United States here we come!! I was 4 years old about to be 5 years old when I stepped foot on American soil. My Father had lived here for quite a while and my Grandma way before him. Our Grandmother Angela (my father's mother) was who brought us to the States. We flew from Guatemala to Florida, we received our passports and then to New York City. The second we were in our hotel I remember seeing american kids playing around the pool and I then saw the faucets in the shower and thought.. "Wow Gold faucets" and knew we were in America (they were really just gold colored). We arrived in New York City and just remember tilting my head way back and staring at the long tall buildings. It was the biggest thing I've ever since. So many cars everywhere and people of all sorts of colors. I was amazed, shocked and so happy to be in America, mainly because everyone in Guatemala would talk about how rich and great America was.
We lived in Queens, New York. Our apartment complex was by a grocery called Western Beef where the frozen foods really were in the freezer, you had to be in a snow jacket to shop in there. There were other shops around us too like the chinese food for chow-ming and few snack shops. There was a public pool but it cost $11 a person to get in, so my brothers and I would wait till the fire department opened the fire hygergent and have all the water come out. We would play at the park with this huge world in the middle of it called "Flushing Meadows, Corona Park" My brothers and I would play there all day, there were times my brother's bikes were stolen. It wasn't such a bad neighborhood but pretty rough compared to many in other states. There were gangs around our home but my mother's example of caring for everyone never did any harm to our family. My youngest brother and I had our first pet, a bunny who we named Poo-key. He past away because my mother feed him alfalfa. We buried him in that park and our Father allowed us to do a ceremony for him. This park wasn't far from our school. My elementary school was P.S. 120. Our fun was playing hand ball ( a blue rubber ball bouncing it to a wall) and jump rope. There was no grass, because it was all blacktop so any of those chalk games were fun.
All of my childhood memories are very vivid from my life in New York City but it wasn't long till my brothers and I would have our lives change.
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