Immigrant Case

I've never dreamed of becoming an American citizen. In the year 2008, my family and I migrated to Hawaii for a better living and soon became citizen. My life in Hawaii is just ordinary and normal like other Filipina girls. Going to school by walking and having an adventure everyday, being carefree about what's going on around me. I can fluently speak two kinds of dialects from my home country such as Tagalog and Visayan but I only knew few Basic English words. Whenever I see an American around my area speaking English so fast, I began to amaze and idolize them on how they speak. I then realized that as I migrated to Hawaii, it seems the world around me is very complicated and way different dealing with the new surroundings, cultures and people. Thus, at that situation, I realized that I have to learn a new language, English, fluently for me to fit in.

I started to go to school. I was very anxious during my first day of school at Farrington High School knowing that I couldn't communicate with people properly since English is not my first language. I had difficulties introducing myself to my fellow classmates and teachers. I didn't have any friends for the first week and I was very quiet in class, so I was once bullied in my English class. People said that I had a weird accent and that I was a FOB (Fresh Off the Boat), which means immigrants who just came from a country who are used to their homegrown language. Sometimes I feel so left out that I wanted to cry often, thinking of not going to school anymore, but I was determined to push myself to go school in order to learn and become better.

Whenever I'm home, hearing my parents speak English makes me feel better for some reason, maybe because I feel like I'm not alone. If the word sounds solid, for example read, hid, eat; they pronounce it softly. They pronounce read as red, hid as hed, eat as ate and so on. But if the word sounds soft, they pronounce it solidly. It was kind of funny. Also, when my Mom buys groceries or she has to accompany me to my doctor appointments, I am the spokesperson even though I am not fluent. I once asked her, "Why me?!" and she said, "Cause you go school so you know better than me!" She lets me talk to the doctor if she can't answer it or lets me go to the counter and talk to the cashier. There was also a time when my Mom talked to my advisor over the phone and the way she pronounced the words was, well, different. The next day, my advisor told me that she couldn't understand my Mom so I had to explain it myself. But even though she doesn't speak English clearly, she is a good writer and she can comprehend.

My parents are my motivators. Since I was a child, they guided me by taking little steps in terms of reading, writing, and communicating which led me to enjoying school, willing to learn new things. They instilled me that education is something that no one can take away from a person. Whatever people thinks and say about me is just a challenge that I have to face. They are the reason of why I tried my best in terms of reading, writing, and communicating properly. I reminded myself to the things that my parents had told me and that practice makes it perfect. They convinced me that literacy skills are one of the keys to success. Despite of how I pronounced the words incorrectly, I showed