Meet Luz Suarez. The third of a family of six siblings, she was born in Peru, and her childhood went through ups and downs due to the fluctuations of the mining business (60’s and 70’s). Married with three children, she had to send them to study in another country to continue their education, as security in her country was complicated by the wave of terrorism in the 80s and 90s. She took the reins of the family business (father, husband), reorienting it to services, such as human and technical resources. The companies grew significantly, providing services at the level of Coast and Sierra of her country. Unfortunately, the global real estate crisis of 2008 dealt a very hard blow that they could not rise up from. After struggling for five long years, she decided to immigrate to the United States, where her daughter, a U.S. citizen resides after completing her studies and graduating from the university TAMU (2007). Luz points out in her interview, “when you have money, there are many friends there and lots of family around,” but the financial situation changed this for her (2013), making everything very different.

Luz vividly remembers her first Thanksgiving feast. In her country it was not celebrated, so why did she have to do it? After some time, she understood the meaning of Thanksgiving. It is a very special day where the family gathers to give thanks, and she has so much to thank this beautiful country for, such as welcoming her and all her family (husband, children and grandchildren).

Luz has been in the U.S. for 10 years now, has a quiet life, works from 7:00 to 3:30 pm, attends English classes, and studies in the afternoons for her citizenship interview.

Luz first arrived at BIIN in 2017 when one of her Grandson’s friends, Carlos Espina, was teaching citizenship classes. At first, she started coming to learn the history of the U.S., but then the pandemic happened and she lost all contact. It was in the summer of 2023 that she came back to BIIN looking for help for her citizenship interview that is coming soon and decided to also practice and learn English.

Luz says that after she becomes a citizen all her goals will be accomplished. She notes also that her grandchildren are making great decisions as well with her oldest granddaughter graduating from TAMU this December 23 (two of the family graduated from TAMU). Her young enterprising Grandson graduated from High School. Both graduated with honors, while her 4 remaining grandchildren are studying (13,12, 8 and 7 years) in the respective schools of elementary, middle and high school. She has big hopes for all of her children and grandchildren to live a good life and finish their education. 

Both Tomas and I (Viviana) see all the hard work Luz has been putting in to prepare herself for the interview and have seen the improvement week after week. We hope all goes well in her interview and is able to come back to us with good news.