I talk about Chalio a lot. He’s my 10-year-old buddy that comes over all the time to hang out, help me in the garden, and correct my abysmal Q’anjob’al. Yesterday was a big day for him; he and his family took a trip to Guatemala City to go pick up their dad, Abel. Abel’s been in the US for years, working illegally cleaning state parks, doing landscaping, and other sorts of things. To be honest, I was anticipating his return with some degree of trepidation. Sometimes, the men here go to the USA and pick up pretty nasty habits: drinking, drugs, bad attitudes. They come back like triumphant gladiators, flush with money and perceived worldliness, to boss their wives around and get so drunk they sleep in the middle of the street. Some meet other women in the US, get hooked up with them, and NEVER come back… abandoning their wife, children, and small plot of corn forever.

But I just met Abel this morning, and he seems like a really honest, nice, down-to-earth guy. I shouldn’t have worried. You see, he has actually done this trip before… and returned. That’s why his wife and kids live in a nice (for Guatemala) block house with a concrete floor; he built it with the savings from his first work trip to the US. He sent care packages when he was able, and I could always tell those days because Chalio and his little brother Alberto would show up to my door with shiny new shoes, or comfy winter coats. And when Abel came home for good, as part of the ritual he brought a pile of exotic gifts for everyone in the family. So far today I’ve seen Chalio with a new toy car, Galindo with a new MP3-playing cell phone, Alberto with a new hoodie, and Emily saw a new Oster blender in Lina’s house. It’s like Christmas a week early.

My fears were partly personal, as well. Will Chalio stop coming by, now that he has a Dad? Who will make kites with me, or eat junk food with me, or make drawings of Curious George for me? It turns out that these fears were unfounded as well; an hour after Chalio came by to introduce me to his dad, he and Alberto showed up to help me work on my garden. Yay.

This whole issue of immigration is woven through every aspect of life in Guatemala. We took this picture when we got off the plane in Guatemala City a few weeks back after our own vacation. Half the plane was returned Guatemalan illegal immigrants, and they were all bringing back the maximum allowable baggage packed full of goodies that can only be had in America: designer clothing, perfumes, electronics. Here we see several of them going through their luggage at the baggage carousel, redistributing the loot that they’d had to shuffle around to make the maximum weight cutoff.

And how did I know they were illegal? As we were flying above the city on final approach, Emily overheard someone behind us say, “Puchica! Nunca he visto cuidad Guatemala antes!” (Wow, I’ve never seen Guatemala City before!) Of course not; when you go illegally, you walk across the desert into Arizona. To be truthful, I don’t know how I feel about all this illegal immigration stuff. It’s complicated. Those that go are breaking the law and I’m against that; but at the same time, I can’t fault them for trying to escape the staggering poverty that exists here. And a lot of them aren’t just doing it for themselves; they are sacrificing and working to help family members back home. I know there is a lot of anti-illegal immigrant sentiment in the US too. It’s misguided anger. Illegal immigrants don’t steal jobs from Americans; that’s just hype. How many Americans do YOU know that want to pick cotton in the sweltering Oklahoma heat, or clean portapotties at a monster truck rally, or work the kill floor of a slaughterhouse? And have you ever seen a mid-level HR manager or a database programmer crying because an illegal immigrant just took his job? It’s a de facto class system to handle the undesirable jobs Americans refuse to do, and has the wink and nod from our society that has grown to depend on them. I read all the time about things our government is doing to crack down on illegals, but these measures all seem like treating the symptoms, not the illness. I was thinking about this today, and wondered: what about the employers? The illegals all go for money. What if no one hired them? Am I oversimplifying this? Every job I’ve ever had, from dish cleaner at a fast-food joint all the way up to Project Architect in charge of $9-million buildings has required me to present a passport or social security card before I saw my first paycheck. Who’s hiring the illegals, and why aren’t we putting THEM on busses to Guadalajara? It seems that if we took away the picnic, the ants would stop coming by. And maybe they would even start spending their energy and ingenuity improving conditions back home.