April/may Issue

Youth Link is a partnership of

the City of Bellevue and

Bellevue Public Schools

Inside this issue:Youth Involvement Conference p. 1Community Leadership Awards p. 2New Horizons p. 2Bellevue 5k/10k Run p. 3Seattle Mariners Opening Day p. 3Seattle Film Festival p. 4Hunger Games: Movie Review p. 4Sakura-Con 2012 p. 5Northwest Folklife Festival p. 5Bellevue Youth Productions p. 6Seattle Cheese Festival p. 6Easter p. 7 Mother’s Day p. 7 Fiction Section p. 8About Us p. 12

Youth Connection

is a product of Bellevue

Youth Link

On Friday, April 27th, three hun-dred youth from around the Eastside will be meeting at the Bellevue City Hall to discuss various issues regard-ing teens. Following the motto, “Speak Up, Step Out, and Break Through,” the Youth Involvement Conference is designed to empower youth in the community and give them an oppor-tunity to talk about the issues in the city. To start off the morning, there will be several workshops held in three sessions. Among these workshops are speakers from companies such as Microsoft and BECU to talk about various issues that concern teens such as technology and finance. In addi-tion to the workshops, there will also be a few groups that discuss academ-ics. For example, there will be a high school panel for middle school stu-dents to learn about the high school experience. After the workshops, there will be a full complimentary lunch, during which all students will be arranged around discussion tables to discuss-ing issues in the community. As part of the lunch program, keynotes Kevin Vu and Chirag Ved, both Bellevue youth who have successfully started

Speak Up, Step Out, and Break Through! at the Youth Involvement ConferenceBy Alex Tang

up their own not-for-profit organiza-tions, will speak about their experi-ence. It is clear that the issues that are brought up by youth are put to good and meaningful use in the communi-ty. For one, Ground Zero Teen Center was derived from a need among teen-agers to have a safe place to hang out instead of on the streets. In addition, the Bellevue Skate Park was a project created in response to the desire for a skate park for our numerous skaters. Space is limited so be sure to sign up! The application form can be found in the offices at your school and also online at www.youthlink.com. See you there!

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Bellevue Youth Link Presents: The Community Leadership Awards

By Alex Tang

On Tuesday, May 24th, over twenty youth in our community will be recog-nized for their spectacular work in the community. At this state recognized event, many distinguished indi-viduals will be present. Last year, the Community Lead-ership Awards were granted the privilege of having At-torney General Rob McK-enna attend and present an

award. Awards are given to in-dividuals who have demon-strated extraordinary suc-cess in various fields—some will be given for academic successes while others will be given for feats of athletics or arts. Others will be recog-nized for their contributions to their schools and toward preserving the diversity in our community. The crux of this event is the people who make this possible. Not the hosts, but the nominees and nomi-nators. Without teachers, parents, or peers nominat-ing youth they see worthy of these awards, this event wouldn’t be possible. It is not

called the Community Lead-ership Awards for nothing. Nomination forms will soon be available in the schools and in community centers.

New HorizonsBy Sooil Kim

Recently Bellevue High School hosted the fundraiser, Soup for Simpson. Soup for Simp-son is dedicated to a former Bellevue High School student who was diagnosed with brain cancer. He chose to donate his money towards New Horizon. This year in honor of Simpson, Bellevue High School donated five thousand dollars from money collected during lunches. New Horizons is a Seattle homeless shelter, which helps teenagers aim for their dreams of success. The organization strives to form connections and build communities of support for youth to engage and equip them with jobs and benefits for the future. New Horizons has served over 1,130 youth, provided over 15,380

meals, and 9,130 articles of clothing in year 2011. For more information about New Horizons, visit http://www.nhmin.org/.

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Bellevue’s 6th annual 5k/10k Run & Walk for Our Community By Richard Tsai

What will be happening this April? Well, for one thing, the “6th Annual Bellevue 5k/10k Run and Walk” event will be held on Sunday, April 29th at Bellevue Downtown Park. Sponsored by the Bellevue Breakfast Rotary Club and Fit & Active, this event is as fundraiser for the Seattle Children’s Au-tism Center and Kindering, as well as other children and family in need of financial support. This run features both a new 10 kilometer (6.2 miles) route and a 5 kilometer (3.1miles) route for participants. In addition, there will also be a non-competitive half-mile Kid’s Dash open to kids 10 and under. So why not register for this upcoming running event to spend time with your fam-ily and friends, while sharing your love and

support for our community? For more information about this event, please visit: http://www.bellevuerun.com/index.html

Baseball Season Opening Day: Mariners Style

The highly anticipated season of the Seattle Mari-ners is approaching fast. The season began on March 28th, a Wednesday, which was an away game in Japan against the Oakland Athletics. The first home game at Safeco Field is set to be on Friday, April 13th.

By Cody Ng

The changes to the roster this year have fans excited about the present and the future. The most notable addition is Jesus Montero, a young player who has great potential to become one of the best hitters in base-ball. Some other additions to the roster include Hector Noesi and Hisashi Iwakuma. The start of a new season provides all fans a great reason to get out of the house to watch this young, growing team. The Mariners are a team with much potential and it continues to grow every year. I am excited to see how this season turns out and I hope

that they will become the one Seattle sports team to be con-sidered “elite.” Let us wish the Mariners the best of luck!

The 37th annual Seattle International Film Festival will take place from May 17th to June 10th. This year it will feature over three hundred movies. The festival is open to the general public as well as industry heavy-weights. Many Seattle venues will be showing various films from all over the world. Many of these will be premiering at the festival. Interestingly enough, there is even a “Secret Festival” unique to the SIFF, which is a showing of four films in which attendees are un-aware of the titles and are not allowed to talk about the movies afterwards. Every year there are awards given out for the Best Film, Best Actor, Best Actress, etc. There is even a youth jury which teenagers can apply for to be a member of judges to determine the winners. If you are interested in buying tickets for the SIFF, buy them now before they sell out here: http://www.siff.net/shop/index.aspx. For any youths interested in filmmaking, the Se-attle International Film Festival has partnered with the SuperFly Filmmaking Experience to develop a

Coming Soon: The Seattle International Film FestivalBy Alisha Saxena

competition in which teens from all over the nation can compete. Youths arrive in Seattle to create four movies within 36 hours to promote awareness about a certain cause. Aside from the competition, there are various filmmaking workshops offered by SIFF Fu-turewave. For more information on the competition, youth juries, and the various workshops, visit: www.siff.net/presents/seriesDetail.aspx?FID=29.

Welcome to the 74th Annual Hunger Games!A Movie Review

The Hunger Games is situated in Panem. Every year, two tributes, one boy and one girl are chosen at random from each of the twelve districts to compete in the annual Hunger Games. The Hunger Games are fights to the death in which the last person stand-ing is the winner. In the 74th Hunger Games, Katniss Everdeen from District 12 volunteers in place of her her little sister in the Reaping—the selection process for the tributes. Also selected, is the baker’s son, Peeta Mellark. The Hunger Games turn brutal as Katniss embarks on the struggle to survive. Alliances are formed and promises are broken. I was excited for the Hunger Games Movie. After all, who wouldn’t be? The book was spectacular. The concepts were original and electrifying. The movie was good, but they could have done better. I have to give them credit for the way they handled Rue’s death. When they showed the riots in District

11, the sadness and loss of the district really stuck me, making it even more touching. However, I did not enjoy the way they filmed action scenes from the fights to the running. With all the bouncing and jostling, I felt like I was going to hurl. The movie was not too gory, which had to be hard to do with all the deaths of the tributes.

Terms from the book were also in-troduced smoothly. For example, with the tracker jackers, I thought it would be hard to explain to the audience without it feeling forced, yet the “news cast” adapted well to the movie. The mutations were terrifying, but they could have incorporated the details from the book and made the eyes like those of the tributes, and added the extra touch. A realization of “Look! That one looks like Rue!” would have heightened the tension and the antici-pation. Overall, on a scale of 1 to 10, 1 being a terrible movie and 10 being “I am going to watch this 100 more times and I will still be obsessed,” I would rate The Hunger Games an 8. This movie is definitely worth watching though I would recommend reading the books first. Happy Hunger Games, and may the odds be ever in your favor!

By Rachel Lau

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Sakura-Con 2012By Noelle Kola

Konichiwa, Seattle! Yes, it has finally arrived—the event that all anime freaks and Japa-nese fanatics (myself included) have been waiting for! It’s Sakura-con 2012! Watashi no tomodachi! Sakura-con is not only the largest anime festival in the

Northwest, but it is also ring-ing out its 15th year of Japa-nese culture celebration from April 6th to 8th. This has come a long way from its humble beginnings at the Double Tree Inn in Tukwila to being clearly ready to pull in thousands of fans from the States and other countries. This year, Sakura-con provides the amazing opportunity to see exciting acts such as girl rock band and plat-inum recorders, Stereopony, all the way from Okinawa! In addition, Fumiko Kawamura, the head designer of the rising Lolita fashion, will be attend-ing to sell her latest wearable masterpieces. The Con will also

Northwest Folkife FestivalBy Bonnie Pan

Bellevue, are you ready to roll? The Northwest Folklife Festival is taking place on Memorial Weekend, from May 25-28, at the Seattle Center. Programming begins at 11AM and concludes at 10PM from Friday to Monday, and the Festival runs from 11AM until 9PM on Monday. Every year, Northwest Folklife explores a topic in depth, featuring one Pacific Northwest group’s traditional arts through special perfor-mances, exhibitions, activities, and many others. This year, the festival will bring a cultural focus on the Seattle Center’s “Next 50”—a celebration and contemplation of what the next fifty years have in store. This year will emphasize green awareness, hybridity, and sustainability in the future and beyond. In addition to the programming offered at the Festival, there will also be exciting attractions between shows. These include the popular Indie Roots at Broad Street where people can listen

to up-and-coming local musicians on the Indie Roots stage. Of course, check out the family-friendly shows and hands-on demonstrations as well! For more information, and the complete lineup of performances, visit http://www.nwfolklifefestival.org.

feature multimedia artist and musician Kanon Wakeshima as well as Naoto Hirooka. Of course, there are many more voice musicians, musicians, designers, and creative forces in the world of anime, manga and games. And who could forget the fans, who will be creating a spectacle with cosplay? The Con will hold numerous con-tests, dances, a masquerade ball, fashion shows and non-stop parties entirely for you. This year is sure to leave every-one breathless and disoriented by awesomeness come Sunday. Believe it! I’ll see you at the Con.

Bellevue Youth Theater Productions: Grease and Beauty and the Beast

By Julia Liu With the start of the spring season comes the start of a series of Bellevue Youth Theater Productions. In the month of April, the local Youth Theater will be hold-ing two productions of Grease, the famous Broadway musical from the 1970s. Both productions will be held at the Meydenbauer Theater but one will be G-rated and suitable for all family while the other will be the original, rated PG. Come join the talented cast of the Bellevue Youth Theater for the G-rated Grease for $12 pre-purchased tickets, $14 regular tickets, or $5 tickets for the Saturday, April 21st at 2pm showing. The PG-rated Grease will be selling special $5 tickets on Sunday, April 22nd at 7pm. Reference the pricing and date chart below. In May, the youth cast will be performing the classi-cal tale of Beauty and the Beast at the Bellevue Youth

Theater. Support your community by coming to the many showings listed in the table below. The advanced tickets will cost $10 whereas tickets bought after April 26th will cost $12. $5 dollar tickets will be sold only for the showings on Saturday, May 5th at 2pm and Sunday, May 13th at 2pm. For more information about the productions, visit http://www.bellevuewa.gov/BYT-productions.htm. The Bellevue Youth Theater Foundation (http://www.bytf.org/index.php) is a community theater that is open to people of all experiences. The theater serves as a place for youth where “skills are learned, talents are discovered, creativity is expressed and community is strengthened. Most importantly, it is a place where everyone has a role.”

Play $14 $12 $10 $5Grease (G)

Thursday, April 19, 7pmSaturday April 21, 7pm

Before April 14th --------- Saturday, April 21, 2pm

Grease (PG)

Friday, April 20, 7pmSunday April 22, 2pm

Before April 14th --------- Sunday, April 22, 7pm

Beauty and the Beast

------- Friday, May 4, 7pmSaturday, May 5, 7pmSunday, May 6, 2pmFriday, May 11, 7pmSaturday, May 12, 2pm and 7pm

Before April 27th Saturday, May 5, 2pmSunday, May 13, 2pm

The Seattle Cheese FestivalBy Sooil Kim

Have a sweet tooth for cheese? Well then, Seattle Cheese Festival will be just right for you! During the week-end of May 19th-20th, the 8th annual 2012 Seattle Cheese Festival will be held at Pike Place Market for cheese lovers, tasters, and makers. There are many showcases of cheese as Education Semi-nars will be held 10:00 A.M- 5:00 P.M, Cooking Demonstra-tions 10:00 A.M- 3:30 P.M, Fresh

Mozzarella Making Demo 10:00 A.M- 3:00 P.M, Wine Garden tour 12:00 P.M- 5:00 P.M, and a Wine Tasting 12:00 P.M- 5:00 P.M. The schedule is the same for both days. Not only can to participate in all these, but you

can also volunteer. So what are you waiting for? Come to Pike Place Market to enjoy a lovely cheesy day! For more information visit http://www.seattlecheesefestival.com/.

An Investigation of Egg Hunts and Easter Bunnies By Maggie Locke

What is Easter Sunday? It is easy to get lost in the celebra-tion itself and forget the original and symbolic significance of the holiday. In the influx of Easter bunnies, egg hunts, and other festivities, the history behind the event seems distant. Easter is best known as a Christian holi-day to celebrate the resurrection of Jesus Christ. But, how does Easter bunny relate to the resur-rection? Children wake up on Easter with a sense of excitement, because the day holds a host of exciting activities such as annual Easter egg hunts held by local churches and neighborhoods. Children are told that the Easter bunny has dropped eggs every-where overnight, and it is their

job to find the eggs, which are hidden in bushes and tall grass-es. Usually the eggs are brightly colored—either hard-boiled and painted brightly, or plastic with a special prize such as chocolate

Mother’s Day This year, Mother’s Day falls on May 13th. What do you have prepared for this day to honor your mother? If you need some crea-tive ideas for making gifts, you can visit www.dayformothers.com. How did the idea of Mother’s Day come about? Initially, women’s rights groups made many attempts to establish a nationwide Mother’s Day, but the holiday did not become official until Congress passed a law and re-quested proclamation to designate the second Sunday in May as Mother’s Day. Near the end of World War I, President Woodrow Wilson officially proclaimed the first national Mother’s Day in 1914 to honor the mothers who had lost their sons in battle.

By Alisha Saxena

Of course, one day is nowhere near enough to honor how much our mothers sacrifice for us. We should be appreciative and thank-ful year round. That said, make the most of Mother’s Day this year and honor our mothers for their hard work.

within. What have these activi-ties symbolized? The brightly colored Easter eggs are often associated with the birth of baby chicks. This beginning of a new life associated with the eggs is a symbol for the resurrection of Jesus Christ from dead. The Easter bunny, as well as the eggs, is a symbol for fertility in the spring. Although nowadays, the Easter bunny has a more secular significance, its role as a central player in the festival maintains a loose symbolic connection. This year, Easter falls on April 8th. And of course it is not necessary to be Christian or religious to enjoy a fun Easter egg hunt.

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Previously in Curtain Closed:After a great amount of reluctance, Seth comes to accept that he is now stuck with a monkey companion, Aeron who is able to communicate with him telepathically. Upon Aeron’s warn-ings, Seth runs to his adoptive father’s theater to discover that his close friend Mary is the second victim of a mysteriously evasive murderer. On the backdrop were the words, Son of Lilith, Your friends will die.

Curtain Closed By Rachel Lau

Fiction Section

Chapter 10: Who is Lilth?

Lilith: A female demon often found in Sumeri-an stories that devour human children and was thought to have 100 babies every day. All her babies were supposedly daemons, but she was cursed by God to never be able to touch or meet her children. There is one exception. Lilith can only visit one child over a span of 100 years, but daemons are immortal. Consequently, many of her children supposedly don’t know that they were daemons.

Daemon: An evil being that is sometimes thought to be from Tartarus. They are otherwise known as demons.

Seth sighed; he had been searching the library for hours, looking for some sign of the name Lilith. But, he had only found this tiny paragraph of seemingly meaningless text. Random snatches of the paragraph floated in his brain. Hundred children a day… Daemon kids… Can only meet one of kids for every one hundred years… That’s useful information. Find more. Aeron whispered obnoxiously in Seth’s brain.

Quiet! I’m doing the best I can! All you’re do-ing is jumping around the roof. Can I come inside? It’s so hot out here! Aeron complained. You can’t come inside the library. No animals allowed. Seth explained. It’s sweltering up here. You get all the good stuff like the air conditioning. Aeron finished crossly. Get out of my head! Seth screamed. As Seth looked up from his book, he no-ticed that all the people in the library were staring at him with an expression of annoy-ance and pity. He put two and two together and assumed that he had screamed aloud in the silence of the library. “Sorry! It will not happen again! Sorry!” Seth apologized profoundly. The people in the library lost interest and turned back to their work. A young librarian approached him.

Chapter 11: The First Encounter

“Hey, I’ve told to ban you from the library for today. You have caused a disturbance in the library for the second time already. I’m sorry… but you can come back tomorrow.” The librari-an said apologetically. She was wearing a white flowing blouse with a jet black cardigan on top as well as faded blue jeans with fashionable rips at the knees. Her blue sneakers peeped out from underneath her jeans. “Wait... When was the first time I disturbed everyone?” Seth asked. He thought that he had only shouted out once. “Well, the first time you shouted, ‘Quiet, please!’ and the second time you shouted, ‘Get out of my head!’ Maybe you should see a psy-

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chiatrist.” The librarian suggested. “There’s nothing wrong with me, I don’t need a psychiatrist.” “Well, if you ever change your mind… try this number. My mom goes there. Don’t worry. I don’t think you’re crazy but maybe you just need to talk to someone.” The librarian assured him gently. “Thanks for your help, uh, what’s your name?” “My name is Elizabeth.” She replied shyly. “Elizabeth…” Seth spoke, indicating for the last name. “Just Elizabeth. I’m just an intern here for the summer. You can come back again tomor-row. Just don’t scream again, or you might get banned permanently.” “Thanks, Elizabeth, I’ll probably see you tomorrow, right?” Seth confirmed. “Yeah, ten to six.”

Chapter 12: Temper, Temper, Temper

As Seth walked out of the library, a shadow shifted behind a pillar, peeling off the siding and gliding swiftly after him. Distracted by pretty girls, even when there is a murderer on the loose. Aeron reprimanded. Seth scowled at Aeron, who was up to his monkey business on the roof of the library. Why so quiet? Hey. People that are new to telepathy are usually bugged by having a voice in their head, especially when they are stressed. Aeron said comfortingly. Seth ignored him, still thinking over his conversation with Elizabeth. He wished that he could have said something more interesting. Well, at least you found that page on Lilith. Oh, no! I forgot to get the page from the copier before leaving the library! I better go grab it! Seth realized with a start. Okay! I’ll wait up here! Aeron sat down on the roof patiently. Seth walked back inside and approached the front desk.

“Umm, Elizabeth?” “Oh, you again. What do you need? You re-member that you are banned for the day, right?” Elizabeth said. “Yeah, I know. I just forgot my print outs and it’s important. May I go get it really quickly? I’ll leave right away, I promise.” “Alright, please try to be quiet.” Elizabeth nodded. Seth thanked her and tiptoed into the library, grabbing the paper and quickly scooting out the door. There you are! Aeron hung down from the side of the roof and smiled at Seth. Yeah, I got the pages. Good! Let us go back to the theater to think about the information we collected. Aeron sug-gested. Seth assented, beckoning to Aeron to follow. Aeron motioned to Seth to continue without him, showing Seth his paw as if to say, there is something on my paw that I have to ex-amine. Seth walked off, with a suspicious look-ing shadow not far behind. The shadow seemed to have a silky texture as it slid over, closer to Seth. Aeron noticed it and slid into a corner. The shadow didn’t appear to see Aeron, so he fol-lowed it and realized that it too was trailing Seth.

To be continued.

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Chasing Tails By: Noelle Kola

Chapter 1: Plight Japan, 500 AD

The darkness of night crept over the land. The moon was high and the shadows were long. The weary were now lost in sleep and the hard-working were now comforted by dreams. Animals that played under the sun now scram-bled to their dens to await the warmth and life of morning. The trees stood strong and menac-ing, protectors of nature and shields from the elements. It was silent. Not a breath of wind blew and no sigh of life echoed. The world was a perfect image of beauty. But everything beau-tiful is never perfect. No matter how flawless something may seem, nothing is without fault. This is the way of the world.

... A figure, fleeting as the wind, sprinted through the night. He burst through the un-dergrowth, pounced from trees, and leaped through the air—doing everything possible to put distance between himself and his pursuers. Sweat streamed down his back, plastering his shitagi to his skin. His lungs screamed for the air he couldn’t seem to draw in fast enough. His feet were raw and torn—a result from running barefoot over rough terrain for many hours. They left bloody footprints—a tell-tale trail that did nothing to improve his plight. But he couldn’t stop. If he paused for even an instant, they would overtake him and kill him. Kami, he thought desperately. Whatever grace you have bequeathed me, take it and spare me! His pounding heart outdid the in-tensity of his labored breathing. His wild black hair fell into his bright amber eyes, momen-tarily obscuring his vision whilst he dashed through the forest. In the time it took for him to push his dark hair from his face, he reached

a tree that had grown a single root above the ground. His foot caught the root and he found himself face down on the forest floor, with a mouthful of dirt. He lifted his head and retched a foul black substance. Cursing everything from the gods to the tree root, he stood and attempted to continue his exodus, only to collapse again from the pain of a fractured ankle. As he lay crippled on the ground, panting and helpless, a wave of fear swept over him. He couldn’t get away. They were going to catch up with him, bind him, and execute him. Coming face to face with that knowledge gave him a strange sense of acceptance of his fate. He was going to die and there was nothing he could do about it. Once all of his jumbled feelings passed, he pried himself from the earth and dragged him-self to the tree with the stuck up root. He sat against it, legs crossed, and closed his eyes. He gripped his medallion, a badge that acknowl-edged his high rank in the Takuetsu, the mer-cenary organization that raised him to plague Japan. They had always told him that if he was ever in desperate need of aid, they would come but he didn’t believe it. He was quite confident that to them, he meant about as much as dirt. He sighed and dropped the medallion. He slowed his breathing and waited for his pursu-ers to come and become his executers.

...

Not ten minutes later, two lithe figures, garbed entirely in black, sprinted out from the depths of the woods, to find their target meditating at the base of a tree. They glanced at each other and took up defense positions in front of him. Upon each of their sleeves was embroidered the symbol of the Prince. Upon their brows were headbands with the golden flames of the Kaizen Academy. The first ninja

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was a teenage girl, no more than eighteen years of age, with long brown hair that was drawn back in a loose ponytail. The second ninja was a tall young man with porcelain skin and shim-mering onyx eyes. He was very handsome and mature looking, but couldn’t have been a year older than his partner. When their target didn’t respond, the girl cleared her throat. When this still drew no response from him, she spoke. “Raiyuka Namorei,” she said in a clear voice. “You are charged with crimes against the Land of the Rising Sun, including the murders of General TsukoYama of Shinjuko and Lady Tensi of Naroya, along with the mass slaughter of the village known as Rengi and the at-tempted assassination of the Prince, the leader of Japan. If you come with us peacefully, you will be given a fair hearing and judgment.” The ninja paused, watching for any response from the motionless criminal, before continuing. “However if you continue to flee, we have orders to eliminate immediately.” The forest went silent. Nothing stirred except for a slight breeze that swept fresh air into the tense night. Raiyuka remained against the tree. The ninjas remained in their hostile positions. The breeze blew Raiyuka’s unman-ageable hair out of his face for a moment, re-vealing his deep honey colored skin. To many women, he would have been quite attractive—if he wasn’t a condemned criminal. Raiyuka opened his eyes suddenly. The sharp glow of his unnatural eye color, startled the ninjas and the swiftly drew their weapons, preparing for the worst. Raiyuka examined them for a moment, scanning them in way that reminded the ninjas of a cat watching a mouse. Then he struggled to his feet, grunting in pain. The ninjas tensed. Once he was on his feet, Rai-yuka looked up to the sky. “What are you going to do to me?” The ninjas flinched. Raiyuka’s voice was gruff, as though damaged by fire, and sounded far more mature than he looked. They didn’t answer. Raiyuka continued to look into the sky. “Are you going to kill me?”

When the silence persisted he did the most shocking thing. He doubled over and began to howl with laughter. Jarred, the female ninja unconsciously took a step back. Her partner narrowed his eyes and raised a kunai. “What do you find so funny?” he growled coldly. Raiyuka continued to laugh. “I-I’m going to die!” he choked out. His merriment sustained. The ninja looked on, positive that Raiyuka was not only a murderer, but also a lunatic as well. A bright blue glow illuminated the night, catching the attention of all three persons in the area. From the ground, an object emitted a hypnotizing light. The ninjas paused and Rai-yuka’s laughter died. Curious, the criminal bent down to pick up the object near his feet. His fingers met a chain which was connected to a fist sized metal disk—the source of the glow. A stunned look crossed Raiyuka’s face, and the promise of the Takuetsu rang in his head. A smirk crept across his face and he closed eyes once more. “Arigato,” he murmured, “Thank you,” whispering his thanks to no one in particular. He pressed the medallion to chest. As the light spread and began to engulf him, the ninjas began to realize that Raiyuka had found a way to escape. “Sai! Get him!” screamed the female ninja. Her partner, Sai, already on it, rushed forward in an attempt to tackle the criminal. Whatever the light was, it acted as a force field and sent Sai flying in the opposite direction. His partner rushed to his side and pulled him away from the expanding ball of light that was Raiyuka. And as she brought Sai to safety, the light imploded with a force that felled the surround-ing trees. Destruction became known to the forest and the light was gone. The female ninja pushed her way through the rubble and scram-bled to the place where her target had been. All that remained was a pile of ash.

To be continued.

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Staff 2011-2012

Editor-in-Chief Lucinda Li

Layout: Lucinda LiJulia LiuSooil KimMaggie Locke

Journalists: Grace ChaiSheuli ChowdhuryEmily JiangSooil KimNoelle KolaRachel LauLucinda LiJulia LiuMaggie LockeCody NgBonnie PanAlisha SaxenaAlex TangRichard Tsai

City of Bellevue Staff:Helena StephensFamily Youth & Teen Serviceshstephens@bellevuewa.gov Patrick AlinaYouth Link CoordinatorOutspoken Advisorpalina@bellevuewa.gov

Gunilla RoslanderYouth Link Volunteerroslagun@gmail.com

To learn more about our Youth Link Program,

please visit our web site at www.youthlink.com or call

our office at (425) 452-5254.

City of Bellevue - Youth Link. PO Box 90012, Bellevue WA 90012 - Tel: 425-452-5254

Youth Connection is an extension of Bellevue Youth Link, a youth leadership program that strives to give youth an active voice in the community and an opportunity to make a differ-ence! Youth Connection articles and issues are also published on Bellevue Patch at http://bellevue.patch.com/columns/youth-connection.

More about Bellevue Youth Link

Bellevue Youth Link is sponsored by the City of Bellevue, Parks & Community Service Department, WA, USA, and Bel-levue Public Schools. Youth Link consists of the Youth Board, the Youth Council, and nine Action Teams and Planning Com-mittees. The Youth Link Board advises the Bellevue City Council and City Manager on youth matters and programs. The Youth Council is the main organizational body of Bellevue Youth Link which meets twice a month to plan various community proj-ects. The council meets to discuss current and future Youth Link projects, hear updates from action teams, and share local events in schools and the community. The council also hears

About Youth Connection

presentations from guest speakers about events in the community and local government and is responsible for planning monthly service projects. Projects started by Youth Link include Ground Zero Teen Center, Skate Park, Teen Talk Radio Program, Safe Rides Program, Com-munity Leadership Awards, Youth Involvement Conference, Bellevue Youth Court and more. Becoming a part of Youth Link is easy! All youth in the area are welcome to join. Sim-ply fill out an application form (http://www.youthlink.com/forms.html) and get in touch with Patrick Alina at palina@bellevuewa.gov.