Speaker 1: Hey y'all. This week on When You're Invisible, I'm so
Speaker 1: excited to introduce to you my parents, Claudia and Francisco,
Speaker 1: whose experiences with invisibility is super layered and fascinating and
Speaker 1: often provides the origin of my own experiences. How did
Speaker 1: you guys meet miky love story? How much time we have?
Speaker 1: Like highlights played Biplane? Your father was working for an
Speaker 1: American company in Monterrey. We met in a discotheq bar
Speaker 1: a club like a club. Picture yourself in the eighties,
Speaker 1: long before there was any internet, the MTV videos actually started. Yes,
Speaker 1: a friend of mine. She didn't want to be alone,
Speaker 1: so she will not How do you call it when
Speaker 1: someone she wouldn't be a third wheel at their will? Yes,
Speaker 1: she was meeting a guide friend. And at the end
Speaker 1: of the evening, your father came into this place that
Speaker 1: I didn't see him, he saw me, I think, did
Speaker 1: you yep? The nod yes, I did to hear. The
Speaker 1: girls said, have you seen that very blond guy over there?
Speaker 1: He's been looking at you? Say yes, I say, we
Speaker 1: will go to the ladies room to see if he
Speaker 1: approached you, And in a loud voice, I say, okay, girls.
Speaker 1: When you come back. We are leaving. Okay did you
Speaker 1: hear her say that? Oh? Yea, So he approached me.
Speaker 1: Do you remember what you guys talked about. I think
Speaker 1: it was a small talk. I guess when you get
Speaker 1: to know each other. The only thing that I told
Speaker 1: him is that I really like change, that I am
Speaker 1: very open to change. No, God, change came into my life.
Speaker 1: Which is the perfect segue. Welcome to When You're Invisible.
Speaker 1: My name is Maria Fernanda. Yes, but I know not
Speaker 1: everyone can rather are, so it's also find a coming Maria.
Speaker 1: In today's world, we love to tell stories about people
Speaker 1: who have reached the top, like people who have achieved
Speaker 1: positions of cloud wealth power. On this show, I won't
Speaker 1: be doing that. When You're Invisible is my love letter
Speaker 1: to the working class and others who are seemingly invisible
Speaker 1: in our society. I hope to build a community here
Speaker 1: that will inspire you to have generous conversations with others
Speaker 1: that are different from you, conversations that might help you
Speaker 1: see life in an entirely different way. My parents, they've
Speaker 1: had to take risks in that pursuit of change. They've
Speaker 1: more than one time had to sell everything they've more
Speaker 1: than one time had to completely take a leap of
Speaker 1: faith on a job. They burned all their ships, their
Speaker 1: financial ships, their relationships to be here and to pursue
Speaker 1: something better. They went from like food stamps when they
Speaker 1: first got here and then slowly progressed to a comfortable
Speaker 1: middle class, which they achieved by the time I was
Speaker 1: about fifteen years old. When you belong to more than
Speaker 1: one country, more than one culture, and more than one
Speaker 1: like socioeconomic background, being in between expands your worldview. When
Speaker 1: you can relate to people from different places, you just
Speaker 1: start to see different perspectives. It adds to the stained
Speaker 1: glass that you are. I think there is a flip
Speaker 1: side if you're in between. One thing that happens is
Speaker 1: people don't always know how to peg you. They don't
Speaker 1: know what you are, so it's very foreign to them,
Speaker 1: and then it's unsettling sometimes or they are like, how
Speaker 1: are you here? And confused by your identity. In this
Speaker 1: day and age, we have such polarizing media and such
Speaker 1: strong convictions, but there's also a lack of acknowledgement towards
Speaker 1: the layers of people and how we change and how
Speaker 1: we grow as individuals. Sitting down with my parents was
Speaker 1: an honor and also a little nerve racking. I kind
Speaker 1: of thought that I would know what they would talk about,
Speaker 1: but there were a lot of layers to their story
Speaker 1: that I didn't even know, which I felt surprised by.
Speaker 1: And also there were some healing moments. There are questions
Speaker 1: I asked that I had never gotten to ask before.
Speaker 1: Let's hoperat it. So question number one, would you guys
Speaker 1: kind of know? Is coming up? How did you grow
Speaker 1: up in Mexico? Growing up was very different of my
Speaker 1: childhood friends. I was a daughter of a single moment
Speaker 1: that became with of very young at thirty two, with
Speaker 1: four children. It was interesting to say the list, and
Speaker 1: so many times difficult because we had to move with
Speaker 1: my grandparents that by then they had lost their money
Speaker 1: in a bad business that my grandfather did, and so
Speaker 1: we live in a very small apartment where we had
Speaker 1: just two bedrooms. So we were the four girls sleeping,
Speaker 1: my mother, my sisters, and I and my brother with
Speaker 1: my grandparents. But I had fond memories with my first cousins.
Speaker 1: With your memos, my fondest memories are with them away
Speaker 1: from their home. They will take us everywhere you know
Speaker 1: parks and recreations, So we're very thankful to them because
Speaker 1: we were able to experience many little childhood moments with them.
Speaker 1: Being in that apartment in a second floor in the
Speaker 1: center of the city, where they were not grass areas
Speaker 1: or anything. It was a little bit tough. And also
Speaker 1: extra curricular activities were not for us because who will
Speaker 1: take us, who will pick us up? It was no
Speaker 1: way to do that. And I went to a school
Speaker 1: very far away from where I live, always with scholarships
Speaker 1: where my mother was an alumni to In this very
Speaker 1: privileged school, I felt invisible, and my defending mood in
Speaker 1: that wealthy environment was being the smart one, being on
Speaker 1: top of my class always so I can be strong
Speaker 1: in one way. Of course, it was defense mechanisms that
Speaker 1: I had that back then, I didn't call it that
Speaker 1: because I didn't know that. My parents always stressed the
Speaker 1: importance of education, and my brother and I both used
Speaker 1: education as a way forward, and it's really interesting to
Speaker 1: see how that developed in their own lives as kids. Well,
Speaker 1: my experience was somewhat different in terms of my childhood
Speaker 1: and my case. I was the third of upper middle
Speaker 1: class family in a smaller sitting in Mexico called Duranko,
Speaker 1: And yeah, one of the funny things in our home
Speaker 1: that was one of those small towns with a lot
Speaker 1: of gossips that they said that we were very rich,
Speaker 1: probably because my grandmother used to have a lot of money.
Speaker 1: But the fame was that my father was just a
Speaker 1: little that's the right term. Centric, eccentric, that's the right word,
Speaker 1: because we lived very, very frugally. They never really traveled
Speaker 1: to places, and my father, despite the fact of his
Speaker 1: low education level, he was successful in almost every business
Speaker 1: that he studied. Nothing really spectacular, but yeah, people you
Speaker 1: hear rumors that we were felt the rich, which is
Speaker 1: hilarious because it's like, I think about that and that's
Speaker 1: not what I would have. Yeah, they had enough money
Speaker 1: to give us a good living, and eventually the money
Speaker 1: that my grandmother left paid for college for my brother
Speaker 1: and for me in a private university in Mexico. And
Speaker 1: our parents both were alive most of our lifetime, and
Speaker 1: we lived next door to my grandmother, and we had
Speaker 1: an upbringing that was fairly rigid in many ways. We
Speaker 1: always grew up a expectation that we had to be
Speaker 1: really good students, well behaved children, despite the fact that
Speaker 1: my father didn't finished primary school until he was in
Speaker 1: his twenties. His father died when he was six, something
Speaker 1: similar to Claudia in this case, he was somewhat abandoned
Speaker 1: in a horphanage at about six or seven years old,
Speaker 1: so he had a really rough childhood and really rough
Speaker 1: teenage time. So the reason he didn't complete school because
Speaker 1: there was nobody behind him that supported him. But in reality,
Speaker 1: what was remarkable and my father was that I'm an academic,
Speaker 1: but probably he read more than I did. In his
Speaker 1: adult life. He taught himself to read English and he
Speaker 1: devoured all sorts of books about English. He was really
Speaker 1: knowledgeable history, politics. He had a hunger for learning despite
Speaker 1: the fact no education, so he had to work very
Speaker 1: early in his years. He did so many different little
Speaker 1: jobs in the farm and ran chair and even at
Speaker 1: one time he was smuggling stuff across the Mexico US border.
Speaker 1: We always ask you, please write your story. We got
Speaker 1: to know more about it. We could write a book
Speaker 1: about it. Limited series about the b s Family coming soon.
Speaker 1: It's really sweet to think about these two kids growing
Speaker 1: up in different parts of Mexico and how they met
Speaker 1: at that bar and a year after the meeting they
Speaker 1: got married, and two years after they moved to the States.
Speaker 1: How did that come about? Whose dream was it? Whose
Speaker 1: idea was it? And how did the other take it?
Speaker 1: It was your idea? Well, yeah, but I convince you
Speaker 1: I think the reason why we decided to come to
Speaker 1: the US, Well, first I had a bachelor's in food
Speaker 1: science food technology, and I wanted to explore the possibility
Speaker 1: of conducting research. Commenced Claudia, that was our best for
Speaker 1: our future. My career if we stayed in Mexico was
Speaker 1: going to be only restricted to Mexico. If I go,
Speaker 1: I'll get out the green the U S I would
Speaker 1: expand or something abilities. So, as they were getting ready
Speaker 1: to fully transition to their soon to be a new
Speaker 1: home in the States, they stopped and worked at my
Speaker 1: uncle's house in Maine, Claudia's great uncle o Hiro's for
Speaker 1: the summer as managers of his property, workers in whatever
Speaker 1: needed to be done, painting, cleaning, or cooking. And what
Speaker 1: was it like when you moved here for the first time?
Speaker 1: Do you remember some of the first thoughts you had
Speaker 1: upon arrival. Well, we drove from Maine to upstate New York.
Speaker 1: And when I saw Syracuse, I say, oh, this is awesome,
Speaker 1: and you're doesn't. No, this is not the place yet,
Speaker 1: we have to drive south. Syracuse is a bigger city
Speaker 1: in upstate New York. And where they were about to
Speaker 1: go was Ithaca, New York, home of Cornell University and
Speaker 1: Ithaca College, and a much smaller city. Can you imagine me,
Speaker 1: a girl from a very large city in Mexico going
Speaker 1: to Ithaca, New York and driving through these little back
Speaker 1: roads and say, oh, my word, where am I going
Speaker 1: to live? But when I arrived in Itaca and we
Speaker 1: walk the little city, the city is just absolutely gorgeous
Speaker 1: and the campus is just amazing. And as soon as
Speaker 1: I arrived, I think a week later, I made a
Speaker 1: friend from Peru in the Bos and from there, yeah,
Speaker 1: we became friends, and another group of friends, and all
Speaker 1: from Latin America, all of them. I love thinking about
Speaker 1: my mom in her mid twenties, making all these friends
Speaker 1: from around the world. And it's crazy to think that
Speaker 1: this incredible adventure that would last the majority of their
Speaker 1: life so far was started actually by the quiet one,
Speaker 1: my father, because he was the one who had spurred
Speaker 1: them to make this big change. His expectations and sense
Speaker 1: of responsibility were a little different. My expectations were surrounding,
Speaker 1: mostly about what was waiting for me. As I started
Speaker 1: my master's degree, I was concerned that I was responsible
Speaker 1: for Claudia. So the setting was always where it would
Speaker 1: be a safe place for us to leave. We were
Speaker 1: very strapped for money because the first year we did
Speaker 1: not have any support from the university. We didn't have
Speaker 1: any fellowships. We basically, like we said in Mexico, we
Speaker 1: burned our ships. In Mexico, we've sold everything and we
Speaker 1: save everything during a year to be able to come
Speaker 1: to the US. We were relatively poor. At least for
Speaker 1: the following four or five years. We were considered on
Speaker 1: their the poverty level in the US. Stay tuned for
Speaker 1: more from one year Invisible after this break and we
Speaker 1: are back to this show with no clear future, but
Speaker 1: navigating as best they could. They were feeling their way
Speaker 1: day by day. I love you have all the perks
Speaker 1: of living in the US as compared to Mexico, because
Speaker 1: at least in our generation, there are many things that
Speaker 1: it was so easy to do that in Mexico was
Speaker 1: a pain in the neck. The moment that I discovered
Speaker 1: you could pay bills by mail. Oh my goodness, that's
Speaker 1: great because in Mexico was interesting physically physically to pay
Speaker 1: office of feature. That's changed your intention was never to
Speaker 1: stay in this country. First was a master's degree, and
Speaker 1: then we decided to stay for a pH d at Cornell.
Speaker 1: I got suppar from the Mexican government, which very grateful.
Speaker 1: We tried to go back, but the economic situation in
Speaker 1: Mexico was really bad. There were no jobs, and the
Speaker 1: jobs that were really bad. So I was fortunately that
Speaker 1: one of the professors offered me to stay for a
Speaker 1: postdoctoral position, so we stayed a little longer. With each
Speaker 1: choice my dad made came a slew of new logistics
Speaker 1: and paperwork for what felt like pretty constantly changed visas.
Speaker 1: We started my master's degree under an F one, which
Speaker 1: is typically even to international students. When I got the
Speaker 1: support from Mexican govern and Fulbright, I was asked to
Speaker 1: move to a J one pisa, and that's when the
Speaker 1: complications came. J one visas have a restriction that you
Speaker 1: have to go back to your home country for two
Speaker 1: years before you could apply for a work pisa or
Speaker 1: a permanent residence. It was going to be almost impossible
Speaker 1: to stay permanently in this country. The University of Minnesota,
Speaker 1: when they wanted to hire me, they were willing to
Speaker 1: support me to get an OH one visa, an Alien
Speaker 1: of Extraordinary Abilities. That was the title of the visa.
Speaker 1: Normally it's a visa that doesn't last more than three years.
Speaker 1: After the first three years, we had to renew every
Speaker 1: single year. The complications of having a visa that only
Speaker 1: last one year while you have a permanent job in
Speaker 1: the US provided not a lot of uncertainty for many years,
Speaker 1: but also some of the complications whenever you crossed the border,
Speaker 1: like your visa was so rare. I remember being at
Speaker 1: borders and having immigration officers be like, what is this?
Speaker 1: I have to go check. At one point, when my
Speaker 1: parents really could not predict how long they would be
Speaker 1: in this country, we started to have conversations about what
Speaker 1: we were going to do if their visa got rejected,
Speaker 1: If we would go to Mexico with them, if we
Speaker 1: would stay in the States with guardians, or what. These
Speaker 1: kinds of conversations started when I was eleven and continued
Speaker 1: until I became an adult, and then I eventually went
Speaker 1: to the forts visa that I we were had, which
Speaker 1: is the h one that allowed the possibility for you
Speaker 1: to then moved to a permanent arrist. My boss at
Speaker 1: that time made the miracle of allowing a fulbright scholar
Speaker 1: to stay in this country permanently. But yeah, I think
Speaker 1: I cannot say that I ever had the American dream.
Speaker 1: To be honest, it's been an accident in my life.
Speaker 1: Let's put away all those mild American stone steps milestones.
Speaker 1: We always arrived later. We've been catching up in terms
Speaker 1: of the American dream. Eventually we kind of fulfill what
Speaker 1: would be considered having a house, having a secure income,
Speaker 1: and then we can clarify it is the reason why
Speaker 1: I were not able to work. They were two decisions.
Speaker 1: One because my visa status, I was not allowed to
Speaker 1: work formally in the States. And another reason is because
Speaker 1: what I was a mother, I wanted to be with
Speaker 1: my children. Thinking on going to work in order to
Speaker 1: pay for childcare didn't seem too clos to to me.
Speaker 1: In that equation, my fulfillment as a professional will come
Speaker 1: second to my motherhood. If I had two children, they
Speaker 1: will be my priority. So I did lots of work
Speaker 1: under the table in Ithaca I had a home childcare
Speaker 1: at my home so I could wash over my children
Speaker 1: after the daycare, and itaca my dad was done with
Speaker 1: his education. With that came all the rejections of all
Speaker 1: the jobs that he applied to. My dad literally has
Speaker 1: a stack of over fifty rejection letters from this time.
Speaker 1: One of the places that eventually accepted him was the
Speaker 1: University of Minnesota. And when Minnesota became our home base,
Speaker 1: that's when my family slowly started to see a transition
Speaker 1: in our financial stability. We went from a two bedroom
Speaker 1: small apartments taking buses because my parents were always working,
Speaker 1: and had to split the same used car that we
Speaker 1: had owned for many, many, many years. Then we got
Speaker 1: to move into duplex and then from there got to
Speaker 1: move into a beautiful house in the suburbs. That finally
Speaker 1: happened when I was about fifteen years old. But even
Speaker 1: at that comfortable middle class we still didn't see a
Speaker 1: surplus of money because any extra funds that we ended
Speaker 1: up having went to my family in Mexico. So while
Speaker 1: we were physically more comfortable and we finally had a
Speaker 1: brand new car for the first time during that time,
Speaker 1: we were still doing what we'd always been doing. We traveled,
Speaker 1: and we made it possible by staying with family, staying
Speaker 1: with friends, always driving, and we would barter for every
Speaker 1: single extracurricular activity. For example, to pay for the Minnesota Opera,
Speaker 1: I sold point set as like a crazy person, hundreds
Speaker 1: of points set as a year to be able to
Speaker 1: do that after school activity. So any time we had
Speaker 1: something what was happening behind the scenes was a lot
Speaker 1: of hard work to make it happen, both on the
Speaker 1: kids parts and my parents party. After about twelve years
Speaker 1: of being in Minnesota, my parents moved to Georgia for
Speaker 1: my dad's job. Again, I'm curious, as you have moved
Speaker 1: from the East coast to the Midwest, then to the South,
Speaker 1: are there any big differences between the three or were
Speaker 1: you guys made aware of your immigrant status in a
Speaker 1: way that you didn't expect it. Fact, probably is one
Speaker 1: of the most liberal cities that I have been in,
Speaker 1: where everybody from all walks of life is welcome and
Speaker 1: no one is strange, no queer people, no black people,
Speaker 1: not Asian people, like It's a very large community from everywhere.
Speaker 1: Probably I was suspecting that experience when we moved to Minnesota,
Speaker 1: and that was not the case. In many ways, we
Speaker 1: really never made friends that were from Minnesota. They say,
Speaker 1: Minnesota nice. Yes, it's true. People work an extra mile
Speaker 1: to help you, to direct you. But that experience that
Speaker 1: we had is that there are people that will not
Speaker 1: open their houses to you if you are a foreigner,
Speaker 1: if you are from somewhere else. And the reason is
Speaker 1: more simple that I imagine at the beginning to be
Speaker 1: is that people have lived in Minnesota for generations. Literally,
Speaker 1: it's very rare to see a Minnesota going out and
Speaker 1: not coming back or even not going out at all
Speaker 1: from the state. Because they have great universities there. They
Speaker 1: don't have the need and the family tides are very strong,
Speaker 1: so there is not chance for you to be part
Speaker 1: of any Minnesota family because they already have their niche
Speaker 1: and it's a very large niche. So our friends were
Speaker 1: from outside that the transplant that established in Minnesota, so
Speaker 1: that was very interesting. And then Georgia, it has been
Speaker 1: a little bit difficult for me. When we moved to Georgia,
Speaker 1: were actually more in the rural area. You're very spread out,
Speaker 1: and so we're like an hour drive to Atlanta versus Minneapolis.
Speaker 1: Was just hop skipping and jump away so they were
Speaker 1: two very different environments. People is more racist, and I
Speaker 1: have seen even people holding pistols or firearms of any
Speaker 1: type a couple of times. I I've seen men in
Speaker 1: their big trucks with that air cape is fifteen on
Speaker 1: the top of their like the truck in the States.
Speaker 1: There's not just the culture shocks that they had to experience,
Speaker 1: but also some discriminatory experiences as well. Being in their
Speaker 1: home country of Mexico, they were white slash white passing right.
Speaker 1: Mexico has its own problem and system of racism that
Speaker 1: is still being unpacked to this day, and it wasn't
Speaker 1: until they got to the States that they really felt discrimination.
Speaker 1: When he moved to a different country like the US,
Speaker 1: the connotation of race and ethnicity and language changes. I
Speaker 1: remember kind of having to listen to my mom fight
Speaker 1: to be taken seriously no matter where we were or
Speaker 1: the context at times, just to clarify in terms of
Speaker 1: racist what have you specifically experienced, Well, in me at
Speaker 1: the supermarket, Oh yeah, well in the supermarket, I just
Speaker 1: had an experience. A man was very upset with me.
Speaker 1: I was talking to you on the phone in Spanish,
Speaker 1: and I saw his reaction. He was very upset, and
Speaker 1: then I hung up because I need to pay. When
Speaker 1: I went out, he approached me and said, if you
Speaker 1: are in America, you should be speaking in English. And
Speaker 1: I say to you, I do speak English, and I'm
Speaker 1: speaking to you in English. No over the phone, And
Speaker 1: I say, why I am talking with my daughter. The
Speaker 1: communication between my daughter and I isn't my tongue language
Speaker 1: in Spanish and say, I don't know where your ancestors
Speaker 1: came from, but can you imagine for them to be
Speaker 1: treated the way you are treating me right now. My
Speaker 1: mom is one of the most outspoken and strongest people
Speaker 1: I know. She's the one who taught me to defend
Speaker 1: myself when I was being bullied in grade school and
Speaker 1: middle school. And my mom taught me about hitting someone
Speaker 1: with a white glove is what she calls it. It's
Speaker 1: a Claudi Ideas method where you don't have to be
Speaker 1: mean in any way back you just shine a light
Speaker 1: on what's happening and the ugliness that the other person
Speaker 1: is presenting. We're gonna get deeper into a person, options
Speaker 1: that my parents have faced and how they perceived themselves
Speaker 1: in different situations and cultures. After this break welcome back
Speaker 1: to when you're invisible. The more my parents were in
Speaker 1: this country, the more there started to be an intermingling
Speaker 1: of cultures. Not only did it impact them, but also
Speaker 1: their kids when they eventually had them, and my brother
Speaker 1: and all of this kind of becomes an interesting melting
Speaker 1: pot of its own within our family dynamics. We tried
Speaker 1: to go back to Mexico, but eventually, as you live
Speaker 1: more here, you started to lose many of the ties,
Speaker 1: and eventually you lose your culture in many ways, because
Speaker 1: culture is not a static thing. But yeah, the fact
Speaker 1: that we decided to leave in many Mexican line and
Speaker 1: we're not exactly traders, but I guess our families resent
Speaker 1: to the fact that we left. That's probably the price
Speaker 1: that you pay when you decide to leave your roots
Speaker 1: in In our case, we came here, not as a
Speaker 1: survival like many other immigrants. In our case was because
Speaker 1: we made the decision that it was the best for
Speaker 1: our future. We could have stayed in Mexico because of
Speaker 1: my education and Claudius skills and education, we probably would
Speaker 1: have succeeded in Mexico. But speaking of like being away
Speaker 1: from family, what was it like raising kids away from family.
Speaker 1: Especially Mexican culture is very family oriented in many ways,
Speaker 1: relief in many ways missing. Mexican families are very controlling, controlling,
Speaker 1: and also they like to be involved. Yes me, Titches is,
Speaker 1: let me put my opinion into it, and I can't
Speaker 1: help you with it all the time, whether you want
Speaker 1: it or not, whether you are at or not. So
Speaker 1: your dad and I had the opportunity to raise our
Speaker 1: children in the way we thought it was the best way.
Speaker 1: So it's a duality on the feeling that I have
Speaker 1: raising you far away. I think in this farness, we
Speaker 1: think we raise two very strong individuals with a mindset
Speaker 1: of their own. They have lived their life the way
Speaker 1: they wanted and I don't know if that transition would
Speaker 1: have been more difficult if you were surrounded with the
Speaker 1: loving environment of my family, and we have seen it
Speaker 1: in your own cousins. They don't detached from their families
Speaker 1: yet and they are. You left home at eating and
Speaker 1: it was very difficult for me to let you go,
Speaker 1: but gave me peace of mind knowing that your dad
Speaker 1: did the same when he left Durango to go to Monterey.
Speaker 1: But I did exactly what your cousins are doing right now,
Speaker 1: and I don't know if one is better than the
Speaker 1: other one. Definitely they were going to be missing on
Speaker 1: all that experience and the support system that sometimes takes place.
Speaker 1: We were fortunate to have really good friends along the
Speaker 1: way that in many ways they played the role of
Speaker 1: a close sister or brother or uncle or aunt. But
Speaker 1: I think that's surprised that you always paid. Because we
Speaker 1: weren't able to be close to our extended family, our
Speaker 1: nuclear family became really tight knit. My mom emphasized this
Speaker 1: idea of home should be a safe space, and within
Speaker 1: that safe space, we were teaching each other a lot.
Speaker 1: What's the hilarious story where Francisco or I taught you
Speaker 1: something with me? Is my pronunciation like what like bitch,
Speaker 1: which is what words c shore. That's why I never
Speaker 1: said the B word to nobody. I just by the
Speaker 1: sea shore, the bedding chit. I just can't even contain yourself.
Speaker 1: It's like I just gotta laugh. That is another one,
Speaker 1: and they laugh and laugh and laugh at me and said,
Speaker 1: I know, but I cannot say it any other way.
Speaker 1: I do also love the memory of like teaching you
Speaker 1: what badass means. Yeah, I used to teach quite a
Speaker 1: bit in Minnesota. So I got some feedback from students.
Speaker 1: Sometimes they praise you, sometimes they tell you that you're
Speaker 1: the worst teacher ever, could be a roller crouster when
Speaker 1: you read those reviews. But one day the statement said
Speaker 1: the teacher wears really badass sweaters. So it wasn't sure
Speaker 1: if it was a compliment or or here she was
Speaker 1: insulting me or what. So I asked the children, I
Speaker 1: have a question for Literally, we were at dinner and
Speaker 1: he goes, I have a question for you. What does
Speaker 1: badass mean? Why? And I was like why, what's the contact?
Speaker 1: And I was like that's a good thing, and he's like, oh, okay.
Speaker 1: In all seriousness, though, my family was really open to
Speaker 1: new experiences and whatever we grew into and became. I
Speaker 1: always tell this story about Maria. She was in preschool
Speaker 1: and she had a wonderful best friend Jody, and she
Speaker 1: will always say, Jody, this, Mommy, Jody, Dad, Jody, Jody, Jody,
Speaker 1: say mom can Jody come home? And the evening before
Speaker 1: mommy pink shorts and white shirts, and Pony tells Mommy,
Speaker 1: why honey, because Jody will be dressed the same way
Speaker 1: and said okay. I loved a good matching outfit. Yeah.
Speaker 1: And I go to school and I see these two
Speaker 1: little girls hand by hand running out to meeting me.
Speaker 1: And this girl was a black girl from Ghana, and
Speaker 1: Marian never mentioned the color of her skin. It was Jody, Jody, Jody.
Speaker 1: And when I saw them, I just started crying, bowling
Speaker 1: my eyes and I say, wow, I believe in a god,
Speaker 1: no church, no religion, but I believe in a higher power.
Speaker 1: And I just thank God that my child was teaching
Speaker 1: me such an amazing lesson because you grew up well.
Speaker 1: My grandparents were very wealthy until my mother got married.
Speaker 1: Right after my mother got married, they lost everything. So
Speaker 1: you can imagine their friendships in Monterrey. All of us
Speaker 1: were white, right, So racism existed, even if it was
Speaker 1: not spoken. Indigenous people people that come to Monterrey to
Speaker 1: work from Michuaka and from the southern part of Mexico,
Speaker 1: they were black. They had just brown skin. There's also
Speaker 1: a decent size of Afro Mexicanos. Yeah, but but we
Speaker 1: don't talk about it. We never saw in Mexico. Basically,
Speaker 1: the air existence is often denied. Yes, the Mexican government
Speaker 1: to this day still does not count the Afro Mexican
Speaker 1: population as part of the official Yeah, but if you
Speaker 1: ask an average Mexican is we're not racist here. Mexico
Speaker 1: has so much to yet unpack that they don't even
Speaker 1: fully realize, and they're getting there. And Maria was one
Speaker 1: of the first people that taught me to see people
Speaker 1: lesson equal. I remember having conversations with you guys about race,
Speaker 1: Remember having conversations with you guys about LGBTQ communities, right,
Speaker 1: Like I remember back in the day, I don't agree
Speaker 1: with what they do, but you can do it in
Speaker 1: your own home, right kind of thing, and like having
Speaker 1: kind of like a fight in the car about it
Speaker 1: and like of why And to watch you guys get
Speaker 1: to the place where you're like people are people do
Speaker 1: whatever you want, like cool, like no opinion whatsoever, and
Speaker 1: like hi, nice to meet your partner and going to
Speaker 1: weddings and like there is no longer that reservation, which
Speaker 1: is incredible to watch. And I think that's a huge
Speaker 1: testament to like you guys and just humanity. That's what's
Speaker 1: so beautiful about people, Like you said, Mom, this interest
Speaker 1: in change and how change can be so integral and
Speaker 1: how we allow ourselves to grow is the only way right,
Speaker 1: because that process is true change, and if only we
Speaker 1: understand that change could bring us closer together instead of
Speaker 1: pulling apart from each other. So while my family did
Speaker 1: have to grapple with tough topics, we eventually work through
Speaker 1: them all. And one of the things that was particularly
Speaker 1: a point of contention between my mother and I was sex,
Speaker 1: sexuality and the perception of femininity because Mexico is a
Speaker 1: very Catholic country still, like I was dealing with a
Speaker 1: more conservative viewpoint in our household that I have changed,
Speaker 1: I know, but we have to say it for the podcast.
Speaker 1: So living in this country definitely took a toll on me.
Speaker 1: I give my mom a lot of appreciation and I'm
Speaker 1: impressed by my mother's ability to grow. And something I
Speaker 1: find curious is the ways that he's been protective over
Speaker 1: our extended family and at times hesitant to push them
Speaker 1: to change. I remember t M, my listeners, t M
Speaker 1: my warning, like when a girl starts to wax, Like
Speaker 1: when I started getting interesting and having waxes. I remember
Speaker 1: you were like lie to your grandmother about it, Like
Speaker 1: you're not getting a bikini wax, You're getting a leg wax.
Speaker 1: Or the fact. I mean, I'm going to say this
Speaker 1: and maybe the family will find out. Like I remember
Speaker 1: when I told you I was by both of you
Speaker 1: handled it while in the car the first time. You're like, okay, cool,
Speaker 1: moving on. But I remember when we had a conversation,
Speaker 1: You're like, don't tell our family when you're in Mexico.
Speaker 1: Why is that? It's not about me being worried not
Speaker 1: to be accepted, but it was me trying to protect
Speaker 1: you from projection or from questioning, or even make them
Speaker 1: feel uncomfortable. Changing conservative more religion Mexican mentality is more difficult,
Speaker 1: and putting you in an uncomfortable situation is what I
Speaker 1: didn't want to happen, because it is why does she
Speaker 1: need to do that? For what type of bikinni she's
Speaker 1: going to wear? And white four who she's going with?
Speaker 1: You know, it's all this question is behind right, And
Speaker 1: I don't disagree with hiding things out of protection or
Speaker 1: simplicity sake, but it is interesting to think about because
Speaker 1: you know, sometimes I have the attitude of like I'm
Speaker 1: gonna knock the fucking door down right. Both me and
Speaker 1: France have that, which I've had to learn how to
Speaker 1: temper Oh yes, just chuckles, just chuckles. But it is
Speaker 1: interesting to hear the full reasoning more when we return
Speaker 1: to when yere invisible. Welcome back to when you're invisible.
Speaker 1: Everybody today, the way we talk about identity and identity politics,
Speaker 1: we want people to fit into one box, but in reality,
Speaker 1: everyone is filled with layers that are influenced not just
Speaker 1: by every aspect of an individual, but also their experiences
Speaker 1: and the places that they live. Like I've said, my
Speaker 1: parents they both identified as white in Mexico, but that's
Speaker 1: despite having indigenous roots, which we're going to talk about.
Speaker 1: Then they come to the US and suddenly they're not
Speaker 1: just white, they're not just Mexican. They're immigrants. They're suddenly
Speaker 1: being grouped with other Latinos in the census, and that
Speaker 1: comes with a whole new set of assumptions that my
Speaker 1: parents oscillated in and out of fitting into. And while
Speaker 1: that's happening, they're constantly coming up not just against others perceptions,
Speaker 1: but they're own. One side of the coin is how
Speaker 1: my mom is perceived as white even among other Mexican immigrants.
Speaker 1: Like when she wants to connect and fit in with
Speaker 1: other Latinos, sometimes the first thing they see is her
Speaker 1: white skin, her hazel eyes, and the fact that she
Speaker 1: dyes her hair blonde. That is until she speaks Spanish. Yeah,
Speaker 1: in the case of Claudia, when she used to teach
Speaker 1: to the Spanic communities back in Minnesota, she had to
Speaker 1: convince them that she was Mexican, even that I speak
Speaker 1: the language perfectly. Right, Where did you learn to speak
Speaker 1: Spanish like that? And I said, excuse me, in Mexico,
Speaker 1: no way. What happened is that Latin American immigrants that
Speaker 1: come in a different circumstances. They come in Mexico from
Speaker 1: that southern part of the country most of the time,
Speaker 1: you know, Soccatecas, Michoka, and Wachaca, and all of them
Speaker 1: creates small communities where you can go to the Mexican
Speaker 1: side of Saint Paul and to the Mexican side of
Speaker 1: Minneapolis and you will see just Mexicans. They're right, but
Speaker 1: I didn't fit the pattern of a Mexican person because
Speaker 1: of the color of my skin and the color of
Speaker 1: my hair and whatever, or my education or so. It
Speaker 1: was really interesting to say the least, to see these
Speaker 1: people saying, no way, you are not. We do have
Speaker 1: indigenous roots and we do have a whole part of
Speaker 1: us that often goes ignored because of the whitewashing part
Speaker 1: of us. That's right, Yeah, just think about it. What
Speaker 1: do we say, oh, yeah, you know in my French, English, Spanish,
Speaker 1: but never we say and where the martinis andres are
Speaker 1: coming from our most recent parents and the grandparents rejected
Speaker 1: those roots, that's right, So what happens? So it was
Speaker 1: a filter to get rid of our own identity, right,
Speaker 1: and the expression of that identity. It's really beautiful to
Speaker 1: hear my parents acknowledge the indigenous side of us. It's
Speaker 1: closer to us than what my family has been allowed
Speaker 1: to express. And it's crazy how such a prideful group
Speaker 1: of people can hide such a large part of the self.
Speaker 1: Seeing pictures my great grandfather is super dark and having
Speaker 1: to acknowledge those moments too have not just the physical
Speaker 1: but culturally we have traditions that are indigenous, but we
Speaker 1: don't discuss it. And so it's like really heartbreaking and
Speaker 1: also very beautiful to have this moment of realizing how
Speaker 1: deeply ingrained like self hate and desire to be white
Speaker 1: and perceived as white, and to carry the traditions of
Speaker 1: white cultures can go. Getting to explore and be honest
Speaker 1: about what my family was coming from allowed me to
Speaker 1: open that door to appreciate my full self. One of
Speaker 1: the first moments that I saw my dad a grapple
Speaker 1: with not only his indigenous roots but his immigrant status
Speaker 1: his Mexican status is Latino status, is when the University
Speaker 1: of Minnesota labeled him a professor of color, and it
Speaker 1: confused him for a minute, and so I wanted him
Speaker 1: to speak on that experience. That's in itself was a
Speaker 1: little bit of my own evolution with recognizing the different
Speaker 1: shase of racism that we have. The reason I was
Speaker 1: classified the blood label as well because probably I marked
Speaker 1: the block of Hispanic because of my name. So I
Speaker 1: think automatically the university started to send me invitations to
Speaker 1: be part of the faculty of color, which initially interestingly
Speaker 1: and now looking back, I felt uncomfortable because I said,
Speaker 1: I'm not faculty of color, I'm white. But I think
Speaker 1: I realized that actually was my own bias, my own racism,
Speaker 1: the realization that I do have Native Mexican ancestors, and
Speaker 1: it doesn't matter what the color of my skin is,
Speaker 1: but the color of my origins that's what really matters.
Speaker 1: The last few years, I changed my viewpoint and said, no,
Speaker 1: I am a faculty of color. It's okay that I
Speaker 1: consider myself faculty of color. The thing is, it's not
Speaker 1: only up to you to decide all the time. And
Speaker 1: I want to acknowledge that in some communities of color,
Speaker 1: I'm automatically accepted as part of it, as a person
Speaker 1: of color. Other times I'm told I'm white and I'm
Speaker 1: rejected from certain spaces. But of course I don't always
Speaker 1: pass for white. I'm off and asked what are you,
Speaker 1: or told you look exotic. My blood, my culture, and
Speaker 1: color can feel at odds in different spaces. Me and
Speaker 1: my dad and many others are trying to navigate this.
Speaker 1: But no matter where you are, there's this pressure to
Speaker 1: meld and be a part of one group or another.
Speaker 1: It can be hard to just hold onto your unique identity.
Speaker 1: You can feel like you're never enough. And one of
Speaker 1: the things that my parents dealt with is feeling the
Speaker 1: pressure of melding into the fabric of American society, and
Speaker 1: not only that, but the fabric of Latino community and
Speaker 1: what that looks like. What do you think about the
Speaker 1: term Latino or Latina with the Latino American community, we
Speaker 1: are different people raising a different way, just like the
Speaker 1: English speakers people from Australia are different from people from England,
Speaker 1: and even in the United States, each region is completely different.
Speaker 1: But the Latini that the embracing of the culture and
Speaker 1: the language. I think it is beautiful. My reaction to
Speaker 1: be in Latino. I think I'm fine with term Latino.
Speaker 1: I think it's a good way to try to incorporate anyone. Yes,
Speaker 1: if you ask me, probably would I identify myself ethnically,
Speaker 1: I would say his Panic, But Latino is fine with me.
Speaker 1: The temptation of putting everyone together under a single term
Speaker 1: is the temptation that exists everywhere. For the most part,
Speaker 1: they have a common language that helps, but at the
Speaker 1: same time, the Argentina and culture is fairly different from
Speaker 1: the Bolivian culture and from the Mexican culture. I gotta say,
Speaker 1: since we're talking about term Latino or Latina, the Latins term,
Speaker 1: it's confusing to me. Yeah, for me too, I don't
Speaker 1: think it's necessary. If you want to say that gender neutral,
Speaker 1: you just say Latin neutral. I think we forget that
Speaker 1: was there a long time before Latino or Latino culture
Speaker 1: like it was Latin culture. Luckily, because of where I
Speaker 1: sit in my little New York City among many different
Speaker 1: kinds of Latin people, I astal I'll be like Latino, Latino, Latin, Latino,
Speaker 1: Latin X and to me, I'm like, it's all of it.
Speaker 1: One of the things that it's interesting is that many
Speaker 1: immigrants when they um to those countries, often times are
Speaker 1: encouraged to renounce the original origin, and they themselves renounce
Speaker 1: it because they are subjected to discrimination and they want
Speaker 1: to melt as much as skin. That's something we never
Speaker 1: did because neither Claudia or I rejector or nationality that
Speaker 1: we still have to this a then we basically tall
Speaker 1: our children. You make a decision. We're proud to be Mexican,
Speaker 1: We're proud to be American to this country has treated
Speaker 1: us really well. We have many things to think to
Speaker 1: our time here in the US, the many friends that
Speaker 1: we have in the US, and we're very happy that
Speaker 1: you feel proud of both of them when we're another.
Speaker 1: Becoming comfortable with myself is partially thanks to my parents
Speaker 1: and my family and spending so much time in both
Speaker 1: my countries and the Spanish language has been a big
Speaker 1: part of this journey. Having been the first gen you
Speaker 1: face discrimination, and not just with America, but you also
Speaker 1: kind of face it a little bit when you talk
Speaker 1: to home country people, like you're the good or goodingal
Speaker 1: and do you understand me when I speak Spanish to you?
Speaker 1: Or you have a slight accent. I was really good
Speaker 1: at erasing my American accent in Spanish. If I got
Speaker 1: re immersed, I was like, Bam, now I talk like
Speaker 1: a native, and that was something to be proud of.
Speaker 1: It is something to be proud of, but it's also
Speaker 1: something to be proud of that my accent is going
Speaker 1: to be different because I am not you. But it's like, yeah,
Speaker 1: you kind of face it from both. So then you
Speaker 1: choose to potentially reject the Latino part of you because
Speaker 1: you're like, well, if they don't want me and they're
Speaker 1: going to make fun of me for it, I'm going
Speaker 1: to simplify in this way. And then you lose it,
Speaker 1: and then as an adult it's hard. We looked out
Speaker 1: where we had some really loving family in Mexico that
Speaker 1: I wanted to talk to them and I wanted to
Speaker 1: be connected, and I was prideful it was so important
Speaker 1: for me. While I spoke Spanish conversationally with family members
Speaker 1: in Mexico and Latinos here in New York, I also
Speaker 1: learned it formally while I was at Columbia. It's funny
Speaker 1: because my parents kept suggesting I should maybe take formal
Speaker 1: Spanish for native speakers. There was moments of shame, of
Speaker 1: like is my Spanish not enough? We thought that your
Speaker 1: job oppor changes by having two languages would be much
Speaker 1: greater if you get some formal Spanish in your education,
Speaker 1: which I mean it has helped. I've taken translation jobs,
Speaker 1: I have acted in Spanish, and getting to tutor in Spanish.
Speaker 1: I never heard my parents mix the languages. I was
Speaker 1: around a lot of people who only spoke one language
Speaker 1: or the other. And so while I did eventually meet
Speaker 1: that mix in New York, for a long time I
Speaker 1: didn't fit in because I didn't know how to mix
Speaker 1: the language is We tried to avoid exing the two
Speaker 1: languages together. Oftentimes I get praise by some of my
Speaker 1: peers in Mexico or family in Mexico because they said, oh,
Speaker 1: you haven't picked up any of the English slangs or anything.
Speaker 1: We really want to conserve the language. My parents desire
Speaker 1: to preserve the language is very much a desire to
Speaker 1: preserve the culture, Mexican culture. Back when Mexicans were considered
Speaker 1: wet backs and beaners, and people liked the food, but
Speaker 1: they didn't fully understand it. And now post Coco, Disney's
Speaker 1: Coco and seeing the flourishment of dachim tequila and mescal right,
Speaker 1: people are now shifting their perception about Mexicans and the
Speaker 1: culture and have a lot more love and respect for it.
Speaker 1: But I find it really impressive that my parents were
Speaker 1: doing this in an era where it was so negative
Speaker 1: to habit. Can I ask you our signature question, when
Speaker 1: do you feel invisible? Invisible? If you go back to
Speaker 1: our experience in Minnesota or even here in Georgia, the
Speaker 1: fact that we are not the traditional Americans in traditional
Speaker 1: American communities, I think you tend to be ignored. Minnesota,
Speaker 1: for example, we had the experience that, as Claudia described
Speaker 1: that we used to invite our neighbors to have dinner
Speaker 1: to our place, but rarely any neighbors invites us back.
Speaker 1: No one invited back, and we had several of those
Speaker 1: cases for different reasons. I don't know exactly if it's
Speaker 1: the definition of invisible, but at least is you're not
Speaker 1: important enough to actually have you in their homes. You
Speaker 1: feel invisible because you are not that knowledge, you know,
Speaker 1: And many times during my life I have felt like
Speaker 1: that sometimes, even to be honest with you, I have
Speaker 1: felt invisible in my own family. But maybe it's my
Speaker 1: making too, because you have accomplished some You are my
Speaker 1: pride and my joy. Your dad went to Cornell, because
Speaker 1: your brother came out of Yale and Princeton, because you
Speaker 1: went to Columbia and went through a difficult time and
Speaker 1: you were able to fulfill and say I will go
Speaker 1: through it with your strong will, right, And I am not.
Speaker 1: I am a mama who keep the house clean, or
Speaker 1: kept the house clean and my children safe. But that's it, right.
Speaker 1: I sometimes felt invisible with my own husband because he
Speaker 1: did not acknowledge therefore that I put in my home.
Speaker 1: He does believe me, he does very often, but many times, however,
Speaker 1: did not right, like I am not enough because I
Speaker 1: haven't done the professional part of it, and I'm probably
Speaker 1: my own doing nothing to do with you guys. I
Speaker 1: have been felt sometimes invisible in that way because my
Speaker 1: work is simple, because my work is has nothing to
Speaker 1: do with professional accomplishments, right, I sometimes live through you,
Speaker 1: the three of you. What did I tell you? Go
Speaker 1: and see the world? And the three of you have
Speaker 1: done it, not me, and I feel invisible for that too.
Speaker 1: I just wanted to be honest. You know, I'm glad
Speaker 1: that you're sharing the story because I think you're not alone.
Speaker 1: I think there are thousands and thousands of millions of
Speaker 1: women that their role has been traditionally just at home,
Speaker 1: and they feel that they are not accomplishing anything in
Speaker 1: their cases worse than years, because there are women that
Speaker 1: even get abused after not even being seen. Very torching
Speaker 1: that you are willing to share that story because that's
Speaker 1: a great opportunity that will reach out to people being
Speaker 1: in similar roles as yours. That really reminds me of
Speaker 1: why I do this podcast. My family and I have
Speaker 1: come from roots where a lot of people go invisible,
Speaker 1: and a lot of women, and honestly, this is like
Speaker 1: for them, and it's for my mom, it's for my dad,
Speaker 1: it's for my brother, it's for my best friends. It's
Speaker 1: for people who have not been able to get to
Speaker 1: the dreams or live a full life that they deserve
Speaker 1: or that they live a beautiful life and no one
Speaker 1: ever knows or appreciates it. And that's the thing is
Speaker 1: the world that I've gotten to explore is one filled
Speaker 1: with incredible people. There is a story behind each person,
Speaker 1: and that we are able to embrace those people and
Speaker 1: just recognize that much a person, what a difference that
Speaker 1: will make. Thank you so much for coming on this
Speaker 1: journey with me and giving me the grace in the
Speaker 1: space to have these conversations and thoughts out loud on
Speaker 1: the first season of When You're Invisible. Hope to see
Speaker 1: you soon, don't forget to like, comment, and subscribe. You
Speaker 1: can find this episode and future ones on the I
Speaker 1: Heart Radio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts.
Speaker 1: I'm your host and creator Maria Fern, with executive producers
Speaker 1: Anna Stump, Nikki Ittour and bans producer Dylan Hoyer, with
Speaker 1: associate producer Claudia Martha Corena and post production producer Daisy James.
Speaker 1: Original theme music by Tony Bruno. When You're Invisible is
Speaker 1: an i Heeart podcast network production in partnership with Michael Kura.
Speaker 1: Cast Network