January+28,+1938+Diary

January 28, 1938 Dear Diary, I hate homework. Every single day, I am left with tons of homework given by the teachers, and some of them are especially given only to me, like this diary work. They keep on giving me useless work which I don't really want to do. The English teacher said to me, "You should write as many diary entries as possible. It will help you decrease your stress and anger that you always show to your classmates." This is such a joke. Does she even know what I've been through? Well, with a dead mother, and a family with barely any money, it's quite hard to live in such a city as San Diego. I know I have many problems, but what less would you expect from a sophomore with these issues? Life is just hard. There is too much pain and suffering, which I don't want to be a part of. I just want to die, but I won't. I need to graduate as soon as possible and help my father earn money for my siblings, and help them with their paths to having successful futures beyond mine. I would just hope that my brother and sister would live through the conflicts that will come in the near future.

A few days ago, I met a person of the name Dennis Frank Oppenheimer around my town. As I had found out, my father was was working for his father at the textile factory. Interestingly, we had very similar opinions about war and about the idea of killing. He wasn't like many of my classmates and their parents with the strong nationalism and hate against the Germans. I discovered someone like myself, scared, and unwilling to fight. This talk was able to help to raise my confidence for what my true purpose was; it was to help my family become successful people. But I guess our families have many differences, which would put us in different standards. While his father is the owner of a textile factory, my father works twelve or more hours a day just to try to make a living. His brother is at Berkley, one of the best universities in California with an expensive tuition. There are so many differences between us, but I am glad that I was able to communicate with someone with similar ideas, but from a different social class.

If the world was at least in peace then the situations would somewhat be better, but it seems that the world is also going through a lot of problems. All day, through the radio, I keep on hearing about the devastating events that are occurring in the East. Like the crap in my life, China also went through many terrors from the "more powerful" nation called Japan. It is known as the Rape of Nanking, and lives are being lost by the Japanese forces. I don't know what's going on in the government, but no actions are taken in defending the country. Like China, I am always left to fend for myself in the hardest situations, and most of the times, I just don't know what to do except keep on getting hit by the forces of society. With Italy withdrawing from the League of Nations last month, I suspect warfare in many nations very soon. Just today, I heard from the radio that President Roosevelt had called for the country to go through re-armament. I would really not want to fight in the military, and help my family with the financial problems, but if I am asked, I think I will help my country in the military. At least I would be able to get away from this society with so many problems and have the freedom away from school and people.