WHO AM I AND HOW DID I GET TO BE THAT PERSON

1. WHO AM I AND HOW DID I GET TO BE THAT PERSON MAYRA RAMIREZ

2. My name is Mayra Ramirez, I grew up in a modest town called Cali located in Colombia, and here I lived with my mother and stepfather. All my ancestors were black people, but I grew up in a township with people of different races because of the mixed population in my country. I would like to tell a story about my life memories starting with my infancy, following childhood and adolescence and ending with adulthood.

3. INFANCY: When I was a little girl, at four-years-old, I was quiet and very well behaved. I would like to ask my mother many questions about who my real father was, because of my stepfathers different skin color I was curious about our physical differences. While living with my mother and stepfather they would often be busy working and running errands, because of this they put me into 7 days a week kindergarten class, including some nights. While in this Kindergarten type daycare, I wasn’t taken care of very well because of the amount of children in my class. I wasn’t fed well and was harmfully punished.

4. As time passed, I started to get sick because I wasn’t getting taken care of. Soon after, got anemia which then resulted in my mother taking work off to take care of me. I was put onto a strict eating diet, with multiple meals a day, and took lots of medicine. When I finally got better I was allowed to join activities again with other kids, and continue you a more normal lifestyle. As a young girl I liked swimming, playing with my friend’s and neighbors, drawing and writing letters to my mother, and the better kindergarten my mom got me into. My stepfather was a very nice man, and influenced my life in a positive way, teaching me the difference between right and wrong. He was always asking me what I wanted to be when I grew up, things have changed now but back then my mind was set on a doctor, that’s what I told everyone I would be.

5. CHILDHOOD: In this stage I was nine years old, I had learned more about responsibility and more aware of the benefits of succeeding in school. One thing I suffered greatly from was the color of my skin. Being the black girl in high school didn’t have many benefits; I was called vulgar names, and verbally was abused by my peers of a different skin tone, all because they felt being a white girl or boy made them better than me. It happened so often that I started to believe things they said, thinking that life would be that much easier if I were a lighter color. My parents started to notice my mood falling and self-confidence, when they realized why I was down they tried to help me and tell me being black wasn’t as bad as other people made it out to be. Things didn’t get better for me, I eventually when to a psychologist, taking a year to recover.

6. An unusual thing I used to do as a little girl was eat parts of the walls in my room. I would cut out little holes in my room and eat it then, at the time this was something I loved to do. My mother got worried for me and also mad because I wouldn’t listen to her and stop. That was the reason I went back to the psychologist for the second time. Though I did have many bad habits, and bad things that happened when I was younger there are good things I remember of my childhood. I got the inspiration to become a model so my parents enrolled me into a modeling academy. The academy was very time consuming, with three days per week learning and doing work. That included two hours of practices,improving the right way walking, posing while I sat how to look around and when to look around. All these were taught weekly. While school got harder, I eventually left the academy.

7. ADOLESCENCE: In my adolescence I used to be more responsible to carry out with my duties since I was old enough to do it. I helped my mother with cooking when she did not have time to do.Also with cleaning the house and other chores along with my homework. When I had to go to school I was the tallest in my class so one day my gym teacher realized that I was really tall so he suggested me to play volleyball, but I refused it. By the end he kept insisting and I started training and playing volleyball for my school. They paid my education to play volleyball for them.

8. I had been playing volleyball since 2006 and my progress was very good. I continued with my high school team, also I was playing with the national team and represented my country. Thanks to volleyball I could travel to different cities from my country such as Bogota the capital, Medellin, Cartagena etc. also international countries like Mexico, Peru, etc. On other hand at this stage of life I graduated from the high school where I got my Diploma desired, and my parents were very proud of me. Having this diploma made me think about how will be my future and also a motivation to start the collage as I had thought.

9. ADULTHOOD: When I came to the United State, it was the best opportunity of my live. I thought that my future will be change in different ways like education, knowledge, and also my sport life. Getting a scholarship for play volleyball at Salt Lake Community College was very important to me because it opened doors to met new cultures; improve English skills, being educated etc.

10. Thanks to volleyball I could travel to many places especially here in USA where I got opportunities that not everyone can have like to be educated. When I left my family, it was a big decision by the purpose of fulfilling my goals that in the future I will be appreciate the effort that I made. All the experience I have had as a volleyball player was very good because it helped me to grow as a person and acquire much educational knowledge.