“I think you just have to cut the bad, I’ll call it, and take the good”

One of the ways that Joselina stays connected to her culture is by keeping in contact with her family. Joselina tries to call/Skype often, but she says it depends on the time of the year and what is going on in her life at certain times. Joselina tends to call her family during the holidays, but it also depends on how busy she is. With school, and her child, time goes by very quickly and it is easy to lose track of time. She described the fast-paced lifestyle of the U.S.:

“Life in the U.S. absorbs all your time”  “There is not time to enjoy or do anything, just between school and the kids, you know. It gets so hectic”

Joselina is also tries to speak Spanish in her home to make it accessible for her daughter. This has proven somewhat difficult since Joselina’s daughter spends most of her day speaking English at school and is not as comfortable with Spanish. Joselina and her partner try to speak Spanish around their daughter as much as possible, but being bilingual takes planning and energy. Joselina says:

 “I don’t always remember to speak Spanish. Sometimes it’s just Spanglish that comes out, so I don’t even know what I’m speaking”

Another barrier is that Joselina’s daughter does not have many people to practice with outside their home. Regardless, Spanish-language skills are something that Joselina does want her daughter to learn. She plans to enroll her daughter in bilingual school sometime in the near future because she wants her daughter to be able to communicate with her Spanish-speaking family in Latin America.

Food is another big cultural connection for Joselina. She says “You know, I like my beans. I like my rice. So I think that food is one that I do the most”. She cooks food for the family, but since her daughter is at school, it is sometimes hard to expose her to the food that Joselina cooks.

Views on education from her home country are one of the things she has rejected since coming to the U.S. She now feels that education is necessary to succeed in this country. Having almost finished her Bachelor’s Degree in Psychology, Joselina believes she has broken the cycle of negative views towards education. She wants her daughter to be able to pursue higher education and a career that she enjoys, and start a new cycle of college education and opportunities.

Joselina also continues to practice some of the lessons her mother taught her. One of the main ones is the way she interacts and relates to other people. Her mother taught her to be respectful of others and look people in the eye when speaking to them. She also learned respect for elders, and parents and this is something that she hopes to pass down to her child.

“So, language, food and the way you raise your children, I think that I’m going to keep that forever”.