Garcia Lost Their Accents By Julia Alvarez

Julia Alvarez is the author of the novel How the Garcia Lost Their Accents. It illustrates a family life adapting to a new culture. Carlos is the overprotective father. He also resisted to the dictatorship in the Dominican Republic because of it the family decided to flee to the United States. Laura is the mother of four girls, when she came to the United States did not feel that she belongs here because in The Dominican Republic she was wealthy, privileged and influential family. Carla was the oldest of the Garcia sisters. After Carla, Sandra is the second oldest daughter. Yolanda is also known as Yo-yo, she was the rebellious tomboy of the Garcia’s family. Sophia is the youngest daughter of the Garcia family.
Immigrants adapting to a new …show more content…
She has returned for the first time after five years in the United States. Everyone was happy with her returned. They bought a cake to celebrate that she has arrived to the island. Yolanda’s aunt starts to explain that the word antojos means a craving for something you want to eat. Yolanda decided that her antojo was to go to the countryside to the coast to look for guavas. However, her aunts were convincing her not to go there because it is dangerous for her to travel along with a luxurious car, and without a man. Furthermore, taking the bus was also dangerous; because she has to travel with campesinos, or peasants which are the lowest class people on the Dominican Republic. Even though, Yolanda’s aunts told her to not go to the country side, she decided to go in her cousin car that was not expensive. While she was traveling to the countryside, she was wondering if the Dominican Republic is going to be her new permanent home. While she was enjoining the fresh and colorful images of the island, a bus full of military soldiers startled Yolanda. However, she was next to a mansion, which she suspected is from relatives. As soon she saw them, Yolanda stopped in a village to ask where to find fresh guavas. But, the old woman suggested that her grandson could guide her to the guava grove, so Yolanda decided to go with the boy guava picking. After they had picked the guavas and put it in the car, they got a flat tire. Yolanda told the boys that she would give him a dollar if he would run back to the mansion to ask for help. On thus years a dollar meant a lot for a campesino so he ran back to the house. While he was gone, two strangers with machetes approached the car, and asked Yolanda if she needed help. She was frightened of the men and could not even move or speak. When they asked if she was American she responded in English and tried to explain that she had a flat