Journal Entry #1 - Columbus Comes to My Village

Oct. 12, 1492

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Journal Entry #1:

My name is Son of Stars, and I am an Arawak teenager, living on the island of Jamaica.

I am 16 years old, and my main goal in life is to find a wife, start a family, and support my family by farming, hunting and making tools for both hunting and farming.

About a year ago, my dad took me hunting and fishing for the very first time, and we were very successful. During the three days we were out in the wilderness, we camped and harvested three deer and caught 45 trouts. Since that time, I have become a very good hunter and fisherman. My dad trusts me and I can now go out hunting and fishing on my own. Like most young men my age, I must first do my chores before I can hunt.

My day-to-day has been pretty regular for the past two years. I have to wake my younger brother and sister, feed them breakfast, and play with them until my mom returns from finishing her chores, which is around lunch time.

I love my family. If it were not for mom, dad, and my siblings, I would be very unhappy. We always eat dinner together, and I hear all the stories of mom and dad's day. It's so very exciting to be them! I can't wait to grow up and be like them.

Today was a very interesting day. While I was hunting, I saw the most humongous, biggest, gigantic wooden floating village out in the harbor. I was in awe. I had never seen, much less imagined, anything like that. It was amazing. I must have been the first to see it because I was the first one on the beach. Ten minutes later my whole village brought out all the canoes and they began paddling to the village on the harbor. I saw my dad and we began loading our canoe with birds, cotton and the spears we had made together. We wanted to meet these new people, and we wanted to give them gifts because we don't often get visitors.

When we arrived to the floating village, the very pale men helped us climb up onto it. They told us their village was called a "ship," which they described as a vessel that sails on the water. They told us they came from far away, and that they were looking for us. They called us "Indians," and they said we lived in a place called "India." That's interesting because mom and dad always told me that we were Arawak, and sometime we were called Taino. These men must know what they are talking about. After all, they did get their village to float on the water. Very interesting that these men did NOT have gifts for us??????? They did have the big knives that they called swords, but they would not give it to us as gifts. They also were very interested in my mom's ear rings. These men are a bit strange, but since we all came from the creator, they must be good.

I asked their leader, a man who is named Columbus, why he liked my mom's earrings so much, and he responded by saying where he's from, a place called Europe, "gold" is the sign of "wealth," which describes a person that has more than what they use. It's interesting that these men are so aware of what other people have. I don't get it, but that's okay because my dad has always told me to never hate others just because they have different ways.

Anyway, it was a very different day, more different than any day I have ever had. Tomorrow, when I wake up, my dad said I had to go out and find the yellow rock we used to make mom's earrings. I won't be able to hunt or fish until I find the yellow rock. So tonight I better get to bed early to I can go out and do what my dad asked.