My intentions are I'm living my life and my life is created by my parents, my different experiences, my languages, my culture and, yeah, my kids do have very Spanish-influenced names.
I'm very influenced by landscapes, not so much the way places look as the way the names sound. In this country we've got so many cultures, and the place names - the Spanish names and the Indian names, which are so incredibly musical.
The language in New Mexico is very different. At first when you hear the speech here, you don't really know what to do with it, but then I just went with it, because as a writer as well as a translator I do believe that translated words are not different names for the same thing. They're different names for different things. I tried to stay as true as I could, so I used Ruben Cobos' dictionary of Southwestern Spanish, and when I went into Spanish I never assumed the word I would use would be the word a nuevomexicano would use.
This happens to a lot of kids from different backgrounds - they lose a lot of their parents' and grandparents' teachings, language and culture because they have to deal with another language and culture 24/7. By the time I was 44, I was terrible at Spanish. I was always intimidated whenever I had to speak it.
In Chinese culture, it wouldn't occur to kids to question or talk back to their parents. In American culture, kids in books, TV shows and movies constantly score points with their snappy back talk. Typically, it's the parents who need to be taught a life lesson - by their children.
My whole life, I was thinking of names for kids, and I had a couple of kind of different names. I just didn't want him to be one of the crowd, with a - no offense to people with these names, but I don't want him to be a Bob, Dave, Harry, Larry.
All my kids' given names, the first names, are all from people in my life, and they have my husband's last name. And we were very thoughtful about it.
I get a lot of parents coming up to me, telling me they are grooming their kids to be professional athletes. I'm really against that. I think it's a great life, and yeah, you can lead them in that direction. I think a lot of parents live their lives through the kids. Because they didn't make it, they want their kids to make it. It puts a lot of undue pressure on the kids.
My first languages are German and Spanish because I was brought up by a Spanish mother and a German father, so I always spoke both languages at home. I'm very thankful that I was brought up in a bilingual house.
Well, my first languages are German and Spanish because I was brought up by a Spanish mother and a German father, so I always spoke both languages at home. I'm very thankful that I was brought up in a bilingual house.
Ultimately we have the vision of expanding to a world wide platform that allows kids from the U.S. to go on field trips to China and adults around the world to make friends from different walks of life and people who have different life experiences.
What I know for sure is that your life is a multipart series of all your experiences- and each experience is created by your thoughts, intentions, and actions to teach you what you need to know. Your life is a journey of learning to love yourself first and then extending that love to others in every encounter.
I learned so much in Zimbabwe, in particular about the need for humility in our ambition to extend mental health care in countries where there were very few psychiatrists and where the local culture harboured very different views about mental illness and healing. These experiences have profoundly influenced my thinking.
I lived in Greece for about four years of my life, and living there had a huge impact on my life growing up. My father was very much adamant that we would learn about our culture. It's a very rich culture to be a part of since it has such a great history behind it. I definitely carry that in my job, and I am very passionate.
I have sung in over 20 different languages and enjoyed it. I have even sung in foreign languages like Spanish and Russian.
I don't like MTV, and I don't like the culture that goes with it. It's OK in very small doses, maybe. Nevertheless, it's a social reality and has influenced how kids perceive things around them, the pace of life and the way people do things.
My dad was born in 1909, my mother in 1914, I believe. Their life experiences were different than younger parents, so I grew up with a different perspective.