wonderful season of summer hasn’t been quite as boring as I had expected it to be. But boring is good at times. I have lots of programs and camps that I’m going to so I always tend to be doing something. I’m going to a swimming program with practice on mondays, tuesdays, and thursdays, with meets every wednesday. I have sewing class on saturdays and next week, I’m going to have music lessons on every day except for saturday and sunday. When I’m not doing camp stuff, I generally work for my mom, helping her at her job for 5 dollars an hour. I’m not really short on money (for a kid), but it’s still nice to have. I also exercise in the evenings, and have parties with my friends at least once a week. And tomorrow is Friday the 13th!! In my opinion, it’s one of the best days of the year, second only to christmas. Me and a few people I know are trying to plan something for that. Speaking of the number 13, I shall have achieved that many years of life on the nineteenth of next month. Wonder what to do for a party… well, I have time ^_^.

Last Saturday at the Bayou Boogaloo I was wondering about when a person wandered up to me and asked if she could take my picture. I said yes, as I do to almost everything, so she asked me were my parents were. I showed her and talked to my mom. It turns out that the woman was Helen van Meene, a famous photographer. We wondered over to a spot and she took many pictures of me in many poses and in different lights. The next day she called and asked if she could take more photos of me in city park. We met here there that afternoon.

Finally, after a lot of hard work, my dad and I were able to get my movie online about the rebuilding of New Orleans one year after Katrina. You can see it on YouTube, or a higher quality version can be seen at Think New Orleans. Thanks to Alan Gutierrez for hosting it.

My movie about the six month anniversary about Katrina is still on YouTube.

This was the first digital image that I drew using Photoshop and a bit of help from my dad.

In art class I drew this using water color pencils. My parents asked me why there were purple mountains and why there was an owl and a deer and little birdie and a bunny. I said “I don’t know.”

Something bad happened to me this summer. Because of Hurricane Katrina, I am now living in Omaha Nebraska. I am in the fifth grade at Sunset Hills Elementary, and this is the fifth school that I have attended and I’m in the fifth grade. Weird. I don’t know when I can go back to my house and school in New Orleans. Probably not for a long time.

In New Orleans my family and I lived in a two story house. When we first moved in, it was a duplex but the people who lived upstairs moved out and we took over the whole house. Now it is under water.

My hometown New Orleans has so much culture you would not believe it. From the food to the music to the festivals, New Orleans is its own world. My favorite thing is Mardi Gras. I love the food, the floats, and everything else. During Mardi Gras people come on giant floats, some are two stories, though most are one, and the floats are all decorated and the people are in costumes and they throw beads and stuffed animals and tons of other stuff. It is so much fun. I hope to go to Mardi Gras this February, if they let us in New Orleans.

My old school’s name is Lusher Elementary. It is the best elementary school in the district. And it has so much art. I loved my school. The people in it were so nice. I had lots of friends there. I didn’t have much family down in New Orleans but I had so many friends. Really the only family I had were my mom, dad, brother and me, and a bunch of pets. The friends I had included Nadia, Miranda, Rachel, Gabi, Dillon, and Monica. NO offense if anybody else is reading this and I forgot to list their name. I miss hearing Louis Armstrong and the music that was such a big part of New Orleans.

Lots of the pets that we had died, but the ones still livinga re Mosey, Kochise, Oot and a couple of birds. Mosey and Kochise are dogs. We call them Mosey and Kochise but their real names are Mosura and Gojira. They come from the Japanese words for Mothra and his nemesis Godzilla. Oot is a sugar glider. THey are furry little creatures that are a lot like flying squirrels. They are fuzzy and cute and they take your heart away with their big black eyes. We used to have some fish but they all died. We used to have two guinea pigs named Venus and Hedgy but they also passed away. One time we had a bunny named Saturn and he died on the same day of the week that we got him. I like many places in my home town, but I really like the zoo and the aquarium. I don’t really know why but I guess it because I really love animals.

When the storm came I was with my mom and brother in Purvis Mississippi. The hurricane sounded like winds 500 miles per hour outside, and trees were snapping all around. I heard the roof coming off and blowing away. It sounded like power lines were breaking and shingles were coming off the roof, and boy was I worried. I wasn’t as worried as me as I was for my dad. When the storm hit I was in Mississippi while he was in New Orleans. You can read how my dad got out of New Orleans on his blog.

He managed to get the dogs out but Oot my sugar glider is still in New Orleans and I feel very sorry for him. I really felt angry when I saw the looters on TV. It is wrong to steal televisions in a situation like this. But I think it was OK to loot for food and water and other necessary supplies .I also felt angry when I found out that people were going to shoot the pets that weren’t able to get out, even when people wouldn’t let them out. I feel sorry for all the sick people in the Super Dome. But I know that in the future they will get out of the bad situation. I also know that in the future that I can be strong and have hope.

Today is my 10th birthday. My dad keeps on telling me that it will be twice as hard now to write my age because I will have to write two numbers instead of one. Today I had a beautiful cake, it had coconut shedding thingies and frosting and lots of layers and it has a sparkler thing that took a long time to go out. I’d say even five minutes. Here is a picture of the cake:

I woke up this morning and we had a lot of work to do before we left the kibbutz. Now we are at the Albright and the cook and my friend Hisham made the cake for me. He is very nice and here is a picture of him:

Today was a nice day. Tomorrow we go to the Israel Museum, and we leave Jerusalem for home on Thursday. In 48 hours we’ll be at the airport.

I haven’t had much to write for a while, therefore I have not written in my journal for a while. Today we went down to the farm and I saw some cows. We went to close to the baby cows and we triggered an alarm, but we got out OK. I buried Harey the rabbit a few days ago. I lost my trowel and my swimming goggles, but I found my trowel in a big container on the sight. Unfortunately, I never found my goggles, but I’m sure they will show up. And I finished The Lion, The Witch, and the Wardrobe, and now I will start the third book. I can’t wait. Today Sy Gitin, the director of the Albright visited Tel Zeitah. He seemed happy to see me. I’ll post pictures sometime soon. We found something living in our house today. It had four legs, and I think it was orange and with a tail, so it might be a lizard. We got new air conditioners in our room. Unfortunately for me I am colder than I usually am so I get more goosebumps.