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The Intro Continued: The Two Worlds
12 years ago
Oh Tijuana, cuantas memorias tengo de ti. I think this is probably where my life reached it's critical point in shaping me. Tijuana was an interesting place. When I first arrived there, it was a city of tourism, with shops selling novelties, gifts, and all sort of Mexican specialties. It was a huge tourist trap. I remember how common it was to see the painted burros (donkeys for my English speakers) with their crazy stripes, making them out to look like zebras. They'd be surrounded by the ridiculous sombreros that befall Mexicans in stereotypical references, and how foreign people would flock to the opportunity to take pictures of the local scenery. It was quite beautiful, in it's own sense. In memories, and in dreams, this is the Tijuana I treasure. Hidden Bazaars, the gentle scent of dust and culture...I remember it all.
I found myself in this place, away from everything I ever knew, when dad was released from jail. For various reasons, dad could no longer stand to live in Los Angeles, and he was expelled from the country he had immigrated to in hopes of a better chance at life. The irony was never lost upon my family. He would have to wait out several years before he would be allowed return back to the states. With my father out, mom took it as a chance to rebuild and start somewhere new with her husband. In Tijuana, he found respite, and freedom from the cage he had been in for so long. As dad began to find a place to settle down in, mom began the arduous process of moving everything she owned to Tijuana. Every weekend, mom began to move things out of the apartment where she lived in, and into storage. After doing that, she would trek the trip to Tijuana with children in tow, and we would spend the weekend...together. I recall this warm feeling that would emanate from my parents as they began closing the years they had been apart for. It was like a second honeymoon for them. I suppose that was my first taste of what having a complete nuclear family was like. Times were nice...we would go out, eat someplace nice, like a Chinese place, or something more familiar, like a McDonalds. This process went on for a while. And then it changed.
To this day, I don't know how it came about that mom decided to leave me in dad's company, but they decided to do it. Maybe it was to expedite moving, or perhaps mom wanted me to have time with dad. For whatever reason, my weekend visits became a permanent stay with dad, and I'll be honest, mom's logic here just doesn't make any sense to me. First of all, there was the fact that we were barely settling in Tijuana. Then, there was the fact that dad had NEVER spent any prolonged time with me. Third, dad had JUST gotten out of jail. Though unspoken of, dad obviously had a lot on his plate at the time. It was...tough. On both of us. I was a picky, stubborn child, prone to fits, and freak outs. How was the guy supposed to handle all that? For all that was dumped on him, dad really did his best. I can't fault him like I did in my adolescence. I'll be honest, dad did a freaking great job. Never did I realize that his coldness resulted from the years of jail time he did. He never turned the frustration of those years upon me, and I although I felt at times like he didn't love me, dad obviously did, with gestures that children never realize or appreciate. When he would take me to school, dad would ALWAYS make sure that I ate something. This is an amazing achievement considering that during the whole year that the moving process took, dad had little to no furniture to speak of. There wasn't a fridge, or a stove...there was hardly any commodities, or even that great of a television. And yet, dad was there. He would buy ice to store food in a cooler. He would even find ways to cook food in a damn rice cooker. All these things went by forgotten when I was young, but as I grow older, I often wonder how dad even managed his feats. Sure, I knew poverty really, really well, but dad pulled me through (with mom's help.) So despite the hell my old man has put me through, I guess I love the bastard.
During this period, I saw so much of Tijuana, and I met so many people. It was a vast and crowded city, with a strange livelihood despite the conditions people sometimes live in. I often feel like such a place instills a sense of survival, of the need to go out and learn the world. For whatever reasons, dad navigated me and taught me a lot. But he wasn't the only one. For the first time, I had peers that weren't family. I had people with which I played with. I learned how bad I was at everything that had to do with sports, but that didn't mean I didn't like to play. There was so much I gained from Tijuana, that I often find myself overwhelmed trying to recollect it all. The people, the sights, the memories...it's all so wonderful to me. I often find I can't return to the places I used to live in without feeling a painful emptiness in my chest. The place isn't the same. The yellow apartments in which I lived in with my father have been overrun by junk that the hermit Cesar has collected. Once having a beautiful view of the outlying hill, as well as the Mexican flag displayed at the distance in the academy at the distance, the place has been swallowed all sorts of trash, very much akin to a dump. Nothing is the same.
Dad took care of me for a year or two, mom visiting on the weekends until the time she finally managed to bring everything. Once she did, we moved across the street from the apartments to the small house my parents rented together. Suddenly there was everything one could want, television, a stove, a fridge...things that some people considered commodities became a luxury to me. My schooling in Mexico was from kindergarden to first grade (boy, was that a strange year.) With our family together, we borrowed the address of a family member, an address that we practically rented out, and I was signed up for school in the States. If I was to be educated, mom wanted me to be educated in the world she wanted me to belong to, the United States. And so began my hard division from a world that I had been born in, and the one I was just getting used to. It was my two worlds.
Every morning, mom, my sister and I would commute across the border, going from one world to another. In one world, I would speak one language, in the other, I would be taught another. To write the words that describe our commute is one thing, but to live it is another. I would often be woken up at the crack of dawn, sometimes as early as 4:30 in the morning. I would be dressed in a practically dead state by dad, while my mom and sister readied themselves. By six am (And this was considered extremely late, by the way) we would leave the house, and cross the border, a journey that sometimes took two or more hours. Mom would drop of my sister off at her high school, and I would be dropped off in the daycare right next to it, and mom would head to work. All of this often happened before 6:30 am. At the daycare, I would have to wait until seven, and go out into the bus stop, a small snack in hand to make for a rushed breakfast and travel all around until the bus made its last stop...my school. I would head inside and make my way to have something to eat if I still had time, and then I would go to the area where my class would would in line for, until our teacher would come for us, and go about class like any other person would. School would end, and then, I would rush out to my bus that would drop me back at my daycare, often being literally the last person on the bus, and wait for mom to take me and my sister back home. Exhausting though it was, this wasn't the hard part of my life. Not by a long shot.
The difficulty that I lived was one of division. See, before my mom even let me go to school she imparted to a sacred duty that I was to follow above all else: Never tell anyone that you live in Tijuana. It would bring up questions, problems, and complications to my strange schooling. I was told excuses, reasons, and lines that I had memorized before even stepping into my classroom. I wasn't allowed to tell anybody. Not even my friends. What did this do to me you ask? Well, it made my not have friends. I can still recall how painful it would me to have to turn down an invitation to a birthday party or something of the sort, because, "My mom was really busy that day," or, "My parents won't let me." Pretty soon I stopped getting invites. Then people stopped talking to me. So during recess, I would sit in the corner of school, and read. Lonely kids attract bullies like carrion to flies. These were my first few years of schooling. Every day I would do the commute and be forced to participate in a world I wasn't fully a part of. Moving schools never changed anything. In fact, the one time I made friends with someone I found myself victim to an almost abusive friendship. I'd get to visit his home, and even visit on weekends, but he'd bully me into searching endlessly throughout the neighborhood while he hid from me in eternal games of hide and seek with his siblings and neighbors...and when I lost, it started all over again. I distinctly recall a time when I was dog-piled by kids for not being able to keep up. I was such a rat at the time, and even when I threatened to tell on him (a child's ultimate weapon), he almost warped some sense of my innocence by telling to go ahead, his mom wouldn't even care. And...he was right. To make matters worse, I was stuck with him. Every day after school, I would join him and head to his house until mom came. Mom could no longer afford the daycare I used to go to, and I had trusted this friend and his mother with the duty I had carried for years. From the start of elementary school, to the end of it, he and his mother were the only ones that knew of my situation. I would sometimes go to the back of the closed neighborhood he lived in, and stare longingly at the place where my daycare was, wishing I could go back. I would beg mom, but I never really got to go back to the place, where I had at least had my own space, and was ignored. For years after that, I would be haunted by his absence. My fear was similar to that of someone who fears an enemy in their midst. If that boy taught me something, it was this: nobody likes a rat.
Mom offered me the chance to move once more, to a middle school with a huge field, a proper library, and an awesome mascot: a knight. I think she knew how much I wanted to start somewhere new. I had, after all, begged her to move me back to the daycare. She moved me every time I grew to hurt by this double world. So she let me see it for myself, right at the time when my elementary schooling was about to end, and gently asked, "Wouldn't this be such a nice school to go to?" I nodded dumbly, almost in a trance by the beauty of the school. I knew it could be possible. "I could make it happen, you know..." and I took the chance. I moved to a school where I was relatively unknown, and where I could enjoy this solidarity. And...I've never regretted my choice. Not only because I ended up not being alone, but because for a while, my two worlds became one...
I found myself in this place, away from everything I ever knew, when dad was released from jail. For various reasons, dad could no longer stand to live in Los Angeles, and he was expelled from the country he had immigrated to in hopes of a better chance at life. The irony was never lost upon my family. He would have to wait out several years before he would be allowed return back to the states. With my father out, mom took it as a chance to rebuild and start somewhere new with her husband. In Tijuana, he found respite, and freedom from the cage he had been in for so long. As dad began to find a place to settle down in, mom began the arduous process of moving everything she owned to Tijuana. Every weekend, mom began to move things out of the apartment where she lived in, and into storage. After doing that, she would trek the trip to Tijuana with children in tow, and we would spend the weekend...together. I recall this warm feeling that would emanate from my parents as they began closing the years they had been apart for. It was like a second honeymoon for them. I suppose that was my first taste of what having a complete nuclear family was like. Times were nice...we would go out, eat someplace nice, like a Chinese place, or something more familiar, like a McDonalds. This process went on for a while. And then it changed.
To this day, I don't know how it came about that mom decided to leave me in dad's company, but they decided to do it. Maybe it was to expedite moving, or perhaps mom wanted me to have time with dad. For whatever reason, my weekend visits became a permanent stay with dad, and I'll be honest, mom's logic here just doesn't make any sense to me. First of all, there was the fact that we were barely settling in Tijuana. Then, there was the fact that dad had NEVER spent any prolonged time with me. Third, dad had JUST gotten out of jail. Though unspoken of, dad obviously had a lot on his plate at the time. It was...tough. On both of us. I was a picky, stubborn child, prone to fits, and freak outs. How was the guy supposed to handle all that? For all that was dumped on him, dad really did his best. I can't fault him like I did in my adolescence. I'll be honest, dad did a freaking great job. Never did I realize that his coldness resulted from the years of jail time he did. He never turned the frustration of those years upon me, and I although I felt at times like he didn't love me, dad obviously did, with gestures that children never realize or appreciate. When he would take me to school, dad would ALWAYS make sure that I ate something. This is an amazing achievement considering that during the whole year that the moving process took, dad had little to no furniture to speak of. There wasn't a fridge, or a stove...there was hardly any commodities, or even that great of a television. And yet, dad was there. He would buy ice to store food in a cooler. He would even find ways to cook food in a damn rice cooker. All these things went by forgotten when I was young, but as I grow older, I often wonder how dad even managed his feats. Sure, I knew poverty really, really well, but dad pulled me through (with mom's help.) So despite the hell my old man has put me through, I guess I love the bastard.
During this period, I saw so much of Tijuana, and I met so many people. It was a vast and crowded city, with a strange livelihood despite the conditions people sometimes live in. I often feel like such a place instills a sense of survival, of the need to go out and learn the world. For whatever reasons, dad navigated me and taught me a lot. But he wasn't the only one. For the first time, I had peers that weren't family. I had people with which I played with. I learned how bad I was at everything that had to do with sports, but that didn't mean I didn't like to play. There was so much I gained from Tijuana, that I often find myself overwhelmed trying to recollect it all. The people, the sights, the memories...it's all so wonderful to me. I often find I can't return to the places I used to live in without feeling a painful emptiness in my chest. The place isn't the same. The yellow apartments in which I lived in with my father have been overrun by junk that the hermit Cesar has collected. Once having a beautiful view of the outlying hill, as well as the Mexican flag displayed at the distance in the academy at the distance, the place has been swallowed all sorts of trash, very much akin to a dump. Nothing is the same.
Dad took care of me for a year or two, mom visiting on the weekends until the time she finally managed to bring everything. Once she did, we moved across the street from the apartments to the small house my parents rented together. Suddenly there was everything one could want, television, a stove, a fridge...things that some people considered commodities became a luxury to me. My schooling in Mexico was from kindergarden to first grade (boy, was that a strange year.) With our family together, we borrowed the address of a family member, an address that we practically rented out, and I was signed up for school in the States. If I was to be educated, mom wanted me to be educated in the world she wanted me to belong to, the United States. And so began my hard division from a world that I had been born in, and the one I was just getting used to. It was my two worlds.
Every morning, mom, my sister and I would commute across the border, going from one world to another. In one world, I would speak one language, in the other, I would be taught another. To write the words that describe our commute is one thing, but to live it is another. I would often be woken up at the crack of dawn, sometimes as early as 4:30 in the morning. I would be dressed in a practically dead state by dad, while my mom and sister readied themselves. By six am (And this was considered extremely late, by the way) we would leave the house, and cross the border, a journey that sometimes took two or more hours. Mom would drop of my sister off at her high school, and I would be dropped off in the daycare right next to it, and mom would head to work. All of this often happened before 6:30 am. At the daycare, I would have to wait until seven, and go out into the bus stop, a small snack in hand to make for a rushed breakfast and travel all around until the bus made its last stop...my school. I would head inside and make my way to have something to eat if I still had time, and then I would go to the area where my class would would in line for, until our teacher would come for us, and go about class like any other person would. School would end, and then, I would rush out to my bus that would drop me back at my daycare, often being literally the last person on the bus, and wait for mom to take me and my sister back home. Exhausting though it was, this wasn't the hard part of my life. Not by a long shot.
The difficulty that I lived was one of division. See, before my mom even let me go to school she imparted to a sacred duty that I was to follow above all else: Never tell anyone that you live in Tijuana. It would bring up questions, problems, and complications to my strange schooling. I was told excuses, reasons, and lines that I had memorized before even stepping into my classroom. I wasn't allowed to tell anybody. Not even my friends. What did this do to me you ask? Well, it made my not have friends. I can still recall how painful it would me to have to turn down an invitation to a birthday party or something of the sort, because, "My mom was really busy that day," or, "My parents won't let me." Pretty soon I stopped getting invites. Then people stopped talking to me. So during recess, I would sit in the corner of school, and read. Lonely kids attract bullies like carrion to flies. These were my first few years of schooling. Every day I would do the commute and be forced to participate in a world I wasn't fully a part of. Moving schools never changed anything. In fact, the one time I made friends with someone I found myself victim to an almost abusive friendship. I'd get to visit his home, and even visit on weekends, but he'd bully me into searching endlessly throughout the neighborhood while he hid from me in eternal games of hide and seek with his siblings and neighbors...and when I lost, it started all over again. I distinctly recall a time when I was dog-piled by kids for not being able to keep up. I was such a rat at the time, and even when I threatened to tell on him (a child's ultimate weapon), he almost warped some sense of my innocence by telling to go ahead, his mom wouldn't even care. And...he was right. To make matters worse, I was stuck with him. Every day after school, I would join him and head to his house until mom came. Mom could no longer afford the daycare I used to go to, and I had trusted this friend and his mother with the duty I had carried for years. From the start of elementary school, to the end of it, he and his mother were the only ones that knew of my situation. I would sometimes go to the back of the closed neighborhood he lived in, and stare longingly at the place where my daycare was, wishing I could go back. I would beg mom, but I never really got to go back to the place, where I had at least had my own space, and was ignored. For years after that, I would be haunted by his absence. My fear was similar to that of someone who fears an enemy in their midst. If that boy taught me something, it was this: nobody likes a rat.
Mom offered me the chance to move once more, to a middle school with a huge field, a proper library, and an awesome mascot: a knight. I think she knew how much I wanted to start somewhere new. I had, after all, begged her to move me back to the daycare. She moved me every time I grew to hurt by this double world. So she let me see it for myself, right at the time when my elementary schooling was about to end, and gently asked, "Wouldn't this be such a nice school to go to?" I nodded dumbly, almost in a trance by the beauty of the school. I knew it could be possible. "I could make it happen, you know..." and I took the chance. I moved to a school where I was relatively unknown, and where I could enjoy this solidarity. And...I've never regretted my choice. Not only because I ended up not being alone, but because for a while, my two worlds became one...
