From introvert to extrovert
-crossing boundaries
Facing the fears I grew up with was challenging. Latino - Chinese born and raised, obviously two worlds collided with no winners on the battlefield. The Chinese factor, still predominant, on my mom side; my dad's first generation was loosing ground. But his blood was pure. On my mom's side, she was 2nd generation. So I was literally 70% Chinese with the other 30% Latino complications. Very conflicting and compelling at the same time.
I am the 4th in line, the youngest, the girl in the family. Mom's favourite if you would've thought. Nope. The oldest of the boys, of course the first one took the throne away. It was a 3 to 1 score. I decided not to lower my guard and go against the flow. Yeah right.
Every time we sat at the table for our meals, no talking when you are eating, only when you finished. Say good morning, good afternoon, good night. In Chinese. Study hard. Succeed. No questions until after meals are eaten... being the last one; again being number 4th, had to wait a long time. If my bother number was lucky to be listened to, was a lucky situation from Mom or Dad to be considered.
My parents way of teaching was to let us know survive on our own devices. Perhaps brother number one , who got all the acknowledgement was to teach us everything he learned from our parents. Encouraging. My mom praised: 'you will know how to react to life's situations' when ur time comes.
Hello? - I'm the only girl in the family Meh
The 4 of us grew up looking forward to study totally different careers: Administration, Mechanics, Programming and Advertising. All of them demanding lots of communication, skills. Being bold and confident in every single way, was the key to survive. No room for shy people lady!
As adults we all departed our own separate ways.
Guided by trial and error; that was at least better than waiting for the lucky lady to come and help us.
Time passed by and the opportunity to migrate to another country showed up in the horizon. I love challenges, I took it. A door of opportunities just opened bright for me. A new world of opportunities was to open In front for me.
Jobs just started to become more scarce in my country as the government was not keeping up with solving the country's problems. I decided to give a try. Maybe an opportunity is waiting for me somewhere.
The question was - where?
I went to the Canadian Embassy and applied for a visa, hoping my credentials would be beneficial to complete and graduate on my career.
Four months later, an acceptance letter arrived. More documentation was required, so I proceed to request the required documentation for the final approval. Also needed were the passports photos.
I was also interviewed to prove the authority's my fluency in English.
To reinforce my English pronunciation , I continued studying English pronunciation, to ease on my Spanish speaking pronunciation that identifies easily this language. I like to sing, so I started to sing along the music being played on the radio.
At that time, karaoke was starting to be the favourite for parties and weddings; and weekend family reunions.
One Monday morning, I received a letter snd an informative package. I got approved and accepted to migrate to Canada. I just needed to go and pick up my passport.
2 years later, I embarked on a plane were the final destination.
Once landed, had to study English first. Then apply for a job. I had to break my shyness. I went back to having an increased sense of insecurity.
Lots of verbal training and vocabulary, still practicing, shy on conversations. I was afraid of saying or sounding awkwardly stupid, my introverted personality increased.
I had to find a job.
I had to break the ice.
I had to gain my confidence back.
A year passed by and landed my first job. A friend recommended me to work at a dry cleaners company. I had to quit due to my transfer to a higher level English and fluency. Yes, it sounded too good to be true, but still not confident enough to carry a proper conversion. Still shy.
Many opportunities to apply for a job were present at that time, it was easy to apply, and the employer supported you on the time slot work, to allocate time for studying the new language.
Due to my grammar and vocabulary, I only needed to be more fluent. Needed a different type of job. By word of word mouth, I learned a new company was looking for people to work filling orders, with a possibility of moving up in the original position for what they applied for. And I applied for it. And got accepted.
I started as a packer. Then I was given an opportunity to process online orders, filing, administrative support. That forced me to be more fluent on my pronunciation. One day, I overcame that fear, and took over different positions throughout the company. I also learn a new job: manufacturing and packing of teas. I was offered to implement their packing snd blending of their products, security and design of their online business. The company also gave me opportunity to edit their product catalogue along with the maintenance of their website. The company started not only to export, imports of finished related products were added to the variety of products already being sold e everywhere.
My English started to become my steady everyday talking language, taking over my mother tongue, Spanish.
I even forgot when that change happened. My shyness disappeared. Not only speaking wise, but writing wise. Now I'm writing to keep my anxiety down during lockdown times. I have discovered that writing ng relaxes me. And keeps my mental health in good shape.
When things happen for a reason
Is this karma?
Or is just a sequence of events
It all began one summer, sticky humid day. It was a day closer to one of the biggest events in the history of world soccer game. The World Soccer Cup.
The Cup many countries longed for; for many years.
A cup that only the best of this game gets. No space for mediocre or undecided players.
One of those annoying black flies somehow found its way inside the house. It was a super humid sunny day. 40C and humidity pushing it to 42C. We just arrived home from doing the usual grocery shopping for the week.
Somewhere; I don't know when, a big black hairy fly found it's way to cool shady paradise. Maybe flying for hours on its way to unknown territory, the exhausted fly needed a break; out tv. Being black, we didn't noticed until late we turned on the tv.
Officially, we had an intruder. We were watching a documentary about nature, so the fly was pretty much on first row watching with us a nature documentary. World Soccer Cup. My husband, super big fan of the World Cup, already planned, talking to himself he was going to watch all possible games to happen. He was super happy- his favourite team made it to the semifinals. This even is so big, not watching the whole semi finals and finals would've been a crime. I already was prepared for this, because the semifinals started a year ago. Being in the finals where a great deal, we had to watch it with friends - of course more enjoyable and exciting! Who denies it?
There are for sure a few times when friends sit together and enjoy the time spent. One of them; that no one can denied it is when getting together at a friends house to watch a game. Even better for the World Cup.
Familia together, great friends together, their kids and ours playing on the computer or socializing with others online.
Busy house in all aspects.
All the kids together playing online. Sometimes they brought some extra games in case they get bored. If running out of options, they would just joined the guys watching the soccer game; to make more noise.
All the women in the kitchen sharing gossips and recipes.
And of course the guys having a good time watching the game, drink beer and eat. Every now and then one would be sent to the enes territory and quickly kicked off because of their nosey comments. It was like entering the 'Women's Club'. No men allowed'
No one dared to break the rules. When women got together, the men dared to join 'the guys club'
It's a great excuse for getting together and celebrate the winning team, if it happened to be our team. I warned him to be careful, the fly was turning into an annoyance. Other than hearing the fly going back and forth between the garage door snd the door to the backyard, sometimes we heard the fly cursed us snd hit bounced us like telling us to leave. Maybe a way of telling us to f*off.
Two days after, after work we sat down to watch tv. Somehow something I felt was missing, but something at the same time, was missing. After 2 days telling my husband 'be careful with that fly' was a annoying task to complete. I've noticed something wrong on the tv screen. I asked my husband if he killed the annoying fly. He proudly said YES!. But it didn't stopped there. Somehow this annoying fly left a mark on the tv.
I was here' was the somehow; the message the fly left. I mentioned to my husband. The fly's signature was annoying me. My husband promised by the time I come back, the tv will be cleaned and everything will be back to normal. First was the fly, next his legacy. The fly's legacy. My husband made me super happy. No more annoying fly, but now was annoying fly's signature. My husband without noticing made a tiny dot scratch on the screen. The 'tiny fit' grew, turned into a dash, and then started to grow. It was like the run on the pantyhose.
I googled it for a solution- nothing.
Fortunately, we saw a great deal - a 50in flat tv, 3D Sony with Blue Ray entertainment set for 1000. Including the 3D glasses.
We had s new tv to watch the World Cup. Super great for my husband, awesome for me watching 3D movies. So we invited friends to come over to watch the finals. Great time to share, we would have a potluck and some other invited friends would bring the drinks, of course to celebrate the winner.
Gooooolllll after gooooolllll it went.
Of course my husband's team made to the finals; and won the tournament. They won the golden world cup. On the second half time, they started to catch up on their judgement to play their game the way everyone knew. Beers started to ran. Potato chips, corn chips and cheese sauce with jalapeños to try. More beer. And more beer. A friend of us, that always spoke and complained over and over again, typical of soccer games. We were so much into drinking beer that the euphoria created made him drink more, our friend only streptococcus say, 'listen I told you we were to win'
He repeated that phrase many times.
He forced us to listen to him, he was the best commentator, we all had to listen no matter what.
Finally my husband's team won the cup. The happiness was huge. The euphoria was thrown through the window, not celebrating was a crime. After all the yelling and screaming all these soccer games brings, our special commentator was sitting on his chair. After commenting for an hour an a half, we gave him the attention he claimed for. He drank so many beers, he forgot what to say. In complete silence we stared at him.
Our commentator finally got out attention, but it was too late for him.
After many time saying he was to talk, and finally had all of our attention; he admitted he forgot what he was going to say.
It was hilarious.
There was a complete death silence. Even the AC stopped. No cars passed by. No annoying flies. No body cheered, it was his time to speak up and express himself.
He had the hole world for him.
But he forgot what to say.