I guess you could say my first language was Spanish. Growing up my parents knew just the essential words in English. In their thickly painted accent, they could say, “Hello, Please, Thank you, Where is the bathroom?” Going to daycare is what taught me English. I am so thankful for this advantage that I have. Knowing another language is like always having $20 in your wallet that you keep just in case. Growing up, I remember always having to help them out. “How to get is Central Park?”, “No ma, it’s how do I get to Central Park’”. But I can’t blame my parent’s for not knowing the correct grammar. To this day I still run into struggles in both the grammar of English and Spanish because I wasn’t constantly speaking both. It’s a learning experience for all of us.

“Do you like speaking Spanish?” I get asked this a lot. And you see, the more and more I get asked it, the more I really think about it. Sure I love it for the obvious reasons. Being able to know another language is an interesting skill to have. It helps me when learning new words or understanding other languages. It can benefit me when applying for jobs or even secretly talking about people with my parents. But knowing your native language, in America, makes you different from the rest. A type of difference I didn’t sign up for. At times I feel the prejudice from others. You feel a type of exclusion where you don’t what you did wrong and how to stop it.

I don’t blame my family for surrounding me in Spanish. Its who I am. At times, its kind of cool to just think about the fact that I can speak two languages. It’s the little things like speaking Spanish with the cashier at the grocery store. Like watching a Spanish TV series and understanding every word. Or even going to a Spanish speaking country and not having any trouble. I am very thankful for this culture I was raised into.