A few months ago, I read the story on a news site about "Pedro the dishwasher," a Guatemalan guy who tried the old hop-the-border-make-money-and-leave trick but failed. The guys from the ranches/poorer areas do it--they sneak into the US, leaving behind wives, children, and friends with the intention of staying a few years, making their fortunes, and sneaking back out. I've known a bunch of guys who did it. They work 90+ hours a week, save every penny, and disappear as soon as they have enough to buy some land back home. Then they tell their friends back home how easy it was and make them want to try. That's one reason why there are so many immigrants who don't speak English (why learn a language if you don't plan to stay?). Pedro was a guy who messed up the system. He ended up making a stir.
He had been here for 11 years washing dishes in a restaurant. I think I've said before that there are few shittier jobs than dishwashing (they are up to their elbows in disgusting water, they work longer hours than anyone else, they are in the back of the restaurant with the worst heating and ac, the water causes extreme skin dryness, there are health hazards from handling sharp objects that people have eaten off of). He made $59,000 in 11 years--a lot of money but not for 11 years of work. Then he put it in a duffel and went to get on a plane.
Bam.
If somebody has that much cash on an airplane, they assume it's drug money.
He lost every penny. And it gets worse.
Watch it.
I saw this story when it first came out, and it's stayed with me because shit, I know guys just like this one. I really feel for the guy--not just because the media was on his side, but he just wasted 11 years of his life in the shittiest conditions and away from everyone he knows for nothing. Despite the risk he knowingly took, it's hard to think about the guy and not want to make everything right again for him. This is a person's life here.
Illegal immigration is an easy thing to condemn when it's just about a group of anonymous law-breakers. When it's real individuals, it's different. When I know it's somebody's daughter or husband or friend who is trying to escape a life of eating rice every day, sleeping on a dirt floor, paying bribes to see a doctor...well, I cannot condemn that. I don't want this country to be overrun, but what gives me the right to eat out twice a week in air-conditioned restaurants while people no better than me are facing limits on how much rice they can buy? Am I more worthy just because I was born here? I've done nothing to deserve my American citizenship except show up, and others are giving up family and familiarity just for a taste of this place.
It makes me crazy.
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