Imagine for a moment that you could go back in time and talk to your younger self, say at about age nine. What would have been your biggest dreams? Favorite color? Best friends? What would you hope to never forget as a grown up? These are just a few of the questions that KALW’s Martina Castro posed to three 4th grade girls, all friends and classmates at the Park Day School in Oakland. They attend an after school art and mindfulness class at Honey Moon Studios. Martina collaborated with their teacher, Emily Frost, to record a little time capsule for each of them – an interview that would capture this moment in their lives. Here’s a bit of what they each had to say.
MARTINA CASTRO: Okay, so the day is Wednesday, December 8, 2010. My name is Martina Castro, and I'm interviewing...
MIRA CASADO: My name is Mira, and I'm 9 years old. PAOLA GIRON-CARSON: My name is Paola Giron-Carson and I'm 9. CLARA HALLOWGRASS: Clara Hallowgrass. I'm ten, and my favorite color... Can I say two? CASADO: I like a lot of colors. Like, I like, I think my favorites are red, green, and blue. HALLOWGRASS: Probably neon green and blue. GIRON-CARSON: Turquoise.
CASTRO: So, if you had to choose one word to describe yourself, what would that word be?
MIRA: Probably funky.
CASTRO: Why?
CASADO: Because I do a lot of funky stuff. I'm funky. GIRON-CARSON: Creative? HALLOWGRASS: Excited 'cause I feel like even when you are having a bad day, you know it's going to get better. It helps to look forward to the future. So, excited, I really feel excited all the time.
CASTRO: If you could give your parents one piece of advice, what would it be?
HALLOWGRASS: Um...don't work as hard. CASADO: I don't know if they know this or not, but I want them to know that sometimes, like, most parents get kind of annoyed at kids, sometimes, and that happens with me. So I feel bad for any times that has happened, and I'm really working on trying to...It's not like I'm bad or anything, it's just that I don't like when my parents are mad at me, and I don't like doing the wrong thing, so, yeah.
CASTRO: So if you had to choose three things you might want to do when you grow up, what would they be?
HALLOWGRASS: Um...Like for a job? CASADO: Um, maybe I want to be an author, maybe? HALLOWGRASS: Maybe um, a clothes designer? CASADO: I don't know if this would be like a career, but it sounds kind fun to be an astronaut, but I don't know, I don't know, kind of, I don't know... HALLOWGRASS: Maybe an electric engineer, like to invent things that don't make as much waste... GIRON-CARSON: Someone who kind of takes good care of wildlife. HALLOWGRASS: Just help the environment and help homeless people to find a job or to find clean clothes or to find a shelter so they can be healthy, instead of sitting out in the rain and sick. CASADO: Maybe I want to be a teacher, I really really don't know.
CASTRO: Yeah, it's okay.
CASADO: A lot of things sound good!
CASTRO: So what do you hope will happen in the next ten years?
HALLOWGRASS: I will probably try to live in a house that's near BART. CASADO: I hope the oil spill that happened gets cleaned up. And, I hope... HALLOWGRASS: I hope that people will stop getting really cheap things that will fall apart really quickly. CASADO: So I hope that the world will think more about creating peace, and that there won't be so much war and violence. HALLOWGRASS: That global warming will stop, so we won't just be covered with water!
CASTRO: What are three things you want to make sure you don't forget when you get older?
HALLOWGRASS: How confident my friends have been towards me when I feel self-conscious... GIRON-CARSON: My teachers, 'cause I like them. HALLOWGRASS: ..And when I feel sad just, like no one cares, just remember how people treat you when you treat them nicely. CASADO: This is always going to keep happening, so I hope I don't forget that everything is going to go up and down and not always going to be perfect and that is just the way of life.
CASTRO: Is there anything that I didn't ask you that you'd like to talk about or that you'd like to say?
HALLOWGRASS: It's kind of weird, but I hate cleaning up when people tell me to... GIRON-CARSON: I want to learn how to speak spanish better. HALLOWGRASS: ...but I like cleaning up when people say, "Go read," or something, I'll be like, "Okay," and then I'll stay in my room and kind of clean up my room and then go read. CASADO: I just want to say, hi future self! I don't know what you're going to be like, but I wonder, yeah.
This story originally aired on February 10, 2011.
