During summer in the afternoon it was a very hot day, so my brother Taylor drove us to a river to party with cousins, uncles, aunties, grandmas, and grandpas and cool off. They were related to me from my mom's side of the family. When we’re about to go swimming I told my brother's wife Cathy  that we’re gonna go swimming. As we’re getting ready to scout the whole river it was getting deep all the way up to my neck. We didn't realized there was a strong current in the corner so we made it to the corner and it dragged only me but then my cousin Bruce saw my face as i was scared and he swam after me, there was chopped up logs in the corner and i was afraid that there might be something deep in that corner and i was scared of getting stab by sharp logs. 

Then my older cousin Hmong said “hey my cousins need some help could you help them get out?” so they swam towards us and took us out of the river.

Once we were out from the river we all went back to the party spot and no one was there. They were at the beginning of the river where it starts small then gets deep. It felt like a car parked in neutral slowly moving back. When we were getting ready to go back home my grandma heard about us and gave each and one of us either sticks or rocks so we won't be scared and our spirits won’t stay at the river. 

We were about to go home but we decided to go to my cousin Bruce who came after me and party there for a bit and went straight home. When we got home my older brother told them everything that happened to us and we ended up getting in trouble because we’re gonna have to buy chickens and go to that river and cut a branch near that corner so that our spirits can come home and go back to our body. Once we're done calling our spirits to come back home we have to put that branch under our bed and sleep with it. The reason why we’re sleeping with the branch it’s probably because when my parents call our spirits to come they’ll need something from the river which is the branch and when we sleep our spirits will slowly come to us and return home almost like walking home from there. I kinda regret not telling my brother instead of my brother’s wife Cathy. 

Mostly she wasn't paying attention to us so my brother Taylor told us to tell the guys instead of them. Once I went to my uncle's house somehow my grandma knew that I almost drowned in that river. When my brother Taylor texted me if i wanna go swimming at the public pool my grandma told me to stay and don't go swimming no more but i told my grandma that it's not a river its just a public pool but she doesn't get it. So my cousin Mikey played around with my grandma and told her that were going to the river but he just said “txhij yog dag lawv yuav mus da dej thiab ua luam dej ntawd” which means “ 'm just lying they're going to the pool and swim there.”

 So my grandma cried and told me to stay but my brother Taylor told her that he’ll be watching me carefully and won’t let that happen again so she stops and let me go swim there.

I regretted not telling my brother Taylor that I was about to go swim at the river. Thats so dumb of me not doing that. If i told him we wouldn't have to go through all of that cutting branch and kill chickens. We had fun at least but not that much of fun after all that. Next time when i go to a river i'll tell my brothers first and see what they’ll say if we should go or not go.