Life in a Nutshell

 I've always been bilingual. As an Indian born in America, from the moment I started school I was exposed to two different cultures—my Indian heritage at home and the English language at school. Being completely fluent in Telugu when I was younger was a quality I wish I still had, instead as I continued going through the American school system I started losing that fluency, becoming a master in Tenglish. I combined most sentences into one mixed language, Telugu and English. It pained me when I had to often glance at the subtitles of Tollywood movies when they spoke too fast or had to guess the meaning of what my family members were saying cause I couldn't grasp everything. Unfortunately, I slowly passed this decrease in the fluency of my mother tongue onto my brother, who I spoke a great deal of English around, due to the English I was exposed to at school versus the Telugu my parents consistently spoke around me. I often feel sorry for my brother for this deficiency in languag...

Poetry is similar to a puzzle, it takes time to put all the pieces together but as you get to the final picture everything becomes so clear. This year was my first time analyzing poetry for the first time, and I was amazed with the different tools I was able to learn to analyze poetry in a more efficient way. Chunking being one of them helped me tremendously in understanding the true meaning of the poem even though it did take some time. It felt satisfying to interpret what the author and speaker were trying to convey. In our Poetry Panel Project, our Author was Ocean Vuong, he used contrasting imagery, symbolism, and layered meanings to convey the brutality of war. When first reading the poem, I wasn't able to grasp the full meaning of the text, but as I continuously read and analyze the poem through many different lenses, such as imagery, voice and symbolism, I was able to get a deeper understanding of the text.  Another thing that I really have liked about the poetry unit is tha...

Who am I? Who will I be? What will I do? The future holds so many unanswered questions, and honestly thinking about it makes my head hurt. For the longest time, I’ve counted the years down before I would leave for college and now unsurprisingly it’s 0. But throughout the years I’ve seen growth and change. I’ve become more sensible, responsible, and aware of my actions. But as I see myself preparing to become an adult I aspire to be fearless, extroverted, and open to new things, but at the same time I’m scared of losing myself, my grounding, the rules, and the support I’ve had through home. I know I will always be the carefree person I am right now, but I hope to expand my perspective on life. I hope to become less stressed over my grades, find joy even when things are going bad, and create happiness for myself even when others can’t.  And now that I will be going to college in a few months, the question of who I want to be has popped up more frequently. I want to mold myself into a...

I used to consume books like the cookies found at our school store. I was the kid lugging around 10 books in their backpack to sneak back home to read all night, fast forward to high school and my TBR pile has never been bigger, just a neverending list of titles that will never be viewed during their old shelf life.  Between all the extracurriculars, hours of homework, late-night studying, and the constant doom scrolling has resulted in every desire of reading to go bone dry.  So my big New Year's goal, which is honestly pretty basic, but also very mature, is to read more books for the enjoyment of myself. Not for an English class or a paper I have to write, but a book that genuinely interests me.  I have a few ideas on how to achieve this. First, get recommendations from friends who give the best book talks, if I'm immersed enough I will pick it up, second, this is a hard one, but I will delete Tiktok (I mean it's already getting banned on Jan 19th, my addiction will hav...

As the world continues to modernize, the longing for traditions increases. More effort from elders to create long-lasting practices and rituals that will fight through time and the future of our world. But at some point, this wholesome practice turns heinous. The pressure on the younger generations to follow this path in the name of tradition creates a sour taste in one's mouth. The traditions that were once meant to unify, protect, and create love, instead create isolation in the means of "community", a community that has gone corrupt. This can cause young people to often feel trapped between their loyalty to their families and their own life and emotions encouraging them to leave a toxic community.  In Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie's 'Purple Hibiscus' the main character, Kambili is stuck and brainwashed by the heavy religious morals placed on her by her father, who tries to harshly instill the values of Christianity into her. Kambili is often placed at a crossroa...

The blue light shined in my fixated eyes. Not giving in, I forced my body to stay alert and awake, just in case I missed a single detail. The scenes continued to pass by as my mind crumbled trying to piece the story together. Every scenario I could think of blew my mind, creating a new alternate universe, changing the course of love, death, and desire. When I woke up, I instantly returned to the change in fate through the time gaps of death. Hopelessly waiting for the next episode of ‘A time called you’ I became a zombie. Mini hibernation #2: It was a rushed nap, I only got 30 mins, but my bed was the warmest it has ever been. Rating: 7.63/10