Growing up I’ve been surrounded by Ecuadorian culture; both my parents are from Ecuador and I consider myself Ecuadorian. I haven’t met many Ecuadorians growing up and many people I’ve met don’t know where Ecuador is, so I had to educate them on the basis of my ethnicity. Because I have so much practice, I want to introduce my readers to a sneak peak of Ecuador.
My dad and I don’t really talk. There’s not much beyond the “how was work”s or “how
was school”s and I can count on my hand the number of times we’ve had an in-depth conversation. There is this sort of disconnect I suppose, this conversational barrier.
“And they all lived happily ever after.” We’ve heard these words a million times since we were children, bringing our stories and fairy tales to a happy, satisfying conclusion. As children, we loved the “happily ever after” because it was a quick and satisfying way to finish off a story. It left no loose ends, nothing more to think about. It kept the story simple, everyone getting what they deserved. But we’re older now and we understand that life isn’t simple or fair. Our innocence and optimism is long gone, but we still can’t help longing for that “happily ever after.”
Growing up in America I rarely see any representation of Ecuadorian culture. The only representation in Western media I’ve noticed growing up was Mexican culture but even then there were still stereotypes involved, which didn’t give an accurate version of actual Mexican culture.
Once you graduate from high school the most common question that people ask is What’s your career plan? What are you going to pursue? What do you want to be? People just start shooting these questions at you.
Women need to be credited for discoveries and achievements they made that most people don’t know about.