VIVI’s
Letter (March 23, 1997)I still remember when I got the news that I was coming here. We were having dinner at home and the phone rang and my Mom, Hilda, answered it. So after she told us the news, I didn’t know how to react. My dad, Juan, wasn’t very happy. I think that the reason was because I’m the last one, "the baby", and I had been always at home with them making company, and also because my first sister, Sandra, was getting over with her studies at the college and the economic situation was not good for travel; but my Mom was very excited and it wasn’t because she didn’t want me to be at home, it was because my third sister Erika was an AFS student three years ago and she had a wonderful experience so Mom wanted to be fair and let me have the same experience and also because my second sister Paola came to live in the U.S.A. a few months ago so it will be a good chance to see her again. Well, I came to Ohio in August and I was very happy but at the same time nervous and I had a lot of questions in my head like: how will my family be, my school, the people, and I was scared to death about the language; but fortunately, I got a wonderful family. My Mom, Joy, and Dad, Mike, are very nice and they always help me. I also got two sisters, Brigetta who is married and does not live with us and her family is very fun. The other sister is Mandy and she is my age. And my brother, Michael, is a wonderful person. In fact, I am very happy with my family and I love them very much. I will never forget all the things that they have done for me. About the high school, I can say that it was a total change for me. I used to go to a high school that was just for girls. We had to wear uniforms, were not allowed to choose our schedule, and it was over at 12:40 p.m. But things are different and I like being in Miami Trace. The people are very nice. I have good friends and I like the relationship between teachers and students. Here it is more friendly. I come from Trujillo, the third largest city in Peru and is located on the coast. My house is 5 minutes from the beach so our weather is pretty much the same all the year. Our temperature is between 60 and 80 degrees F. so we never get snow and at the beginning it was kind of hard to get accustomed to this weather. Our alimentation is based on fish, chicken, meat, rice (every day), potatoes, beans, soups, salads, etc, and we do not get much fast food as here. Our lunch is the biggest meal of the day so it is different but I like it. That is why I came here- to try new things and learn other cultures. But I could say that the thing that surprised me the most was the transportation, because if a person does not have a car, he/she can’t do anything, except go to school because you have the school buses and we don’t. Everything is spread out and it takes time to go from one place to another. My family in Peru has just one car and we don’t need others, because everything is so close that you can walk, ride a bike, take a bus or take a taxi. We count on a lot of public transportation. I used to walk to go to the university and sometimes take the bus so it wasn’t a problem for me to go anywhere. The life style is also different. Here the people spend a lot of time working even when you are at the High School and there is not too much time to spend with the family. In Peru neither I nor my sisters had worked. We just study and Mom and Dad were the only people of the family working. Most of the time the studies and work are in the morning so we usually have lunch together and a lot of time to talk. We consider the family a lot and the children live and depend on their parents until they get married. About the social life, I think that here it’s very related with the High School and the parties for example are just to talk, play and eat, but how about dancing? It’s very different. Most of the weekends my friends and I used to get together in a house to talk and sometimes to go someplaces and sometimes to go dancing, and it’s pretty normal to drink, but here it’s considered illegal. I think that it is because most of the teenagers drive so it’s kind of dangerous but we don’t drive so it’s normal to find alcohol at parties and because of that we don’t drink too much because we know we can get it whenever we want and it’s the same for smoking. But not all of my life has been parties and full of fun. We also get together over the week to study and help each other. Well, I know that coming here was a good decision and if I will have the opportunity to do this again changing anything that I would like, I can say with my hand on my heart that I’ll do it exactly the same and I won’t change anything. I know this is going to help me to build my personality and since I don’t have anybody else here, I’m learning to make my own decisions and I know that what I have to do depends just on me. I’ll always keep this year on my mind and heart and I’ll never forget my year here in Fayette County, because the people here are full of love. They made my year like this and I’m very pleased to be here. With love,
Viviana Sanchez / Peru
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