Igbo: My Personal Sacrifice

"A person who arrives at a feast when the cooked meat is being pulled out of the pot does not know what was endured by others to catch and cook it.” An Igbo proverb that summarizes what my paternal side always tell me. Moreover, it is very valuable in my opinion, because it applies to my life. Overall, I came to this world with my parents having to sacrifice such things to give my siblings and me the life that we have now. Yet we don’t really know what’s endured behind their smiles when they greet us. This Igbo proverb corresponds to this quote by Phil Hine, “ One cannot shape the world without being reshaped in the process. Each gain of power requires its own sacrifice.” I’ll walk you through some of my personal stories to prove this.

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I had people tell me that they would be really happy if they had my grades. Others said that I shouldn 't go too hard on myself, including my dad and my grandparents. Somehow, I know that deep inside if my grades even go down a bit I know they would be disappointed and it would hurt witnessing that. When I was growing up, back when I was in the Philippines, my father would always tell me stories about how he struggled when he was growing up. I didn 't struggle at all when I was in the Philippines. My dad always works, and in exchange he buys as gifts or give us money. He told me how he had to go straight to the farm during his lunch break in his elementary and high school days. He told me how they had to share a little meal, how sometimes they didn’t have coffee so they used other alternative ways to get the bitter taste of the drink. He also told me how they have little school money and sometimes they walked from school to the house. It was all based on sacrifice, but if you look at him he 's always smiling and making jokes. He 's always loud and energetic, and people look up to him in my community. He was able to contribute to the name of his family, even though his dad didn 't finish school, he was able to do