I’m an immigrant. And my husband was an immigrant when we met. And nearly all of my close friends here are immigrants. And many of my friends back in the US are immigrants. And so, as you can imagine, in my house we often discuss why people cross international borders to live in a foreign country.

Life as an immigrant is not easy, not here in Mexico and not in the number one immigrant destination in the world, the US. As an immigrant you stick out, everywhere you go, especially if you don’t speak the language fluently. Sometimes you might seem exotic or sexy or interesting to the natives of your new chosen land. But often you are treated as an outsider, you are a target for crime, and an easy target for the cops; you are forever removed from the culture, not privy to the inside joke.

If you qualify to live in your chosen country legally then life is easier. Being illegal grates on you, it makes it impossible to ever fully relax. When you are illegal you can’t easily rent a place to live, you can’t buy property, you usually can’t work in your own profession, you have trouble establishing credit, you may have trouble registering a car, and you can’t travel. It’s easy to tell the people who live somewhere illegally, the rule is that if they are not broke, and don’t travel home to see family then they are illegal. The exceptions come when their home country is so far away that plane tickets are ridiculously expensive, or when their family is nuts, or dead.

Some people put up well with being illegal, and when they do you have to wonder what the hell they ran away from. Because being illegal sucks, so if they can be happy that way then what they came from was worse.

I have friends who are illegal, lots of them here, and also back in the States. And I have slightly more friends who are legal in both places.

So why did my friends emigrate? Commonly the women moved because their husband got an important job in a new country. And sometimes the women moved because they needed to escape intense care-taking duties. In fact I know several women who moved here to Mexico to escape raising children that belong to their mentally unstable or substance addicted sisters.

I know people who’s spouses can’t get permission to live in their countries, so they chose to move to their spouse’s home country. I know people who moved to the US because they would make more money working in a kitchen there than staying in their home country and working in the profession they are trained for. I know people who moved here to Mexico to hide from something in their home country, be it child support payments, crazy relatives, a warrant, a stalker, a husband, an addiction. Everyone has a reason. And when they tell you that they “just love the beach” or “wanted a change” that’s just the tip of the iceberg.

But what’s most disturbing to me are not the people who are skipping out on child support or running from a bad divorce. What stops me in my tracks are the stories of immigrants who are escaping real persecution in their home countries.

Recently there has been talk of a small wave of immigrants coming to Cancun, who are coming from Eritrea. All of the cases I have heard of are men, young men, men who were once soldiers in the army there. They come saying that if they are forced to return to their country they will be shot. They come having deserted the army there. They have made their way across Europe, then they come here. And they try to get into Mexico, hoping to cross Mexico and sneak into the US I guess. And it doesn’t work, they screw it up. And they become desperate.

The stories range from a guy who fought off 5 men who tried to force him onto a plane back, to a guy who tried to commit suicide when they put him on a plane back. These people know beyond doubt that going back is worse than anything that could happen to them here. I can’t imagine what kind of hell these people live with, that they prefer being detained in Mexico to “going home”. As my husband always says “everyone has a reason”, but some reasons are better than others.

My kid is home from school today because today is the day Mexicans celebrate the start of the Mexican Revolution. The Mexican Revolution gave rise to Mexico’s present-day Constitution which among other things is supposed to:

• Limit the work day to 8 hours. My husband’s shift today as a Federal Agent with Immigration is officially from 7 am to 7 pm, last time I checked that was 50% more than 8 hours! Last Saturday he worked from 7 am to 10 pm which is normal during tourist season (we have about 8 months a year that are considered “tourist season” here). So much for an 8-hour workday, not even government employees enjoy that one.
• Establish a Minimum Wage. Well, it did do that but the minimum wage is so low that you cannot possibly live on it no matter how frugal you are unless you live in a shack and eat nothing but rice and beans (which is exactly what a lot of people in this country do).
• Limit Child Labor. I don’t know what the limits are but when I go to the grocery store a child younger than my daughter bags my groceries. I always want to tell them to go home and study and that I’ll bag my own groceries, but instead I tip them well and thank them and put up with it.
• Restrict Property Ownership by Foreigners. But of course the foreigners have found all manner of ways to get around this one and are now busy buying the coastline from the tip of Yucatan down to the Belize border. Personally I disagree with this restriction anyway, but it certainly isn’t working the way it was intended to.

I have read in numerous places that the Mexican Revolution killed about 1 million people, which was 10% of the country’s population at the time (no wonder people here have so many children). I’ve also read that about 900,000 Mexicans fled to the U.S. during the Mexican Revolution. I can’t imagine the emotional wreck this country must have been after the war ended and roughly 20% of it’s population was either dead or gone to Gringolandia.

So today we celebrate. Well, I’ve celebrated already by sleeping late. I cherish those days when I am not forced out of bed at the crack of dawn. Further celebratory plans include possibly hitting a matinee with said kiddo and having a nice café con leche (oh, I forgot, I would do that anyway). Then I plan to work, work, work for the rest of the day (oh yeah, I would do that anyway too).

In the spirit of celebration I will offer up the below photo of a Mexican Christmas ornament which someone gave me. Incidentally we’ve already put up our Christmas tree, probably ensuring that we’ll be completely sick of Christmas by the time it actually arrives. But I just got the bug the other day and had to put it up. My husband now thinks I’m crazy and tells me so every time he sees the tree (but he secretly loves it).

Here is a decent (but long) article about the Mexican Revolution:
Encarta’s Article: Mexican Revolution

Here’s a much shorter (and less thorough) synopsis of the Mexican Revolution:
MexOnline’s Article: Mexican Revolution

Check out Miniature Earth, it’s a Flash movie that takes an interesting look at the world’s population. Sniffle, sniffle.

Ok, so a couple of interesting tidbits have come my way today. First, I saw this great video of Keith Olbermann criticizing The Shrub, that moron currently residing in the Casa Blanca.

And then I happened upon this sample U.S. Citizenship Test. And, well, I just wonder whether old Georgie would actually pass this test himself?? Me thinks not.

Go Keith!

This weekend Mexico’s electoral tribunal will rule on whether to force a partial or full recount of the votes from last month’s presidential election. Check it out here.

It was obvious that this election would be a close one. I know quite a few right wing Panistas who supported Felipe Calderon. But I know an equal or greater number of people who supported AMLO (Andrés Manuel Lopez Obrador) the leftist PRD candidate.

But the disturbing thing is that I have personally heard of quite a few examples of people who intended to vote, and went to their polling places, and waited in long lines, but who were unable to cast their votes due to a lack of ballots. I went with my husband when he voted here and everything was fine. But after the polls closed the stories of problems with polling places started pouring in.

My personal opinion is that with an election this close, with less than a 1% difference between the candidates, they sure as hell better recount, and recount and recount. They’d better recount until the people in this country believe the ballots have been counted properly.