FFJ Meets FFA

Recently my family and I hosted a FFJ student from Engei High School. Nervous and excited we picked Yuriko up. My first thoughts were, oh my goodness, she speaks Japanese and I speak English, this is gonna be a long and quiet car ride home. Quickly I learned that the language barrier wasn’t that big of a deal and the car ride home was fun. With the help of hand motions, sounds, expressions, and the use of her portable computer translator it was easy to carry on conversations. It didn’t take long before Yuri and I bonded.

As her first day of school approached we were both very nervous for her first day at an American high school. When we got there, she kept saying, “Dokey dokey,” which is the Japanese word meaning her heart was beating fast, but that soon went away. She soon trusted me and if she didn’t understand what someone was asking her, she would look at me with an expression of confusion that seemed to shout, “Please help me understand.” I would in turn translate what they were saying in simpler English.

Even though she was 3 years older than me, I felt as if I was her older sister guiding her through a new experience. As I was teaching her new words she was teaching me new Japanese words. I would write down the word and the English translation on a piece of paper so I would remember them if I needed help. I was slowly but surely speaking a very little bit of Japanese. I’ve learned that even though we are from two different countries and we speak two different languages we are so much alike, and we share our sense of humor. Besides speaking Japanese, she was just like any other American teenager. I would advise anyone who hasn’t had this opportunity to quickly ask to host a student from Japan or any other country, because regardless, the experience is still the same. It was a life changing week that I’ll never forget and will cherish forever. Yuri has become a member of my family who lives miles away, and someone whom I, my friends, and my family have grown to love.

-Karlyn Wolfe
Rosewood FFA

Caroline Tart Outlines Her MEGA Experience

Is this real life? That was the constant feeling that I kept having during the weekend of March 23^rd. I have had this feeling many times throughout the year, but it was evident this weekend. It was our first and last MEGA conference as state officers, and we were so excited! We made our way down to Greensboro on Friday night, got started preparing, and met the two National Officers that would be joining for the weekend, Seth Pratt and Jason Troendle. And, not only did we get to have two national officers, but we also had a past national officer, Mr. Wyatt DeJong! Well, just because they were visiting they did not get out of some work. We put them to work blowing up balloons, making balloon animals, and helping decorate our workshop rooms before they headed to bed. After we got our 200 balloons blown up for the workshop we decided that we would take a break and cheer on our beloved Wolfpack. The game did not end how we wanted, but we still cheered with all our hearts. We went over our workshop and then headed to bed, thrilled about the weekend that we were about to embark upon.

The next morning we woke up, put on our snazzy official dress and headed down to the ballroom to practice our morning session. Shortly after, when the members started making their way to the hotel we could really feel the excitement build for the weekend. We hung out for a bit, chatted, and saw all our friends that we've missed so much. Finally, the time had arrived. We began with opening ceremonies and got the conference kicked off. Beverly and I, along with our fellow Over the Top members had tons of fun Saturday learning about resumes, job interviews, etiquette, image, social media, and organization involvement after high school. We had a scavenger hunt, YouTube videos, blindfolds, magazines, balloon towers, and even some ice cream. To end the workshop on a high note, we went out with a bang by popping all 200 of our balloons. It was definitely over the top!

 The fun didn’t stop Saturday night. We had a lovely banquet where this year’s delegate issues were revealed.  We were also joined by some of our past State Officers from North Carolina from 1929-1971. It was an amazing night to be a part of North Carolina FFA. After our banquet, we had two more workshops before we could get ready to boogie down at the annual MEGA Conference dance, with DJ JT3. It was a night full of dancing and excitement. After vespers we reviewed the next day’s itinerary and then hit the hay.

Sunday came quickly and breakfast came early, but a morning session with a keynote from Mr. Jason Troendle was more than enough to get everyone enthused for our last day of MEGA. A talented and very inspirational speaker, Jason entertained us with stories of fishing with his sister and the lessons he learned growing up. After that we went to our last workshops of MEGA '12.  The ending, as with most endings, was a little bittersweet.  I can’t explain the impact that the Over the Top group made on my life. Each and every member stepped out of their comfort zone and encouraged me to step out of mine, and for that I want to say thank you! Also, thank you to all the wonderful FFA members that attended. You’re the ones that made this MEGA '12 the most amazing and endearing conference yet. Thank you for that, and I can’t wait to be reunited with everyone at State Convention!

Alyssa Ramsey's Reasons for Loving Livestock Juding

At the Madison FFA Chapter, the Livestock Evaluation CDE is a big deal.  Every year our advisor would start the first practices around November and we would go hard until contest time.  We would show up rockin’ our blue blazer and spittin’ some mad reasons.  Somehow, however, I missed the bandwagon on this one.  I never took the opportunity to attend the Livestock Judging CDE in high school, so just imagine how excited I was to welcome in almost 150 Junior and Senior teams to the event!  The day was full of surprises.  I got to drive Beverly’s beast of a truck, honked Katie’s Duke’s of Hazzard horn and got to see a lot of FFA members I hadn’t seen in a while!

It always amazes me who you run into at some of our state’s events.  There are those we are just getting to meet for the first time, standing in line for barbeque, getting psyched to give a set of reasons, or a few middle schoolers there just to try and figure out what the contest is all about!  Then, there are those members we haven’t seen in awhile.  Maybe they were in our small group at SLC, competed in a contest earlier in the year or we were lucky enough to come to there school during FFA week!  And still again, there would be some members our team had just spent all weekend with at MEGA, we were getting to see them that day, and we would see later that week at Land Judging!  No matter what, it was a good day to connect!  Especially since we don’t play a big role in the activities until it’s time to round up score cards.

Since we weren’t tied up with judging until the end of the day, that meant the rest of the time we weren’t running errand for event staff, we had to find our own entertainment.  Earlier I mentioned the excitement of running into old friends we haven’t seen in awhile; I ran into a few of my own.  Somehow, three girls who were in my small group at White Lake ended up in the same rotation group.  After they finished their reasons, we laughed and giggled waiting for the next rotation, but we also devised a diabolical plot.  We had a vision of starting a wave all around the arena!  FFA members going crazy!  Blasting music over the intercom!  However, the reality of this being a cut-throat competition, beat us back into our seats, where we continued to quietly visit so that we would not disturb anyone...

In just a short matter of time, the rotation ended and it was time for my friends to move on.  I waved them TTFN and it was time find more fun stuff to do.  I migrated to the center of the arena, where I found most of my team standing with our interns and two very special guests, two national officers.  Jason and Seth had been with us for about a week now, so they had become part of our family.  They both shared stories of their year of service that inspired us to keep pushing to make everyday of ours better, but mostly they made us laugh.  Our whole team was very fortunate to have spent time with two such wonderful people and can’t wait until we can see our friends again someday.

Throughout our state officer year, there have been a lot of comings and goings, hellos to new people and good-byes to old friends; many connections have been made.  Though the Livestock CDE is about applying the technical skills as well as the life skills we have been able to learn in our agriculture classrooms, for me March 27, 2012 was all about coming together as FFA members and connecting at one of organization’s oldest contest that helped start it all!

Respectfully Submitted,

Alyssa Ramsey

North Carolina FFA Association

State Vice President 2011-2012

State Dairy Judging

From rainy days to cold nights, it did not stop the 2011 Dairy Judging participants from coming out and having an amazing time at the Rowan County Fair Grounds. As Beverly, Alyssa and I loaded up in “The Tank”, aka Beverly’s truck, Wednesday afternoon to head to the fair grounds we where on the look out for activity buses filled with excited FFA members. We passed the West Carteret and Johnston county buses, smiled and waved as we went by them! As always, we had to do a traditional Wal-Mart stop and found Hobbton wondering around the parking lot waiting to get on the bus.  Finally, we made it to the fair grounds with a warm welcome by FFA members and enjoyed a great meal provided by the West and South Rowan FFA chapters… baked beans, slaw, pork chop sandwich, chips, sweet tea and some amazing banana pudding! After the meal FFA members were divided up by chapters to go and run through the events so that the students would know and understand the rules for the next day’s competition. As the rain continued and the tornado warning was no longer in affect it was time to call it a night. The FFA members went back to their hotels, cows where loaded up on their trailers, and the state officers, Cory Wade and Mr. Davis were on the way to Beverly’s farm. Beverly and I in the Tank, and Cory, Mr. Davis and Alyssa in the struggle van, what could go wrong? This, the struggle van could not make it to the farm due to the road’s flooding. So now it was time to get some sleep for the next days events.

Bright and early Thursday morning it was time to get things started on the Rowan County fair grounds. Every one was divided up in A, B, C and D and the event started. As they competed in the cold and rainy weather they had to opportunity to have a snack brake with milk and an Apple Ugly, known to be a great snack in Rowan County. The competition continued with people giving oral reasons, tests and placing the dairy cows. As the day ended, it was good to see familiar faces and also meet new people. I had a great time talking, laughing and getting to know all the FFA members there at this event! We had an amazing time and cannot wait to see y'all at the next few events!!!!!!!

-Hannah Russell       

FFA Day at the North Carolina State Fair

The fresh morning air smelled marvelous as I pulled up to the office. This was the day. It had finally come, and I was super stoked. Yea, that’s right, the North Carolina State Fair was in town, and we were officially opening the fair on this Friday, October 14^th. We piled into the State van and made our way to the fair grounds. As we got out and entered the gate, the fragrance of fried food and agriculture filled my nose. Yep, it was definitely the State Fair. We opened the fair with FFA day and a few comments from Commissioner Troxler and our keynote speaker Mike Hall. After that we all made our way down to Heritage Circle for the anticipated ribbon cutting. My teammates and I gathered at the front of the stage for the ceremony, and as the Commissioner proclaimed the opening of the 144^th North Carolina State Fair we cut the ceremonial ribbon.

I was gripped with a sense of awe as I stood there surrounded by so many inspirational people that not only impact agriculture, but help make the North Carolina State Fair possible. I couldn’t help but smile knowing that I had been a part of something so special and memorable. We kept part of the ribbon as a token to remember the ceremony, and it will forever be something we treasurer. 

With the ribbon cutting over it was time to have a little fun. The other officers and I set out to learn to tie tobacco, just like our grandparents would. This was probably my favorite part. I felt a sense of pride in tying tobacco. There was feeling of connection to my past and heritage and it was awesome to experience part of my culture and see how agriculture was half a century ago. We enjoyed learning about the process and getting to experience it firsthand.

Then it was off to the Jim Graham building and the Livestock Hall of Fame where we enjoyed a delicious lunch with the commissioner and other special guests. We also visited with some of the 4-H state officers as well as some Grange members. It was great to see all the FFA members walking around brimming with excitement for the opening day of the fair.

State Vice President, Caroline Tart