My name is Krysta Murillo and I live in Pennsylvania with my family. My given name is Lloydia which is a common name in Belize. The story has it that I was expected to be a boy and named after my dad, and given the surprise, I was anyway. I recently discovered that the name is also a genus of a type of flower that grows in harsh climates, such as out of a rock or in the Arctic. I find this to be tragic irony. Here is a picture of the flower:
Lloydia Serontina
image obtained from: www.botanische-spaziergaenge.at
I was born in Los Angeles and spent my early childhood in San Fernando Valley, CA. I went to an awesome elementary school for kindergarten and first grade there. The school had a large backyard where animals such as rabbits and chickens were cared for. My friends were from many different cultural backgrounds: Russian, Japanese, Indian, Jewish, etc. As I am multiracial myself, I just assumed that every community was like mine where multiple people of different backgrounds co-existed together. I realized through my travels that is not the case!
I am Belizean-American and I have lived there on numerous occasions during my childhood. Belize is a tiny country in Central America that shares much of its culture with Caribbean nations such as Jamaica and Barbados due to its history as a former British colony. English is the official language making it the only English-speaking country in Central America. Belize is a top tourist destination and boast the largest barrier reef in the Western hemisphere and the second largest in the world. Belizeans today are descendents of African slaves, white colonizers, Mayan indigenous groups, Indian indentured servants and other groups such as Lebanese and Chinese, as well as a large influx of people from neighboring Central American nations that migrated to seek land and work. In my family I comprise the first four of the aforementioned groups.
I enjoy traveling and have been to 19 of the 50 US states, as well as Mexico, Belize, the Bahamas, Germany, Costa Rica, Argentina and Brazil. I hope to continue to add to this list in the years to come!