Characterization

   In all stories there are archetypes/ certain characteristics that each character is categorized in. In these three stories I was introduced to three very similar characters, La Guera (Priscilla), Payasa, & Marin. The three girls are unique only in the part of the situations they are placed in but in their appearance (butterfly colored eyeshadow, raccoon style make up, big "green apple" like eyes) and attitude they are extremely alike. They are all Latina & once you read the stories you get the image in your mind that they are what people call cholas.  They all have the typical chola attire, from the high teased hair, to the tight short skirts and heavy make up. They all want something in life and they find a way to get it. They all come from a broken home/family or they face difficulties .

   La Guera is a 14 year old girl who stole sweets to fill in an empty void in her heart. She started out stealing a little candy here and a little candy there but over time she became an expert and the amounts of goods she stole gradually became bigger and bigger, she started from liquor stores to well known candy shops such as Sees Candies. She thought that by stealing candy her heart would feel somewhat full due to the fact that candy was literal sweetness and that's what she needed. In the story there was never a mention of a father figure in her life, she had a bad relationship with her mother, and she lived in a ghetto neighborhood therefore seeing bad all around her and getting bad influences from so called friends. In the end she came to the realization that sweets weren't giving her full satisfaction, she realized that she needed real love, so she stole her friends boyfriend. That of course made her friend furious and they fought. After that fight any chance that La Guera had of changing herself for the better was gone, she turned cold, nothing was ever going to be the way it was again. The second character is named Payasa. Payasa is the street name for a teen who liked to get high. She huffed, meaning she sniffed aerosol spray to get high. Payasa comes from a home full of abuse. Her two brothers are old gangsters or "veteranos" therefore she gets the influence from her brothers and was taught to be tough. They would always fight her on purpose and whenever she lost a fight between her brothers they would slice her tounge with a razor. That being said , Payasa always got meaner, tougher, more boisterous after each fight she's lost. She always felt empty and longed for the feeling of being high. The emptiness and toughness in her soul stopped her from being intimate, it stopped her from going to school. She didn't care about anything, she had a mindset that she'll get over it... Eventually. Due to her careless acts and huffing her boyfriend Luis broke up with her because she was " getting to be too much" , after all that she enrolled herself into Teen Rehabilitation to hopefully get better. The last character in these stories is Marin. In the story it doesn't mention her age but judging by the fact that she sells Avon I would say she's around 18. The story also doesn't mention where she lived exactly other than saying that she had a boyfriend in Puerto Rico, they planned on getting married, and she lived with her aunt and took care of her cousins. The interesting thing about Marin is that she doesn't get High nor does she steal to fill in the void in her heart. The one thing that she longs for is love. She wants a wealthy handsome man to sweep her off her feet and change her life. She wants to wear nice clothing, get a job downtown, & live in a huge house. Marin was always pretty, she had beautiful green eyes & she always wore tight skirts. She always got compliments from men & her younger female relatives looked up to her. According to her cousins she always had great advice because she was more "experienced" & "knows lots of things". Marin is never phased by all the attention she gets by her appearance. She just wants a car to drive pass sweep her off her feet and change her life forever.  

   In my opinion I think these three girls fit perfectly into particular archetypes. Marin is the damsel in distress because all she longs for/ all she wants in life is to be loved by a wealthy man. Payasa would be the trouble maker or the "bad ass" because she was always mindless, she didn't care about what was going on. She had a boisterous demeanor & a very empty soul. La Guera , in my opinion, is a villain with herself. Now I say she's the villain because she never tried to make herself better. All she did was get worse. She knew what was going on, her own mother begged her to stopped but she just got worse. She was a villain to her own conscious. All her actions made her even more empty inside at the end even though she felt like she was completed. She tore herself down, all hope was lost. I also came to the realization that all these characters also fit in a category in society now a days. They are part of a stereotype of what Latina/Hispanic girls are thought out to be, cholas, drug addicts, school dropouts, & girls with sassy attitudes.The Authors reinforce that stereotype & they reinforce those archetypes very well in those three stories.