Lima (The End)

A little after two weeks, during the second week of March, I was enrolled in an American public high school. I had to go through my first fight against stereotypes to make my way into eleventh grade because my counselor guessed I was only fit for ninth or tenth grade without proper testing. After proving him wrong and frustratingly threatening my parents about going back to Perú if such a thing happened to me, I started school as a second term junior. Coming from a Peruvian private Catholic school, I was excited to experience something new because I love challenges. I was expecting to see a crowd of Kevin Arnold's, Winnie Cooper's, Zack Morris' and Kelso's walking down the halls and hopefully I would not be the female version of Fez in this story (not when I did not want to be anyway). But television deceived me because I never saw a "Screech" Powers being bullied by thirty-year-old looking high school students. However, I did have the opportunity to hang out with people who belonged to different subcultures that I had only seen on television; I was experimenting new things because I had always been part of the same little powerful school clique and the rest of the people in Perú were just sheep. But, in America, I hopped from one clique to the other, exploring and learning as much as I could. Every clique had its own ideas about the other and their own advice about who to talk to and who not to talk to, warning me to watch my reputation. One of the moments I remember the most is when one of my new friends who belonged to what I will sadly call the popular clique or, more accurately, the promiscuous clique, told me that her ultimate goal in life was to be like Britney Spears. What these people did not know is that they all had a little something in common: smoking reefer every day, which I did not object to; they were engaging in the same activities, talking about the same things, and yet they felt too good to mingle with each other. My high school boasted about being a great public school, priding on its diversity and its absolute lack of crime. I was not sure of what this meant until I started watching the news and realized all the discrimination and crime happening in American high schools and how students carried guns.

Having the need to speak English perfectly, make new friends, make up work the rest of my classmates had done for the first term of the year, running from one class to the other, and getting used to the weather were challenges. I did not want to be just a face in the crowd; I wanted to be outstanding in every way: I did not want to lose myself, lose that person I had been forming for the past sixteen and a half years of my life. College came later and more challenges arose; overcome obstacles that made me grow as a person and made me stronger opened my eyes to reality, buried some dreams and brought up others. Life hit as it is, unveiled truths that brought disappointment or joy, I realized I was just a number and not a name like I had been all my life and this is one of the reasons why I wanted to move to America, so that people would let me be and mind their own business, because everyone knows your name in the classist city of Lima; it is the gossip kingdom...but grass is always greener on the other side.

I have always thought I can be or do anything because I have high confidence in myself due to received compliments and recognized achievements. Unfortunately, unspoken reminders of society, innuendos, and a constant comparison of realities try to bring me down each day, and each day is a battle of assurance, of reminding myself who I really am. Stereotypes, racism, and ignorance are the obstacles I have to overcome now as an adult, in order not to forget who I am. Luckily, I have met wonderful people that I can call friends with a clear idea of the world and an interest in asking instead of assuming. Sadly, some friends, professors, strangers, or colleagues have brought me down with impertinent comments, and even though I try to ignore them it is impossible to do so. However, they help me learn how to deal with people who have different ideas than my own and help me be more understanding; but overall, after 3 and a half years of adapting to a new culture, I can say I am proud of myself for achieving the things I have and manage to be as happy as I have always been despite the problems presented on the way. I ascribe this to my persistence and hard work.