Diario de un Mojado (Diary of an Undocumented Immigrant) » (Spanish Language Edition)

Diario de un mojado es la historia verídica de Ramón "Tianguis" Pérez, de su odisea por los Estados Unidos, del inacabable camino de trabajos domésticos y sus indignaciones, así como su humor y optimiso. A través de imágenes implacables, la prosa incisiva ofrece una visión de los Estados Unidos desde la clase pbrera inmigrante, Un sinnùmero de sociólogos han documentado esta lucha, pero olvidan el testimonio de sudor, trabajo y llanto.

Quizás esta obra nos ayude a comprender a los seres humanos frecuentemente humillados, casi siempre desapercibidos, que nos atienden en las mesas de los restaurantes, limpian nuestras casas o cosechan la fruta y vegetales que comemos. El testimonia de Tianguis Pérez nos presenta esa visión que muy pocas veces se documenta en forma de libro—y casi nunca en un libro escrito por los obreros mismos. Tianguis dice que emigrar "era seguir la tradición del pueblo. Uno casi puede decir que somos un pueblo de mojados". eneste libro, ese pueblo de mojados obtiene voz.

Acerca del Autor
Ramón "Tianguis" Pérez es originario de San Pablo Macuiltianguis, un pueblo zapoteca en la región de la Sierra Juárez en el estado de Oaxaca, donde su familia opera un taller de gabinetes. En 1979, Pérez hizo el primero de una serie de viajes que lo llevarían como mojado a Texas, California y Oregon. Él y su esposa Mary viven en Xalapa, Veracruz, donde Pérez trabaja como fotógrafo ambulante.

This is the straightforward testimony of Tianguis, a young man from a small Mexican-Indian town in the mountains of Oaxaca, who interrupts his studies to enlist in a guerrilla movement to reclaim the right of his people to ancestral communal lands. As a disciple of the famed Güero Medrano, a revolutionary who put his family and his own life at mortal risk, Tianguis begins to grasp the economic and political forces that Mexico's indigenous populations must cope with if they are ever to gain control of their lands and lives.

Through Tianguis' eyes we experience small-town life in the mountains, the grassroots organizing conducted by the peasants, and the power of regional and national politicians to enforce their social order through pistoleros. The pursuit of Güero Medrano—and of Tianguis and his friends—is unremitting; there is no escape as they flee through the forests, small towns, and big-city barrios of Mexico. Following his release as a political prisoner, Pérez crossed the border to work in the United States, an experience he recorded in his previous book, Diary of an Undocumented Immigrant (1991).

Sonia Merubia, Benson Latin American Collection, Univ. of Texas, Austin Copyright 2003 ReedBusiness Information. - Criticas

In addition to this book, which was first published in English in 1991, Perez wrote Diary of a Guerrilla (1999), a personal testimony about his experience as a guerrilla combatant in Mexico fighting to reclaim the ancestral communal lands of Oaxaca. This first-person account, the original Spanish version of Perez's first book, focuses on the author's journey to the United States as a young, undocumented immigrant. After experiencing some problems crossing the border, he finally arrives in the United States, where he holds a succession of menial jobs in Houston and San Antonio, and later in Oregon, where he harvests strawberries. Perez adds substance to the narrative by providing the historical background behind the waves of immigration between the two countries, focusing especially on the Bracero program in the early 1940s, which allowed thousands of impoverished Mexicans to work as farm laborers in the United States. He also uses and interprets terminology peculiar to the undocumented worker, such as coyote, a man who takes people across the border to their city of destination for a hefty fee, and the much cheaper patero, who merely guides the immigrants across the river. Finally, the author exposes the ironies of immigration. After returning to Mexico, he has to bribe some customs officials so that he can keep the carpentry tools he has brought for his father's shop. Although at times the stories about the characters he meets seem more like digressions than an integral part of the narrative, this is generally a worthwhile book. Highly recommended for public libraries and bookstores.