Marco Padilla

Hi all, my name is Marco Padilla, I am a transfer student from Santa Monica College. This is my first quarter at UCLA and I am majoring in English. I chose English because I enjoy literature and want to go onto law school. I've worked in a law firm for the last four years primarily working with personal injury related cases as well as aviation and business cases. I am a Los Angeles native, my mother came here from Guanajuato, Mexico and growing up there were a lot of religious traditions we followed and we often went to Mexico during religious holidays. My mother is catholic so naturally the Virgin Mary was a prominent figure growing up, to this day we still have religious figures on our living room walls and during christmas my mom sets up her nativity scene.
When I was a kid we visited my aunt in Mexico and went to the D.F. where we went to the Basillica, I've never been a devout catholic but I was impressed, and respected the vast amounts of people who went from all over to visit their mother. The basillica itself is so rich in culture and imagining that Juan Diego and the Virgin Mary met there was fun. I've enjoyed so far what we have learned in class and have loved seeing chicana art, the main reason why I am taking this class is because I recently became more interested in my culture which started by reading books by Junot Diaz, Gabriel Garcia Marquez and others. I hope to learn more about art and culture through this class.