In the spirit of remixes...

Modern...

Classy....

Reuniting With Myself

Marquez 1

Erica Marquez

Dr. Preston

AP English Literature and Composition

31 March 2014

Reunited With Myself

When I came into this world and took my first breath of oxygen I stunned many and became a special case for the doctors. I was premature and unable to eat without assistance. As I see it, I just could not wait to start living. As I grew older I found things that I liked, people that I loved, and experiences I wanted to go through. As I kept existing in this world I forgot what it meant to live. I forgot what it really meant to enjoy life. I got so wrapped up in what life and my education should be that I forgot what I loved about these things. I lost an essence of who I was and this course helped me reunite with that person.

When I began this course I was slapped with the big question. I thought and thought, and I wondered should I strive to impress or should I be truthful? I went with truthful and there my journey began. I felt like I took a fresh breath of oxygen.  I took this course to heart because then is when I knew that it would benefit me. Working with others, making connections, and sharing my ideas allowed me to become interactive in class. It allowed me to enjoy the course and I would definitely say that we as students deserve that opportunity. We deserve the opportunity to finally breathe a breath of fresh air; a breath of a new system.

Marquez 2

Literature is about learning and reading, and writing, and loving, and feeling, and emotion. It is so many things in so little pages. Part of our experience in this course was literature. My favorite pieces of work from this year are “The Kite Runner”,  “A thousand Splendid Suns” and, “In The Time Of The Butterflies”. These were my favorite because I am very passionate about justice for all. I like to think that we all have voices and that they should all be heard. These novels have many injustices embedded in the story lines. They are so raw and are based on the reality of two countries, Afghanistan and the Dominican Republic. Reading about these events reminded me about my life, it reminded me of how grateful I should be, and about how I want to change the world.

I could breathe since day one, but I did not know how to live or what I would live for. Connecting with myself allowed me to realize that there is so much to be done in this world and for the world. I could be a change. I could be passionate again. (I lost that in school) I could express my feelings and share my concerns in this course. I could talk about the campesinos and their injustices. I could hear about

other peoples passions like teaching, releasing stress through blowing fruits up, inspiring others through films, creating websites to help and entertain others, etc. The list of passions and interest goes on…The fresh air is breathed, it is contagious in this environment.

            I like oxygen and breathing this type of fresh air, but what really made me inhale and exhale lots of it were Javi’s and Izamar’s In Loco Politico post. The

Marquez 3

sarcasm and truth to their post was the freshest of air. Also, the class readings of plays like Macbeth, and Hamlet. They were very fun and entertaining.

            In that class we all breathe the same cool air. We all have a passion or something we care about and want to share with others. Kristen, Jacob, Kendall’s, Kylie’s, Maria’s and Javi’s and Izamar’s presentations were all connected and unified in two things. I felt like their presentations were focused on identity and change. They all put something on the table, something that they liked or could identify with and they talked about changing it, being innovators, trying to understand it and making a contribution to it. They all let us have a breeze of their wind.

            This year I not only stunned many…I stunned myself. I fought many battles, and I struggled to breathe the fresh air. Despite these gust of winds that seemed to tumble me and shake me once in a while I became aware of when I needed to hold my breath and when I could breathe. And finally I could breathe…            

Voices Without A Voice/ Voces Sin Voz

This is for you my dear campesinos

As you read this think of yourself as a farm worker...

YOU came into this huge and "rich" country at a really young age. YOU came on your own, YOU came with your family, or your parents brought you here. The only thing you came here for was to survive. Your beautiful country did not provide you with the resources or opportunities you needed to survive. You had no choice...You had to leave your home and you had to say bye to your mom and dad, your spouse, your aunts, and uncles, and cousins, but worst of all your children, your babies, your everything. You had to leave them. You left with absolutely nothing and came with absolutely nothing. YOU are nothing...

Oh and by the way while you were on your journey to survive you had the cross the border, but before that you were faced with Mexican and American assailants and kidnappers after your money, you were faced with heat, the sun, snakes and cacti, after your body and American vigilantes after your freedom, and border patrol after your records. Then you had to stay in a small dark and damp room with about 20 others oh and by the way you are dehydrated, and eating rotten food. You are unshowered...but wait the fun does not end there...You also had to go under a 7 foot barbed wire fence run across a sand road run across another barbed wire fence and keep running until you cannot breath...And then maybe you will make it through. Oh and by the way you had to pay for this 3 day vacation trip... (source Fresh Fruit, Broken Bodies by Seth M. Holmes)

You see, YOU are opressed and your dignity is squandered therefore like Che Guevara said in his Motorcycle Diaries  "they stop being father, mother, sister or brother and become a purely negative factor in the struggle for life and, consequently a source of bitterness for the healthy members of the community."

Guevara also says " The lives of the poor, unsung heroes of this battle, who die miserably in one of the thousand traps set by nature to defend its treasures, when all they want is to earn their daily bread." 

Voices Without A Voice Video 

Cesar Chavez Movie Trailer :)

I Strongly dislike (hate) school

I have been going to school every year. Every year gets a bit more complicated.

Same equations...just an added letter or number maybe
Same routine...just different building and/or city
Same personalities...just different faces
Same classroom setting...just different rooms
Same rules...just different places
Same material...just more detail
Same projects...just different rules
Same stress...just growing increasingly fast
Same content...just in a different order
Same as yesterday...just today is a new day

That is the problem... school is stuck on yesterday
BUT I want to learn about today!

I'm stuck on this fenced campus full of classrooms called school...It is practically a jail.
I move from one cell to the next but at the end of the day I am still stuck there.
I was done learning when I realized it was all too similar. Every year was full of stress and things I would never use in life. These things I would only use in the next cell, but never outside the jail. 

I want to learn...actually there are only 2 more weeks of school and all I want to do is graduate. The thing that really ticks me off is that teachers think "Oh what the heck let me just try to get through the whole damn book in 2 weeks, let me just assign massive projects out this week, so that during dead week my students could actually be dead" 

Being a student is great in highs school -_- ...

you are killing me!

Dear school,

I hate you and your dumb education system that has been around far too long!

Disgustingly,

Erica

and...

 Dear Education,

I love you. You allow me to be creative and free! I wish I could be with you all the time, but unfortunately school jailed me in. Come and get me!

Eagerly,

Erica

WHY I HATE SCHOOL AND LOVE EDUCATION VIDEO: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=y_ZmM7zPLyI

Our silence is a crime...

Are we human?

Muslim

Spoken word

IT IS NOT ABOUT THE FRUIT. IT IS ABOUT THE PEOPLE!

Photo Essay: Farming on the Frontlines in Gaza: http://www.newsweek.com/photo-essay-farming-frontlines-248321

By Jošt Franko/VII Photo Mentor Program

Farmers install an irrigation system in Beit Lahia, near the Erez checkpoint.

In Gaza, with the Israeli border within sight, Palestinian farmers lead worn-torn lives, dealing farming fields on the frontlines. Trying to make a living cultivating crops like strawberries, oranges, grapefruits and olives, their task became even more difficult after a military blockade in 2007 made it impossible to export their products. Up to 80 percent of agricultural yields from Gaza and the West Bank used to be sold abroad, but a ban on exports has devastated the Gazan economy. At the same time, essential supplies including fuel and electricity are strictly regulated by Israel. Farmers are most likely to be settled in small communities like Rafah, Khan Younis and Beit Hanoun, which are now known as frontlines, where missiles most likely to be fired and lives taken. In these struggling farming towns, the Israeli army has bulldozed land and sniper fire is a familiar occurrence.

More than 35 percent of Gaza’s agricultural land is in so-called buffer zones. Officially, these restricted-access areas extend 300 meters into Gaza. In reality, they can extend up to 1,500 meters from the border fence and are enforced with lethal means. In addition to declining agricultural production here, existing water shortages are exacerbated by heavy pollution, leaving just 10 percent of the water supply potable. (All images from October and November 2013.)

Khalil Zaanin works at his farm in Beit Hanoun. His land was bulldozed several times by the Israeli army.  

 Workers gather products and load them on a car in Khan Younis.

A white flag leans on the ruins of a farm in Rafah.

Geese at Medhat Hamad’s farm in Beit Hanoun. He and his wife work on the field during the day. After school, their children and grandchidren come to the farm to play. Their land was bulldozed several times by the Israeli army.

Medhat Hamad’s grandchild lies on the ground on their farm. 

A donkey eats from a bucket on a farm in east Rafah.

Remains of a rocket following an Israeli air strike lie next to the shadows of Eyad Qudaih’s two daughters, as they stand near their house in Khan Younis. The children ran to their fathers just before the projectile hit their bedroom, Eyad remembers: “If they stayed in the room, they would have been all dead.” He says his wife was pregnant with twin boys, in her sixth month, and had a miscarriage the night of the bombing.

A wife of a farmer makes bread in the area of Rafah.

Tomatoes are transported to market in a pickup truck in Rafah.

Mohammed Abu Daqqa’s farmland in Khan Younis is in the buffer zone. Abu Daqqa cannot hire workers because the land is considered to be too dangerous, so he has to work on the field on his own. Foreign activists accompany him from time to time as human shields, to protect him from Israeli army sniper fire.

Left: Abu Tareq Wahadans’s son unloads fertilizer in Beit Hanoun. Because of the fuel crisis, many farmers use horses and carts to transport their goods. Right: Medhat Hamad’s wife peels an orange on their farm in Beit Hanoun. The family says their farm was bulldozed several times by the Israeli army.

Baby of the Al Roomi family sleeps in her mother’s lap on a farm in Rafah.

Palestinian children and a man gather near a greenhouse at the farm in the Msabbah area in Rafah.

A farm in Rafah.

Daughter of Mohammed Abu Daqqa plays on the roof of their house in Khan Younis.

Ghanma Jbara, prepares tea on the ruins of her house in Rafah. In June 2006, one day after Israeli soldier Gilad Shalit was kidnapped, the Israeli army invaded the area, and her land and house were bulldozed. The farm was surrounded by tanks and soldiers for more than two weeks, and food and water had to be provided by Red Crescent. She refuses to leave her land and move from the ruins of her house and now lives in a shelter home next to her former house and land.

The Abu Daqqa house in Khan Younis. In the last war in 2012, their house was occupied by the Israeli army. They detained their father Mohammed for several days while their mother Jihan and their kids were forced to stay in the house with Israeli soldiers.

A man holding a cabbage, stands next to his son in Rafah.

Abu Daqqa's farmland in Khan Younis.

My opinion: The injustice of the farm laborer is not only a problem for the Latinos. It is a epidemic faced in many countries. I will repeat what Cesar Chavez said until we understand that the problem is not about the fruit it is about the people and about humanity. "The fight is never about grapes or lettuce. It is always about people"

MUST READ: Farm Confessional: I’m an Undocumented Farm Worker

Original Article: http://modernfarmer.com/2013/11/farmworker-confessional/
By Lauren Smiley on November 6, 2013

As told to and translated from Spanish by Lauren Smiley

I’m Odilia Chavez, a 40-year-old migrant farm worker based in Madera, California, the heart of the fertile Central Valley. I’m also a single mother of three: my 20-year-old eldest son came and joined me in 2004, crossing with a coyote. My son is now at the university, studying political science. The younger two were born here — American citizens. 

I grew up in Santiago Yosondua, Oaxaca, in southern Mexico. I went to school through third grade, my dad was killed when I was 11, and we didn’t even have enough food to eat. So I went off to work at 12 in Mexico City as a live-in maid for a Spanish family. I’d go back each year to Oaxaca to visit my mom, and the migrants who’d come back from the United States would buy fancy cars and nice houses, while my mom still slept on a mat on the floor in our hut. A coyote told me he could take me to the United States for $1,800. So I went north in 1999, leaving my four-year-old son behind with my mother. I was 26.

We crossed through the desert into Arizona, hiding from the border patrol. I finally arrived in Madera in March of 1999, and I moved into a boarding house for migrant farmworkers.

I’d never worked in a field. It was really hard at first — working outdoors with the heat, the daily routine. But I’ve certainly learned. In a typical year, I prune grapevines starting in April, and pick cherries around Madera in May. I travel to Oregon in June to pick strawberries, blueberries and blackberries on a farm owned by Russians. I take my 14-year-old daughter and 8-year-old son with me while they’re on their summer break. They play with the other kids, and bring me water and food in the field. We’ll live in a boarding house with 25 rooms for some 100 people, and everyone lines up to use the bathrooms. My kids and I share a room for $270 a month.

I head back to Madera in August for my children to start school. We own our house now — paid off in April! I reached the American dream — ha — thanks to the help of the father of my youngest son, who died in 2007 after he returned to Mexico after a problem with immigration authorities and was killed while working as a policeman. In Madera, I pick grapes that will be made into raisins in September, usually rest in October. In November, I travel each day to Stanislaus County to work planting trees in a nursery until February.

On all the harvests, men and women work side-by-side doing the same job, and women work just as fast as the men. I’ve been harassed one time: when a boss who drove us out to the field every day wanted to hug me, and said he wouldn’t charge me the $8 a day for the ride if I’d go out with him. (Most of us don’t have driver’s licenses, so the contractors organize rides to work.) I left the job. In California, especially in Fresno and Madera counties, there’s an abundance of farm jobs. So you don’t have to do one you don’t like.

I’ve seen on the news that some Congress members or American citizens say undocumented workers are taking their jobs. We’re not taking their jobs. In the 14 years I’ve been here, I’ve never seen an American working in the fields. I’ve never seen anyone work like Mexicans. In restaurants and construction, you’ll find Salvadorans and Guatemalans, but in the fields, it’s almost all Mexicans.

The work is hard — but many jobs are hard. The thing that bothers me more is the low pay. With cherries, you earn $7 for each box, and I’ll fill 30 boxes in a day — about $210 a day. For blueberries, I’ll do 25 containers for up to $5 each one — $125 a day. With grapes, you make 30 cents for each carton, and I can do 400 cartons a day – $120 a day. Tomatoes are the worst paid: I’ll pick 100 for 62 cents a bucket, or about $62 a day. I don’t do tomatoes much anymore. It’s heavy work, you have to bend over, run to turn in your baskets, and your back hurts. I say I like tomatoes — in a salad. Ha. With a lot of the crops, the bosses keep track of your haul by giving you a card, and punching it every time you turn in a basket.

I wish they would be more considerate of what we’re doing with the pay rate. They’re a little cheap: 31 cents for a carton of grapes. I would like another two or three cents a carton, because it’s really hard and heavy work. I’ve never worked a union contract job — a lot of them are in tomatoes or oranges — but if anyone doesn’t want to pay you, the United Farm Workers of America where I’m a volunteer, will help you get paid.

I’m very fast. In jobs where you’re doing delicate things, like pruning plants, they don’t want you rushing, so they pay you by the hour. But harvest jobs are usually paid by the quantity you pick. I prefer it that way — you have to run, but you can get home faster. We get there at 6:00 in the morning and, if I rush, I take a break at 1:00, drink and eat something, then work for another hour and head home. You pick the amount of hours you want to work, and you try not to take a lot of breaks so you can earn more. Some people will go until 5:00 in the afternoon and want to work and work, but I have my kids.

You come home really tired. I’ll come home, take a shower, put lotion on my hot feet, and be ready for the next day. I’m usually in bed by 9:00 to get up at 3:00 or 4:00 in the morning to make and pack some tacos for the day. Also, undocumented workers don’t have any medical insurance — so the majority of us just buy over-the-counter pills for any problems. Luckily, I haven’t had many health issues yet.

Some contractors think they can abuse you because you’re undocumented. One time, a contractor who was an American citizen with Mexican parents called me a no-good illegal, and claimed he was going to call immigration on me. I said, “Send ‘em over, I’ll be waiting!” I left that job.

We all want immigration reform. First, I’d get a driver’s license, social security, and go see my mom in Mexico. (The last time I went was in 2008, and I had to cross the dessert again with a coyote to get back here — but it was the only option.) I would still work in the fields. I don’t know how to do anything else. A lot of workers haven’t gotten very far in school, and they can’t use a computer. What job are they going to do? We can’t get a better job. They were farmworkers in Mexico and we’re going to die as farmworkers. I do have a lot of pride in my work, though. It can be fun. We joke around.

I’m going to keep working as long as I can. My youngest son says he’s going to invent a robot to do the housework for me, and he’s going to earn a lot so we can buy our own ranch.

And yes, you can use my real name! Some undocumented people are scared, but I’ve never seen an immigration raid on a farm. (I hope they don’t start, either.) Agriculture is dependent on undocumented workers. We need the money from the farmers, and the farmers need our hands.

My opinion: This women is a true warrior! I am amazed by her dedication and her will power to keep moving forward in life. The pay she describes is ridiculous. It nearly nothing when compared to the time and back breaking labor they put in each and every day. The American Dream is a broad term and each person describes it slightly different, but I am fed up with it. How can this be the American Dream?! It may be better than being unemployed in your homeland and not having enough to feed your family, but how can one be satisfied with just this...There are many other warriors out there and I wish them the absolute best. May they be able to find the American Dream and not the American Nightmare. 

FED UP Movie Trailer

NEW FILM COMING OUT ABOUT OUR "AMAZING" AND "HEALTHY" BODIES :)

 ENJOY THE MOVIE TRAILER!

THE NIGHTMARE OF THE AMERICAN DREAM

This "DREAM" that so many Latinos yearn for and would leave everything behind for has become more and more impossible. The conditions that these people have to go through are heart breaking, inhumane, and yet they move forward...They are the definition of determination, persistence, and resilience...When crossing the border from Central America to Mexico and then the United States, or from Mexico to the United States their stories go unheard of, their bodies lost on the way, and eventually they become invisible...They are LOS INVISIBLES.

A special thanks to Marc Silver & Gael Garcia Bernal for the documented videos that open our eyes to the immigrants' stories. 


Los Invisibles:

La Vida De Las Mujeres Migrantes:

More Videos on the YouTube channel: The Invisibles, Amnesty- https://www.youtube.com/user/invisiblesfilms

WHO IS DAYANI CRISTAL?

Gael García Bernal Explores A Migrant’s Tragic Journey In New Documentary: http://www.buzzfeed.com/norbertobriceno/gael-garcia-bernal-explores-a-migrants-tragic-journey-in-new 

In a report by Humane Borders, since 1999 there have been 2,471 migrants deaths in Arizona alone. Most of the bodies found have not been identified.

Humane Borders

A new documentary by Marc Silver and Gael García Bernal tells the story of one of these unidentified migrants, who died while crossing the Sonoran desert in Arizona.

(Kino Lorber)

In August 2010, border patrol officers found a migrant’s decomposing body in Arizona’s infamous “corridor of death.” His only identifiable feature was a tattoo that read “Dayani Cristal.”

The film follows García Bernal as he travels the migrant trail from Honduras through Mexico to cross the American border.

(Kino Lorber)

Along the way, he meets other traveling migrants – some who’ve made the journey several times before.

(Kino Lorber/ youtube.com)

Their stories are often times chilling and eye-opening.

García Bernal explores the dangers these men, women, and children face as they travel to the United States in search of a better life.

(Kino Lorber)

These dangers include everything from drug cartel massacres, to kidnappings, to freezing temperatures in the desert. “I will never understand the extent of the dangers he faced,” García Bernal says about the unidentified migrant. “I can only retrace his steps.”

According to a press release, “The film brings viewers intimately close to the often-invisible lives that have been affected by a broken immigration policy.”

(Kino Lorber)

“This film is about migration, it’s about humanity,” García Bernal tells El Cafecito. “It is perhaps one of the most primal stories of humankind.”

(Kino Lorber)

The film won the Sundance 2013 World Cinema Cinematography Award and was featured at the 51st New York Film Festival. Who is Dayani Cristal? opens April 25 in select cities.

WHO IS DAYANI CRISTAL?  TRAILER 

For The Campesinos: Thank you for picking our daily bread

Today is International Worker's day...

Everyday I roll out of bed. I turn off my alarm clock lazily and turn on the lights. As I get ready for school I try to be as awake as possible. I go down the stairs and in to the kitchen, grab a snack, kiss my mom and out the door I go. Walk, walk, walk I go with my brother to my side. I wait for the bus...I get on the bus and sit next to Maria.

When I look out the window I see people with their backs to me. They are bending over picking the daily bread for us all. I see them running from one side to the next. Carrying boxes and picking frantically. I stare...I cannot believe my eyes.

I go to school, I study, and learn material, When I get back on the bus for my ride home and I look out the window...I see people with their backs to me. I see people sitting on the floor, eating their meals.  They sit on the dirt, right next to the soil they have spent tilling for minutes, hours, days, lifetimes. I stare. I have been in school for six hours. I have learned something new and have expanded my knowledge. They have sold some of their health away, they have shortened their years in life...

They pick the daily bread
I eat the daily bread 

They sit on the floor
I sit on a desk

They bend over
I stand tall 

They hold a fruit
I hold a pencil 

They work under the sun
I work under a roof

They feed a family
I am fed by my family

They are human
I am human

The injustice that the Campesinos go through each and every day does not have a name! I am disgusted by the way these human being are treated...

GRIDLOCK

Title of poem means: I cultivate a white rose by Jose Marti

Paraphrase parts of the Poem: " cultivate a white rose In July as in January" meaning: I am kind all year. I give kindness..."

Connotation of some of the words – changing literal meaning to implied or associated values: "I cultivate...I cultivate" meaning I give kindness, I grow kindness in me and in others. It is something that  is distributed. "And for the cruel person that tears out" meaning to crush, and/or harm.

Attitude What is the attitude of the author, characters or yourself?: Attitude/tone is sincere

Shift At first we think or feel one way – then there is a shift:  identify the shifts and explain them: The shift happens in the second stanza. That is when it is spoken about the cruel person and how that does not differ the kind reaction and helping had that will be offered to them. 

Title revisited Any new insights on meaning or significance of title?: Cultivating is our morals what we have been taught, it is what we give and what we have worked to build. The color white signifies purity, and the rose represents beauty, nature, sensitivity. The title states that a white rose is cultivated and throughout the poem the reader is able to understand that though many can be cruel we should practice being kind and compassionate. 

Theme: Be kind to all, friends or not.