FINAL Coming of Age

“New school new me!” Same line almost everyone says to start the new school year. It’s the time where you can have a fresh start, new image, new expectations and new plans. Well this whole “new” experience is not what I’ve expected. It’s always tough having an older sister due to the fact that people see me being a magnacumlaude, focus and time managing type of girl. Being the total opposite has made things harder and self-cautious about myself. 

            I started my years at Moanalua during the summer in color guard. I should have known joining guard was when people would start to notice I’m Danali’s little sister. Although I didn’t mind, being a freshman your first goal was to be known for something. Going through my first year of high school I’ve made friendships, went through new experience and try to do what every teenager does in high school, to find themselves. The fact that teachers and other students recognize my last name and my face it’s hard to find who I really am and where I belong. Being called “Mini Danali” from my perspective isn’t very well.  As I was growing up, I was taught to always be myself and to not let anyone change who I really am, For having the same title following me around made me become somebody that I’m not.

Having to live in a Asian family good grades is a must to have. Although it may sound so stereotype it’s true. Since being the youngest I have a lot of standards to reach. As first semester grades came in, it’s a must to show it to my uncle. Once he glanced at the paper is eyes turn to worry saying “What wrong with your grades? Your sister never has these grades!” from that moment on I needed to be better then her, my life has become a competition. I was too busy trying to do everything better then her just so people would be proud of me. It came to a point that I wasn’t really me, and from then on realized that I need to find out who this “me” person I’ve been wanting to be for so long.

 Who am I? What am I doing? How did I get here? I’m not anywhere near to answering any of these questions. I know living in the shadow of my sister isn’t how I planned my high school career to be like, however as much as I know that I’ve done a lot through out this past school years I know that there is more to come, before I can even touch these questions I need to start worry about myself first and not what people want from me, After this experience I know now to not care about what people think and what people see me as. I need to know who I really am for me to really make decisions in life. There yet still so much to learn and so much to do.

Finally becoming a sophomore, looking back at all my actions is quite funny. Changing who I am just to please people. I started to dress like her, study like her and soon act like her. I’ve been complaining about people expecting me to be someone I’m not when I let them. I became a person that when you look in the mirror you think,, “Who are you?” I may not know the complete answer for this but then again I’m only a Sophomore still going through life finding out who she really is.