Oaxaca Connection (fwd)

[phil cash cash]

Oaxaca Connection

The migration of tens of thousands of people from Oaxaca to Oregon is
altering both states

GABRIELA RICO
Statesman Journal
November 12, 2005
http://159.54.226.83/apps/pbcs.dll/article?AID=/20051112/NEWS/511120303/1001

Ignacio, Sergio, Dagoberto, Neftali, Joel.

They are among the tens of thousands of people from Oaxaca, Mexico, who
are in Oregon trying to make a buck, provide better lives for their
families or find a piece of the American dream.

They all left villages in the impoverished southern Mexican state
because they couldn't make it happen there.

Their migration to the United States is the latest chapter in a
centuries-old story -- one that is changing them, their families and
now the Willamette Valley.

Cotton in Texas, chiles in New Mexico, cantaloupes in Arizona, grapes in
California, apples in Washington, potatoes in Idaho and berries in
Oregon have long been harvested by migrant workers -- predominantly
from Mexico.
In the past decade, many Mexican immigrants have risen from the fields
and become construction workers, cooks, maids and factory workers.

But in Oregon, which takes great pride in its agricultural products,
someone needs to tend the crops.

That someone is the indigenous farmworker from the mountains and
villages of southern Mexico, home to ancient cultures and languages.

"The manual labor of the indigenous has always been admired," said Jesus
Leon Santos, a farmer in Nochixtlán, Oaxaca. "And it has always been
recruited."

Oaxaca -- Mexico's second-poorest state -- provides a significant farm
labor force, according to Oregon employment and legal experts.
Many of these immigrants speak only to the handful of others who
understand their language; Spanish is something they learn in the
fields of U.S. farms.

Discrimination is unremarkable to the men and women who make up 75
percent of the farm labor in Oregon. In their own country, they also
are treated like second-class citizens.

"They're so accustomed to discrimination, they don't respond even to
Spanish speakers in Oregon," said Valentin Sánchez, co-founder of
Organización de Comunidades Indígenas Migrantes Oaxaqueños
(Organization for migrant, indigenous communities from Oaxaca) in
Salem.

"Many Mexicans don't have pride in where they come from and don't
respect the indigenous," said Sánchez, a native of San Juan Cahuayaxi,
Oaxaca. "They call us 'Indian, midget, short one,' and the Anglos learn
that and think it's OK to treat us like that."

In the past five years, there has been a dramatic increase of Mixteco,
Triqui and Zapoteco speaking indigenous workers in Oregon.

"I knew that it was happening," said Lynn Stephen, a professor of
anthropology at the University of Oregon. "What surprised me was that
absolutely no one in Oregon -- except for those who work with
farmworkers -- knew this was going on."

Fernando Sánchez Ugarte, Mexico's consul general in Oregon, said the
growth of Oaxaqueños in Oregon has been "explosive" but is difficult to
quantify.

Although the U.S. Census Bureau counted 260,094 Mexicans in Oregon in
2002, the consulate says with the "uncounted" -- the migrant population
and seasonal workers -- that total is closer to 600,000. More than 11
percent are from Oaxaca.

Oaxaqueños are the second-largest population of Mexicans in Oregon,
behind Michoacán, if you count only those who register with the
consulate for a Matricular identification card.

"Many of the farmworkers here don't need these IDs," Sánchez said. "They
arrive in groups, live where they work and see no need to interact with
the rest of the state."

The reason for the growth is no great mystery: they know how to work the
fields and are easily exploited, farmworker advocates say.

"The bottom line is cheap labor," said Ramon Ramirez, president of
Northwest Treeplanters and Farmworkers United. "They'll do the job for
cheap. I'm not saying it's right."

Stephen, who has extensively studied the connection between Oregon and
Oaxaca, said the result of the migration is that in some villages, half
of the people are gone. In others, all that's left are women, children
and grandparents.

Languages are being lost and individual rights learned in the United
States conflict with the collective rights that have bonded Oaxaca's
indigenous people for centuries.

Oaxaca de Juárez, the state capital, is a beautiful tourist destination
for international travelers, but the farmworkers in Oregon come from
villages and mountains that aren't on the route of any tour bus.

"Where they're from, there's no work, no tourism," Stephen said. "It's a
part of Oaxaca where no one wants to go."

While some immigrants speak of Oaxaca longingly, others say living in
their new home -- Oregon -- has changed them.

"Home will always be home," said Dagoberto Garcia of Salem who grew up
in Huajuapan de León, Oaxaca. "But, dreams change over time. Everything
changes when you are here."




Copyright 2005 Statesman Journal, Salem, Oregon