Two months was all my brother and I were supposed to spend in Colombia. It was supposed to be a simple summer visiting our dad and stepmom and getting to know our baby sister. Two weeks in though, that changed for me. My fear of the unknown dissolved into excitement. Everything was new, and the language barrier made it so that even going to the grocery store felt like an adventure. I tried my hardest to learn the new language, insisting on ordering my own food at restaurants and talking to the housekeeper as much as possible.

Two weeks into the two months I made the best decision of my life. I called my mom and had a tear-filled conversation, telling her that I would not be returning to the United States at the end of the summer with my brother. I would be staying in Colombia to live with my dad permanently.

That August, when my brother left, my vacation came to an end. I was enrolled in a school and had only one thing to do: learn Spanish. My vocabulary had grown over the summer, but I still had no formal Spanish training and sounded like a kid just learning to talk every time I opened my mouth. People laughed and my confidence shriveled. My learning came to an abrupt halt, and I stopped speaking Spanish altogether. For weeks I spoke only to my family, my best friend Antonia and her family. And only in English.

People would try to communicate with me and even though I normally understood what they were saying, I couldn’t bring myself to reply, fearing that I would say the wrong word or use a verb incorrectly and they would erupt in laughter.

Slowly though, I grew comfortable speaking again, but only around certain people. By the time October came, there were five good friends that I would speak to in Spanish. They would listen and help me when I mispronounced something or put a word in the wrong place.

One day in November was especially hard. My Spanish teacher had called on me and refused to move on until I read the paragraph he had asked me to. My friends explained my fear to him, but he said I needed to move past it. After five minutes of silence I began to read. I sounded like a robot, having to stop and sound out every third word. My friends and teacher supported me, helping me through it as the boys of the class laughed. I could feel hot tears in my eyes, and mid sentence I stopped, stood up and left the room, walking to the elementary side of the school and sitting down on the wet grass.

Two friends followed me, and by the time they caught up, my crying was uncontrollable. I had never felt so embarrassed in my life. I was ready to admit defeat and give up. My friends held my hands and hugged me, urging me to keep trying and moving forward. Soon the entire class joined us on the grass. The boys who had laughed hugged me and offered words of comfort, apologizing, saying they hadn’t realized they were the reason I refused to speak.

I had never experienced this before. In all of my life I had never had this kind of support from people my own age. I had never had so many people telling me that they wanted to help me. That was the moment that I realized that I had been overreacting the whole time. I figured out that the laughter had never been meant to degrade me or make me feel bad. I saw that they all wanted to help me become better at Spanish, and would have if I had just calmed down and asked. In that moment I realized why I had decided to stay. It was for the people and the culture and the massive amounts of kindness that I had never experienced while living in the United States. I stayed because Colombia was, and still is, my home. Yo me quedo en Colombia porque era, y todovía es mi hogar.