When Life Takes Over

Lately, I have not been writing a lot.  It has been more than a month since I have posted here. My readership has taken a nose dive. This is thanks to that fact that there have been some major changes in my life. Among them being, a divorce and surgery. Life has taken over and my writing has had to wait. The lull in my posts and my other online collaborations isn't permanent. In the meanwhile, as I get my posts going again, I am going to explore the usefullness of recycling old ideas. I'm taking out some old posts, dusting them off, and sharing them here, just like Professor Michael Starbird suggests trying in his online edx.org class Effective Thinking Through Mathematics, so for now, here are some posts from that past that I hope you enjoy:

You Don't Look Mexican

Victoria Ryan Interview

Las Aparicio

Eating Bugs

Economic Growth and Corruption: The Conjoined Twins

Recently, Huffington Post Live did a segment entitled "Mexico Quickly Becoming the New Migrant Destination" relating to an article the New York Times published about new immigration to Mexico that you can read here. I was invited to comment on the segment and afterwards I was left with the need to say a little more about some of the topics we discussed.  

Economic Growth and Corruption: The Conjoined Twins 

From my perspective, there has been an upturn in economic growth in Mexico which would make immigrating to Mexico attractive for many people from around the world. I was asked about finding employment in the segment. At the moment, of my twenty and thirty something Mexican relatives (who aren't still studying), everyone is employed. However, and sadly to say, I can't say the same for my relatives in the USA.  When I first moved to Mexico I had work as an English as a Second Language teacher. Later, I worked as a translator, academic advisor, a silver jewellery salesperson, a higher education administrative assistant, I started my own business and worked for an NGO on a fair trade retail project. Finding a job hasn't always been easy but I have found work. Having a university degree, in my opinion, has made all the difference and being bilingual makes me a more attractive candidate. 

Image source:https://www.facebook.com/Upworthy

Yet poverty and socio-economic inequality exist in Mexico. A lot of that inequality has to do with corruption. Corruption is in fact everywhere in the world. But in Mexico, it is just more institutionalized and people speak about it openly. From the illegal quotas that parents are asked to pay in public schools (which in fact did happen to me when my son was in a public school), to the desperately obvious unjust enrichment of Elba Esther Gordillo, Mexico's teacher's union president (who has lifelong permanence as the syndicate's president), to Wal Mart paying bribes to get more stores built around the country, corruption is, in my opinion, the number one factor that is and always has, held Mexico back from a more even, across the board, economic growth. 

At the risk of sounding näive, I firmly believe that corruption can be reduced drastically, if several policies and reforms would be put into place. Primarily regarding how elected officials are paid and what rights they have while they hold office. My belief is that, if elected officials in Mexico, beginning with federally elected officials, received the same benefits and minimum wage pay as the working class Mexican, things would start changing fast. To begin with, the bureaucratic monster known as IMSS (Mexican social security) would be reformed over night. If elected officials had to use IMSS instead of the private health insurance that Mexican tax pesos pay right now, millions of Mexicans would be better off. At the moment, IMSS is riddled with inept processes and personnel.  Daily, millions of Mexicans stand in lines for hours on end awaiting all to often sub-par medical attention and medicine. IMSS is not paid for exclusively by the government; workers who have IMSS through their employers pay for these services every time they get a paycheck since a percentage is deducted from their wages. 

Secondly, elected officials must be treated as any other citizen. The infamous fuero or priviledge that elected officials have to immunize themselves against any kind of legal procedings while they are in office must be revoked retroactively. There are several well known cases of illicit dealings among elected officials that have not been prosecuted because of this privilege. It is time for these and other Mexican politicians to pay the proverbial piper. For those elected officials who have not committed any crimes, knowing that if they will be prosecuted immediately, might just be what they need to behave like decent citizens. 

Finally, in order for these two aforementioned societal problems of gargantuan proportions to be reduced in size, policies that directly impact how business is done in Mexico need to be implemented. I believe that Tim Padgett puts it best in an article he wrote for Time back in March of this year. 

So forgive some of us if, almost 20 years later, we’re a bit reluctant to declare another fast-track Mexican Miracle and set aside our concerns about Mexico’s lingering dysfunction. Not just the mafia bloodletting, but the nagging failure to modernize a corrupt and incompetent judicial system. Not just the social inequality, which is still too vast, but the shameless business monopolies that exacerbate it by choking off competition and inflating prices.

However, I don't agree with everything he writes in the article. I do think that there should be hype about Mexico's economic boom. We need to hear that there is growth; news shouldn't be just the bad or doom and gloom. The Mexicans I interact with, those I know and love, are hard workers and persistent people who have a strong work ethic. Why shouldn't the media talk about how our economy is recovering? Padgett points out that Mexicans aren't convinced of the economic growth themselves and cites polls from Andres Oppenheimer´s article in the Miami Herald. But this negative view of the economic growth makes me think that, sometimes we can't see the forest for the trees. After hearing about corruption and knowing that nothing is being done about it, Mexicans hearing good news about Mexico are bound to be take it with scepticism.  I personally know Mexicans who openly say they despise their country and are convinced they live in the worst country in the world. While I respect their opinions, I whole heartily disagree. The worst countries in the world are places where your opportunities are limited to such a degree where can't do things like visit your family that live in other countries, which is the case in North Korea or drive a car because you don't have male genitals,  like in Saudi Arabia. 

None the less,  Padgett has a point when he talks about shameless business monopolies. Two of the biggest monopolies that come to mind are in fact media monopolies known as Televisa and TV Azteca. They are the biggest television companies in the country and have far too much control over the masses in my opinion. And Televisa, from what I saw during the last election, was the reason why President Peña Nieto was elected. We have yet to have something like the Huffington Post Live in Mexico that isn't tied to a monopoly that has ruled the airwaves for decades. 

So, in the mean time, I will leave it up to you, reader, to decide. Can Mexico, or any country for that matter, have real economic growth when there is rampant corruption at every level of society? Which makes me think of something my uncle said to me the day he dropped me off at Museo Soumaya, "now it turns out that only the wealthy can change a country." Power, money, corruption. All a part of the human condition and all a part of life in my Mexico. 



As you can see from the image bellow, taken from Maria Amparo Casar's article Los Dineros del Congreso (The Monies in Congress), Mexican congress members earned in 2011 over $12,310 USD a month. The minimum wage in Mexico for 2013 is just under $6.00 USD a day. That means that the elected officials, whose salary is paid with taxes, earned in 2011 is over $500.00 USD a day. Ask any worker how much he or she wants to earn, let them set their wage, and this is what happens. 

Image source:http://www.nexos.com.mx/?P=leerarticulov2print&Article=2102411

The interviews: Alejandra

Immigration reform has been a hot topic of debate once again since President Obama made his speech on January 29th in Las Vegas.  A public campaign to reform immigration policies has the potential to change the lives of millions. One of those people who could be impacted is Alejandra.* A thirty something native born Mexican living in Seattle for almost four years, Alejandra’s dynamism and bright smile captivate instantly. In 2008 Alejandra traveled to Seattle to visit family and the following year, after finishing her undergraduate degree in business in Mexico, returned. “I fell in love with Seattle” Alejandra recalls. “My brother married a girl from Seattle..but we don’t really get along much but...I met his friends and one of them [offered] to let me stay with him until I could find my own place.” Recalling The help from her friend gave her the opportunity to start a new life in Seattle since arrived with very little money. “I came here with one hundred pesos...I’m not kidding, I’m not kidding” she laughs. She soon found work cleaning houses, waiting tables and eventually started doing other things like being an extra in movies.  

When questioned about how she started in her various jobs, Alejandra smiles broadly and says “that is the magic of Seattle”. Thanks to serendipity and some insominia, she started appearing as an extra in movies. “There had been construction by my building for months,” she explains adding that she didn’t sleep for months “and every day it was this brrum-brrum, you know, this machine” she clenches her fists and repeatedly moves them up and down imitating a jack hammer.  “And I had just moved to another apartment and I saw a guy in that orange vest putting up sign and I thought, ‘oh no! Not more construction´”. “So I went down to ask him what he was doing,” she adds with a smile, “and said to him ‘No! Are you guys going to start construction?’ And he answered, ‘no, we are going to film a movie. Do you want to be an extra?’ ” When queried if she’s been asked if she has a visa that allows her to work, she hesitates and answers,  “I mean, I think they knew...” she pauses “it’s like something that we don’t talk about and it’s like good for me and it’s good for them...sometimes they don’t pay me and sometimes they pay me cash...but I just wanna do it...”

Today, work is more steady, with four movies under her belt, a roster of families that use her trusted services as a nanny and a satisfying volunteer job at a well known foundation, Alejandra’s days are full and long.  Her work at a well known foundation appeared in the form of a bus ride. She was having a conversation on the phone one day on the bus and a man overheard her and gave her his card. Alejandra decided that she needed to do more to help others and to also meet more people. Her work at the foundation is focused on helping with translations and making sure that the facilitators are using proper language. The job is varied and interesting.  Plus the foundation’s mission inspires her. She says, “everyone has the right to be educated and to live with dignity.” Getting out and spending time away from work is an added benefit to her volunteering; she had been spending a lot of time alone, in homes cleaning or taking care of children.

Alejandra adores living in the Emerald City but it isn’t always easy. “It’s been hard, you know, I have been working since I was 16 and... I am tired of working...with employers that you don’t like them or they don’t like you. I decided to have a change in my life...whatever I am going to is going to be something that makes me happy every day.”  Alejandra works long hours, between 10 and 16 hours a day. She says she is trying to find a way to be more formal and fixing her status. “It’s hard when you don’t have any support from your family, you know, like money...” But she perseveres, and deals with racism, classism, ignorance and economic hardships. “People try to humiliate [me] but everyday you are learning...” There are good times and bad times.  Alejandra admits that her visa status makes her uneasy but she is unapologetic when it comes to explaining herself to people who may ask too many questions. “This is my life, and God, or whoever, put me here for some reason and I am just trying to find the reason every single day. That’s what I am doing here and that is how I feel.”  Alejandra does miss Mexico but is convinced that Seattle is the best place for her now. As to what she will do when her tourist visa expires, she isn’t sure but she guarantees that she won’t do anything illegal. “My visa is going to expire and then I don’t know what I am going to do. I mean, I am not going to do anything illegal.”

You don’t look Mexican

Dealing with ignorant people is part of a typical day for Alejandra.  At five foot eleven, light brown eyes and dark blonde, she all too often hears “you don’t look Mexican”.  “People make you feel, think, that you are ignorant or you don’t have any education.” She asks herself “how can I show them I know how to use a computer, I know what happened in the war...” and she laughs. “Most people are like that, very ignorant about what a Mexican looks like, and how the country [works]. If you have a graduate degree people get surprised, and that kind of thing is pretty racist for me.” Alejandra believes that  much of that is due to ignorance and says she usually answers racist remarks with “you don’t know what a Mexican looks like because you’ve never been to Mexico.”  

Alejandra may be in the mastery phase of culture shock but she still misses the more laid back approach of life in Mexico. “Everything is on a schedule” Alejandra says. For Alejandra, life in the United States is at times, too ordered and scheduled while in Mexico, people have more time, they are less rigid and more relaxed. I ask her if maybe she should consider California and she laughs “but I don’t want to be around Mexicans if I am going to be here” she laughs and I point out that there are Mexicans everywhere in the USA, catching her in her own double standard.

Other differences between life in the US and Mexico stick out in Alejandra’s mind. We talk about families, since she has has intimate dealings with over a dozen families.  One such family went through an acerbic divorce where the wife asked her to spy on the husband and after refusing, was accused by the wife of having an affair with the husband.  It was mortifying and she suffered to see the couple’s son torn between the two.  Alejandra even had to answer questions posed to her by the family court.  Though now, things are better and Alejandra spends most of her time working with different children and feels that families in the US are more “health conscious and concerned with exercise” than in Mexico.  

Alejandra is uncertain about her future, although she jokingly foresees a boyfriend very soon. She hasn’t had a boyfriend in a while.  “It has been three years” she grins. I ask her to describe her ideal man. “He has to be able to make me laugh” she replies, “and be kind and educated”. Alejandra wants man with a plan and future. And “a sexy mouth”. I get the distinct impression that she’d like to date a guy from Seattle. A guy from Seattle with a sexy mouth. If you know of a man that fits that description, tell him to take the bus in Seattle, Alejandra is convinced that that is where the magic happens.