THE VIRGINIAN-PILOT
Copyright (c) 1994, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: Friday, July 8, 1994 TAG: 9407080073
SECTION: DAILY BREAK PAGE: E11 EDITION: FINAL
COLUMN: TEENSPEAK
SOURCE: BY EMMILY SMITHWICK, HIGH SCHOOL CORRESPONDENT
LENGTH: Medium: 61 lines
BROTHERS ARE cool. Hometowns rule. Traveling stinks.
Sibling grunts and moving gripes topped the list of childhood complaints recently, when participants in this newspapers' 8th Annual Minority Journalism Workshop responded to the question, ``If you could change one thing about your childhood, what would it be?''
Adding an older brother to the family was 16-year old Angela Clark's suggestion. Angela has five sisters ranging in age from 13 to 29.
``I really do wish I had an older brother,'' said Angela, a rising senior at Granby High School in Norfolk. ``Guys are so different.''
Angela added that if she had an older brother, she might not have asked so many ``stupid'' questions. Once, she asked a friend if boys talked on the telephone.
Another sister basher, 16-year old Chanda Farrow, said that if she could transform something in her childhood, it would be her sisters' ages.
``You really can't talk to them about boys,'' said Chanda, a rising senior at Maury High School in Norfolk. Chanda has three younger sisters: Felicia and Alicia, seven-year old twins, and one-year old Kayla.
Moving around and making new friends was another common childhood tragedy. Alan Chang, 16, a rising junior at Kempsville High School in Virginia Beach, did not like moving around the world so much. Alan's dad is a cargo ship captain.
``I picked up so many languages, I didn't know which one to use,'' Alan said. Besides English, Alan speaks Mandarin and Spanish.
After living in Virginia for five years, Alan said he is more accustomed to Hampton Roads than he was to Taiwan, Costa Rica and the many other places he has lived in.
But for someone born in a suburb of Boston, Mass., Virginia was an extreme adjustment. Toureia Williams, 17, a rising senior at Maury High School in Norfolk, came down with the homesick blues when she moved here seven years ago.
``I basically stayed on the same street all my life,'' she said. ``I'm more used to it because most of my relatives stay there.''
As a child, Toureia remembers all of the neighborhood teenagers coming over to hang out with her dad, who she called ``a father figure for all the kids.''
``Everybody looked out for me,'' she added.
Although most teens said they would change one thing or another, 17-year old Deena Ines, a rising senior at Cox High School in Virginia Beach, said her childhood was ``perfect.''
``I think about the childhood people have today. . . it's a lot more difficult than the one I had,'' she said. ``People are being forced to grow up a lot sooner.'' Staff writer Holly Wester contributed to this report. MEMO: Emmily Smithwick attends Oscar Smith High School in Chesapeake. She
wrote this story as part of the newspaper's 8th Annual Minority
Journalism Workshop. ILLUSTRATION: Photos
by CNB