"Crossing Flatbush Avenue" Pamela Bucknor

We take a drive down the belt parkway and onto a ramp that says Rockaway Blvd. Driving down Rockaway Blvd we turn a corner and end up at the house of Pamela Bucknor. Once a straight A student in Belize and is now a mother of seven children and a wife. I am her fifth child and I am proud of my mom. She has sacrificed a lot to see her children get where they are today. She has had many tragedies but still holds her head up high and is able to provide her family with everything that they need.

Pamela Bucknor

Relationship: Mother

I was 17 years old when I moved over here. I had just graduated from high school. I went to high school in my country on a 4 year scholarship because I got so high on my exams when I took them. We weren’t poor but we couldn’t afford the school I wanted to go to so I was glad to get that scholarship. I wasn’t even supposed to be going to that high school. It was a catholic high school and back in those days you had to be catholic to go to a catholic high school. I almost got kicked out one year because they found out I wasn’t catholic but my father fought really hard and they really couldn’t do anything because I did so exceptionally well.

The country I came from is Belize, formally known as British Honduras. I was born in Belize City. When I was a child we moved around a lot because my father did different types of jobs. He made a good living; we always had an easy life. By the way people always have a misconception about Belize, because it is located in Central America people always think we speak Spanish, but we speak English and a dialect we call Creole. In Belize Creole is the same as patwa in Jamaica.

I’ve lived in the United States for about 37 years. I’ve never lived anywhere else but New York. I’ve lived in different parts of New York though. I’ve lived in Brooklyn, the Bronx, and Harlem and now I reside in Queens. I’ve lived in Queens the longest, for a little over 30 years. My oldest son was 4 when we moved to Queens. My entire immediate family lives in the United States. My youngest sister lives in Delaware with her family, my two older sisters live in Staten Island with my mom and my two brothers live in Queens not that far from my house so our children are really close. My father died over here. I still have family that lives in Belize but only aunts, in-laws and lots of cousins.

When I came to the United States I worked at a few places. Currently I work at New York Presbyterian as an operator/call center agent. When I’m not hard at work I spend time with my kids. I have 7 children the oldest is 34 and the youngest is 15 going on 16 in December. There are 4 girls and 3 boys and I have 1 grandchild from my oldest daughter. All of my children were born in the United States but all of them have visited Belize. My husband is also from Belize but we met over here at a mutual friend’s party. He said he always used to see me when we were in Belize and he used to whistle at me when he saw me riding my bike to school.

I miss Belize. I didn’t want to move over here my parents made me and my siblings come. They decided that since they came over here we had to come over here and we had no choice because we were minors. Coming here I thought the streets were going to be paved with gold. I thought it would be such a wonderful life. I got a rude awakening when I got here. I got this misconception from people that used to come back home and brag about their great life over here. I was very disappointed when I saw the ghetto. I couldn’t believe people lived like that or acted like that. I thought life would have been much easier or happier then it was when I was in Belize. It’s not a rat race back home like it is over here. Life there was so relaxing. You didn’t have to be rushing all the time like here rush, rush, rush that’s all people do but I heard it’s only like that in New York. When I visit my sister in Delaware it doesn’t seem to be like that there.

I can speak perfect English, even though sometimes I may have a slight accent. My children always tell me that I don’t have an accent but I feel like I do. I guess it was easier for me to come here and speak English because in school we are taught to speak English and we only speak our dialect at home. I don’t believe in using slang words, I do it just for fun when I’m joking around with my children or their friends and they can’t speak slang around me either. I am very comfortable with my demand of the English language. I still speak my native language. Well, it’s not really a language it’s a dialect. I only use it when I’m with my family, friends or when I’m trying to teach my kids. They always want to learn so that they can speak it when they go back to Belize.

I strongly believe in the values I was taught. I haven’t really changed them; I try to keep the same values I grew up with as a child but after having so many children you start to get lenient with the younger children. No one can pressure me into changing my values because I have a strong mind. Even being in the United States for so long has not caused me to change them. I have become a U.S. Citizen several years ago because I decided to stay and I got married. Also, all of my immediate family was over here so there was nothing to go back to. All though I’m a citizen I still think of myself as a Belizean. To me being an American Citizen means that you have more benefits and more rights, like voting. My experience with immigrating here was unusual to me because I’ve never done it before. It was a lot, we had to know how the system worked and we had to learn about government because in Belize you don’t have a president you have a prime minister.

There are still many connections that my husband and I have to Belize and the main one is family. We still visit as often as we can because we still have a lot of family there especially my husbands family. All of his immediate family still lives in Belize although his mom did come to the United States but died years ago. We still love our country, we miss it so much. I make sure my children maintain connections with Belize. We always tell them and teach them about our dialect, our culture and especially our food. I’ve taught my daughters how to cook many dishes from Belize and I hope they will continue this with their children. We also make sure they keep the bond that they have with their family in Belize.

In 5 years I see me and my family still living in the same house, doing the same thing with all of my children going to graduate school and college and finishing. I also see my children having a great career and living more comfortable then we did. In 10 years I see all my kids graduating and having thriving careers and great jobs. I see my husband and I will have retired by then and have our children giving us 100 dollars each a week (I start laughing). Hopefully we will also have a bunch of grandchildren running around the house that we baby sit while our children are at work.

I like the United States but I hope to return home one day for an extended stay, but not too long because I’m going to have grandchildren to take care of (I laugh again). Coming to the United States caused me to experience prejudice for the first time. People here are meaner in the work place then they were back home. What’s weird to me is that people call each other by their first name no matter how old they are. In Belize you had to address elders as Ms or Mr. Also, I noticed that when I first came over here how much fashion has changed.