I don’t know where to start considering I have so much to say, so I’m going to start from the very beginning.
   

All through elementary “I had no thoughts” I didn’t think about how I may be different from others or how people saw me, because in my eyes I was the exact same as everyone else. Back then I didn’t know what a race was, that all changed when I first went to middle school and throughout my years of middle school. As my family put it I would be going to school with a lot of white people (they assumed there would be more white than hispanic), they made it sound as if they were this whole different type of species and explained to me the ways they would act or the things they would say. I remember thinking How are they so different? Would I turn like them? Would they not talk to me?. So many questions that I didn’t know the answer to and I had to figure out on my own.
   

After awhile I knew the difference between me and of the other girls at school, duh they had lighter skin, but why did that matter to my family? At this time in middle school (6th grade) I knew my race was hispanic but I didn’t know what it “meant” to be hispanic. I had seen certain entertainment before, where they reference to hispanics liking beans, being named Jose or Maria, we were always the help but again I still didn’t see how this affected me, until I had experiences of my own.
   

I remember for about every time I went into HEB with my father we were followed by a white security guard, right from when we walked into the store to when we were getting in line to pay. At first my father and I didn’t notice it but after awhile her face was something we were expecting to see when we walked in, it made my father and I very angry because it wasn’t like we were going to steal and we understood that it was part of her job but to follow ONLY us was a little extreme. My father got so mad one day that as she stood next to the aisle as we paid he pulled out a hundred dollar bill as to say    “I have money so I don’t have to steal” and thank god after that she stopped but it’s still a memory marked in my brain.Experiences such as people giving me weird looks, people assuming I spoke spanish, etc. All these things made me aware how some people saw me, I was just a little girl who’s name was most likely named Maria and loved beans. This made me aware of my appearance, so as an “act of rebellion” I made sure that anywhere I went my hair was decent, and my outfit had to perfect in a sense. My appearance mattered to me so much that if the people I was with looked anything short of good it angered me, I had a point to prove, a point that I was more than a skin color and some cliches.
   

Now as I am about to enter high school, my obsession with appearance has lessened because I realized by acting on the racist/cliche thoughts of others made me believe them, I gave the thoughts power by acting on them. But my point still very much needs proving, I have yet to finish proving that not just me but other hispanics out there are more than what we seem. In order to grow as a human race we need to stop judging each other, and this goes for everyone the whites, asians, blacks, indians, etc. We need to also show more recognition for each race’s history for example I know that the blacks went through a lot to gain equality so rightfully they should get a whole month to celebrate their accomplishments but what about the hispanics? We too fought for equality and justice yet all we get is one day (cinco de mayo) where we truthfully celebrate while others celebrate by throwing on sombreros and mock our culture. Or what about the Japanese when they were thrown in camps after the bombing of pearl harbor, approximately 110,000 were put in these camps. They were forced out of their homes and yet as far as I know we the U.S who threw them into the camp don’t even give them a day to celebrate. The point i’m trying to make is that we’re more than a color and together we need to stop judging each other because in the end we all want to be better than the stereotypes that confine us. As Muhammed Ali said “Hating people because of their color is wrong. It doesn’t matter what color does the hating. It’s just wrong”. For the rest of my life I will try to prove my point because I am not named Maria and I do not like beans.