I looked forward to summer the entire school year. Summers were as careless as one could get those days: there was no homework, no need to help dad cut firewood, no need to worry whether my only outfit would dry by Monday morning for me to have something to wear to school (I wouldn’t see a drier until I got to the US), and the sun shone late into the evening, so that we could stay out and play until 9 or 10 pm.
The summer of 1994 will go down in history as the time when I got really good at jumping rope. The girl gang and I had been together for a year now. During this time we had managed to climb and fall out of trees together, adopt a few stray dogs, organize a holiday pageant show and performance, get in trouble for stealing green apricots from a neighbor, and a number of other adventures befitting 10 year olds. But this was the summer that we’d dedicated ourselves to jump rope.
We jumped long rope and double dutch: we would ask some of the older girls for their ropes, tie the ropes together, and play into the evening, until we couldn’t see the rope anymore. I had never jumped rope until that summer and I was determined to get at least as good as the others. I’d practice at home by tying one end of the rope to a chair and making my dad spin the other end (my mom would absolutely not get involved in my shenanigans – that was not what chairs were for). The chair would often come crashing down and I’d have to try and dodge it, but I think that just added to my jump roping skills.
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Packing List for Immigration 