The Voice of the Immigrant Worker
By Doroteo Garcia
Introducing
contributor Doroteo Garcia covering work issues of the
Latino immigrant community
East Palo Alto is a city whose population has increased
considerably in the past 10 years, mainly due to the immigrant
community coming from Mexico. The majority of the Latin
American community that lives here works in low paying jobs
due to the language and our immigrant situation. The jobs
in which we usually work are either janitorial, house cleaning,
landscaping, as cooks or dishwashers or in the construction.
Our jobs and our salary are precisely designed for an immigrant
community, which is satisfied with less of what this country
has to offer.
We are an immigrant community in search of opportunities
that we don’t have in our native countries. Some of us come
alone then bring our families later. Others leave their
families behind in their native countries while supporting
them financially. We all face the difficulty of adapting
ourselves to this country and its language. We all have
something in common: to find opportunities to improve our
way of life.
The Latino community has high economic power and is a force
for developmental growth for this city and the state of
California. Because of that we consider that it's very important
to have learning centers where we can learn English and
improve our culture so that we can find a better job or
defend the one we have. Cultural growth means supporting
and helping our kids in school. Because we as parents seek
the best for our children, we do not want them to work where
we do, but rather that they have better opportunities and
become educated professionals.
This column serves as the voice of the immigrant working
community that lives in East Palo Alto. We want to thank
EPA.net for the opportunity of giving us a way to communicate
to the entire community about our origins, our problems
and our feelings.
For column suggestions and opinions please send email to
doroteogarcia@yahoo.es or call (650) 838-9108
Translated by Omar Revueltas
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