I was procrastinating on Twitter instead of writing the blog post I’d been hoping to write, and sweet Guillermo took my pathetic whimper about writer’s block to heart. To my absolute delight, the following appeared in my in-box just a little while later. You really didn’t think I’d post it, did you Guillermo? But really, after reading it, how could I not??
Hi there! My name is Guillermo (“William” for you my “anglo” friend, “Guillaume” pour vous, mon ami) and I am a latinamerican immigrant to Canada. Well… to be correct I’m not an immigrant any more because I already swore my commitment to our mutual friend “Elizabeth”. But you and I know that an immigrant is always an immigrant with or without the navy blue passport.
So, today DaniGirl had writer’s block and I tried to help her by sending her a few subjects she could use. In exchange, she mocked at me and dared to ask me to write a post for her. And here I am, dressed as Mr. Creativity, writing a blog in my second (third?) language for an English speaking audience of mothers that were expecting to see beautiful pictures of very nice toddlers and found something else. But let’s see how it goes…
As I told you before, I am from Latin America. More exactly, from Argentina. “Wow!” you may be saying to yourself at this time “So far! Is it always warm down there? Does he look like Antonio Banderas?” Others, more enthusiastic, may be are saying “Mmmm… Latino!” You are all wrong. It’s not always warm, I do not look like Banderas. And I’m not that tasty. Also, I’ve been living with my family in Canada for the last 5 years and we’ve enjoyed this journey a lot (not a hundred percent of the time… but most of it.) Thanks for letting us in!
Today, I to share with you some facts about latinos and “argies” in particular… Maybe I’m destroying some myths on my way so I apologize! This is a payback for the guy that told me hockey was fun and soccer was boring.
1. All Latinos are not Mexicans.
2. If you think all Latinos are Mexicans, then all Latinos look like Mexicans.
3. If you think all Mexicans look “kind of toasted”, therefore all Latinos look the same way.
4. When one of the rules above do not apply, someone can tell you “Really?! I did not know there was white people down there?” Yeah, it happened!
5. Not all the Latinos look like Banderas. Some of us look much better.
6. And not all Latinos are great lovers. Many of them are…
7. Not all the “Latinas” look like Jennifer Lopez. Some of them are hot, pretty and can dance and sing very well.
8. We love soccer but we watch hockey games just to guess where the puck is, not because we like it.
9. We cannot understand games that are played with a ball that cannot be found or clearly seen.
10. Every four years we teach Canadians what soccer is about and give them a chance to know that soccer is not only that game your wife takes your daughter to Saturday afternoons. It’s also a men’s game.
11. And every four years we feel forced to put our national flags in the car to see if we can find another soccer lover at least once!
12. Tex-Mex food that you see in TV ads is not Mexican. They do not even eat it there! It’s some USA invention to make you believe that that is Mexican food. Really!
13. Argentina is not part of Brazil.
14. And Rio de Janeiro is part of Brazil, not our capital city.
15. And they are the ones that speak Portuguese, not us.
16. Buenos Aires has winter. A zero degrees winter, but winter.
17. No. We do not have snow in Buenos Aires.
18. But we do have it in the Patagonia and some other provinces.
19. Patagonia is a place where we used to have dinosaurs and now we have English farmers, sheeps and Turner’s cottage.
20. In Quebec they like to say they are like “northern latinos”. They also say they speak French, and that does not always seem to be true.
21. Not all the Latinos dance salsa.
22. Or “Bamba”
23. Or “Tango”
24. Or dance at all.
25. Chavez is not a “hero”. Nor is Castro. Those are all myths.
26. “Che” Guevara was from Argentina. But he never met Evita.
27. Evita never sang “Don’t Cry for me Argentina”
28. And she was an awful actress from the 40s that ended up engaging a dictator.
29. Yes, we all talk loud. No, we do not have hearing problem. We just like to be noticed.
30. In Argentina we used to have a diet based mostly on beef. In Canada I reduced my cholesterol levels and learned to appreciate pork and chicken. Thanks!
31. Most of “Dulce de leche” you can find at Superstore or Costco is from Argentina. Be careful! That’s how many invasions started!
32. We are use to having economical or political crisis every now and then. Harper helps us to feel less homesick sometimes. Thanks “Steve”!
And may be there are a thousand more that I’ll keep for another time. If you and DaniGirl allow me.
Chau!
You can read my blog and practice your Spanish everyday at “Los Ziegler en Canadá“. I hope to see you there!
Thanks for posting it! I never wrote ti with such intention…
(33.- All latinos are liers. No, just a few of us.)
Thanks…interesting and funny.
Well done!!
Thanks for the chuckles!
32 things about latinos in Canada (Me animé y escribà en inglés. perdón Shakespeare, que te mueves en tu tumba) http://bit.ly/9y1fmT
Wow, what a disappointment – for a second there, I thought I was fluent in Spanish since it took me much less time to read this article than it does for Guillermo’s other articles. Then I realized it was in English. 😆
I must say I haven’t met many English in Patagonia and Tierra del Fuego, most people seemed to be from Buenos Aires 😆
About how Latinos look, or are supposed to look… I think I look more “Latina” than a lot of girls in Buenos Aires, who look European but definitely not like Jennifer Lopez. And don’t get me started about Brazilians… half of them truly look German, especially in the South. This is also true with Peru – not all Peruvians wear these funky colorful clothes, that is mostly in the Andes.
However, I still think there is no such thing as a “vegetarian Argentinean” – to most people in Argentina, eating vegetables is eating potatoes and tomatoes sauce with a lot of meat.
Thanks for the laugh Guillermo, and learn to dance for Christ’s sake!
Very nice to meet you Guillermo! I loved your post and wonder if you have considered starting a blog of your own?
Well done Guillermo! So funny AND informative. Darn I wish I took Spanish in school – I would like to read your blog. Generous of you to post it Danigirl. 🙂 Chau!
Guillermo, please edit your post to include something about empanadas.
And chimichurri.
Two of the best things to come out of Argentina BY FAR.
(Dani, did I ever tell you my husband in Argentine?)
But Amy, I’ve seen pictures of your husband — he doesn’t look Mexican at all! 😉
(Meant to mention before, #8 is my favourite!)
This made me smile, and set me straight on a few things! Also, thank you for Dulce de leche, from the bottom of my caramel heart.
@Zhu… You are right! They are not English… They are Welsh. You are right… Southern Brazil has a strong german presence. Veggies in Argentina is what the ladies prepare to when their husbands are at the BBQ.
@Finola… Actually I’ve been writing a blgo for the last 5+ years… in Spanish. Do you mean in English? To be honest, I don’t know if I can write daily in English. Every blog I started in English ended up abandoned!
@Laura… You are welcome! Many of my local readers use Google Translator and it looks to be pretty accuratte. At least the comments they write have to do with the subject of the post! Why don’t you drop by and give it a try?
@Amy…Gosh I miss those two things! Mom is coming for the summer… She won’t left without having cooked some empanadas!
@Trista Your welcome!
Nice to see a friend posting here Guille, well done!
Well, I’m mexican, I’m not dark skin, I’ve curly hair; but I do not look like Jennifer Lopez nor Salma Hayek, neither like Shakira…but my hips do lie LOL
I believe that there is no “Latino” look; once you get to know more places than Cancun, Los Cabos, Cuba, Copacabana or BsAs, you find out that there is multicolor skin people, multicolor hair, multicolor believes and multicolor food! This I should say that is one of the things that distinguish us: the colors and flavors in our food.
Fact: not all mexican or latino eat chile(hot chili), like me, I can’t stand chili.
Lie: not all latinos are “great lovers”, many of them like to stay in front of the t.v. on sundays with a beer watching soccer, at least in Mexico. Think about a mexican Homer Simpson.
Lie: We do not wear tipical sandals all the time, nor “charro” hats. We dress like every canadian does.
Fact: We drive cars on the streets, not horses or any other animal.
Fact: Mexico is part of northamerica, guatemala-belize-honduras-peru are central america; and from colombia-chile-argentina-brasil is south america. But we all are named latinamerica.
Fact: There are places in latinamerica where people speak native languages; but there are others where people speak french, portuguese or english, not only spanish.
See u in “los ziegler” Guille,
Regards to Patricia and the kids.
Thanks to share the post with us Dany, very fun to read about us!
I forgot: in Mexico it is common for all the men to play soccer, but it is not for women. Some people say soccer is a “men stuff”; and most of the women are afraid of the soccer ball to hit them; although we do have some women soccer leagues…somewhere…
Believes change from one place to another…
See you there Marisol!
So nice to see a bunch of ladies talking about me! And they are not Mom nor my wife! Yeah!!
Gracias, Guillermo! Interesting, and humorous.
Don’t suppose you have taught Spanish classes for the City of Ottawa, have you? My teacher bore the same name, and it would be quite a coincidence, although I realize Guillermo is a common name…
Never mind, should have clicked through to your website first…not you! lol
Hmmm Guillermo is getting more comments that I usually do — maybe I need to hire him on as a ghost writer???
hellow evvery body!!!! stopping by-!! muchas cosas sobre los latinos no, que raza que somos noo! somos los unicos a los que entiendo,, faltaron mil.
@2hirondelles… Nop… not me. But I’d love to! Convenient fares. Lots of love and games, crafts, healthy snacks… Ouch! Wrong ad! Sorry.
@DaniGirl… Or may be we can discuss an opening at a Gov related Web 2.0 Dept. Because I’m good at this! And I know how to use del.icio.us! LOL!
This was just sooooooo funnyy lol….Guillermo, if u need a translator let me know!! besides, para algo somos latinos jejejeej….There is something interesting here, and is the fact that people from latin american can be confused with any kind of people from all over the world. I remember myself in USA when people was asking if I were from Jamaica, India, Russia (come on, My skin looks like Obama’s Skin! so Russian!) or any othe part from USA.
The thing is that we are a great diversity, that includes skin colors, hair type, cultures, idioms (Im from Dominican Republic and speak my dear Spanish, English and French!).
I guess this is just the way we looks ourselves, because a the end of the day, we are all neighbors!!!
Nos vemos en “Los Zieglers”
😀 I really enjoyed it!
hey no all latinos like spIcy food and were ar not MEXICAN
correction
marisol
Central America: Belize, Guatemala, Hondura, El Salvador, Nicaragua Costa Rica, and Panama
South America Venezuela, Colombia, Ecuador , Peru, Brasil, Bolivia, Paraguay, Argentina, and Chile
Latinos we are Beautiful people, diference of colour,languages, warm and happy .. and Proud to have a latin blood
Xhinna