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A Stranger in his HomelandHis Story
I was born in 1981 in the city of Morelia, Michoacan, which is near Mexico City. My Father worked as a private doctor who would service patients in the villages in and around Morelia. Payment from the villagers generally consisted of chickens or other farm animals like that. As there was not much money in it, the family also had to sell stuff over the weekends to make ends meet at the local swap meet.
Like many others, we heard about the great opportunities that could be found working in the United States. So my parents decided to take the chance and move the family to the U.S. The first time I crossed the border, I was the border, I was almost 4 years old. It was October of 1984. We entered through Nogales. I was too young to remember how we got across, but I know my father has a passport to gain legal entry into the U.S. My mother, younger brother and I had come through with temporary visas.
We had come to live with an uncle of mine who was living in the U.S. already. I actually have very few memories of this time, but I do remember that the living spaces were very small and cramped. Our stay here was brief. This particular family member had 12 kids, and a few family problems. An argument erupted one day over religious differences so my Father decided that it was time to move on.
We ended up moving to Riverside, California to live with my Mother’s sister who came to the U.S. 4 years earlier. We lived with her for the next year or so. During this time, my Mother worked many different jobs. I remember her finding work that was very physically demanding. She would come home with her hands blackened from the printing press she had been running, or dyed red from the strawberries she had been picking. My father had contracted polio as a child and was left with a disability limiting the amount of physical activity he could do. His jobs were less physically active, but were more risky. He found work delivering pizzas and as attending gas stations. I remember he would come home with broken glasses from getting mugged or telling my Mom about how he was robbed at gunpoint in the gas station.
Eventually, my Mother found work in a home for mentally handicapped adults. They allowed our family to live on the premises rent free for about a year. During this time my sister was born so our family had gotten a little larger. Eventually, the City seemed to have realized that a family was living there and began an investigation grounded on the concern of too many people living in the structure. So we had to move again.
Our next move brought us to our first house that we had ever lived in! To my six-year-old eyes, it seemed as big as a mansion! We lived here for the next eight years. During this time I went to school and struggled with reading and writing. I remember finding punctuation very difficult to grasp. It was also difficult dealing with some teachers as I got older and started attending high school. I remember being embarrassed by a computer teacher for misspelling the word “You”. She made such a big deal out of such a small mistake. I remember how ridicules it was sitting there being humiliated by her insults. Only now do I realize that she only did this to the non-white members of the classroom.
At home, are father only let us speak Spanish since we were learning English at school. In the evenings, he would teach us how to read and write Spanish from the books he would buy and bring home. My 2 younger brothers struggled with it, but my sister and I took to it very easily.
During these years, I learned to never tell anyone of my residency status. It was something I always felt was better to keep hidden. Over time, I began to realize that my 2 youngest siblings had certain advantages that my brother and I did not have by being born in the United States. Opportunities would be available to them that we could not take advantage of. I don’t want to say I was jealous of them, but I did recognize it, and was perhaps a little envious of them
On November 8th, 1994, something happened in California that would once again uproot our family and set us moving once again. Proposition 187 was passed by the voters of California. This proposition stated that in order take advantage of any government programs, including education and medical aid, legal residency had to be established, and any illegal immigrants found would be deported back to Mexico. When I heard the news on the radio that morning, I remember felling afraid and uncertain. I didn’t understand what people were so afraid of that they would not want us living here. I kept thinking that at anytime I could be yanked out of school, arrested and be left stranded without my family. My parents decided that it would be best if my Mother and the kids returned to Mexico, while my Father remained in the States. So we were all pulled out of school and we left the home we had known for the last eight years. Sadly, we received word that the Proposition 187 was shot down in court well after we had already left the States
My Mother, my 3 younger siblings and myself then moved to Tijuana, where we lived for about six months. During this time my brothers had a very difficult time adjusting to the Mexican school system. Both were held back 2 grade levels because of it. We then moved back to Morelia with Father’s family where we lived for the next year or so. During this time my brothers improved in school enough to be moved up to the next grade level.
Eventually, we heard the news that my Father received a job in Phoenix, Arizona managing a truck stop. The best news being that it paid enough to support the whole family and could return us back to the United States. My Mother, younger brother and sister were sent north to live in Phoenix. My brother and I had to stay behind because it would have been too difficult for all of us to go together as my mother, brother and I would have to be smuggled across. Then I wasn’t sure how my Mother was smuggled across, but later learned that some family member in Yuma had a system worked out that could get her over the fence and into a city park where she could wait without looking inconspicuous until my Father got there to pick her up.
The next six months were very long for my brother and I. We stayed with family in Morelia and continued going to school. I did enjoy living in Mexico, but I never really felt at home. The pace of life was much slower then in the U.S. and we could go almost anywhere with out feeling out of place or in danger. However, it always felt like a place you would go to visit, but could never call home. I grew up in the United States. It was all I ever knew.
The day we finally got news that our family was ready for us to come
home is one of the happiest I can remember! We were finally going home to be with the rest of our family! The difficult part of which would be getting across the border. My brother and I were placed on a bus, which took us to San Louis, by the border. What I remember most are the Federalies. We were two teenage boys traveling by ourselves with our luggage with us. I knew that often times the Federalies would search your luggage and make excuses to confiscate things that they may like for themselves. We were carrying several valuable things hidden in the bottom of our bags, including a boom box that was to be a gift for my Father once we got to the U.S. Fortunately, the guard who searched our luggage was an American Football fan, and I was wearing my favorite jersey at the time. He was so distracted talking football with me, he barely looked any further then the first few layers of clothes we had draped over our valuables! We were very relieved that we would be able to take everything out of Mexico that we brought with us!
At this point, we met our Father in a restaurant nearby the crossing point near the border. He had with him the birth certificates of two of our cousins who were very close to our age. He gave them to us and explained that we would be using them to cross into the United States. We would walk through the entryway, while my Father would drive the luggage across. We were wearing nice clothes, were clean cut, and could speak very good English so we should get passed though with no problems. When asked, we explained that we had crossed the border earlier in the day to do some shopping and to grab some lunch. They asked a few other questions, then let us pass without any problems. We walked to the nearest fast food restaurant where we agree to meet my Father and went to Phoenix.
I remember how excited we were to be rejoining the rest of the family, and I could not believe how hot it was when we arrived! I had a very difficult time adjusting to summer heat. At this time we were living 2 rooms above the truck stop my Father was managing. My father would manage the gas station portion, and my Mother would manage the small hotel rooms that were built over the truck stop.
Upon arriving in Phoenix, I was enrolled in High School ans would have to adjust my self again. Growing up I always had to wear hand-me-down clothes that came from other family members or from church clothing programs. I didn’t notice so much when I was younger, but it got much harder to do once I got older. However, now that my Father was making better money, I was finally able to get new clothes. I remember how happy I was to be able to wear better clothes to school and fit in better with the other kids in school. Due to the education system in Mexico, I was much better equipped to handle the schooling system here in the States. I had learned organizing skills that helped me develop better study habits that helped me cope better with the stress of a new school.
We lived in the rooms above the truck stop for about 6 months until we were able to get another house where we lived for the next 2 years. During this time I had become active in school sports and band and was able to enjoy my high school experience. The thing that I regretted the most though is that I was not able to participate in certain activities due to my residency status. I couldn’t apply for a driver’s license or attend class trips to Mexico as the other kids could. When asked why, I would always make excuses explaining why I couldn’t do certain things, but never explained told anyone about my residency status.
One of the things I was not very happy with is the fact that I was forced to take ESL courses. Even though I grew up in the U.S. they still felt the need to place me in these classes. I feel this was a large hindrance in my education. I was placed in classes that were full of students that could barely speak English. I spent most of these classes bored and learned very little from what the teachers were teaching.
As graduation approached, I was unsure what to do after high school. I wanted to go to Northern Arizona University. I had excellent grade from high school, and had the capability to go, but I couldn’t find a way to finance it. It was while speaking with a counselor from NAU that I first told someone about my residency status. I was very nervous doing so and was not sure what would happen when I did. The counselor helped me find alternatives by directing me to community colleges and helped me find scholarships to pay for tuition. I was able to take full advantage of these scholarships and was able to get a large part of my schooling done using them.
Besides going to school, I also started working when I turned 16 years old at the truck stop my parents were working at. When I turned 18 I was promoted from stock boy to cashier. During this time I learned how to manage the store by watching my Mother and Father work. The owner’s son took me to a different store and hired me as his cashier. I worked as cashier in his store for a year before I was made store manager. All this time, I was being paid in cash under the table. A portion of the money I made I made sure to save just in case something happened in the future.
The great difficulty I always had was trying to find rides from work to school and back home again. My parents were usually able to help, but it was always such a hassle for them to always be driving around to pick me up.
I graduated from a local Community College with an Associate in the Arts degree in 2001. It was then that I applied and was accepted at ASU, despite a guidance councilors great negativity. I was making enough money managing the store to cover out-of-state tuition as well as cover other expenses I had while going to school.
Things continued this way from another year or so. I would go to school in the morning, work at night, and studied when I got a chance. Thing were going fine until the storeowner lost the rights to his store. I’m not sure how it happened, but I was just told not to return by the new management. My brother was working at a local chain convenience store and was able top get me a job there. He was working on a “borrowed” social security number, but I was able to apply for and receive a tax number that I was able to work under. I worked for the next year and a half here. Going from store managing to cashiering again meant taking a huge cut in pay. The only thing that let me continue paying for school was the savings I had put aside while working for my previous employer.
Unfortunately, my parents were no longer able to give me rides to this new store location. I was finally pressed into driving myself around Phoenix in order to get to work and continue my schooling. I was both thrilled at the possibility of driving and scared to death at the same time. I was finally able to do something I had always wanted to do since high school, but I would be doing it without a drivers license or insurance. I was limited to driving from home to work, to school and back home again. I was as careful as I could possibly be, but new it was just a matter of time before it caught up with me.
As graduation drew nearer, I was wondering what I was going to do with myself. I would have a diploma, but still would not have the proper papers to get a formal job. At this point I had been dating a beautiful girl I had met in church for about two years. After a lot of thought and discussion, we decided to get married young so I could begin establishing credit, get a job, and better prepare for our future together legally. After the wedding, I was accepted in an interning position for a local TV news station. When my papers finally arrived, I was hired as a full time news editor just in time to graduate with a Communications degree from ASU. I am now working as the assistant manager of a large rental car company managing a large work crew and a fleet of rental cars.
In my position, I am in contact with the public on a daily basis. I hear many different negative comments about current immigration issues all the time. I have several people make rude comments regarding Mexican immigrants while talking to me without realizing that I am one. Usually I’ll make a slightly sarcastic reply to their comment to make them think about what they just said to me. After I let them know that I am a Mexican immigrant, I get to enjoy watching the embarrassed look come over their face as they reach for other topics of conversation.
As I look back on all the things my family has accomplished over the last few years, I can’t help but to feel a sense of pride. My parents are living in a nice large house, driving new vehicles, and are able to support my brothers and sister while they attend college. They did all this through working hard and taking advantage of every opportunity that was given to them. All this was also accomplished without a single dime from the federal government, a fact my Father is very proud of.
Of all the things I have accomplished so far, I consider my crowning achievement my eleven-month-old daughter that my wife and I had. She gives me a renewed sense of hope and a feeling of extreme satisfaction that all the difficulties I experienced in the past were not in vane. Knowing that the sacrifices my parents made to help me succeed, will allow my daughter to have a better life. I look forward to giving her all the things I always dreamed about growing up, but could never have.
