My true story is that I came to Italy for love
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Jatziri Mota Gutierrez is 34 years old and from Mexico, from Cuernavaca.
She came to Italy six years ago to follow her boyfriend from Brescia. “I came to Italy for love. Then the story ended, but I received the best gift in the world because now I have a family, with a partner I met here at the university, and a daughter”.
Jatziri has a Bachelor’s degree in Human Nutrition from Mexico, a Master’s degree in Molecular Nutrition from the Netherlands and a PhD in food microbiology from the University of Turin in Italy.
She travelled a lot, from Holland to Vietnam, to the United States, to Italy, “out of curiosity to learn about other places, other cultures… Curiosity was the biggest push. In Mexico, I was living in a small village but was able little by little to go beyond: beyond my village, my country, my continent”.
After his PhD, he continued her research for one year with a postdoctoral fellowship at the Department of Agricultural, Forestry and Food Sciences, University of Turin. Right now she is a full-time Jatziri mom but would like to apply for a Marie Curie postdoctoral fellowship in the future and then try to fulfil her dream of becoming an entrepreneur.
It was not all easy at first, especially the encounter/clash between the high expectations with which she arrived in Italy and the reality of language impact, interaction and integration with others. “There are still so many stereotypes attached to the image of the Mexican people,” Jatziri notes, “because not everyone has the opportunity to learn about other cultures. We need to learn to be patient and tolerant”.
“Now I feel light, before I was full of anxiety and fear for the future. Now I am happy, or rather at peace with myself, because I made it because of my determination and the people who believed in me and gave me a hand”.
Today, even if she could, Jatziri would not choose another country to live in: she has everything here in Italy and it has always felt like coming home because Italy looks a bit like her Mexico, but with the novelty of breathing and learning about European culture. “Even in the event of working in other countries, I would still always return to Italy”.
She has also found a modern and advanced research environment in Italy, with considerable resources for experimentation, although she would like to see a higher level of funding for scientific research at both the Italian and European levels.
Nostalgia for Mexico?
“I miss my country, of course, I miss my family a lot, but what I have in Italy and don’t find in Mexico is the feeling of security, of being able to move without fear”.
