Across the Pacific drift five continents; there lie two lands that start with C: China and Colombia. In one I was born, in the other my grandmother. Her people, that run away of her lands to live without smiles; mine, once enslaved, sang to die smiling. Both of us learned to accept what belongs to neither here nor there—she, for crossing coasts for a husband who died; I, for being her grandson, bearing my grandfather’s name.