Search results matching tag 'immigration'

The author speaks

Sarah Samson — Fri, 07 Sep 2007 21:17:00 GMT

I got a response from Mr. Urrea this week answering the questions some of us had about his book, The Devil's Highway. I'll post his response here. The questions I asked him in my email were: Why did you write the book? And, are you in touch with any of the survivors?

Here is his response:

" ...As far as why the book was written: it was a request from New York. After Across the Wire, By the Lake of Sleeping Children, and Nobody's Son (about to be re-released with a beautiful new cover, by the way), I thought I was through with the border. I certainly had no plans to write another book about it.

However, Little, Brown contacted me and basically told me they thought I was the only writer who could tackle this tragedy and do it justice. They wanted a "Trojan horse." In other words, a men-in-peril adventure that snuck secrets and revelations about immigration and immigrants into Mainstream America. What a challenge!

I never knew I'd be doing that duty for the Border Patrol too. But, I think, that's what helped make the book valuable.

The survivors. This is an interesting situation. Only recently have they been released from their vows of silence by lawyers and Immigration officials. The various lawsuits and criminal trials are over.

Through my movie team (how tacky does that sound) we have all been in touch with the widows and the people who went back home to Veracruz. We actually have some footage of them at their homes talking about it. The small cadre of men that survived, led by Nahum, still resides in Phoenix, with immunity provided by the US Government. But they are afraid of exposure and leery of "fame." Nahum, in fact, was going to come to my last series of readings in Arizona, but declined at the last minute. Mendez, on the other hand, remains in prison under death threats to himself and his loved ones. He will not talk. His lawyer has taken him correspondence from me, and the movie guys have tried to get him to open up, but he won't even answer their letters.

Now, the law enforcement side and the consular side have been very much in touch with me over these years.

Honestly, I thought I'd report on it and then move on and it would all be forgotten. I had no idea there would be a strange little Devil's Highway industry. I'm glad I didn't know, or I would have been more timid in my writing. I wrote with the kind of rage and fatalism of someone who was sure nobody gave a damn and wouldn't pay attention anyway. Oops. When the Pulitzer thing happened, you could have knocked me over with a feather.

Luis

The Book

Sarah Samson — Fri, 03 Aug 2007 11:27:00 GMT

We had a great brown-bag discussion of The Devil's Highway last Saturday. Near the end of the event, we came up with a few questions for Mr. Urrea, the author, so I've been waiting to post until I heard back from him. Well, he hasn't responded yet, but I promise I will let you know when he does. This is what we decided to ask him:

Are you in touch with any of the survivors? How are they doing?
Why did you write The Devil's Highway?

Many of us attending the discussion shared with the group what a difficult read Devil's Highway was, painful to read about people suffering so much, going through the stages of heat exhaustion, and then many of them ultimately dying. It's grim. I appreciated that Urrea told the story as if he were a reporter, he did not over-emotionalize or over-identify with any one character, making the story more bearable for me to read. From the Border Patrol cop, to the immigrants from Veracruz, he gave us a picture of each individual; there were no "good" or "bad" guys, they were all people trying to do what they thought was the right thing for them to be doing.

One person at the discussion read an especially poignant quote from near the end of the book: (page 198, 199)

"Vargas watched as each coffin was carried from the plane to great tumult. One by one, they were laid inside the waiting hearses.....Later, she calculated that the dead men's flight alone had cost over sixty-eight thousand dollars.

'What if,' she asked, 'somebody had simply invested that amount in their villages to begin with?'

Something to think about.

Panel Wrap-up

Sarah Samson — Thu, 26 Jul 2007 22:09:00 GMT

The panel discussion on immigration Monday evening at City Hall was lively. A crowd of about 50 people were in attendance, and many stayed until the end to ask questions of the panelists.

Reverend Dr. William Sappenfield served as the moderator and each panelist got approximately two minutes to answer each of Dr. Sappenfield's six questions. Panelists included: Curtis Collier--President of US Border Watch, Terri English--Director of Immigration Counseling and Outreach Services, Leslie Helmcamp--Catholic Charities of Central Texas, Edna Yang--Political Asylum Project of Austin, and Larry Youngblood--Texas Border Volunteers. The six questions were:

By 2010, it is estimated that over 50% of people living in Texas will be non-Caucasian. Why do you think some Texans fear this demographic change?
How well does building a wall help with the border problem?
Do you think the immigration laws in the U.S. need to be reformed? Which reform is most urgently needed?
The Hutto Family Residential Facility in Taylor, Texas has received considerable publicity in recent months. In your opinion, how close does the facility come to fulfilling its intended purpose?
Should all government services be denied to undocumented workers, or just some? How should the U.S. decide which services are appropriate to offer to undocumented workers?
What do you think would happen if the U.S. was able to send all undocumented workers home tomorrow?

As you can imagine, the panelists had varying opinions on each question, but they were all civilized and respectful of one another. There were newspaper articles on the panel on the front page of the Round Rock Leader today, as well as the Daily Texan on Tuesday. The panel was videotaped, so if you would like to view the discussion from your computer, click here.

The events surrounding Round Rock Reads! will end this Saturday with a brown-bag book discussion of The Devil's Highway by Luis Alberto Urrea. The event is from 12-2 in Meeting Room B of the library. The library will provide dessert. Hope to see you all there!

Immigration Panel Discussion Monday night moved to Council Chambers

Sarah Samson — Thu, 19 Jul 2007 19:55:00 GMT

We've moved the Immigration Panel Discussion from the library to the Council Chambers in City Hall. The acoustics are better at this location, plus the disucssion will be videotaped and podcasted. If you can't make the discussion (Monday night, 7-9 PM), it will be broadcast live on Channel 10. Council Chambers are located at 221 E. Main Avenue, 1st floor.

I'm really looking forward to the panel! Rev. Dr. William Sappenfield will be moderating, and we will have 5 panelists present with members on both sides of the issue. The five panelists are: Curtis Collier--President of U.S. Border Watch, Terri English--Director of Immigration Counseling and Outreach Services, Leslie Helmcamp--Director of Catholic Charities of Central Texas Office of Immigrant Concerns, Edna Yang--General Counsel for Political Asylum Project of Austin, and Larry Youngblood--Texas Border Volunteers.

Los Trabajadores/ The Workers

Sarah Samson — Wed, 11 Jul 2007 13:32:00 GMT

Monday night, the documentary film, Los Trabajadores/The Workers screened at the library. I was pleased with the attendance (28); clearly there are folks in Round Rock who care about the immigration issue and how it affects us here in central Texas. The film's director, Heather Courtney,was in attendance as well. For those of you who haven't seen the film, Los Trabajadores follows two Austin day laborers as they struggle to support their families living in other countries.

The film brought me to tears at points; Courtney has really put a human face on the issue of immigration. Both of these immigrants feel strongly about their "right" to be here in the U.S.: "What I did was to come here illegally and this is against the law of the United States. But it is not against the law of my family." --Ramon Castillo Aparicio. "I will be deported and I don't care... I will have to face the judge and... tell him that we are human beings, the same as his parents and other people who come to the United States as immigrants. We are doing the same thing." --Juan Ignacio Gutierrez.

Following the film, Courtney took questions from the audience. One woman asked Courtney if she thought one of the reasons why people are so angry at immigrants is because they are a drain on the healthcare system. Courtney answered that most immigrants would never go to the hospital or the doctor because they would be too afraid of being deported.

If you would like to see the film, you can check it out at the Round Rock Library.

One side of the story

Sarah Samson — Sat, 07 Jul 2007 02:46:00 GMT

The Dustin Inman Society was featured on NPR this week. This grassroots group advocates securing America's borders and enforcing deportation "in such a way that creates an inhospitable climate so that illegal immigrants will leave, and employers won't hire them," said president of the group, D.A. King. You can hear more or the interview here.

If you go to the Inman Society's website, you can read more about their views and their mission. They are "dedicated to educating the public and our elected officials on the consequences of illegal immigration, our un-secured borders and the breakdown of the rule of law in our Republic."

The most interesting thing to me about the society is the reason that they got started. Mr. King explains their beginnings in an interview with Business Week in 2006: "It's named after my friend's son. Dustin Inman was in the back seat of the family car in the year 2000 on Father's Day weekend, on his way to go fishing in the mountains with his dad and his mom. An illegal alien, who happened to be from Mexico, who held a valid North Carolina driver's license...ran into the back of his car stopped at a light at more than 70 miles per hour. [He] killed Dustin, put both of his parents in a coma -- neither of whom were able to go to his funeral, their only son -- and then put his mom, Kathy, in a wheelchair for the rest of her life."

Legal Ease?: Breaking the Ice

Sarah Samson — Fri, 06 Jul 2007 00:31:00 GMT

I heard on the news today that in a recent poll, most Americans didn't understand the terms of the Immigration Bill that went before Congress last week. That makes sense to me--so many of us have opinions about immigration, but few of us take the time to really learn and understand the issue in all its complexity.

Luis Alberto Urrea, the author of The Devil's Highway has started "Immigration Monday" on his blog--one day a week he'll explore the issue of immigration with his readers. Here's what he has to say:

"It's just a small acorn of an idea--let's see what happens. Maybe a scraggly tree will grow. I hope to post something about immigration/border issues here every week. Might be nothing--might be a book. I don't know. I have invited others to take part, so I hope to post essays, notes, letters, poems from other writers about the topic. For and against. I don't care what position people take, as long as they are informed. Lots of inflammation out there, but there's no information. Has anybody ever explained to you what "illegal immigration" means? By law? What law is being broken? What is the precise law: what does it say? Let's look into it. Are there any really informative new books about the subject? Let's see. Links to articles? Right here. Let's make a full-service immigration site. Just one day a week. The rest of the week, we can explore writing and soul and gardens and family together. But it might be amazing to see what we come up with. I don't mean the royal "we," either. I mean you and me. Send me somethin'." You can read more of his blog here: http://lavistaluisurrea.blogspot.com/

I think Mr. Urrea's idea is great--I'd like to do something similar on the Round Rock Reads! blog. I invite anyone to send me comments about their views on immigration, good articles, links, anything that will help us understand the issue better. I don't care what side you are on! In the meantime, I'll continue to write about articles, interviews, and websites that I see related to immigration and The Devil's Highway. Tomorrow I'm going to write about The Dustin Inman Society. Stay Tuned.

Beginning our Journey

Sarah Samson — Sat, 23 Jun 2007 21:58:00 GMT

Since I finished reading the book, I realize I really don't know a lot about the issue of immigration. This weekend, I set out to educate myself. For this post, I'll start with listing some good websites, links and facts about immigration. For my next post, I'll get into some resources and articles that will help us understand the different positions on the immigration debate.

First I started with a pop quiz from the Census Bureau's website to find out how ignorant I really am. I did lousy--five questions and I didn't get one right on my first guess. My score was 225. How did you all do?

So now it's Sunday night, and I'm a little more educated about the statistics. Here are some things I found out: there are approximately 11.5 to 12 million undocumented people currently living in the U.S., according to the PEW Hispanic Center. Most of these immigrants are from Mexico (56 percent), 22 percent are from other parts of Latin America, and the rest are mostly from South and East Asia. Immigrants in the USA sent $40 billion to their relatives and friends in Latin America and the Caribbean in 2005, according to the Inter-American Development Bank (IADB). You can read some more basic immigration statistics here.

At the end of The Devil's Highway, Mr. Urrea suggests some non-fiction books for further reading: Dead in Their Tracks by John Annerino, Down by the River by Charles Bowden, Coyotes by Ted Conover, Border by Lila Downs, Hard Line: Life and Death on the U.S.-Mexican Border by Ken Ellingwood. Most of these books are available at the Round Rock Library. I'm definitely going to check one out!

Hit the Road: The Devil's Highway

Sarah Samson — Tue, 19 Jun 2007 14:20:00 GMT

In May 2001, 26 men crossed the Mexican border into the desert of Southern Arizona and only 12 made it out alive.

Round Rock Reads! has begun!

On May 31, Mayor Nyle Maxwell announced the winning book for Round Rock's first community-wide book club.

The book is entitled The Devil's Highway by Luis Alberto Urrea. Pick up a copy at the Round Rock Public Library and read it during the month of June and join in the discussion.

We want to hear what you think!

In July, the library will host a panel discussion, a film documentary, and a book club discussion that will tie into the book and its themes.

I read The Devil's Highway in just a few days. The topic of human suffering is always tough. However, the struggle to endure hardship for the potential of a better life can be pretty inspiring. And, it's an issue that affects everyone. Whatever "side" you are on in the immigration debate, after reading this book, you can't help but care about these men and their plight. It's easy to forget sometimes that real people are involved in the news stories we hear on TV. This book offers a fresh perspective on a hot button issue.

During the next few weeks, I'll write posts about The Devil's Highway and I would love to hear your comments about the book. Did it inspire you? Did it make you think differently about the Immigration issue? How so?