A plane to Mexico City, another to Oaxaca, and a six hour car ride had lead us here. My mom, my sister, my nanny, and me, driving through the winding back roads of the Sierra Madre del Sur mountain range. As the car glided down a skinny road hugging the mountainside like a python wrapping around its prey, I could see my sisters face slowly get more and more pale. The winding curves slowly rocking me into a trance, only to be scared into reality as other cars came the opposite way on this tiny one way road. I could feel my stomach squeeze up like a raisin as our driver would maneuver the car onto the side of the mountain, allowing the others to pass. Sitting in the old bumpy car, I asked myself, where in the world am I going, and why did I agree.
I was eight when my mom decided that it would be nice to visit a town in the jungles of Mexico called San Bartolo, Yautepec. A village of no more than 700 people, where my nanny, Alicia, called home. Alicia had been a part of my life since before I was even born. She had traveled to Mexico City in 1995 looking for work when my mom met her. My sister had just been born, and my mom hired Alicia to help. Since then, she has been as much a part of my family as anyone
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With each turn we made, there was less civilization to look forward to, and more to look back at. At one point, the driver’s radio stopped picking up signals and just turned to static. I looked over to my sister in shock. Her pale face, pressed up against the window, looked back at me with an uncomfortable frown. Behind the nausea, I could tell my sister was nervous too. We were on the same boat, blindly sailing in the wind. Quickly, the paved road under us gave way to a dirt and gravel path, giving Alicia the cue, “we’re close” she said. I could see the excitement in her eyes, the anticipation of seeing family after spending months away from