Jaslyn Mendez
Reilly
Honors ELA 10
October 11, 2017
I Am Me Yo soy Jaslyn, and I am Latina. I’m a Mexican girl who was born in the United States of America, which makes me Mexican American. Being Chicana always made me feel like an outcast. When I tried to make friends with full Americans, I could never relate to them because I wasn't exactly like them. Mexicans always viewed me as a brat who doesn’t know anything about being Mexican. I’ve always hated when Caucasians put me in the category of “chola” or “uneducated” and automatically think of me as a bad person when I tell them I’m Mexican because there is more to me than that. I could never fit in because like Pat Mora said in the poem “Illegal Alien” I was “too Mexican for the Americans and too American for the Mexicans.” (Mora, 40) Growing up, I was a happy, talkative, and social child. I loved being friendly and talking …show more content…
When I'd say I'm Mexican, questions and comments would start flooding, like “You can't be Mexican, you're not brown enough.” “You don't act like one.” “You don't even speak Spanish.” Or the well known comment people thought or said behind my back, but never actually said to my face, “Pinche fresa. Nomas porque es del Norte, se crié muy muy.” As if I couldn't understand them. If I spoke to Mexicans in Spanish, I was made fun of for my choppy, underdeveloped ways of speaking, and the Americans look at me in disgust and tell me to speak English because I’m in America. If I spoke in English, I was considered “Whitewashed” by Mexicans, and the Americans would be so amazed at how I don’t have a Mexican accent. So I thought to myself. If I can’t win either way, then there’s no point in letting those words get to me. I KNOW two languages, I might know one language better than the other, but I still speak two languages. Either way, I’ll get judged, so I should be confident in who I am. And who I am, is
Reilly
Honors ELA 10
October 11, 2017
I Am Me Yo soy Jaslyn, and I am Latina. I’m a Mexican girl who was born in the United States of America, which makes me Mexican American. Being Chicana always made me feel like an outcast. When I tried to make friends with full Americans, I could never relate to them because I wasn't exactly like them. Mexicans always viewed me as a brat who doesn’t know anything about being Mexican. I’ve always hated when Caucasians put me in the category of “chola” or “uneducated” and automatically think of me as a bad person when I tell them I’m Mexican because there is more to me than that. I could never fit in because like Pat Mora said in the poem “Illegal Alien” I was “too Mexican for the Americans and too American for the Mexicans.” (Mora, 40) Growing up, I was a happy, talkative, and social child. I loved being friendly and talking …show more content…
When I'd say I'm Mexican, questions and comments would start flooding, like “You can't be Mexican, you're not brown enough.” “You don't act like one.” “You don't even speak Spanish.” Or the well known comment people thought or said behind my back, but never actually said to my face, “Pinche fresa. Nomas porque es del Norte, se crié muy muy.” As if I couldn't understand them. If I spoke to Mexicans in Spanish, I was made fun of for my choppy, underdeveloped ways of speaking, and the Americans look at me in disgust and tell me to speak English because I’m in America. If I spoke in English, I was considered “Whitewashed” by Mexicans, and the Americans would be so amazed at how I don’t have a Mexican accent. So I thought to myself. If I can’t win either way, then there’s no point in letting those words get to me. I KNOW two languages, I might know one language better than the other, but I still speak two languages. Either way, I’ll get judged, so I should be confident in who I am. And who I am, is