Hispanic immigrants retain pride in heritage

Paulita Matheny, a native of Bolivia, lost her job as a prominent attorney, her social life and her maids when she married and moved to Hanover County eight years ago.

More significant, in the eyes of many, was that she lost her Bolivian identity when she fell under the "Hispanic" label used by the federal government since the 1970 census.

But that designation barely begins to define a group that comes from dozens of countries, cultures and backgrounds.

To honor and recognize the contributions of the Hispanic cultures to the United States, Congress approved National Hispanic Heritage Week in 1968. Twenty years later, it became National Hispanic Heritage Month and is celebrated Sept. 15 to Oct. 15.

"Being a Hispanic, people label you as a Mexican," Matheny said recently, with her husband, Jim, at their home on Kings Charter Drive in Mechanicsville.

"I'm like, no, Latin America, it's a little bigger than just Mexico. So I learned, in these eight years that I'm here . . . [to] always say, 'I'm from Bolivia, South America,' so people know exactly what I'm talking about."

Over the years, as the Hispanic population in the U.S. has grown to 46.9 million to become the largest minority group, the government has tried to capture the diversity by including Hispanic, Latino and Spaniard designations on the census form and asking for a country of origin.

Three-quarters of Hispanics identify themselves by their place of origin or that of their parents, not as Hispanic or Latino, according to the Washington-based Pew Hispanic Center.

Nationally, those of Mexican origin are the largest group with 64 percent, followed by Puerto Ricans at 9 percent, Cubans at 3.5 percent, Salvadorans at 3.1 percent and Dominicans from the Dominican Republic with 2.7 percent, according to the census.

Last year, about 40,500 Hispanics lived in Henrico County, Richmond and Chesterfield County, the census estimates.

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Matheny is not the typical Hispanic immigrant who comes to the United States seeking a better life and economic opportunities or refuge from political persecution and war. But her struggles in adjusting to a foreign country and holding on to her culture have been no different than other immigrants.

She met her husband, a project manager with Anthem Blue Cross and Blue Shield, at a conference in Oklahoma nine years ago. They married a year later.

Matheny said she studied English in Bolivia, but it was hard to speak it when she arrived in Hanover, and some people didn't understand her.

"I found myself like I was speaking like a 5-year-old," she said. "I felt like people didn't accept me or they were looking at me like something different. I just couldn't speak about politics with somebody, which is my passion. I was so disappointed with myself. My first goal was trying to speak perfect English."

But that was only one of the challenges. She also had to learn to cook, to eat leftovers and frozen foods. Maids at her parents' house in Bolivia cooked every meal from scratch.

"I realized that I wasn't in the wonderland," she said. "The land of opportunities for many really became the land of the nightmares for me."

Two years later, she brought her nanny from Bolivia to take care of the couple's son. About that time, too, she began attending St. John Church in Highland Springs and found a larger community of Hispanics.

"I had no clue how big the Hispanic community was in Richmond until we joined the church and then got more involved," Jim Matheny said.

As their circle of friends from the different Latin American countries expanded, he began noticing the cultural differences, Matheny said.

Sending formal invitations for parties is a common practice. Guests make sure that the first thing they do when arriving at the party is to greet and thank the host for the invitation, he said.

"I could be flipping burgers, all sweaty, they come and shake my hands and say thank you for inviting us and they say goodbye before they leave," he said. "My American friends, you don't know when they showed up and you don't know when they left."

He has also noticed language differences among his wife and friends, Matheny said. For his wife, "torta" means cake, but for their child's godfather, Juan Coronado, who is from Mexico, the word means sandwich.

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Paulita Matheny also learned that many of the children don't speak Spanish at her church and feel ashamed of their parents' Hispanic heritage. When they have bilingual Masses, it's hard to find a child to read in Spanish, she said.

"That's sad, because the less you know about your culture, the less proud you feel about your culture," she said. "One of my tasks as a mother was to be sure that my children learn to write and speak Spanish because it's an advantage for them in the future."

Paulita Matheny speaks Spanish to the couple's two children, who switch seamlessly to English when they talk to their father. Jim Matheny speaks some Spanish, too. Their first child, Paulo Leony, 7, has been spending summers in Bolivia and attending school there. Their second child, James Kendrick, is 2.

"Every day, we do homework in Spanish," she said. "I have dedicated an hour a day to do this. We say prayers in English one night and in Spanish the following night."

At a recent gathering with friends at her house, Paulita Matheny told the guests that Paulo had come home excited because his teacher had asked him to read from a Spanish textbook he had carried to school, and his classmates were in awe.

"I felt for the first time that he was proud to be speaking Spanish," she told her friends.

Among the friends at the party were Colombia native Diana Velasquez, who lives in Varina with her husband and two U.S.-born teenage twin daughters, and María García Lara and her husband, both of whom are from Mexico. They talked about working hard to make sure that their children grow up fluent in Spanish and appreciate their parents' cultures.

"We have to teach them to love who we are," García Lara, who lives in Hanover, said. "They should never be ashamed of their Hispanic culture, they should be proud."

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Paulita Matheny will fill out the census form in April and check that she's of the white race, which contradicts many people's perception of Hispanics.

Nine out of 10 Hispanics reported white alone or some other race alone, while less than 4 percent reported black or African-American alone, according to the 2000 Census.

It's clear what she and her husband will check on the census forms, but it complicates things for the children, Matheny said.

"They're not Caucasian. They're not Hispanic. They're half and half," she said.

After having her children, Matheny began searching for a job, and says she was shocked that law offices wouldn't hire her as a secretary. She had no better luck at retail stores. She got to know the Rev. Wayne L. Ball at St. John Church, and he asked her to help him with his canon law cases involving Hispanics. She plans to pursue a degree in canon law in the future.

She now works as business manager for St. John, which is sharing resources with St. Patrick and Holy Rosary churches.

What surprised her at St. John Church's Spanish Mass is how laborers and professionals mingle together, she said. She comes from a well-to-do family in Bolivia and class divisions are not crossed, she said.

"If I never [had] come to the United States, I would never have learned to be humble."

Contact Juan Antonio Lizama at (804) 649-6513 or .