Some people say that family does not always have to be blood-related. I found this out this summer when I visited my family in El Salvador. I hadn’t visited my family there for more than nine years, so it basically felt like I was meeting them for the first time. Everybody was really nice and I had a great time and didn’t expect anything out of the ordinary to happen. Yet a friend of my grandmother’s came to visit her family at the same time that we were there. I didn’t know much about her and didn’t even notice she was there until she decided to stop by and talk. It was then I found out that she believed I was her granddaughter. I didn’t know whether to believe her or not, since I didn’t know much about my biological father. She kept on insisting that I was her granddaughter and everyone kept on saying, “Yes, she looks like fulana de tal’s sister or cousin.” I fell in love with the idea of knowing my father’s family, but in the end, we all accepted that I was not related to them by blood. However, that did not stop me from seeing her as part of my family or from her seeing me as part of hers. My time in El Salvador was irreplaceable. It not only gave me the opportunity to spend some time with my family, but also allowed me to add another member to my family.
