A Life Lesson 
By Gabriella Amberchan

School Assignment: Writing a personal narrative
December 2006

As we drove our dingy into Geko Beach, Mexico, I leaned over a little to see if I could spot a whale shark. As we approached, there were three other dinghies already there at the location, where whale sharks had been sighted the day before. “Overboard,” my Dad shouted. Sami dived over the bow. Mom and Dad dived over, too. We waited for the whale sharks to arrive.

“There they are!”  Yelled, Sami. She was off with Dad and Mom to swim with the whale sharks. I stayed in the dingy rowing the dingy behind them. Then, I spotted one! The animals were huge, maybe twenty feet long and purple with white spots. Amazing! There were about five swimming around them and our dinghy.       

Later that night when everyone was saying how much fun it was Dad turned to me and said, “You’re going in tomorrow.” Protesting for a while he finally talked me into it.

The next day Dad said, “Overboard!”  Sami, Mom, and I dived in to the sea. I nervously swam behind Sami, while underneath us swam a whale shark. Frantically, I started swimming back to the dingy wanting to get out of there as fast as possible. However, when I had just touched the dingy my dad said, “No getting in the dingy. You go right out there with your sister.” That was the end of that discussion. So, I swam back out to Sami and I followed her around; we swam with the whale sharks and I watched and dove down into the water while they swam beneath me. The longer I swam with them, the more I felt at ease, still nervous, but becoming more comfortable as time passed. I also became more aware of how these animals were quite gentle and as much afraid of me, as I of them.

When mom caught up to us, she told us to head back to the dingy. After we had all jumped back into the dinghy, Dad told me that he was proud of me.

That’s when I started to understand that, to conquer your fears in life, sometimes you just have to dive right on in.  

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