My name is Cristina Ramírez, although people here in the States probably say ‘Cristina Ramirez’ because it’s easier and it’s hard to roll your ‘r’s’ and the ‘th’ sound for the ‘z.’ I have that skillset—I speak Spanish, I’m Latina, but I’m also a Professional Librarian.
When I took the job at Richmond Public Libraries, I was stationed at Broad Rock Library, and I would say it’s a community that’s been struggling for quite some time. It has a growing Latino and immigrant community. I think transportation’s a heavy issue for a lot of folks there. They don’t have ready access to bus lines, and so they feel in some ways cut off from opportunities either in the city or in Chesterfield.
I think a big part of the mission of the library was really to help connect people to the resources to help better their lives. So whether it was offering basic computer tech literacy classes, whether it was telling people about job fairs, job opportunities, giving people resources on how to create a resume, cover letter, a GED class for adults in the evenings, homework help in the evenings for children, especially children whose parents didn’t speak English. They would come in in the afternoons, some of them religiously, like five days a week. They would come in and check out books regularly and read them even if their parents couldn’t read with them. The parents were bringing them so the kids could check out library materials.
I was at the front desk and I was checking out a line of people, and a mom and her daughter came up, and the mother did not speak English, so she had her daughter interpret, unaware that I understood everything the mother was saying. I answered actually by talking to the mother back in Spanish and she kindof was surprised, and the little girl said to me in English, ‘wow, you’re like me.’
I think she had never maybe in the States seen someone in a capacity of a government official or somebody running an organization that was Latino and spoke Spanish like that.
I want to tell people, ‘be a great student, give back to your community, don’t give up your language, don’t give up your food traditions, don’t give up what makes you you, because you don’t have to to be part of the fabric of this country.’
I’m just as much an American as the next person, even though my last name is not Smith. And I want to share that with other people. I want them to realize they don’t have to give up a part of who they are, an essence of who they are, in order to be part of the community here.
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