Dear Mexican: I’m a pocha immigration attorney. I have so many questions for you I’m thinking I should just hire you as a consultant. Why do Mexicans seem to want me to lie to them and steal their money, and tell them they can become residents even when it’s hopeless? Why can’t Mexicans answer yes or no questions, with a yes or no? Why do they have to give me long narratives that make no sense? If Mexicans claim that part of the reason they don’t want to be in Mexico is because of government corruption, then why do they ask me to lie for them, and help them to lie? Why are polleros the rudest, most aggressive clients a lawyer could ever have? Why don’t mexicanas want a female attorney, while mexicanos seem to think it’s kind of cool? When I go into fast food restaurants in my power suits and order tacos, why do the mexicanas selling me the food giggle and make fun? Why can’t they just be happy and proud for one of their own? When I tell a Mexican that I don’t think their case is winnable, why do they change from using “usted” with me to “tu“? When I tell a Mexican bad news, why can’t I just speak normally in Spanish? Why is it that I get so nervous that my pocha accent comes out super strong?
Pocha Attorney
Dear Wabette: If people want to hire me as a consultant, I charge by the hour, with payments acceptable in tacos, tequila bottles, and Chicano Studies books. So let’s empezar your bill starting … ahorita. Mexicans want you to tell them they can become residents because they are paying you to make their hopeless situation a legal one, lies or not. Their “long narratives that make no sense” is otherwise known as America’s immigration system. They ask you to lie for them because the alternative is going back to Mexico’s cesspool of corruption—again, it’s your job as an immigration attorney to make the hopeless hopeful by making the impossible happen, ethics be damned. Polleros are going to be rude because they’re criminals—and outside of Daniel Stern’s character in Born in East L.A., do you know of any gentleman human smugglers? Mexicanas not wanting you to represent them isn’t a pocha thing but a female thing, so go write to Jezebel about that one; Mexican men wanting you as an attorney, in turn, is all about an hombre ogling you. As a pocha, you shouldn’t be eating fast food in the first place—and the mexicana-on-pocha hate is another female issue that Jezebel can answer. When a Mexican switches from addressing you as usted to tu, it’s because you’re no longer someone deserving of their respect but the shyster scamming them out of cash. Finally, you start talking like a pocha when you tell them the bad news because you don’t like delivering bad news—that’s understandable. Let’s see … carry over the dos, add 3, include a first-timer discount and your final legal bill with me is a taquero for 30 people, a bottle of ON Tequila, and a first-edition autographed copy of Occupied America. Pleasure doing business!
Why do so many Mexican parents let their kids play in the street unsupervised? I’m sure this practice isn’t limited to Mexicans, but it seems like some neighborhoods are filled with Mexican kids playing in the streets, not paying attention to traffic (no matter how quiet the street might be), and with no parents in sight. Are these parents lazy, stupid, or encouraging self-reliance?
Whitey
Dear Gabacho: Every chamaco is going to be a different story, but the main reason Mexicans let their kids play on the street is because there’s nowhere else for them to play. The lack of park spaces in barrios is an unfortunate phenomenon well-known to city planners, and best examined in Cal State Los Angeles professor David R. Diaz’s influential Barrio Urbanism: Chicanos, Planning and American Cities. Compounding that is that most landlords in barrios don’t allow kids to play in common areas, leading families to let them loose onto the mean streets.
This article appears in Nov 7-13, 2013.
Dear Mex: two comments on this weeks letters and YOUR answers. 1 hardly ever read your column. Today I did and now I recall why. If you want to pick up Anglo readers like me, it strikes me you should speak in clear English decipherable to us. I have no idea what Gabacho means, etc. Therefore you have not communicated. Ditto, “Pocha.” (??) 2. Parks in the city is in my opine a lame excuse here in Tucson b’cuz of Reid, usually filled with every ethnicity living here, including yours from Christmas to St. Swivins Day. Lastly, in Denver with a high Hispanic population, there exists “green zones” (aka PARKS) what seem to be every ten blocks for most of the last century, occasioned by every one, from the famous author of Broadway plays to nudists….so there. Rethink your think, bud.
Dear Gustavo, In response to the snarky commentary above and on the subject of language…I enjoy your column, being called guera by my Mexican supervisor, being called m’ija and taught the Spanish equivalent of objects by my Mexican co-workers and being good naturedly included in conversations with people who flow between English and Spanish with beautiful fluidity. Students pay big bucks to take language classes here at the University but this old white lady is getting it and more for free. Cogitate on that “Anglo Reader” and brush up on your own English grammar, punctuation and composition if you’re so dead
proud of it.