Dominicana, Even When I Dream in English

by Soíia Villafaña

“Cion, tía, Cion, tío.” I say as I kiss them goodbye, sleepily following my parents to the car. Spanish is my hellos and goodbyes. It’s in the small parts of me in between. In the way I dream of tropical islands, and piña coladas under beach umbrellas with sand between the cracks of my ass. It’s the best part of me. 

I remember learning to play dominoes, at a small table in the summer sun between my pa and my tíos. “Pa’lante como la elefante, verdad, Sofía?” My tío jokes with me as he drops down another domino. My parents scold him for reinforcing Spanish speaking to me, not when they were trying so hard to get me to learn English. We lived in a country that spoke English, which shamed people for being different. Or too different, really, not digestible. 

I learned the oddball word in Spanish before English, so long before that I made the mistake of saying the Spanish word in front of a class of English speakers. I remember their laughter, their giggles behind their hands as they heard the garble of funny letters and sounds come out of my mouth. I hated the burn in my chest, the smile that crept on my face because my cheeks don’t turn red, I hated it more. A comedian would think they had sold out stadiums from how loud they were laughing at me. My teacher shushed the class, urging them to quiet down, but the damage had been done. 

I was now the girl who lived in a blurry plane of existence between this one and another tropical island of barefoot adventures. Here, the words that float out of my mother’s mouth are embarrassing and a joke; they’re weird. Inherently, so was I. 

I stopped speaking in Spanish when I was five. I stopped uttering the familiar phrases or singing the fun songs of my childhood. I wasn’t Dominican anymore. I ate pizza. I spoke English. I wanted to live in a concrete jungle of skyscrapers and iced coffee. There was nothing better to me than the beauty of living a full city American girl life. I remembered the feeling of being laughed at, more than once. For the food I ate to be given an odd stare. For people to turn their nose up at my mother’s broken English. 

Either way, I eat my tostones. I love my mom’s mangú. I sneakily enjoy my bachata and merengue when I’m cleaning, I drink coffee the way my classmates drink juice, daily with almost every meal, but especially breakfast. I drink it iced, or hot con leche and cinnamon, the way my mom taught me. I codeswitched in just about every way, and I dressed like a mini New Yorker who knew nothing about island life. 

I wear my Dominican colors and flag with pride because there was a very long time I didn’t. Now, I can barely speak Spanish even when I know every word that comes out of someone’s mouth. I miss a few steps when I dance to the music of family reunions and don’t always like the taste of bacalao. 

Still, I write about a life in between. I write about my pieces of Spanish memories that live in my heart in the middle of a city of culture and language. I drink brown sugar shaken espresso while playing throwback Prince Royce and Marc Anthony, pen to paper as I fight a rebellion my ancestors started. I will die in this war, because I am still Dominicana, even when I dream in English.