Mexican flag inside an American flag

Remembering my bully and the wounds to my ethnic pride

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Editor’s note: This blog is part of a series of first person essays about identity written by UTEP Liberal Arts Honors students during the spring 2013 semester. EL PASO – I still remember the name of my middle school bully and what he looked like. I might have been an insignificant part of his life but for me he was not. His behavior when I was a teenager produced fear, self-hate and an identity crisis that haunts me to this day. A native of Ciudad Juarez, I have always considered myself Mexican and I have been proud of my background.

Mike Martinez, my grandfather. (Courtesy of Rebecca Guerrero)

When Alzheimer’s strikes, a granddaughter’s memories keep his spirit alive

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Editor’s note: This blog is part of a series of first person essays about identity written by UTEP Liberal Arts Honors students during the spring 2013 semester. EL PASO – Life was beautiful until the year my grandpa started forgetting. The first time I noticed his memory loss I was 15 years old and he was 75. Grandpa walked through the front door, sweaty and breathing hard. “Mickey, ¿qué pasó?

Charles Ndeki, Bourama Seydi and Lamine Fati all stepped on land mines on their plantations in Senegal, West Africa. In his interview with Brinegar, Bourama said, "Journalists, they come and they ask us questions, take our picture and they write and then they leave and nothing happens." (©Felipe Jacome)

Seeing poverty and seeking to change the world, word by word

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Editor’s note: This blog is part of a series of first person essays about identity written by UTEP Liberal Arts Honors students during the spring 2013 semester. EL PASO – Last summer I was standing in front of the Martyr’s Monument in Dhaka, Bangladesh.  There was this being, an old man, lying on a thin mat. He looked like he was dying there as people walked around him, unchanged. One, two, three…I could count his ribs. His arms and legs were as thin as a broomstick, bones jutting out like knobs in wood.

Writing out my future then and now

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Editor’s note: This blog is part of a series of first person essays about identity written by UTEP Liberal Arts Honors students during the spring 2013 semester. EL PASO – When I told my Mom I was going to be a published writer, she said to make sure my stories were on audio-tape so she wouldn’t have to do any actual reading. Dad then joked that she’d have to learn how to read first. Whether or no they knew how serious I was, my parents always told me to do what I loved, even if it meant not studying a “safe” major like business or nursing. Neither of my parents, or anyone else in my family, has ever shown an interest in writing, creatively or otherwise.