My Heritage and Me

It was not easy to come to terms with my roots and heritage. I am half Guatemalan with an understanding of what it means to carry Mayan blood. Ever since I realized I was of Latino Heritage, I was hooked to the culture. But, my other half, the half ignored by me until now has shown itself quite worthy to be remembered and molded into who I am. I am an African American Student.

My people’s history, of pain and of victory, is now morphing into a great source of strength. When I reminisce on the history of my people, I picture a peaceful day in the African savannah, swept by winds, backed by the sun into a golden shine. I also picture that same sun beating down on the backs of my ansestors as they sang songs of distant freedom and toiled incessantly, slowly stripped of their dignity and pride. When I see my people, I see the history of modern music sang from their lips. Without them, no one would ever know rock, jazz, blues, rhythm, blues, gospel, country, or hip-hop. When I see my people, I see the love and acceptance forged by the ruthless separation of families. When I picture my people, I see a crowd of a quarter million gathered at the steps of the Lincoln Memorial in anticipation as Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. passionately debunks racism and segregation. This is what I see.

The debt I owe my predecessors is unplayable. It is too immense to even contemplate the value. What my people have suffered for me, the tears they have shed, is beyond the world and me. The hundreds of years of whippings, of being treated as cattle, and of being forced to make their oppressor rich are not going to be in vain. All the years of laws that forced my people to succumb to inferiority and all the years of rejection and hate stop with me! They have not died at the hand of cruelty, starved in the name of progress, and kicked down by the foot of racism for me not to remember their sacrifice.

If I would live a life where I did not recognize the beauty and the empowerment of who I am, I would live a life wasted. I believe that I been masterfully created exactly the way I was meant to be and that there was no mistake. To discover who I am is to know where I came from; for I all I can be without knowing who I once was.

I am an African Chieftain, who leads his people with wisdom and love. I am the lowly African slave who cries out for peace and rest. I am an African Musician, who composes melodies with ethnic pride and creativity. I am an African Minister who teaches that God accepted all people and forgives all sin.

I am an African student with Mayan blood who needs the tools and the education to make my people, my tribe, my clan, my creed, and my ancestors proud. I owe them to receive the rights they bought for me. This is what I see.

Author's Note

Yes, I am half black.

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[Cicera]

Maybe one of the truest things that could ever be said, and stay true at all times, is that time not only a cure but a fair weapon just as well will bring justice to those who lost it without right. And indeed, one of the first things that the opressors also want to erase is the past. Remembering the past does not stall the future, the progress, as some claim. We sometimes forget that as humans we are all prone to succumb and also we are capable of doing the right and good thing.

Therefore remembering the past keeps the present alive. From the past comes purpose; and with that procured, continuation becomes semi sure no matter how harsh the conditions of the day become. Identity is important in that sense because without it there wouldn't be direction, a way to follow, a goal to achieve and a future to hope for. Now, strange as it might sound but oppressor and oppressed are in the same fog trying to push the same boat. What makes an oppressor a wrong person however is the method he pursuits to achieve his goals. When that is done to garner benefit, prestige or whatever he gets at the cost of someone else, that feels painfully unjust. But people in different parts of the world continue doing this. For most of them in the jungle that we call world you are supposed to do what you can to secure your own needs. A mentality like that-capitalist vision if you like-wouldn't hesitate in defining the world according to its interests. Only this, with time, would begin to crack for the conflict this philosophy had caused between the more and less privileged members of the same community. A white man who uses artificial superiority to accrue his right of living, prospering and leading a direction can go as far as feeling more superior among his white peers-for reasons as light as the perfect lightness of his skin or the complex line of his ancestors-for the pure distraction and charm of his individual interest.

Reacquiring identity by locating old and forgotten files is sometimes the only thing to do, even more it is the easiest option. One thing I am sure of though is that the oppressor-now that time came and established his guilt and named him guilty-has either the option of fighting back or to accept to pay the penalty. Now he is going to bend his back in slavery, caving with the burden of shame; waiting for the day to free himself of this universal ignominy.

To the oppressed I say: do not forgive but instead try to accept. To the oppressor, my words are: do not repent but instead try to feel responsibility.

I can never be sure of the practicality of this method of thinking, but thinking this way makes me feel more comfortable. More because I believe in lasting brotherhood than in eternal confrontation, this, I hope, should work, with a little help of time!