Character Analysis
Gonzalo is our resident teenager with a big family. He moved to Cleveland from Guatemala with his dad, and eventually, his mom, Tío Juan (his mom's uncle), and his younger bros come over as well. And Gonzalo is a major player in his family: he helps his dad out, because his pops doesn't speak English; and he watches over his great uncle because Tío Juan likes to wander off on his own little adventures.
We have to hand it to Gonzalo. He helps out his family a ton and he doesn't complain about it one bit. In fact, Gonzalo learns a lot about himself while he's being such a helpful guy. When he helps Tío Juan plant some seeds in the community garden, Gonzalo finds out that he's still got some growing up to do:
Watching him carefully sprinkling them into the troughs he'd made, I realized that I didn't know anything about growing food and that he knew everything. (4.9)
Gonzalo has to act like an adult a lot of the time. But in the garden, he discovers that he can learn a thing or two from the rest of the world.