Alba Vigil, originally from El Salvador, fled to California 20 years ago to escape the civil war in her home country. She came to D.C. a year later and has worked at AU since.
She said her family started immigrating to the U.S. one by one when the military started getting violent. She now lives near Columbia Heights.
Vigil has been working as a cleaner at AU for 20 years and came here on the referral of a friend, who is also still working here.
|
Five Facts
• She is the second-oldest of eight in her family. • She has dual citizenship in El Salvador and the U.S. • She loves to cook and eat any kind of seafood, except pupusas. • She likes go to the beach, especially Ocean City, Md. • She calls herself “crazy,” and says she sings and dances around her house constantly. |
Vigil now works for Aramark Monday through Friday, 7 a.m. to 3 p.m., but in El Salvador she was a cook in her family-run seafood restaurant.
Her brother still runs the restaurant there, but the rest of her family is in the U.S.
Vigil became a U.S. citizen last year, with help from her tutors in the AU student-run organization Community Learners Advancing in Spanish and English. The group aims to bridge the gap between the University’s non-English workers and the students through tutoring and community bonding.
Vigil met once a week with her tutor to prepare for the citizenship test, which she said was easy. But to her, learning English is like a puzzle.
While talking with The Eagle, she answered questions in both Spanish and English, with help from CLASE tutors Melissa Mahfouz, a junior in the School of International Service and Aaron Montenegro, a graduate student in the College of Arts and Sciences.
She loves to cook and likes making everything except pupusas — one of the most popular Salvadoran dishes — which are stuffed tortillas similar to Spanish empanadas.
Her two children, now 22 and 26 years old, originally stayed in El Salvador when she came here. But now, her son is working toward his master’s degree in education at the University of Maryland.
She said there are occasionally problems with student and staff respecting her when she cleans, particularly the men’s bathrooms. However, the majority of the time she does not have any problems.
Without the students here, she would not have work, Vigil said.
sdazio@theeagleonline.com
