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Where do people find the strength and will to go on despite difficulties?

Essential Questions

How do separated families stay connected in today’s world?

What motivates many immigrants to work hard and succeed in the US?

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Opening Scene / Page One Moment

Opens with the writer peacefully star-gazing. Her tranquility is interrupted when her father asks to speak to her and puts the decision about her future in her hands. Will she join him in the US or stay with her mom and brother in El Salvador? Her decision sends her down a path along which she is still traveling, hoping to one day re-establish the peace that was shattered that evening.

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Timeline / Booktime

Begins with her father’s invitation for her to travel to the US, moves through her decision making process, her leave-taking and journey to the US. It ends in the present in which the writer strives to take advantage of the opportunities she has to improve her life, anticipating that doing so will make it possible for her to be reunited with her mother and brother.

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Describe the writer’s family. Who are its members? Where do they live?
How does the family stay connected?
At the beginning of the story something unusual happens. What is it?
Why does the father ask to speak to the writer?
For the writer, what are the pros and cons of saying yes? Make a two-column chart. Which side is longer?
Who has the power to change the writer’s mind? How does this person use her power?
What makes the journey emotionally very difficult for the writer?
In whom does the writer place her trust during the journey?
According to the writer, how do dreams come true?
What is the writer’s dream? Does she expect it to come true?

Guiding Questions

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“I was leaving behind everything I knew and heading to an unknown place, unknown people, unknown culture. I placed my life the hands of God, hoping He would be the one to safeguard my journey.” (P. 85)

The writer’s repetition of the word unknown helps the reader understand the source of her anxiety at traveling from her home. She then shares what helps her face that anxiety - her faith in God’s protective power.

Quotations & Figurative Language

“Not everything in life is rosy. You have to act not just dream, because if you don’t act and put effort in, dreams aren’t going to become reality…” (P. 85)

This captures the writer’s philosophy of life. You must work hard to build the life you want to live.

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“My life was like a piece of fragile glass that any word my mom would say, like, “Don’t go,” I wouldn’t have done.” Writer uses a simile to capture how her great love for her mother would have made her change her mind and stay had her mother asked her to do so.

“I imagined that was something horrible for my mom because she probably wondered, What happened to me? Where was I? Was I okay? Alive? I knew that was destroying my mom…” The writer uses a series of questions to express the anxiety she imagines her mother is experiencing at not hearing from her daughter for fifteen days as she travels to the US.

“These tears I shed now, I shed with pride because I know that in the future these tears will become joy and much happiness and prosperity.” This imagery helps the reader connect to the writer because we have all cried both tears of sadness and tears of joy.

Literary Devices & Other Techniques to Elicit Caring

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Moments of Power and Beauty

Power: “…if I fail I will get up again with the strength of God, first, and then for my family that’s my strength to be able to keep going forward.” Faith and family both motivate and give the writer the strength to try hard.

Power: We were lying in a hammock talking and she was giving me wise advice. “Hija, if you leave for the United States it’s for a better future and to be better, not to be worse. And don’t think I’m making you go, believe me that my heart breaks in two knowing you’re leaving my side, but the decision is yours to make, not mine. You decide if you leave or not. But from my end, I support you in your choice.” The writer’s mother empowers her daughter by expressing her support for her no matter what choice she makes.

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Enduring Understandings

Immigrants often leave family behind with the hope of being reunited in the future.
Separation from loved ones can be especially difficult on important holidays and celebrations.
Being able to communicate with the people we love, whether in person or electronically, is vital to our emotional well-being.
People can find strength and hope through religious beliefs.

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Write two sentences in English and native language...

Discussion Prompts

Write a short essay/ journal entry…

Discuss aloud with the class...

(1) Discuss the title of the story. Why do you think the writer gave her story this title?

(2) How do the writer’s parents empower their daughter?

(3) How does the writer’s mother continue to influence her in the US?

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