Hi, my names Emmanuel (Manny). I live in Lawrence, MA and in a few months I"ll be a sophomore at Central Catholic High School. I've been with YDO for 3 years now. For me, the best things about Lawrence is that there's always something to do, I can always go play basketball at the courts, play baseball with random people that want to play too, or just walk around and wait for something exciting to happen. The worst thing about my community is the bad reputation it has, i know it has its reputation for a reason, but sometimes i think its exaggerated. I say that because when I get hungry after school I go buy something to eat at the store real quick before practice, and i ask some of my friends (that live in the surrounding towns and cities) if they want to come with me, and they could be starving but almost always they say, "Nahhh, it's too far, and i don' really trust that guy walking down the street" or, after practice" Nahh, it's too late to be walking around this city" when its 5 in the afternoon. If I had one wish for this city it would be for people from other places to see the good things about Lawrence, not just the bad. Note to the reader: Over the next few weeks, as you read our blogs and stuff, just know that I switch topics fast when I write. Like now. I started to think what I was going to do this summer, I wanted to get a job, I wanted to have fun, I wanted to do something! Now i know what I'm going to do this summer (SHOUT-OUT TO HOWARD: Yea Howard I'm going to race llamas the whole time I'm in Peru). The first time all of us met (THE PERU CREW) as i like to call us was interesting, we talked about a lot of things, like what we were going to do over there, where we would live for those weeks, and who was in charge of what, maybe the most important thing was that there was going to be animals that we would have to fight off, i cant remember what i got, hopefully nothing like a snake ,or wolf, or alpaca, Do they have wolves where we'll be? anyways at least i know i'll be safe from sharks thanks to my new friend Michael.