Trejos travels from Colombia to increase her education
By Manuel García Sánchez
Apache Co-Editor
Colombian Claudia Trejos, 29, describes herself as passionate, responsible and enthusiastic. She does not like mess or intolerance.
“I try to enjoy my life,” she said. “Everything I do, I put in a lot of me.”
Trejos studied in a French School in her hometown, Cali, Colombia. She liked to speak French but she never liked English so she did not learn it while in school.
“They tried to teach us [English] but I was a very bad student andI never learned it,” Trejos said. “I never wanted to and I regret it now.”
Surprisingly, she is currently studying in IVCC’s Dental Assistant Program. She came to the United States four and a half years ago with the purpose of continuing her education as a dental technician and learning English.
Her first destination was the University of Illinois in Chicago where she studied English and did her fellowship as Maxilla Facial Prosthesis Technician.
“At the beginning, it was really hard to understand what people were saying,” she said. “They started talking to me and I said ‘What?’ I didn’t understand anything.”
After her Chicago stay, Trejos came to Ottawa to do her internship in the Ottawa Dental Laboratory Company. She enjoys living in Ottawa because she said it is cheaper, safer, and the people help each other.Once in Ottawa, she decided to enroll at IVCC.
Initially, Trejos was not happy with the college because she thought it was just a small school.
“But right now, I am very happy,” she said. “This is a really good school. I have good instructors and the facilities for the students are amazing.”
Trejos is specially proud of the new Dental Lab. As both student and dental technician, she said that it is one of the best Dental Labs she has ever seen.
“It is really a clinic where you can see patients,” she said. “It has the perfect equipment.”
She also enjoys her classmates at IVCC. She said they help her, have patience with her accent, and are funny.
Trejos already has a major in Dental Technology from the University of Colombia and her goal is to have an American bachelor’s degree in dentistry so she could work and live in this country.
The big difference between U.S. and Colombian education is the use of technology. She said that in Colombia teaching techniques are more primitive. Blackboard, chalk, and books are the education tools in her country.
Another difference is the access to education. Normally, in Colombia, the family pays for most of the education, while in the U.S., students can easily obtain financial aid.
“If you don’t have an education in the U.S., it is because you don’t want it,” she said.
As is true of most Latin Americans, Claudia is close to her family. Her roots are very important. She said that the concept of family comes before work, money, material things, or before anything else.
Claudia has a sister living in Chicago, a brother in Chile, and the rest of her family in Colombia. She talks frequently with them on the phone and, every time she has a chance, visits her sister in Chicago.Homemade meals are in her list of things she misses.
“We still follow grandma’s recipes,” she said. “In Colombia it is weird to find microwaves in the kitchens.”
The main meal for Colombians is lunch. They have two hours to eat, from noon to 2 p.m., and most of the people go home to have lunch. They do not spend the two hours eating; they reserve some time for siesta , a nap.
She gets really excited when talking about her country.
“It is a nice country with a very rich soil and surrounded by beauty,” she said. “People do not know that most of the bananas, flowers, emeralds, and coffee found in the U.S. come from Colombia.”
Unfortunately, Colombia has two negative aspects: drugs and terrorism which are closely related to each other. Before the tragic events on Sept. 11, Trejos felt a lot safer in the U.S. than in her native country where killings and kidnappings are frequent. But now, she is not so sure.
“After what happened in the U.S., I realized that we are not safe here,” she said. “I really tried to figure out what is the reason for such an atrocity and I do not find it.”