“So where are you from?” This question has always been haunting to answer. “There is just no concrete response,” I would tell myself.
When I was eight years old, I migrated from Venezuela to the USA. Growing up in the suburbs of Miami alleviated the stress of how to answer the question. Miami is an international crossroads where you may meet individuals from all over the world. But reality struck when I moved out for college. People confused Venezuela with Minnesota and did not understand my European descend. My strong accent and Latina appearance puzzled them. I would explain to them I was from Miami the following question would be “But…where are you really from.”
For the short amount of time that I have been working with Paisaje Transversal, I was welcomed with open arms. When I mentioned to them that I was born in Venezuela they greeted me with a big smile. Currently, in the City of Madrid, there are over 100,000 Venezuelan immigrants. Many of them have been looking for a source of income and a way to make ends meet. With this in mind (and despite working remotely), the Paisaje Transversal team has made me feel understood and like a colleague.
Despite the fact that working remotely is challenging owing to the fact that we are on separate continents and time zones, they have been able to include me in the projects they are working on. I am currently working on a project where I will be studying the different Latin American communities that are in Madrid, Spain. I was very ecstatic to be working on something like this given my background and my passion for helping Latin American immigrants across the globe. I am confident that the people in Paisaje Transversal and my mentor will keep being (remotely) present and I am very excited for the current projects that I will be working alongside them.
