Roberto Monologue

In A Place Where the Sea Remembers, Sandra Benitez invites us into a mesmerizing world filled with love, anger, tragedy and hope. This rich and bewitching story is a bittersweet portrait of the people in Santiago, a Mexican village by the sea. Each character faces a conflict that affects the course of his or her life. The characters in this conflict are Remedios, la curandera of the small town who listens to people’s stories and gives them advice, Marta, a 16 year old teenage girl, who was raped and became pregnant. Chayo is Marta’s big sister and Calendario is Chayo’s husband. Justo Flores, his conflict is person vs. self. One of the most important conflicts in this story is person vs. person, then person vs. supernatural followed by

Enrique’s mother’s decision of leaving couldn’t have been any worse, “She walks away. Donde esta mi mami? Enrique cries, over and over. Where is my mom? His mother never returns, and that decides Enrique’s fate” (Nazario 5). His mother leaving without saying a word to him was heartbreaking because he had no idea she was leaving forever. Enrique became unhappy and had to grow up with this feeling inside him which later caused him to make poor decisions. Being left by his mother, Enrique had to stay with his grandma and “every year on Mother’s day, he [made] a heart shaped card at school and [pressed] it into her hand. “I love you very much grandma”… but she is not his mother” (Nazario 12). The growing love for his grandma caused him to consider her as his mother. Since Enrique was young and didn’t understand why his mother had left him, he blamed her for not being there for him. Nazario hopes to persuade readers to feel like they need to dwell on the topic of immigration and notice that it is still happening

“I want to stay at the oasis,” the boy answered. “I’ve found Fatima and as far as I am concerned, she’s worth more than treasure.” Everyone knows what they want to do, but they are afraid of hurting those around them by abandoning everything in order to pursue our dream. Some do not realize that love is something to impel us, not something that will prevent us to go further. Those that genuinely wish us well want us to be happy and are prepared to accompany us on that journey. After hearing the Alchemist’s predictions and Fatima saying that he should go, Santiago decided to accompany the Alchemist and pursue his personal legend. Santiago overcame his problem when his father told him he can not travel, and he also perused his personal legend and did not hurt Fatima.

In the novel, Bless me, Ultima by Rudolfo Anaya, a boy goes through many more experiences than any child in the hot summer days in Santa Rosa, New Mexico. He witnesses the deaths of his close friends and family. This boy expresses his emotions and grief through his dreams, only to wake up with fear and confusion in his mind. Antonio’s life is filled with dreams that foreshadow future incidents, as well as influences Antonio’s beliefs of religion and ideas of innocence.

“On March 20, 2000, he goes to his grandmother Águeda’s house. He stands on the same porch that his mother disappeared from eleven years ago. He hugs Maria Isabel and Aunt Rosa Amelia. Then he steps off” (44).

Getting to know Sydney made me realize a lot more about life. Going into college I felt agitated because I wasn’t sure what I wanted to do with my life, and maybe moving here was a mistake, but Sydney reassured me. Although tomorrow is a mystery, we need to have faith that it’ll bring us exactly what we need. Her story of having a youth full of uncertainty and now having a life of complete sense has given me hope that I will be okay, and to just enjoy today and it’s opportunities.

As haunting as Antonio finds the owl, it is Lupito’s death that shows him his first horror in life. He sees the blood in the river, the blood on Lupito, and throughout the whole scene he hears the ever-present “lapping of the river” (20), as if the river was lapping up Lupito’s blood and his life like a thirsty dog. He is faced with, again, the difficult division between two identities: man and

When he was thirteen, IV broke his first mirror. He can remember how the glass sliced into his skin, like it was made of nothing, like he was made of nothing. It hadn't stung at first.

Rodriguez does not comfort whose mother even though he feels something is not right. Richard thinks that his mother is “sad” and wanted to approach her and ask however claims they are “questions of paradise.” if someone's mother felt sad or upset, usually there children would try to comfort them and understand what they are feeling, however richard feels his mother’s pain but does not even try to ask what the cause of it is. Richard compares his mother too material objects. Richard thinks that his mother “seems very small,” when compared to the “expensive foreign cars” behind her. Richard instead of notices his mother, notices the expensive foreign cars more. Richard also does not even recognize what his parents are doing. He didn't realize that his father “has” only said one thing to him all evening. Someone would notice if their father had not spoken to them all day, however richard does not realize this to the very

I used to be proud of who I was. I used to be free, but I’ve fallen, slowly stripped bare of all I was and could have been. I resent them, those who gruesomely ripped me from my haven and shackled me beneath their feet. I resent the world for abandoning me in this hell, leaving me to suffer. I resent who I have become, a puppet, used only for their entertainment. The devil only grows within me, plaguing my mind during the sleepless nights. Feeding images into my mind. Images of their blood splattered across the walls of their beloved blue and red (tent). My teeth sinking into the fatty flesh of their neck. The horror painted on their faces as I gleefully avenge the loss of my sanity. And I detest myself. I loathe the satisfaction that I feel fantasising about their murder. I fear myself, and what I have become under their control. I yearn for the days I spent in my

Children like Enrique dream of finding their mothers and living happily ever after. For weeks, perhaps months, these children and their mothers cling to romanticized notions of how they should feel toward each other. Then reality intrudes. The children show resentment because they were left behind. They remember broken promises to return and accuse their mothers of lying. They complain that their mothers work too hard to give them the attention they have been missing. In extreme cases, they find love and esteem elsewhere, by getting pregnant, marrying early or joining

I live in my nice house, here on Isla Negra. However, what I’ve done to get me here, it haunts me. I have not killed anybody myself, there is no blood staining my hands. However, it feels like there should be, for all I have survived. For all those who stood by me, that bled. There is only so much a person should have to live with, only so much a person can live with before the darkness behind them becomes overwhelming. I feel like, looking back on everything that I have experienced, that everybody has a past that is dark. Everybody has things they have seen that haunt them, that cloud the memories you would like to preserve, tainting them with the sorrow of another time. When I look back, I see those I have lost, such as Malva and Maryka, my first true love. She left to go back to Europe, and that was the last time I ever saw her. She took my only daughter with her, where she would die 6 years later. I try to think back to the times where we loved each other, where we had no quarrel or conflict, but it is clouded by the years of turmoil and anger. I too moved to Europe, where I stayed with Delia del Carril in France before moving to a diplomatic position in Spain. Here, I met with a new group of literary enthusiasts, some much younger and some my age. However, living and writing in Spain was not long-lived. A friend, Federico García Lorca, was executed by Franco. The area of Madrid that I lived in was attacked and burned, children killed by merciless soldiers. The time before the fall, the peace before the storm, is blurred out and empty to think about, as it is overshadowed by the tragedy and loss that it proceeded. I know that my memories are unique to me, and that some carry some much worse, and that others don’t carry very many in the first place. Things have changed, my perspective and understanding of the world and the way its inhabitants work has been altered greatly. I see the light of my past, reflecting back upon the things I have

“Since this is your first time, I”ll call Nancy to show you around.” Gonzales said, thrusting a white sheet, two white pillowcases, a grey striped pillow and a thin white blanket in my arms, “Warehouse will assign you another sheet after orientation.

It was one of those rare moments where father gave us a day off. Though, I can’t complain, but I felt something odd as if something is going to happened. Like the feeling of that night a week ago.

"How could you Father!” I exclaimed. What he did to Fortunato was awful, I cannot believe him. My own father, who taught me right and wrong, who would never harm a fly, ruthlessly murdered the uncle of my best friend, Lorenzo. I could not bring my eyes to meet his, I sat there staring at the extravagant designs on Father 's blanket. He looked at me blankly and another fit of coughing followed, through his fit he indicated to open his closet and go through his old clothes. There laid, none other, then a bottle of Amontillado.