It was a hot and greenish day in Peru when I had to say goodbye to my family members and got in the airport. My enthusiastic 12-year-old self did not understand the magnitude of what was happening, but my family who was crying their eyes out surely did. Hours later, I arrived in the United States and the first thing I felt was like I went through the wardrobe of the movie/book Narnia. Even though just a brief period of time passed, the day was the complete opposite, it was blueish and as cold as a corpse. I was wearing shorts and a t-shirt, while others were wearing coats, puffer jackets, and jeans. I felt out of place, but still with a big smile from ear to ear and a heart excited for my new future. A future illustrated by my parents as promising, harmonious, and secure. These feelings and promises got into my head, but were completely shattered when one day my family deceived me into thinking that we were going to a store, but actually we were going to see my new school. I remember entering a big grey building with colored doors and asking myself, “Well… this store sure looks unique.” Then, I was waiting for my father in a very strange room at the “store.” I was like, “Why would a store have unfinished drawings laying around? There are pencils, a multiplication chart, the alphabet?… Oh nooo!” There is when I realized what was actually happening. My heart skipped a beat when my father confirmed my theory and told me that this was going to be my first day of classes. My eyes were watering until a girl my age approached me, and with a broken Spanish that I have never heard before told me that she was my guide for the day. After saying goodbye to my father, I followed her, as I did, I was able to see all different kinds of people from different ethnicities, races, and characteristics. By the time we got there, the students who would soon be my classmates were in a library period. At least that’s what my schedule said because they definitely did not seem like they were reading at all. When I was at the door, I was hearing a few of them screaming, and others were having conversations in what seemed like gibberish to me. Then, as I was entering the room and passing through the middle of two long tables, I saw how everyone started going silent gradually and started staring at me like I was the new zoo animal. That moment was when I began feeling like an outcast. It got worse when a group of two guys approached me and tried to talk to me, but I could only stare at them since I could not either speak or understand English. Then, the same thing happened when I met my English teacher. I did not know what she was saying, but I felt like she was mad at me for not understanding. Because of this, my grades began decaying and the feeling of not belonging there kept going through my head. This shattered me since it was my first time in my life where I felt a sense of inferiority. I went from being one of the best in my school in Peru, to the worst. Also, I was filled with invisible language boundaries, which limited my life entirely. I had to use Google Translate every time I needed to understand anything causing constant frustration.  Because of these I went through the stages of grief. First, denial, I could not believe all of this was happening, which made me feel very sentimental. Then, anger, I wanted to go back to my country where everything seemed easy and positive. Finally, acceptance, I realized that I could not change the circumstances and the only thing that I could do is deal with it and rise from the ashes. At this stage, I began using Duolingo, Roseta Stone, and even talking to my peers daily, although they could barely understand me. I wanted to break the barriers that were holding me back, the language barrier as well as the barrier I set for myself in response to the fear of not being like the others. From this experience I was able to see how important language and our voice is, without it we lose ourselves as well as others. This is similar to a quote professor B showed us in class that stated, “The limits of my language are the limits of my world,” which I agree with since I had to live with these limits created by language boundaries. However, all the struggles I had to overcome to get to this point have helped me a lot to develop my character, and understand that in life, if you want to accomplish something, you need to put a lot of effort into it and be consistent.

(I marked the parts where I used AI with green. The first time I used AI was to know how the closet from the movie Narnia was called since I knew it was not a closet. Then, the second time, I was looking for a word that meant equality, but that fitted the context. Next, for the third time, I was trying to think of a word that meant “not well done” drawings, but I could not think of it, so I asked AI to give me a suggestion. Finally, for the last time I used it, to replace “I had a lot of boundaries” with “I was filled with…”)