De aquí o de allá?

De aquí o de alla?
(From here or there?)

Every time a situation comes in life we let it affect us or we let it change who we are; yet life is full of surprises and changes. In my life there were many situations that changed me completely such as moving to another country and having to adapt to the new rules, culture and language. It was hard to adapt because it was something new for me and because I was different from everyone else; I was treated differently. I had to fight different battles that life made me face and learn from what was around me needing to adapt to a culture that wasn’t mine.

Who are you?
“If you want to be American speak “American”. If you don’t like it, go back to Mexico where you belong” (Anzaldua pg. 249)
When I was in middle school I was stereotyped by the way I looked. Simply because I was brown people already assumed I was Mexican. They would come up to me and ask “De que parte de Mexico eres?” (What part of Mexico are you from?). I would firmly tell them I’m not from Mexico I’m from Guatemala, yet I was treated differently because I wasn’t like them. It was hard because they were the only ones who spoke Spanish at school. I had to change the way I spoke and be more like them to be accepted, which was difficult because I had to learn their culture and language, and I was starting to forget my own culture. Once I got to high school I started hanging out with “white” people more and they would make fun of me because of the way I talked. If I mispronounce a word they would laugh and tell me “Go back to Mexico you beaner”. These words would affect me and make me realize I wasn’t like the rest of them; it made me doubt on who I was. These comments made me push myself in school and prove to everyone that even though I wasn’t from this culture I could still belong in it. Later I learned to not get affected in any way by the comments that my “friends” would make. It didn’t affect me anymore because I was adapting to their culture and the way they were.

Two roads which should I take?
“I was spending time with my new Caucasian friends and learning new values that clashed with those of my parents” (Wakatsuki 4¶).
Living in two different countries with different cultures confused me in who I was because outside of home I would act like my friends. I wished to go out whenever I wanted, but at home I was a different boy. I would follow whatever my parents would tell me and be a nice kid to them; I was someone that they were always proud of. A few years later my parents saw that I was changing, that I was acting more like my “white friends”. I wouldn’t listen to them anymore; I wouldn’t care if I was doing badly in school or if I didn’t do any of my work or chores at home. Then one day my parents sat me down in the living room and told me how they had seen a change in my life. They began to express how they felt pointing out that it seemed I had lost the family values and I had begun to live two different lives which was affecting me because I didn’t know who I was anymore. I remember my dad telling me that even though we were in another country and the culture and values were different, I still had to follow the culture and the values that were thought to me growing up. At the beginning I was bothered by the fact that they wanted me to be in a different country but live with concept of a different culture, our original culture. This caused a lot of tension in my family because my sister and I shared the same mentality which our parents saw as a problem. They wanted us to follow certain traditions that the family had but we didn’t agree to because we didn’t see ourselves as they are. After talking to my parents many times they finally realized that my sister and I had a point, we couldn’t be like them because we were being raised in a different culture and society. Even though my parents agree to let me be part of a society that they don’t believe in, I still try to follow their values at home and act in accordance to their teachings because although it may bother them that I act differently outside, being at home I give them the respect they deserve.

Have you decided?
“Now I just entertain according to how I feel that day, if my Japanese sensibility is stronger, I act accordingly and feel comfortable. If I feel like going all-American, I can do that, too, and feel comfortable” (Wakatsuki ¶19).
After living through these problems I had to decide what to do, who I was going to be; I decided to live a double life. I would have the values of my parents but also live the culture of the country which I live in and had a hard time adapting to. I had decided what to do and what to become. I learned to live through the day and be whoever I wanted to be. I know I have two cultures which I accept but also I know I can control both of them and be who I want to be no matter what. I have to become who I want to be in life. I’m not going to let someone or a culture decide my future because it’s up to me to be whoever I want.
Even if you don’t know or are confused of whom you should be because people want you to be like them, know that it is up to you to decide. You can have and believe in their cultures and values but you can’t let it decide who you will become in life. You have the power to decide who you are going to be, just remember where you came from and always have in mind your goals and what you want in life as an independent person. I have decided to follow both my values and show everyone that I can do it. For this exact reason I decided to attend college to succeed in life, to be someone different from what people expected me to be. I know that college would be a good experience that will prepare me to go out to the world. Now I understand that those moments or problems that occurred have helped me define who I will be. I believe that everything that happens does happen for a reason, weather good or bad, but it’s up to us to decide if it’s going to bring us down or help us, picking up the good things from the situation and be someone better and stronger in life.

The Men We Carry In Our Minds

1. Sanders sees the different physical conditions of the men he knew when he was a little, he saw how those men worked for hours doing labor with their bodies which lead them to be hurt or have soared bodies, on paragraph 3 he gives many examples "the nails of their hands were black and split, the hands tattooed with scars". Sanders shows how these men were affected by the labor they did, how their hearing was affected from so many years of working with machines or how their knees ached from standing on concrete. He also shows how their physical appearance was affected from so many years of labor " the fathers of my friends always seemed older than the mothers." (Paragraph 3).

2. Sanders describes the "other sort of men" as some one who wouldn't "swear and break down like mules" because this men didn't work like the other men, they lived in military bases waiting to be call for duty, like wars transfers and they seemed like their work wasn't hard like the other men but they had something that the other men didn't, these men would spend their days practicing in a simulated war so they could be ready for the real action "I also felt certain that when the hour for killing arrived, they would kill. When the real shooting started, many of them would die. This was what soldiers were for, just as a hammer, was for driving nails." (paragraph 4)

3. Besides the "warriors and toilers" there was another kind of men , men that Sanders could never imagine becoming them "I could no more imagine growing up to become one of these cool, potent creatures than I could imagine becoming a prince." Sanders grew up as a low class boy and all this "cool jobs" were high class for the people who he read and watch on the television, these men were politicians, astronauts, generals, lawyers, philosophical doctors. Sanders believed that he already had a destiny and that was to follow his fathers steps and since he was never one of these men, he knew that he couldn't couldn't be like them.

4. Sander's father has a different job than all the men he knew "my father, who had escaped from a red-dirt farm to a tire factory, and from the assembly line to the front office" so this means that Sanders could have a different ending since every one followed their father's steps "they were bound to work as their fathers had worked, killing themselves or preparing to kill others." but since Sander's dad worked in an office he had a chance to work there too without enrolling on those hard jobs or the military and get train to kill some one or simply kill himself on those labor jobs that they offered.

5. When Sander went to college he met women who thought in a different way than him "and for the first time I met women who told me that men were guilty of having kept all the joys and privileges of the earth for themselves." He was confused by their thoughts could he would see the men at home and would ask himself what privileges they were talking about, if the men he know worked themselves to dead for their families to have a roof but then he realized that they were talking about the college men and he saw that their lives were completely different "here I met for the first time young men who had assumed from birth that they would lead lives of comfort and power, then he realized and understood that women have the better life "the only ones who ever seemed to enjoy a sense of ease and grace were the mothers and daughters." so he understood that women had more privileges than the men he knew.

6. Sander later realize that men and women have the same work to do just in different ways and they suffer the same or sometimes it would be worst for women. "I did not realize-- because such things were never spoken of how often women suffered from men's bullying." (paragraph 8) He also talks about how women were abandoned wives, single mother and how tired it could be to take care of a baby all day so these changed the way he saw women because he realized that they have the same amount of work to do just in different ways.

7. What Sanders and the college-educated women was that they wanted to be in control "The daughters of such men wanted to share in this power, this glory. So did I" (paragraph 11) but he knew that these women saw him as an enemy because of his sex and because he was destined to become like his father but he believed that he was more of an ally than an enemy to them but he knew they wouldn't believe him if he shared his thoughts with them.

Summary

I didn't do the summary because I procrastinate on it, I waited until the last minute to do it and eventually found myself in class realizing that I didn't do the summary, then I turned in the Pass but I thought it was a pass that it would excuse you from the project but it wasn't like that so I didn't do it, what I'm going to do now for the new summary is dedicate time to do it and if I don't know how to do something ask Susie or visit her on her office hours and ask her for help or I can also email her but this time im actually going to dedicate time on it and put all my effort to do it right, I can also go over other people summaries to see how they did and read their comments to see what I can do or what not to do.

Libby Blog Response

The author's survey demonstrates many different points of view, males say that they can not believe in it because they are guys and some people just by hearing the word they freak out about it because they believe it's something bad. Libby offer many reasons why people don't identify themselves as feminists, one of the reasons is that most people don't believe that this problem exist either because they don't like it or just ignore the fact that this problem it's actually going on in the world, another reason why people don't call themselves feminists it's because they simple don't believe the ideas or agree with what it means to be a feminists. People believe feminism is a bad thing and the media propaganda shows it as a negative thing in the world like a way of saying women are raising against men and will try to take control over the country but people should get inform of what it really means to be a feminist and this is that women and men have the same right that they can choose the way they want to live, that they have the same right at home and on the streets, that they will not be discriminated because of their gender. Many women don't call themselves feminist because they believe it's something bad but it's not it's something good for them because it will give them the same right as men, it's a way of fighting for what they believe it's right for them. Libby believes that more people should be identify themselves as feminist but I think it's a personal decision weather you know what it really means or not it's up to you to decide if you believe in the idea but don't want to be called a feminist, every one has the right to decide what they want to be so it's really up to the people to decide what they want to be and articles like this one can influence people to think in a different way but it's still up to them to decide who and what they want to be.

Highlight of conference

There were many different things in the conference that caught my attention, I was impressed of how many people there was in the conference from many schools and to have some one like Cruz Reynoso to take make time to go and talk to us I think that was the hightlight of the conference for me, it's really impressive how he became what he is now and how he didn't give up when people were attacking him, he kept fighting for what he wanted and that inspires me to fight for what I want and whenever some one tries to stop me or tells me I can't do it I will remember that I can because I am capable of doing many things I just how to get my head on my goal and fight for it and try my best to accomplish it. Another thing that I liked was the campus of Sacramento it's a nice university the campus is really big and has many departtaments that you can go and study and what they have to offer really caught my attention and also everything that they have on the campus really impressed me. This conference was good the trip, the workshops, the campus and being able to spend time with my friends from the Puente class.

Anzaldua Blog Response

I agree with the ideas that you presented about how sometimes we don't fit in, in a certain place because the way we speak and we feel out of place because we ask ourselves "where do we belong?" and how we have to conform ourselves to other cultures that are around us, on my experience when I moved to the Unites States I was the only Guatemalan in my class and everyone else were Mexican so I had to get used to their words and use them because I was the only one who was "different" and living that changes the way you are, it can change your culture, if people ask me what I am I will tell them I am Guatemalan but I am a mix of different cultures, I don't speak like a Guatemalan because I'm used to speaking English and also "Mexican" which is totally different than the Spanish that I grew up with and sometimes it's hard to fit in a certain group because I don't speak like them and makes me think who I am and after reading your article I realize that I'm a mix of different culture and no matter how hard I try not to be changed by the way society is it just happens naturally I don't try or push myself to act different its just out there that it becomes part of my life, I know what my culture is and how I was raised but living half of my life in my country and the other half in another country changes the way I am and created a new culture because its a mix of two different countries, in a way it could be a good thing because I can learn different things from both of them but it can also confuse me of who I am and that's where I sit and think who am I? but like I said after thinking I realize I am a mix of many cultures since I live in another country, hang out with many different people that have different cultures so I learn from them and get used to them, so I agree in everything that you presented in your essay because it's true and it helped me to see who I am and I decided that I am Guatemalan, American and a mix of many different countries.

College Student Inventory EC

There are thing in which I agree and disagree on the College Student Inventory, I agree in many things for example my desire to finish college it's high, my attitude towards educators, academic assistance. Those are thing where I can relate myself and see that I am really good at and those are my strongest attitudes. This inventory shows me different interests or needs that I have, there are some parts where I disagree, for example on the Academic Confidence my results were very low but I do have confidence on my academic skills, motivations but there must be a reason why the results were low so even though I disagree it should be something that I should look at and pay careful attention to it, to understand it better what it really means and what it proves. This show me problems that I have like study habits, I do have a very poor study habits I'm not used to study or prepare for a test or presentation I always try to see what my brain knows which doesn't help me because I always end up doing bad on it; this should be something I need to change so I strongly agree with the results that I have a very low study habits. These also gives me recommendations that I would strongly follow like getting help with reading and writing skills because they are not my strongest parts and I do need help on them. I agree with mostly all the results that are presented on this paper the very high and very low results, it really describes my behavior or the way I am when it comes to school, different activities or even with my family I agree with what it’s presented to me.