PHIL VALER

Actually, my name is Philippe - pronounced like ‘fill up.' It's just that Phil is a lot easier to spell and say. You might think I'm French, and you'd be correct to think that if it wasn't for my names being of French origin, but I'm a Peruvian-American... I am the son of first-generation immigrant parents. My family originally came from the country of Peru, and, shortly after moving to the United States, I was born. I was fortunate enough to grow up in a mixed environment. With my parents, I'd only speak Spanish, and outside of the home, you'd find me speaking English. I say fortunate, but it didn't seem like that at first. I grew up in a state where I was very much the minority. Now, things have changed, and my home state has become much more diverse; however, before all that change occurred, my childhood made me develop an inquisitive nature - perhaps one of the biggest takeaways from this period was that it helped define me. Questions such as "why do I look different from others?"..