cover letter

When writing this essay it made me truly go in depth on my identity, and this caused me to have a sense of wondering where I actually belong . When writing such hard questions to myself i started thinking about how language was a big part of my identity which made me wanna share my experience of mexico allowing me to see that spanish nor english was a language that could not truly allow me to express myself allowing then to finding where i truly belong which was spanglish.

While writing this personal narrative I was able to express and gather my thoughts and see how I felt , allowing me to analyze my emotions for the first time . hopefully at the same time allowing my audience to get a moment to feel the same type of emotions as me. But I feel like for me it was hard to remember these events and put them in a chronological order in order for me to tell a story in order to keep the main idea of the story alive .If I’m being honest I hope when people share my personal story it allows them to hopefully feel

like learning or being able to relate the same feeling that I went through not knowing where I belonged . When writing this I hope that people can see that language is something that connects to culture and self worth that it brings being allowed to communicate with people. I don’t know if people felt these emotions when reading my personal narrative but when you first start reading i hope you can sense the emotions that i tried to portray when talking Spanish which made me feel embarrassed and disconnected with the culture that i thought i belong to . but soon after i realized where i belonged it made me like a sense of growth and acceptance and strength. To conclude, I feel very proud of my essay and very proud of how I was able to keep my main message and portray how I was able to find a sense of identity with language and how it help me to better understand myself in order to find a voice.

Narrative Assignment

As a little kid, I always wondered where I belonged in society. I was always told that I couldn’t speak Spanish or English. This was due to me not talking in the proper way they was expected for someone  to  talk  in  their  language.  This  often  made  me  feel  like I  didn’t belong  in both communities, which eventually made me take a push to implement Spanish more into my life. I then started thinking to myself about the time when I went to Mexico in September of 2024. My sister and I were going to Mexico for my cousin’s sweet 16 birthday party, which is a big party where a girl becomes of age and grows up to become a woman. I saw this as a perfect time to establish the side where I belonged as a sense of personal security from my culture. As we got ready to leave the airport, I realized I had a problem. The problem was that back then I was so focused on fixing and always just talking English in my everyday life, I had forgotten to practice my Spanish. This led me to stutter in front of people at the airport and blank out while trying to finish my sentences.

Eventually, my sister and I caught a taxi to my aunt’s house. After arriving, we unpacked in the spare bedroom and fell asleep, waking up to the sound of our family eating breakfast. It felt surreal because at home, it is just me, my mom, dad, and sister. Waking up to a house full of family was definitely  different—a good kind  of different.  I felt  like I was finally where I belonged and wouldn’t be cast out like an outsider. Eventually, my aunt and family were like, “Cómo está tu mamá?” I responded, “uhhh muy bien.” They then asked if I had been practicing my Spanish since I blanked out. I quickly made an excuse that I was tired. Later, my family kept trying to talk to me. I tried to add an accent to sound like someone from Mexico, but it didn’t work. As they heard me talk more, I made even more mistakes, which gave me away.

Eventually, on the day of my cousin’s sweet 16, my whole family showed up which meant that I i had to be at my 100% A game for my spanish in order not to sound broken. This led me to say phrases that I knew I could complete and things that I was comfortable with to not allow me to blank out but caused my conversations to become limited while interacting with my family . Eventually, my family started making fun of my stuttering and pronunciation of words, as well as teasing the accent I was trying to adopt while speaking. Even though I was made fun of, it didn’t feel as bad due to them being a part of my family. This eventually made me feel like I was back in New York, where the language I was speaking wasn’t good enough or not enough to express myself, but I i couldn’t get upset at anyone but myself due to my not having set aside any time to practice, which made my skills rusty, which automatically made people not take me seriously for the most part . Eventually, this led my family to tell me not to speak too much Spanish in front of people, as locals could realize that I wasn’t from the area. Which would cause them to raise local prices, cause they would know that I’m from the U.S.

Throughout the trip, I was made to feel like I didn’t belong in my own culture. I struggled with Spanish and felt unwanted and embarrassed in front of my family. By the end of the trip, my Spanish had improved, and I was able to connect more with my family. However, I realized that if you can’t speak someone’s primary language, you are often ignored or exiled, with people questioning your intelligence or choosing not to acknowledge you.

This made me realize that I’m not good at either language, but spanglish is the one that takes the strong suit for me, as it is a combination of both English and Spanish mixed in one language.