Gorgeous weather, a break from school, worry less times are all the signs of vacation. Vacation is a time where you can relax and have nothing to worry about. Everybody loves vacation. Do you like going on vacations like me? Have you ever gone to a country other than the United States? Sometimes situations can be different than the way you’re accustomed to. Cultures differ from each other. Some vary little while others vary drastically. Cultures vary by their clothing, what food they eat, their religion, and the language they speak. The most difficult part of going to a foreign country is the language barrier. If you do not know the new language fluently, it’s going to be hard to understand basic things in that country. This is what I learned when my family went on a vacation to Mexico!



I myself thought it was something crazy when we arrived at our hotel in Mexico. The culture was different to Caucasians but would be less different than the ways of the Koreans or Japanese people. Even though I was taking a Spanish class in school, I could barely understand signs and other simple things like that. I was at a restaurant and there was a group of Hispanics chatting amongst themselves. One of them said something to the others and the rest of the group looked at me and started laughing. A bunch of questions ran through my head, “is there something wrong with the way I look? What are they saying? Are they disrespecting my family and I?” I wish I knew what they were saying because it was killing me not knowing. I now know what it feels like to be the outcast. I also know how people of a different language, barely informed of the English language, feel. How I felt was left out, confused, embarrassed, and lost. Even though my family was with me, I still felt left out of this country. I felt as if it were the 1950’s or ‘60’s when segregation was popular. I was the black in a group of white folks. The look on everyone’s face when they looked at me was as if I had bright pink hair or I had forgotten to put pants on.
The food in Mexico is not a huge difference than that of the Americans because we have Mexican food in the United States and I have had it enough that I am used to it. One thing I noticed while I was in Mexico is that Mexican food tastes so much better in Mexico than here in the United States. I had American food at my resort and let me tell you, it sucked. A hamburger at a 4 star resort tasted like the hamburger of the cafeteria. They weren’t as flavorful as the ones in the United States’ finest restaurants as I expected them to be. But the Mexican food there was how they say it, “Muyo Bien.”

I learned that you should prepare yourself for things to come on vacation. My experience helped me learn more things in life and helped me see a different perspective on not every day things in life. Even though there was that one challenge on my vacation, I still had a blast in Mexico. Enjoying the sunshine, going to water parks, zip lining, and enjoying the authentic food, is just some of the good ways that made that vacation amazing.