Do You Speak English?

A state that is diverse and full of life would be the big apple, oh New York New York. I can say everybody knows one of Jay-Z’s big hits featuring Alicia Keys “Empire State Of Mind” https://youtu.be/QsZlY0Vz4-o. Well that’s my home, that’s where a young latina girl grew up within the five boroughs of New York City. There are so many languages you hear when going by the city, but the most common language is spanish. And spanish is my first language, coming from two parents who were born and raised in Mexico wanting to achieve the American dream and settling down in a place full of opportunities was a big dream for both. They always told me that I was lucky to be a U.S citizen. But they never knew the struggle it would be going to school and picking up a new language.

I recall starting my education at a preschool near my home at the age of 4. It doesn’t exist anymore today since they changed their name and location. But I loved it there. The thing is the lessons weren’t really taught in english as often and I only picked up the basic english words and phrases. And going home was like going to a spanish class full time since both of my parents didn’t really speak english. And besides all we watched and heard was all in spanish. Therefore I ended up picking spanish quicker. After graduating preschool I transferred to an elementary school located at 1250 Ward Ave in the Bronx, there were three schools in the building, the one I attended was called P.S 197 and I started kindergarten right away. During my time there I was assigned to a special program called ESL. ESL stands for English as a Second Language. I was then introduced to a male teacher, he was tall, with blond curly hair, and blue eyes. He didn’t look like the people I knew and surrounded myself with. His name was Mr.Hill, and was one of my ESL teachers.

I will meet up with Mr.Hill once a day. I always thought to myself I was the lucky student who was able to get out of class and do all these fun activities. We used a lot of english word flash cards, worked on several worksheets, practiced spelling, and pronunciation to improve my english. Mr. Hill helped me so much, he had so much patience for his students and made every lesson as fun as possible. That was one of the reasons why I was confident in picking up english and tried to study as much as I could. After school I’ll go home and watch cartoons or animation films in english and try to repeat the phrases and words the characters would be saying. There were times I’d get frustrated with myself when words or phrases didn’t sound the same when I repeated them. So sometimes I would just give up. Later on in the year I was informed that I would take a test to see my progress in english to see if I needed to take the program again. I remember being so nervous in general that I didn’t pass the test until the end of first grade. When I look back at it I realize that even though I didn’t pass the ESL test in kindergarten, I picked english within 2 years. And I should always be proud of myself for that.

I’m always improving and practicing my writing skills today by writing in my personal journal. Writing in my journal helps me express myself, it could be when I’m feeling down with a lot of emotions happening at once or when I had the best day of my life that I would jot down every detail of it no matter the situation. This way it helps me look back and travel to that specific time of day. The last time I wrote in my journal, I talked about how grateful I am that things seem to finally be falling into place. For instance, one of my goals was to work part time before I started my first semester in college, same as getting all of my personal documents like my passport and state ID. I did all of that, within 5 months and I couldn’t be more proud of myself. Writing really helped me be more organized and plan things ahead of time.

When I think about American Musicals I think of a portal to a new world. The reason is that there are literally so many types of American Musicals, we have comedy, romance, horror, tales, and historical musicals. They all have unique settings, wardrobe, color, and humor which I really love. And the audience who watch these musicals all have a different point of view in viewing them. Which then creates an ongoing discussion. One of my favorite musical would be The Phantom Of The Opera which from my point of view there is a love story and an obsession from a third party ‘The Phantom of The Opera’ | The Phantom Of The Opera,and the Broadway actors really bring the characters to life. I’m really looking forward to analyzing and getting to know more about American Musicals. I chose this course since I’m really interested in music as well as acting. And how music can be performed in all types of ways.The musical In The Heights really demonstrates my hispanic background when it comes to music and being a hispanic woman growing up and living in New York City. It’s really an advantage to be able to read,speak, and write both in spanish and english, since I live in a state that contains a diversity of people from different backgrounds.