My name is Andrea Gonzalez, and I’m Mexican-American from Aljojuca Puebla, Mexico. My family and I are one of the unfortunate families struggling with immigration legalization. 

My grandparents have been trying to get documented so they can live the rest of their lives with their kids and grandkids. Each of my birthday wishes, New Year’s Resolutions, and Christmas wishes all revolve around the same thing: my grandparents’ legal documentation. 

Around 1995, my grandparents Maria Vasquez and Alfonso Gonzalez decided to emigrate to the United States. They brought their five kids, three boys and two girls. They had made the decision to come in hopes of better opportunities compared to what their homeland was offering. 

During their settlement in North Hills, Los Angeles, they did not taken any opportunity they had been given for granted. My grandparents weren’t financially stable enough to allow all of their children to return back to school, so they only sent their youngest daughter to complete high school at Monroe High. The rest of their kids began working – my dad and his older brother began working in construction with my grandfather, and the youngest brother began working at a local swap meet. They took advantage any resource to be able to put food on the table. 

After a couple of years, each of my grandparents’ children had their own lives. They had married and even had had their own kids. It was then that my grandmother’s mother got badly sick back in Aljojuca. 

The guilt eating my grandmother alive, she returned to Aljojuca to take care of her mother. My grandfather returned with her as he didn’t want to let her travel such a distance alone. 

It was then that immigration laws had become more severe and enforced. Since my grandparents were undocumented, they were unable to return. 

During the holidays, we make sure to communicate twice as much as usual to guarantee my grandparents don’t feel lonely back in Aljojuca. Since they can’t come to us, and travel is too expensive during holidays to go to them, we bring several Mexican traditions into our home in California. 

In Aljojuca, my grandma described herself as the host during Christmas. She still decorates her house with a Christmas tree and lights. All our family members in Mexico gather at my grandparents house. They each take traditional dishes, and my grandma also cooks a bunch of food. 

For Christmas here in Los Angeles, we gather as a family. We use recipes passed down generations to make traditional food such as pozole, tamales, and bunuelos. We make the same foods my grandma does in Mexico to make our culture feel more present: since we can’t go to it, we bring it to us. Then, once it reaches 12am we exchange and open gifts. 

I asked my uncle, the youngest brother, what his favorite memory of Christmas was as a kid in Aljojuca. He responded with, “Well, back in Mexico we didn’t really celebrate Christmas. We were never really big on that celebration. Instead we celebrated posadas, those were our favorites.” 

Posadas are religious festivals celebrated in Mexico that commemorate the journey Joseph and Mary made from Nazareth. They had searched for a safe place to stay where they could give birth to Jesus.

My dad was asked the question, “Do you prefer Christmas here in America or in Aljojuca?” 

He responded with, “Aljojuca. Me gusta más México porque ahí es donde están mis padres. Eso y las tradiciones aquí no son las mismas que las posadas en México.” [“I like it better in Mexico because that ‘s where my parents are. That and the traditions here aren’t the same as the posadas in Mexico.”]  

One day, I hope to be able to experience Christmas in Mexico with the comfort of being with my whole family, giving my dad and his siblings another opportunity to spend the holidays together with their parents and their childhood home. 

No amount of distance could weaken our family’s love and loyalty. In another universe, the immigration system would be more accommodating to the several families like ours who wish to spend the holidays together. Yet I can only wish it was in this one.

Happy Holidays from the Gonzalez family to yours.