By: Juanita Santiago
Wela, my great-grandmother, is still in the cocina infusing the smell of rice and beans into my hair and clothes. For years, I’ve watched the heat in the kitchen paint her face like a tomato and the steam from the pot of rice fog her 1980’s glasses as they slip down her pudgy nose.
Growing up, I thought Wela was too old-fashioned. I did not understand her perspectives, her restrictions and her style. “You have to learn how to cook so you can serve your husband and family,” explained Wela countless times. She automatically assumed my ultimate destiny meant marriage and kids. If I dared think differently, she would worry about my future.
In my pre-teen and teenage years her binding rules were: “You can’t spend the night at your friend’s house. You can’t wear make-up. You can’t wear that outfit. You have to be in by 8 p.m.” Naturally, I would ask, “why?” But to my displeasure her reasoning did not satisfy.
At 86, her gray bun on her head is her crown of wisdom that perfectly complements her plain and simple face. To me however, I thought her appearance was outdated, even boring. She’s never worn pants in her life and never will. Her usual ensemble is a mix-match blouse and skirt with a floral apron. In the summer, she wears hideous batas with her worn-out chanclas.
Wela never wears make-up, not even lipstick or lip-gloss. When I was little, I would play with the spiky hairs on her chin because she never thought to wax it. Her nails are brittle and yellow, and she thinks it’s cute to tap them to the tunes of old Puerto Rican cantos.
I offered my services to “fix” her up, but she resisted. When confronted with her old-fashioned style, she’d laugh unmoved by what I thought.
Wela is a housewife and I mean that literally. She never learned how to drive and she intentionally avoids public transportation, so she’s always at the house. Her house is unique. The sala had plastic covered sofas and was cluttered with figuras from Folana’s wedding, babyshower, and quienceanera. I thought these things are so tacky, but she faithfully collects them. I tried to understand her ways, but my conclusion never changed, Wela is too old-fashioned.
Yet, when I grew older, I began to realize that Wela, is a woman of endurance. She came to this country over 50 years ago with Welo and three small children and learned survival. While Welo fought in World War II, Wela raised the kids alone. When he returned, Wela wanted to work, but Welo frowned on that idea.
So as time passed, she found her fulfillment at home in daily routines. She smiled at life but then the storms of life hit hard and saddened her soul. During the week of Thanksgiving 1969, her only daughter died in a tragic fire along with three small children. My mother was spared.
Years after the devastating news of the fatal fire, Welo committed adultery. Despite her utter despair, grief, pain, and humiliation, she stood by him. In the midst of this great suffering, she said she gained strength and character. Driven by more than duty, she pressed on for the sake of her children whom she loved unconditionally. After raising her own children, she sacrificed long overdue comforts to raise grandchildren, and once her task of raising two generations was done, she raised me too, her great-grand daughter.
As I learned these things about Wela, a deep fondness and appreciation in my heart developed and I began calling her by the nickname I gave her, “vieja linda.” From afar I admire her. Even though I got embarrassed from her broken English, corny jokes, and her creative ways of saving grease for the next meal, I cherished her. I noticed how she was becoming a part of me and I was becoming like her. I didn’t care anymore that she was old-fashioned. I finally accepted who she was a woman of great value and worth.
Then I discovered the other half of my heritage. At 15, I found my long-lost Grandma Juanita, papi’s mom. She represented all I thought I wanted to be and I inherited her name. Initially, I was magnetically drawn to her; Grandma Juanita was and is---modern.
She goes to the salon every two weeks and along with facials gets her toes and nails well groomed usually with earth tone colors. At 72, she wears fitted jeans, high heels, owns tons of jewelry and showers herself with expensive perfume that makes me nauseous. If you looked in her make-up bag, you would thinks she had a life-time membership for Clinique.
Grandma Juanita gets frequent flyer miles, goes to the malls and hosts parrandas---getting her grove on unashamedly. But she keeps her five-star reputation mostly by acting sophisticated and practicing etiquette.
When I first met her, she informed me of how she arrived to her highly esteemed status. As soon as she came from Puerto Rico, she worked. Then she married and had three children. However, her husband was a “macho man,” so she divorced him and raised the kids alone. She earned her education and took extra classes because she loves learning. She saved money, bought a casaita and lived to give her children the best. She worked 35 years as a state employee and is now happily retired.
As I got to know her better, she described how she explored the beauty of Europe with her second husband, a German man. Together over fine wine, they would discuss politics, religion, philosophy, the arts and current events. Watching Telemondo kept her informed about celebrity gossip, a topic she loved to give her opinions.
She was an accomplished woman in my opinion, and I was proud of her. I was impressed by her success. She gave a sense of empowerment: I can be anything I want to be. But behind all her success were a lot of struggles too. I became intrigued by her, especially when she would tell me stories about my dad, her youngest, who is schizophrenic. The sleepless nights and hopeless days battling against his outbursts and fits of rage drained her. But she never gave up on him.
I have to admit, Grandma Juanita was modern and I was attracted to her “moderness.” She had her own mind and was strong in her attitude and beliefs. I coveted her wealth of knowledge and her individuality.
But her modern views sometimes shocked me. For example, she once gave me permission to have sex as long as I was smart. “Young people have biological needs,” she said with a smirk. Wela would say it’s better to stay a seniorita until marriage.
This was when my struggle between them began. On different occasions, I began wishing Wela would be more like Grandma Juanita or that Grandma Juanita would be more like Wela.
At that point, I did not know how to appreciate them individually for who they are. I admire things about Wela such as her practical skills, virtues and her humble heart, but I desired things like Grandma Juanita’s pride, success, self-sufficient and independent style. I was torn between them until I discovered, I didn’t need to be.
I love both my abuelitas. I realize, now that I am grown I am a fine balance of both. I enjoy traveling---expanding my horizons like Grandma Juanita. I’m independent, strong-minded, opinionated and stylish. Yet, these things are rooted in values I inherited from Wela. I am modest and pure---always being ladylike. I seek to put the interest of others before my own, Grandma Juanita acknowledges me saying, “You are wise beyond your years.”
I trace most of my identity back to Wela’s traditional values that are enhanced in me by Grandma Juanita’s modern sensibility. Together they have influenced my character and conduct, molding me into a dignified Latina.
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By: Juanita Santiago
The nuke shutdown in the communist North Korea is sparking passionate reactions from Koreans in Chicago. Although they are thousands of miles away, Koreans in Chicago say they pay close attention to global affairs in their native land, whether it's North or South Korea, and they are unashamed of their political views even if their fellow Koreans don't agree.
"I think there is no choice for North Korea except shut down. I think they should come through and give it up. Of course it will help [in making the world safer if they give it up]," said Jae S. Park a Korean pharmacist in Korea Town in Chicago.
Recently, a team of U.S. experts began disabling North Korea's nuclear weapons-making facilities--- the first time Pyongyang has ever moved to scale back its development of atomic bombs.
Last week, U.S. State Department spokesman Tom Casey told reporters in Washington that the disabling of the North's nuclear reactor at Yongbyon "is a positive first step in this process, and we certainly hope to see it continue."
North Korea shut down its only functioning nuclear reactor at Yongbyon in July, and promised to disable it by year's end in exchange for energy aid and political concessions from other members of talks on its nuclear program: the U.S., China, Japan, South Korea and Russia.
Despite its shutdown of its main nuclear facility, Mina Schraeder from the Tomato Fashion Store in Korea Town in Chicago considers North Korea is still a security threat in the region.
"I mean how many communists countries are there right now? North Korea and where else? I would say that North Korea is the worst country in the whole world. So how can you trust them? South and North Korea...we are the same people, but I'm saying their own people can't trust them so how can they expect other countries to," asked Schraeder.
Frustrated with North Korea's communism, Schradeder does not approve of her native South Korea helping North Korean people.
"So, South Korea is now giving them all this food and taking care of their needs and stuff. It's good but is the North. Korean government themselves going to appreciate it? I don't think so. They just taken them as fool and say ok now we got this money we're going to spend it on our own thing let them take care of my people.
Never mind the nukes is the sentiment Schradeder says some South Koreans have toward North Korea for the sake of maintaining economic relations and diplomacy.
"Please I am from South Korea so I am really for what the U.S. is doing and they should go stronger. I am upset with the way that South Korea is handling it. They are so afraid of North Korea getting mad at them. It's so pathetic. They [South Korea] should be doing what the U.S. is doing or more," said Schraeder.
However others from South Korea are sympathetic with their fellow South Koreans who fear a nuclear North Korea.
"It makes sense that it will strike fear in South Koreans and in the world in general that some idiot out there can have the potential to blow everything up because he has the control at his finger tips," said Samuel "Chino" Lee, a hip-hop musician from Chicago.
There are reportedly as many as 22 nuclear facilities in 18 locations in North Korea. These include uranium mines, refinery plants, nuclear fuel plants, nuclear reactors, reprocessing facilities, and research facilities. Officials in Washington want nuclear weapons already developed to be confiscated.
"This hasn't been the only time South Korea has told North Korea to calm down with the nukes, and he [Kim Yong Il] says okay, but he goes ahead with the testing anyway," said Lee.
By Juanita Santiago
Robinson remembers being five-years-old hopping on different busses and trains and hiking miles and miles with a smuggler along with his mother, big brother, aunt, uncle, and his uncle's girlfriend to reach the United States from Guatemala.
After travelling 16 days with little food and water, they made it to America. In 1981, they moved to Chicago's Logan Square community where, at the age of 12, Robinson joined a gang called "The Maniac Latin Disciples."
"I joined the gang because I wanted to be a part of something," said Robinson, now 30.
Robinson, who has since turned his life around, has an expired permanent resident visa. But he still has a narcotics felony on his record from his past gang activities - and he fears being deported. Besides being in America since he was a child, he has two children of his own, two daughters.
"My life is here. I don't want to be deported," said Robinson.
Ex-members and current gang members are now the target of immigration officials under a new comprehensive national law enforcement operation led by federal agents and officers of the Department of Homeland Security.
U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement, known as ICE, recently arrested 1, 313 violent street gang members, associates and illegal aliens in 19 states and in 23 cities, including Chicago, in an effort to deport illegal gang members like Robinson.
"We have learned that these are extremely violent foreign-born gang members," said Gail Montenegro, spokesperson for ICE in Chicago.
The arrests are the result of "Operation Community Shield," launched by ICE in 2005 to disrupt and dismantle transnational violent street gangs. Since it began, agents have arrested a total of 7,655 street gang members and associates from more than 700 different gangs, according to public information records at ICE.
"The majority of them arrested have criminal records and have notoriously violent criminal histories," Montenegro said. "Most of them were covered with [gang] tattoos."
Initially, ICE agents focused on transnational gangs like the MS 13 gang, which is rampant in Mexico and parts of Central America, Montenegro said. Other target gangs included Surenos-13, 18th Street Gang, Latin Kings, Blood, Crips and Vatos Locos.
"(In Mexico) gangs are a lot different from gangs here. They are a lot more radical," said Major-Emanuel Seay, associate executive director at the YMCA street intervention program in Chicago's Little Village community. He said those gangs are driven more by social political issues.
"In the United States, people usually join gangs for survival but over there it's more about protecting yourself from the government," Seay said. "In some places they have government hit squads."
Seay and his boss, Kenny Ruiz, the executive director for the YMCA's street intervention program, both have experience working with members of transnational gangs in the Hispanic community.
"Trying to work with gang-bangers who are illegal immigrants heightens the complexity of the matter," said Ruiz.
Tara Tidwell, spokeswoman for the National Immigrant Justice Center, said ICE is targeting gang members who are no longer active.
"I think the problem with ICE is that they are not only arresting gang members, but also people who have changed," said Tidwell.
For the past 38 years, Ruiz has dedicated his life to reduce community violence in gangs through prevention, intervention, gang mediation and case management. Seay and Ruiz have worked with Robinson at the YMCA because he volunteers to help get other bandits off the streets.
"I was an angry child. I was a follower and that's why I joined a gang, but now I'm different," said Robinson.
Rosanna Pulido, spokesperson for the Minuteman of Illinois, expresses no sympathy for Robinson or other foreign-born illegal gang members.
"Ask someone who has had a family member killed by gang violence if they would want an illegal gang member to stay in America," said Pulido.
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