I was born in Yamanashi, Japan and lived there for seven years of my life. My childhood was quite fun, I would not compare it to american school at all. Field trips were a weekly activity and nap times occurred daily. I remember going out in the garden with other students picking out sweet potatoes and giving them to my mother. Also going to the zoo and petting the horses while feeding them carrots.
I feel as if I had a balanced healthy lifestyle as a child but I must admit I was a pain in the ass. I would constantly play around the playground and dislocate my arms 5 times in one year. The teacher would hit me with a plastic bag full of paper as punishment for talking back. I would be sneaky and spit food in a napkin and throw it away to avoid eating my entire school lunch. I never enjoyed loosing as a child so I would often cheat in games and when I was caught I would throw insults at the other child that accused me. I had that latina fire in me I guess haha.
During World War II my great grandparents fled from Japan in a small boat to Peru. Peru began having a growing population of Japanese and Chinese citizens because of the war. After years went by my mother grew up in a Japanese community in Peru and met my father at a college party that he crashed. My father lived in the barrio or the slums of Peru and my mother came from an upper class family. Their story is quite hilarious which I will someday unravel. The birth rate in Japan continued to drop significantly during the 1980s, dropping from about 14 births per thousand to about 10 births per thousand. There was a great shortage of young workers which is how my mother and father were able to receive working visas to work in Japan. My parents left Peru during a time of chaos where there were terrorists and violence in the streets of Lima to find a better future in a foreign country such as Japan.
Each person has a story of where they originated from. What is yours?