Most students who live more than one mile from CHS rely on motorized transportation to get to school: a bus, a car, or maybe even a scooter. 11th grader Vang-Lee Vue has his own method.

“Every time I come to school, I walk,” he said. “It’s not something I love or hate. I just do it for myself.” The average person, whether he/she loves to walk or not, takes about 1,000-2,000 steps, according to thewalkingsite.com. It takes about 2,000 steps to walk a mile. Vue lives just over three miles from the Juneau Campus. That means that some days he takes over 12,000 steps just on his way to and from school. To stay physically healthy, a person has to walk approximately 10,000 steps a day, about five miles.

Vue does not always walk home. His friends play a big part in his decision-making. “When I try to walk home from school, my friends would usually try to convince me to take the city bus home,” he said. “I guess it’s because they’re just looking after me since it gets darker outside during the winter.”
Before Vue began walking to school he was taking the yellow bus provided by MPS. That all changed after he was placed in a class that began before regular school started. He was placed in Cell Biology, taught by College Advisor Marqurite McCurdy. Because he was placed in that class, the yellow bus no longer served his needs.

Instead, he was given city bus tickets to serve as his alternative transportation to school. But by taking the city bus, it meant Vue had to get up early in the morning—around 5:00 to 6:00 am. By the time he would leave his house, he would still feel sleepy. And that sleepiness would affect his attitude towards other people and his outlook on life. “Some days I would miss breakfast and other days I would feel like not coming to school,” he said. “They’re both bad habits, but I’m progressing.” Though he says in the morning there is not much commotion on the bus, there are some unpleasant people whom he would bump into from time to time. He described them as “not morning people” because they would be easily hot-tempered.

“It’s like if you were to accidentally elbow a passenger or step on his or her shoe, he or she would flip out even though you would apologize about three to four times,” he explained. Though he does not like how alarming some passengers are on the city bus, he even considers himself not a morning person. “I understand how they feel,” he said. “In the morning, the city bus would be crowded because people have places to go too, but I’m not the type of person who would snap over pity stuff.” Over time he realized that taking the city bus to school and attending the early class was stressing him out. Because he was tired of being vexed by the negative vibe of the city bus, he began to walk to school. He described his first time of walking to the Juneau campus as “tiresome” and “exhausting.” After an hour and a half of walking Vue realized that he had underestimated the time and endurance it would take to get use to it.

Though he does not like how much time it takes to walk to school, Vue claims that it has played a decent role in relieving his stress and enhancing his physical and mental state of well being. “In the past I would smoke and drink to try and rid all of the stress caused at home. It gets somewhat personal,” he said. “My father never knew about it.”
He eventually realized that smoking and drinking would never solve his stress and that the bad habits he chose only made his stress worse. He explained that he was “troubled” and he did those things in attempt to escape from his stress, but he knew it would never work.

He refused to seek help and for his problems. He claimed, “Seeking help made him feel weak” so he decided to keep things to himself. He thought nothing was ever going to help him relieve his stress. When he started walking, he discovered that it took his mind off of things. The way Vue explained it, “Walking became his own personal therapy”. “In a way I have found my own peace,” he said. “Though I will not always enjoy it, walking keeps me going.”

He learned that by walking, it helped him escape from the negatives in his life because his focus would always be on the road. Though he knows walking will not always get rid of all of the negative things in his life, he uses it as a method to keep thriving.
Even after Cell Biology was cancelled due to complications, Vue is still walking to school till this day. Though he knows a yellow bus will always be waiting around the corner, he would rather walk to school.