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Milagros Acosta Carmona

6-03-2015
EDU 280
Cultural Autobiography
I come from a small country in South America (Peru) where Castellan Spanish is
our first language and where the vast majority of the population is pretty much the
same. We are either a mix of Spaniards and Indian Peruvians, or Spaniards and black
which are called mestizos, there is also a large population of Chinese immigrants. I
grew up in the capital city of Peru -Lima, in a middle class family of six siblings including
myself. I did not have any cultural diversity while growing up. I went to Catholic school
and my high school has never hosted a foreign exchange student. We all have the
same social class and religion, so needless to say I rely on education and media to
enlighten me of other cultures. I have done some traveling within the country, and have
had opportunities to observe other cultures and learn about different people of diverse
backgrounds. I have learned that even though I may be the same ethnicity and religion
as somebody else, we may have different beliefs and practices based on which side of
the country we lived on.
I have always been interest in learning about new cultures and traditions. I
decided to come to the United States when I was 21 years old as a cultural exchange
student. While getting ready for my departure, I was very nervous about the language
barriers I thought I may face. I first arrived to New York City, New York, where I stayed
for a week. While there, I met with a group of other cultural exchange students from
different parts of the world. They were mostly from countries like Germany, Poland,

Czech Republic, Brazil, Australia, and Italy. From day-to-day, I had a storm of cultural
diversity from the variety of people and the countries they were from. We all were
required to have a background of English before coming to the USA, but we all had
thick accents trying to communicate to each other, so things werent easy. We all used
the universal body language to communicate with each other to understand our needs
and requests. For me personally, I got along better with Italian and Polish people from
the diverse group. A week flew by and I then was transferred to Ventura, California,
where I made friends with a Mexican girl and Polish girl. We were so different in so
many ways but yet we had a special bond. When living in Peru, I saw many movies
about World War II, where I was under the misconception that all Polish people were
Jewish, but I was wrong. From what I understood from my Polish friend, it seems that
the most popular religion in Poland is actually Catholicism.
After a few years in Ventura, I moved to Las Vegas in 2006. It was harder to
adapt to Las Vegas than California. The life-style was so different from everything I was
used to while living in the United States. An element of Las Vegas I noticed was the
different variety of accents from different parts of the U.S. that lived in Las Vegas
some of them I struggled (and still struggle today) to understand.
Shortly after moving to Las Vegas, I started College. I was able to meet more
people from different cultures and was able to understand American culture more. I
have to say, I love it here! I dont see myself going back to Peru to live ever again.

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