ABSTRACT
Most people would kill for the opportunity to seek a better life in America. My friends told me that Americans are so rich that money is strewn on the ground like garbage. A friend told me to stick gum on my shoe so I could pick up the money off the street without looking bad. Although I believed these myths, my life in a “good” American school was quite different. School was filled with racial problems. People of color did not understand each other and no one understood me. But everyone united in hating the Haitians. We were stereotyped as having bad hygiene, carriers of diseases, and people feared us because we practiced voodoo. People called me “HBO” for Haitian Body Odor. School was traumatic. I never had problems with who I was before because everyone in Haiti was the same as me. Now I had very negative feelings about who I was. I was constantly teased after school. I began to internalize the stereotypes and hate myself. The only way to survive was to speak and look like everyone else. I refused to talk or participate in class for fear someone would hear my accent. I had transformed from a very outgoing self-assured child in Haiti to a withdrawn depressed kid with a low self-esteem. I did not speak in public or admit I was Haiti until I went to college.
