became the Conquistador, the Spanish soldier mascot of El
Camino Real High School.
At mrst, I tried to join the cheerleading squad, but the
cheerleaders had too many rules. ͳeir rules were
nonsense. Like you can’t cuss, you got to be on time, you
have to wear mascara every day, you have to have your hair
done pretty every day. All these rules. And you can’t just
dance when you feel like it. I was like:
Tiffany: “What kind of rules you got for the mascot?”Teacher: “The mascot doesn’t have any rules.”Tiffany: “That’s what I want to be, then—the mascot.”Nobody had tried out to be the mascot, except me. So I
got it.
ͳe mrst time I mascoted, I didn’t have the uniform yet.
It was too big for me, so I had my grandma do alterations
on it. I had a T-shirt, and I wrote on it in big black letters:
“Will have uniform in 2 weeks. Grandma doin’ it.”
People loved it.
My routine was dope. I would be running up and down
the meld with my megaphone, telling people what to do,
leading cheers.
Tiffany: “El Cam, what?”Crowd: “Mino!”