DELGADO, Jasmine Rivera

If you want to know my historia, then I think I have to go back a little farther than me. My mamá y papá were born and raised outside of Mexicali in Baja. Right next to the border. Neither of their families were well off and mi mamá got pregnant with me young. When they found out, they knew that life in Mexico was not the life they wanted me, or any other children, to be raised in. So with that in mind, they ran and managed to cross the border to the U.S. Months later, in Chula Vista California, I was born. Following me, mis padres had three more kids. Mi papa was good with electrical work and he managed an under the table job in that where he raised enough money to get my abuela and abuelo over.


From the time I was muy poco, I knew I was different than the rest of mi family. Somtimes, things would happen. When I was upset, or my emotions were high especially. Eventually my 11th birthday came and I found out just how different I was. Sometimes it made things a little awkward at the skate park.


Did I mention I love skateboarding and extreme sports in general?


Pero de todos modos...


My first year of school, I attended Ilvermorny. I flew through my coursework, taking as much as I could and then some. I was fascinated by this new world I found myself  a part of. It was here that I heard people talk about a more specialised school in Switzerland. I begged my parents to send me. We talked to the school, and after some testing they agreed to allow me in on a scholarship. As long as I maintained basically near perfect scores, my scholarship would hold and my parents wouldn't have to pay an obnoxious amount of money.


I work really, really hard to stay in this school.


When I was 14 though, we were dealt a blow when mi papa passed away. Then 2 years ago, policía de inmigración caught up with mi mama and deported her. Ignore the fact that they aren't supposed to separate families. Thank God for Abuela and Abuelo. They took my brothers and sisters in and keep things as normal as possible for them while working to raise money to bring mi mama back. I was told explicitly to stay in school and work hard. I'm the only witch in my family and I think they think school is the best answer to getting out of our situation (not that I think they are wrong).


So I work my ass off to keep up my grades and work on petitions and reforms on the side. And somewhere I find the time to be there for whoever needs a friend because love is what makes the world go round.