Personal Statement it Is Almost

Personal Statement

It is almost time for dinner. The smells of rice, beans, and spicy chicken come wafting up to my bedroom, calling me to the table, along with the roar of the Yankee game on the radio. My father is cooking. He talks to me in Spanish, I answer in English. My mother speaks to me in English, I answer in Spanish. The bilingual rhythm of this dialogue is as natural to me as breathing.

I love the noises of dinnertime almost as much as the smells -- the sound of the TV, the dog barking, and the cacophony of English and Spanish. Only when we sit to savor the meal is there a moment of quiet, when we connect, share our lives, and enjoy one another's presence. We say goodnight, and whether we are heading off to bed, to homework, or to the moves, that moment of bonding remains in our hearts for the rest of the night, long after the plates have been scraped and cleaned, and the dog lies snoozing by the door.

My father is from Puerto Rico and my mother is from Colombia. They have always instilled in me the importance of honoring the cultures from whence they come, as well as the need to actively participate in the wider cultural landscape of America. Their rich and wonderful experiences have become part of my memories, as they have always told me stories about their homelands. They have taught me very important lessons -- most importantly there are those who are less fortunate than ourselves and need our support. My mother works as a physician serving an underserved population and my father is the Executive Director of an HIV / AIDS prevention services agency in the Bronx.

I moved here when I was eight years old. My old home in the Bronx was a Tower of Babel -- filled with the warble of more languages than the United Nations. Every house I walked past on my way home from dinner poured forth different sounds, different smells. The pungency of curry powder, the sun-baked scent of saffron, the strange fermented odor of kimchi -- none of these were of my culture, but all of these smells became part of my world, my soul, my sense of identity.

Then my family moved to the land of odorless bologna and tasteless white bread. I feared my Spanish heritage would become a social liability. What was I to do about my funny name, my parents with their heavy accents and unapologetic celebration of the ways of their homelands? I was an extrovert in my old neighborhood. Now, suddenly I worried about making friends and being accepted. Bringing kids to my home made me feel self-conscious and uncomfortable. I was nervous that my friends would not like the spicy food, or poke fun at me because we spoke Spanish at a breakneck pace, punctuated with heavily accented English. I found myself suddenly resentful of the expansively outgoing nature of my family -- the hugs, the kisses and the endless nicknames!