1995

Rafael de Souza – Sao Paulo, Brazil

Rafael was sitting in his last class of the day, English. He was lost in his thoughts, paying no attention to the teacher. This wasn't all that uncommon for him. It's not that he was a bad student, or disliked English. It was for the opposite reason actually. Rafael was very smart for a 13 year old and knew English fairly fluently. The class just wasn't stimulating enough for his mind. He was quite different than most other Brazilian boys his age that he knew. Not just because he knew English and did so well in school, but his family was rich, though they were generous with their money.

That's actually what Rafael was thinking about during his English class, trying to figure out how his family became so wealthy. From what he knew, his father, José, grew up on a farm in Rio Grande do Norte. His family was very poor and couldn't even afford to send him to school. When he was 17 he moved to São Paulo like many other northeasterners, hoping to become rich in the metropolitan capitol of South America. However, unlike most other illiterate northeasterners that migrated to Sao Paulo, he did become rich. He learned to read, learned how to speak English, and met Rafael's mother, Teresinha. Rafael was never able to understand how his father was able to make such a turnaround in life. From all his studies of Brazilian Politics, History, Anthropology, etc.. the Brazilian System didn't allow the poor to work their way up. The rich kept them oppressed. Though he'd asked more than once, his father never really gave him a straight forward answer to how he had managed this.

"Rafael, presta atenção, garoto." Rafael was pulled away from his thoughts by Professor da Silva telling him to pay attention. "Te perguntei, 'Whatch timey is itch?'" I asked you, 'What time is it?'

"Sorry Professor, it's five o'clock, time for class to get out." He knew that the professor would be a little annoyed at being told it was time for class to be over, but he just wanted to leave. That's what bugged Rafael the most about English. It seems like all they ever learned was to say silly things like, "What time is it?", "What's your name?", "The book is on the table", and such.

The professor excused the students and they started filing out of the classroom. Rafael started walking home from school as usual. However, when he turned off of the street of the school he was grabbed by a couple of guys that looked like they were in their twenties. They threw him into the back of a beat up Volkswagen Bug, and blindfolded him and drove off.

Daniel Zimmerman –Minneapolis, Minnesota

Daniel's cousin, Jake, his wife and little one year old baby, Levi, were visiting Daniel's parents' house. It was probably the last time he'd get a chance to be with his cousin, Jake, and younger brothers, Seth and Luke, before he went off to college. Luke had just bought his first guitar, too. So they sat around the basement playing some Cat Stevens songs. That's about all Luke seemed interested in learning at the time. It was fun to sit around and play music with them. Daniel had always enjoyed playing with Jake; however, lately he just hadn't been nearly as interested in playing guitar as he used to be.

What he really felt like doing right now was skateboarding. Daniel had always enjoyed skateboarding, but in the past year it had become a real passion of his. He didn't like to skateboard with other people though, mostly just by himself. After an hour or so of playing music with them, Daniel told his brothers and cousin that he was going to go skateboard for a little while.

Daniel grabbed his skateboard and started riding around. There were some places that he almost always went to, places that seemed special to him, and places he wouldn't see again for a long time. They were places that didn't really interest the few other skaters he knew. He liked hills and he liked going fast. He started going down one hill that he had a pretty strong emotional connection to. He was going pretty fast and started doing a power slide, sliding sideways down the hill for about 30 feet until he came to a near stop at the bottom and continued riding. As he continued rolling along he reflected on how this particular hill became so important to him.

It was just a little less than a year before that he was riding his skateboard home from school. He was coming down a hill about a block ahead of where he was now. He was going as fast as he could, so that his momentum would take him as far up the hill he had just power slid down as possible. However, at the bottom of the hill he hit a little pebble. He went flying forward, expecting some painful road rash. He hit the ground and went sliding forward as if he were on a slip and slide. He just kept sliding with out slowing down all the way to the hill. And as he slid past a couple other people who were walking on the street, he noticed them slip and fall on their butts. He started sliding up the hill, but was slowing down now. He came to a stop about 20 feet up the hill, and stood up. He looked at his hands, and they didn't have a scratch on them. He could feel that his palms and knees were going to get bruised from the fall, but didn't feel any burning sensation that accompanies road rash.

He looked back and saw his skateboard at the bottom of the hill on the other side of the block. He took a step forward, intending to go get his skateboard, when he slipped and fell on his butt. He slid back down the hill, and nearly all the way back to the other hill where his skateboard was before he stopped sliding. Forgetting about his skateboard for a minute he just sat there on the ground confused, wondering what was going on. He put moved his hand back about 2 inches and felt the ground, and noticed that it was completely smooth, where as the ground he was sitting on was rough as asphalt should be.

As he was feeling the difference between the two sections he had the impression that he had somehow done this. Why else would it have become smooth right where he fell, and why would those people have slipped as he passed him, and not at the beginning of the apparently frictionless section of ground?

Daniel concentrated, and could somehow feel that exactly where the frictionless ground ended on the hill. Somehow he was able to feel the difference and with concentration change it back to the same roughness as the rest of the asphalt. This became apparent, because as he concentrated in doing this, the other people that had been sliding slowly on their butts, came to a stop.

David Jacobs –Salt Lake City, UT

David was just getting out of his last class of the day, Phys 5110 Introduction to Nuclear and Particle Phyiscs. Even though he had just started going to the University of Utah the beginning of the previous summer, he would already have a bachelor's degree in Physics in December. He thought that the company he worked for would be pretty happy about that. They didn't even want him to go to college, but he convinced them that with a better understanding of physics he would be a greater asset to the company, and that because of all his advanced placement classes in high school he would be able to get a degree in a year and a half. They only agreed when he told them he would only take Tuesday and Thursday classes, that way he would be available for extended periods like Friday through Monday.

David was glad that class was out. He was looking forward to going on a hike up in Big Cottonwood Canyon. However, just as he was getting ready to go, his cell phone rang. "Dang it!" he said. There weren't many people that called him on this phone, and so he already knew who it was. "They said they wouldn't bother me on Tuesdays."

With that he answered the phone, "Hello.."