- Posts:
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- #3
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- Dec 26, 2012
- Country
- Australia
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- Real Name
- Daniel
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Danny's Life
Year by Year 1997-1998 My name is Daniel and I was born into a Christian family on the 3rd of December, 1997. I live in Melbourne, Australia and have never really lived anywhere else. In fact, I've hardly ever been anywhere else. Our family has been in Australia for many generations. One of my ancestors was actually sent to Australia as a convict for stealing a gun and shooting a chicken for food back in 1837. That was when Australia's population was just 130,000. Currently, almost all my close relatives are living here.
The beginning of my life was actually quite a miracle. I was born with my umbilical cord wrapped around my neck, almost choking me. Doctors also said I was almost sure to have brain damage. I know most of you aren't Christian but my family is and so my parents were praying for me. I imagine it would have been pretty stressful for them. A month later, they had me checked again and I was found to be fine. I'm so thankful for that.
My first home was in Burwood, roughly half an hour from Melbourne's CBD. We had a medium-sized backyard for a small city house and it sloped steeply. Some of the things I remember from an early age were that we had a huge inflatable pool, a lemon tree, a rectangular trampoline, a sandpit and a mini playground in our backyard. As a baby, I always had very bright blue eyes. Growing up with two older brothers, I was dressing up as Star Wars characters and playing with pretend light sabers from a very early age. 1999-2000 In 1999, my sister was born. Her name is Kaytlin and she's basically been one of my best friends all my life. I don't remember much from when she was born but I do remember walking into the living room and seeing mum had replaced me with this horrible little ball with black hair sticking out in all directions. But soon we became very close. I have some very fond videos of us playing games with my plastic bug toys or my plastic zoo animals.
Even from very young ages, it was clear what our futures had for us. She was a born leader and I was a born world conqueror. 2001-2002 As a little kid, I always loved animals and for as long as I can remember, my favourite animals have always been tigers. That's also why my favourite colour used to be orange. From an early age, I decided that I was going to grow up to be a zookeeper, and that dream has hardly changed. Almost everything I did or liked had to do with animals - or trains. I loved trains! Lol, I remember my first Thomas the Tank Engine train set. Yep, possibly one of the best birthday presents I ever got. Anyway, back to animals. At age three, my grandma bought me a book on animals. I'm not sure if this is where my love of animals came from or if I already did love them. Mum says that I actually taught myself to read and write using this book I was given. A age three! Yeah, I was a bit of a nerd as a kid. Still am honestly. I started schooling at about age 4. I was homeschooled - just like all my siblings. I don't remember much about the kind of schoolwork I did but I do remember trying to learn my times tables and counting ducks... Yeah back then, THAT was Maths. As we did our work, my sister would watch Bug's Life nonstop... I think until she discovered Barbie movies. And that's when I started watching with her  In December, 2002, I turned 5. I had my birthday party at McDonald's and I still remember it quite well. At that age, the only people I really knew were from my church so I invited about fifteen kids my age as well as my siblings. One of my strongest memories from the party is actually not such a good one. Before that party, I'd always celebrated my birthday at home with my family. We'd play games and eat junk food just like you would at any party, but it was just our family - and our family has a sort of "tradition". Whenever it was your birthday, mum and dad would specifically rig it so you win all the games. You can imagine my shock when I found out McDonald's was a little more fair. We were playing Musical Statues and I didn't win... One of my friends got the prize - a party bag - and I didn't. I was devastated. So I began to cry. I can imagine it would have been quite embarrassing for my family and the party people at Maccas... But they gave me another party bag anyway so overall, it was worth crying about.  2003-2004 One of my greatest memories from these years would have to be my first trip to the zoo with Grandma. For both my brothers and my sister later on, my Grandma had a special day with each of us when we turned five. My choice was to go to the zoo. I don't have many memories of visiting zoos before that though my mum says I did go to some as a baby. Melbourne Zoo was (and still is) the largest zoo in Victoria. I remember that when I went as a five-year old. as soon as we got through the gates, I wanted to see the tigers. No, I didn't want to go through the zoo in a proper, sensible route. I wanted to go straight to the tigers somewhere in the middle of the place. I had a lot of fun on this trip and I remember I was pretty amazed to see all the animals they had there. This trip may have been a reason I decided for my career I would be working at a zoo.
I honestly don't remember much else from these years - except that from that day on I made a habit of making sure my mum would let me go to a zoo at least once every year. Other than that, my life was purely playing with my friends at church and my siblings. 2005-2006 There wasn't a whole lot that happened during these years. My oldest brother started school at a small Christian private school near where we lived. He was in Year 6 and one of his friends from church also went to that school. My best friend was in Year 2 at the school as well. My other two siblings and I, however, continued to be homeschooled. School was boring for me. And I was lazy. There were some days where I managed to convince my mum not to make me do any work at all. Then there were days when I was forced to do the work anyway. I was still smart... But extraordinarily lazy. I managed to catch up to the level of spelling my brother was doing despite the fact that he was two years older. I was also doing Year 4 Maths in Year 3. I often found the work too easy. I don't recall actually doing much other than homeschooling these couple of years. But I did find out part way through Year 3 that I would be joining the same school as my brothers the following year. 2007 (Year 4) In 2007, I started going to school. I was in Year 4. Before then, I hardly knew anyone except for my family and kids from my church. My world was small and innocent but I loved it! But when I began going to school, my world begun to change. I joined the same small private school as my brothers (my brothers were in Year 6 and Year 8 at the time). I was partially excited, but then partially worried. I knew I was lazy and I knew that would have to change once I joined school. It was a pretty big surprise, though, when I found out what school was actually like. At church and home, I had always felt a part of everything. Nothing ever changed and I was always everyone's friend. Not so much when I joined school. First day, I had no one to talk to. I knew no one. I wandered around during lunch time while all the kids in my class played basketball or talked with each other or played tag... But no one would ask me to play. And I was too shy to ask them. It wasn't long before my lonely emotional side came out and I began to cry. But I'm a guy so obviously I tried to hide it. Eventually, one girl noticed me. She sat next to me in class and she had similar interests to me. Her favourite animals were tigers and her favourite colour was blue (mine changed to blue earlier). Being nine years old, I thought that was awesome! By the next day though, I'd found a few guys to play with. Some of the boys asked if I would like to play basketball and so I joined in. I was awful at sport back then. In fact, I was awful at most things. I didn't realise it then, but I was a shy, socially awkward, goody-two-shoes. And I cried a lot. But I was smart and good at most subjects. I was top in the class at the end of the year and won the Academic Excellence award. 2008 (Year 5) During the summer holidays between Year 4 and 5, we went on one of the biggest holidays I've ever had. We went to the Gold Coast in Queensland, Australia. If you don't know where I mean, perhaps you've heard of Brisbane? Well, Gold Coast is about an hour or two south of Brisbane. It was my first plane flight as well and that was a pretty exciting experience! The Gold Coast is definitely one of Australia's hot spots for tourism. They have five of the biggest, if not THE biggest, theme parks in Australia - Movie World, Sea World, Wet N' Wild Water World, Dream World and White Water World. We went to the first three of these. Having been a pretty shy and non-adventurous kid, I'd never been on a roller-coaster before and I was too scared. I still am really. This holiday, I went on what was basically, the safest and tamest roller-coaster at Movie World. I still somehow managed to vomit. Even though I didn't go on any of the big rides, I did enjoy the holiday a lot. I tried out a lot of pretty cool water slides and I loved them! Sea World also had some pretty cool animal displays, such as polar bears, bottlenose dolphins and dugongs. Sea World on the Gold Coast isn't too big, but the exhibits were quite decent and large enough. During that holiday, we also went up to the famous Steve Erwin's Australia Zoo so in the end, we did see enough animals to make the holiday sufficient for my needs.
Year 5 was an interesting year. I made new friends and became even more of a nerd, winning the Academic Excellence Award a second time, but I was still just as innocent, awkward and shy. I won $100 in a poetry competition and then later that year, won a second poetry competition. The judge's comments on my poem were, "It was so good, I had to actually google your poem just to make sure it wasn't copied!" But in the end, Year 5 wasn't that much different to Year 4 except that our teacher was great! She was always very kind and didn't make going to school a challenge. Overall, I have to say Year 5 was a great year!
2008 was also the year Hawthorn won the AFL Grand Final. I think that was the moment when I truly started to love footy. 2009 (Year 6) Year 6 was even better again. Our teacher had a great sense of humour and clearly loved her job. Somehow, she even made English lessons fun by dressing up as some strange English Professor with a thick fuzzy moustache known as "Professor Flooglegrubber". That year we also had a camp at a farm in Western Victoria. That was one of the funner camps I've been on and was definitely a highlight. Oh and once again, Academic Excellence Award.
Towards the end of the year, I also joined a cricket club. I was one of the worst in the team. I liked cricket but had only played at home with a tennis ball before then. Real cricket uses a ball that's solid as a rock, much harder than a baseball even. My first three matches, I made no runs and hardly bowled well either.
Year 6 Graduation night was pretty fun, although being in a Christian school, it wasn't crazy or anything. It was simply a dinner with a few speeches and gifts to the students. I have this book with a list full of all the comments my friends made about me. They are following:
"A kind, unselfish boy that loves animals."
"Is smart and good at running competitions."
"Very good in things about animals."
"You're a kind and friendly friend."
"Very smart, a nice person to have as a friend."
"Very smart and helpful."
"You are the smartest person in our grade."
"A very creative boy and is very organised and an awesome drawer."
"He is smart and he is good at drawing."
"He is smart and likes animals."
"Smart boy and good friend =]"
"A smart boy who is a great drawer."
"A smart and funny guy."
"He is a good drawer."
"Smart and creative."
"Is gentle."
"Responsible and good person."
"Smart, good at cricket, always has a go at whatever comes his way."
"He's smart, kind."
"He takes care of people and animals."
"The animal lover."
"Really, really smart and has excellent ideas and thoughts."
"Smart and good at drawing."
"Smart."
"Your bowling is super."
"He is really smart and full of humour."
"Great at drawing and grammar."
"Loves animals, understands Maths well and always gets involved."
"Kind and smart."
"He's good at drawing animals and is a great writer."
"Very smart." 2010 (Year 7) If you know anything about the Victorian school system, you will know that Year 7 is the start of high school. But even at the start of high school, I was still one of the most innocent kids around. Cricket season finished and our team won just one game that season. Between Year 6 and Year 7, our family had made a lot of changes. Our school had moved to a new location, we moved church and we moved house for the first time in my life. Our new home was only about twenty minutes to the east of our first but it was so much better. This house was nearer to the "mountains" meaning the area was a lot more beautiful. the house had two storeys and a pool which is pretty awesome.
I guess one of the biggest changes of all that year, though, was High school generally. The fun was taken out of schooling and I suddenly realised the world wasn't as simple and kind as I had once thought it was. Many of my friends left the school for bigger and "better" high schools and a group of new students joined. By now, I actually had a group of friends who were really friends. In fact, we started to notice groups forming. There was the girls' group, the group of guys that try and hang out with the girls, the group of Asian kids who played soccer all the time, the group of sporty kids and then... there was our group. The group of four kids which we named Peer Group 3. We were great friends and always hung out together. My best friend and I would often play footy or cricket with the sportier kids but we definitely got along better with the other two in our group. Along with High School also came exams. I had no idea what to expect but fortunately they were easy back then. I got all As, scoring 92% for English, 93% for Humanities, 96% for science and 98% for Maths. My second set of exams that year were also pretty good. I got 91% for English, 93.5% for Maths, 94% for Humanities and 100% for Science. I also won a writing award for a short story I wrote. But during Year 7, no one was innocent any more except me, though it wasn't long before I began to learn. Everyone was suddenly obsessed with talking about sex and girls... But fortunately, at our school, it was only talk. At first, I didn't understand most of what they were saying. Everything was just new words to me. 2011 (Year 8) The second year of High School wasn't a whole lot different. This year, my cricket team didn't win a game at all but I played better. I was still a terrible batsman but I was one of the best bowlers in the team - and the fastest. I believe I joined the community early this year as well. It wasn't long before I decided to try out designing. I'd used Paint.NET before and, even though I was shocking, it wasn't long before I figured out how to get my skins working. I made a lot of new friends, especially at Aurora Designs Forums and Northern Skies.
In terms of schooling, I was still a nerd. Top of the class and winning the Academic Excellence award for the fifth time in a row. I was still in my small group of friends but one of them had moved to Sydney so our group was now just three. Since starting school, I had improved so much in sport and I felt like I finally fitted in, which was good in some ways but bad in most. I found myself becoming more and more like the people around me. When there was a kid who was left out, I would make jokes about them and I would talk about the things my "friends" talked about. I was no longer that innocent little "good" kid from Year 4. 2012 (Year 9) Year 9 was a pretty awesome year! To start it off, our family went on a cruise to New Caledonia and Vanuatu! We first went to Sydney and to Taronga Zoo which is definitely the best of Australia's zoos. The cruise was amazing though! My favourite part had to be the food But the whole experience in general was great.
However, the cruise was hardly the best part of the year... Halfway through the year, I started to have a crush on the most amazing girl on the planet, Susan! <3 I'd never really felt such a way about anyone before I met her. And she was (is ;3) perfect! An amazing artist, lovely personality, talented writer and she's beautiful!
In Year 9, we also got our own iPads for school! Which is one of the reasons I'm so active in the community these days and a reason why I fell in love. I was still doing well at school but I was also beginning to focus on art as well. I started drawing more as well as making digital art. At the end of January, I got my Private Wildlife Licence and bought a Central Bearded Dragon named Gimli. She lives in my room and she's grown a LOT since I got her. She's now about fifteen months old and well over a foot long.
Our cricket team merged with another team and we actually made the Grand Final this year. It was a real step-up from the teams I had been playing in and I loved it. I didn't have a great season statistically but I believe I improved a lot. We had electives at school so I chose a lot of PE and IT. Even though I love Art, I didn't really like art at school so I didn't pick it much. I also did a fair bit of Food Tech and I enjoyed that.
Year 9 camp was so much fun and it gave me so many amazing experiences. My favourite part was definitely snorkelling but I also loved surfing as that's something I haven't really done much at all. We went snorkelling in the sea to the west of Geelong. It was a coldish day and the weather wasn't perfect for snorkelling but the best part about it wasn't ever by any means the weather. We got to go snorkelling with wild Australian fur seals! It was incredible. 2013 (Year 10) I am currently in Year 10. This year will probably be a big year for me. Firstly, I had my best season of cricket so far, taking 14 wickets in total and batting the best I have ever batted. At school, I was chosen to be part of the "Student Service Council" (along with two others in my class) which isn't that exciting or great but... we get badges! I joined this program called the Duke of Edinburgh Award. There are three levels to it. I am currently doing the bronze level. Basically, to pass the bronze level, I need to do 1 hour a week of Public Service for three months in a row, 1 hour a week of Sport Improvement for three months in a row and 1 hour a week of Skill Development for three months in a row. I also have to do an additional three months of one of these. I'm planning on doing logo design as my skill, cricket as my sport and helping out with "Kid's Church" or "Sunday School" at our church. Another part of Duke of Ed. is that I must do two "expeditions" during the year with our DoE class. I completed my first one not long ago and even though it was a little challenging, it was quite fun!
Year 10 is also the last year before my VCE (Victorian Certificate of Education). Year 11 and 12 are the VCE years and they will have a huge influence on my life ahead. I am planning on doing courses in Zoology and Animal Care/Zookeeping so I hope I do quite well in my VCE. The subjects I plan to study next year will be Biology, Chemistry, Advanced Maths (Specialist Maths), English and maybe Business Management. I am currently doing Year 11 Maths Methods, which counts towards my VCE, and so far I'm doing well in that.
In a couple of weeks I'll be doing work experience and I'm really excited. Why? Because I'm doing my work experience at Halls Gap Zoo. Halls Gap is around 4 hours from where we live so I'll be staying over there as I do my work experience. The zoo isn't that large but it's one of the largest country zoos in Australia. It contains around 140 species. About half of these are native however the zoo also holds a few common exotic species such as Rothschild's giraffes, servals, red pandas, meerkats and a number of birds, monkeys, reptiles and ungulates. I'm pretty excited for this as it's really my first step towards a career working with animals. I also hope to start doing volunteer work at a wildlife park or a zoo some time but unfortunately I'll be quite busy over the next couple of years and I don't live close enough to any zoos. Bravery Bravery
True bravery is something that you don't see a lot of these days yet it's something that we should all strive for. But what exactly is it? It seems that today's society has a completely lop-sided view of bravery and to explain my point, I'm going to tell you a story.
Imagine there is a wooden bridge across a wide river. Now, a group of ten boys is walking along the bank of the river when they see the bridge. As they talk and laugh, they start to walk along the bridge. There is nothing overly special about these boys. They are just a bunch of ordinary kids with their own talents, their own dreams and their own fears.
When they get about halfway along the bridge, the ten boys stop to have a rest. That's when one sporty, strong-looking boy has this great idea. He thinks that they should all jump off the side of the bridge and into the water. The water isn't too deep and the bridge isn't too high so jumping off should be, more or less, safe.
About five of the boys agree immediately and all jump off straight away without a thought. They all land in the water safely and climb up onto the bridge to go again. However, the other few boys are all too scared to jump off the bridge. So they wait. But after a few jumps, the first five start pressuring the scared boys to go as well. The boys are definitely tempted and don't want to seem like losers by not at least giving it a go. All but one of them eventually jump in and even though they were afraid, once they give it a go, they can't stop! Still, there is one boy who will not jump in. The others keep pressuring him to jump but no matter what they say, he will not.
After a while, it begins to get dark and they all begin to walk back to their homes. The one boy who was too afraid to jump in goes home feeling like a loser and the other boys who did jump in go home feeling extremely brave.
But what exactly is bravery? Is it when you jump in fearlessly without a thought? Is it facing your fears and taking that risk? Or is bravery when you hold back and resist the pressure of your friends? I'm sure almost all of you would naturally agree that it's the first - diving in right from the get-go.
If that's what you would say, then it's time for you to stop and think. The first group was not afraid to jump in whatsoever. For them, jumping off the bridge was easy, fun and certainly not challenging in any way. They simply gave it a go without hesitation. They were fearless; completely unafraid. But is that bravery? Is it brave when someone does something that they aren't afraid of? I wouldn't think so. I am not afraid of walking down the stairs and I'm sure none of us would consider it brave if I walked down the stairs. Walking down the stairs is in my comfort zone. I feel perfectly safe doing it and I walk down the stairs without a fear. In the same way, the first few boys felt perfectly safe jumping off the bridge and did it. They weren't brave. They were simply unafraid.
"Courage is resistance to fear, mastery of fear, not absence of fear."
- Mark Twain
Bravery requires fear. Without being afraid, you cannot possibly be brave. When a soldier goes out to war, he is afraid. He is risking his life and he knows that. Yet he still goes out there and fights.That is bravery.
If you tie that back in with our bridge example, you could say that the second group of boys were brave and, yes, I agree. They were afraid to jump but they still did it. They stepped out of their comfort zones and did something that was beyond what they felt safe doing. They were afraid but they were brave.
Now, what about the last kid? The one who never jumped in no matter what the others said? Surely, he can't be brave, can he? Let me bring you back to the quote by Mark Twain. Was this kid absent of fear? No. He was terrified! Did he master his fear? No. He stood back and wouldn't face his fear of jumping off the bridge. But did he resist fear? Yes, he certainly did. In fact, he resisted one of the most difficult fears of all. The fear of being mocked. The fear of being hated. The fear of being unloved and lonely. When a person is able to stand up to that kind of pressure and resist it, that is still bravery. In fact, it is one of the most rare and most unrecognised forms of bravery. But it is still bravery and a bravery that our culture seems to lack. A bravery that requires complete strength and will.
You see, every person wants to be loved and wants to be cared about. When we, as humans, are pressured into doing something, it gets extremely difficult for us. Even when we are pressured into things that we would normally never do or even want, we become so tempted. Why? The idea that we might lose friendships or no longer be accepted if we stand back is too difficult for us. We would rather give in than lose the people that we believe care for us. That's what is so brave about this one boy. He saw all the others jump in. He must have known that it was perfectly safe and he certainly would have been tempted. Yet, he went against the flow and chose not to give in. When people dare to be different, that is true bravery.
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Very helpful Danny.
! Thanks for it Danny!
Azrael
