My childhood in the very diverse borough of the Bronx, New York was full of adventures. I vividly recall my early days learning the English language after spending my early days in a strictly monolingual household. My parents gave up their “bodega” (grocery store) to the Communist Castro regime to provide their children with new opportunities. This journey began with the many assimilation steps into American culture.
After my first half-day in Kindergarten at P.S. 75, my mother picked me up after school and wiped away my flood of tears – you see, I had no clue what teachers were trying to communicate and felt totally lost and ridiculed by fellow classmates for not speaking or understanding the English language. I will forever be grateful for the patience and grace demonstrated by the teachers, my classmates and of course the many hours of cartoons and interactions with other children. Over the course of that year in Kindergarten, I gradually started feeling more comfortable communicating in a new language at school. By the time I completed first grade, I began a new adventure in a local parochial Catholic elementary school (St. John’s Chrysostom).
Despite the language barriers, I felt the love and support of many during this journey and my parents were always mindful of never forgetting our Cuban heritage. They frequently shared stories in their native Spanish language and my mother also insisted that we spend a few hours Saturday morning in Spanish lessons on a chalkboard at home before allowing us to tune into Saturday morning cartoons. Of course, the other benefit of growing up in such a diverse Bronx neighborhood was exposure to many different cultures, ethnic groups and races. I quickly learned that many friends were also assimilating from other Latin countries (Puerto Rico, Dominican-Republic, Argentina, Chile, Peru, Cuba, etc.) along with many friends who had roots in Jamaica, Haiti and the U.S. Virgin Islands. We were not alone growing up as a bilingual household in the Bronx and often even invented many Spanglish (English-Spanish) phrases of our own.
