Narciso

Narciso’s Last Night in L.A.

by Azra Isakovic

Eating at a restaurant, it’s easy to overlook the people who make your food. Working in a restaurant can often be the same. It’s a social environment in which customer service comes before any interaction with your coworkers. Conversations with co-workers are often interrupted by orders, so by the end of your shift all of the words you exchanged essentially amount to small talk.

Going into work for me in L.A. meant entering through the break room where you see the same familiar faces every night. Most of the workers had two jobs, so they were usually trying to rest before their next shift. One face that always stood out to me was that of Narciso Perez. We called him Chicho.

He filled every interaction with optimism and a smile. No matter how exhausted he may have been, he was always doing "great." Often I would catch him FaceTiming someone with enthusiasm, and finally after asking who it was, he revealed it was his son, Luis Fernando Perez. He hadn't seen him in close to 10 years and practically raised him through a small device. I had a sense of what it was like to be separated from my own father, but not for that long. I couldn't even imagine it. I remember the day when my mom, sister, and I fled Bosnia in June 1992 due to the war. We said goodbye to our dad who wasn't able to come with us. I didn't know if I'd see my father again, and six months later when he surprised us in Germany, it was the happiest day of my life. 

This separation of families is a way of life for many immigrants and refugees. They usually work two jobs to send money to families left behind. Being a former refugee and immigrant myself, Narciso's fight resonated with me because I had seen the separation of families from very early on and understood the impact it had. Narciso and I may not spoken each other's mother language, but we understood one another. 

Talking to Narciso emphasized for me that circumstances may vary in various times, places, and among different cultures, but people’s fight for a better life crosses cultural bounds. Despite Narciso’s short stature and darker skin, opposite of my dad’s tallness and pale face, there were so many similarities between them.

Both he and my father were accountants in their home countries (Narciso was from Guatemala originally; my father was born in Bosnia). But each of them had to walk away from professional careers and give up the accounting practice at the border, in order to cross over and hopefully enjoy a better life in another place. That was the hope.

That better life though was often filled with hard manual labor, so far removed from the respected white collar professions they once held in their origin place.

A spooky similarity between them was that they had both helped another family carry a five-year- old daughter on their shoulders across borders. Narciso was in better shape than the parents of a five-year- old, when crossing the Mexican-U.S. border and he had helped the family by giving their daughter a piggyback ride across the desert. My father did the same thing crossing the Austrian border into Germany with another family, in freezing weather at night across a mountain hill. The weather conditions may have been different, but the human ones were clearly the same.

After many failed attempts to get together and find out about each other’s stories, Narciso approached me one day at the restaurant and told me he had some news. He was going back. His son needed him. We had to get together beforehand, but our schedules didn’t align until his final day in Los Angeles, April 8th, 2017.

His last day in L.A. began with a catering job at a church in South Central. Even on his last day, he decided to work. When I picked him up, he said he wanted to explore Universal City. He hadn’t been in years, and neither had I, so we went, but first we made an initial stop at The Springs in the Arts District in Downtown L.A. to get some green juice. It prompted a whole conversation on healthy eating and its importance.

“In my country, we eat all organic. In my little town, everyone’s skinny. In Guatemala City, it’s like here. A lot of heavy people.” It was the same in Bosnia. We pay a high price for organic foods in L.A., but back in our home countries it seemed just the natural way of life.

Narciso arrived to the States in February 2008. He said he was lucky because it only took him 20 days to get to Los Angeles from Guatemala City. He was 30 when he arrived and left behind a son who was 7 at the time, an ex-wife, 8 siblings, and his parents. His ninth sibling, a brother, was already in Los Angeles. It was his idea to invite Narciso to come for a few years. At the time, Narciso was living in Guatemala City. He was recently divorced and lost his accounting job at a construction management company due to a dispute with the owner.

Coming to Los Angeles for a few years in order to make some money and send it home seemed like a smart choice. His initial plan was to stay for five years, but after his father’s death in 2009, he found himself responsible for his whole family and instead of going back, he took on a second job and sent money back home.

Sending money home is a $400 billion industry and according to a recent Fast Company article, “remittances, which totaled $429 billion in 2016, are worth three times as much as all the foreign aid doled out by governments worldwide….Unlike aid, which is notorious for passing through corrupt middlemen and inefficient bureaucracies, remittances go directly to recipients, where they pay for schooling, medical expenses, and new fridge-freezers.”

Working two jobs and staying longer in the U.S. meant sacrificing many other things like a personal life and being present in person for his son. So he relied on technology to connect. He spoke to his son every day, sometimes multiple times a day, even helping him with his math homework on the phone. However, not being there cost his son true fatherly guidance. Narciso revealed that his decision to go back was not only due to the political turbulence due to the Trump administration and his daily fear of being deported, but his son had also gotten into some trouble and he needed to be there. He wouldn’t reveal what happened with his son specifically, but his face showed worry.

How To Come To The United States - How Narciso Got Here

“For me, it was easy. It took 20 days to come here. For us, it’s not easy but for me, I was lucky because for the first four hours I was in a car with a guy talking in Spanish. Then the following hours, they put me under a truck for 10 hours. It was hot, and they don’t want to give you anything to eat because if you eat, they need to stop at the bathroom. So they gave me a gallon of water. Ten hours later, they get me out to a house somewhere, they give me food and some rest. Then we go again for 10 hours. They carry bananas, so I was under the bananas. It’s crazy, but for me it was great.”

“So then 10 more hours from the Mexico border to DF. Then after Mexico City DF, I took a bus  to Guadalajara. I stayed there for one week because it was too hard to go. One week is a long time when you don’t do anything. Just wait. We can’t go out. You can call family to let them know you are ok. After that, we take bus for twenty-six hours to Sonora (which borders Arizona). We tried crossing it ten times. We go, we cross the border, and then when we see ICE, we come back. So they can do nothing. They can see you, they talk to you, they speak Spanish. They ask, ‘what do you do there?’ and we say ‘nothing.’ We go back. But we have to walk like six hours, but not alone. With 70 people. They  give us food for three days. When the food is gone, we have to go back to get more food. We try many many times. One afternoon, when the sun sets, everything is clear, when there is no ICE, we go.”

Narciso described trying to cross the Mexican-United States border at night as something frightening. Something that presented multiple threats.

“You hear many coyotes. You have to keep together because they can kill you. But let’s go. It’s our opportunity. Nobody is there. When we cross, we go to the desert. But after we have to walk, I think 20 hours in the desert [they crossed into Arizona at this point]. That’s why many people can’t do it. They get hurt. But for me, I was playing soccer in Guatemala four times a week, so for me it was easy. There was one family with a little girl they couldn’t carry, so I carry her. Her weight is 90 pounds, so for me it was easy. I was lucky. You know why? Because I exercise. But many people have problems. Sometimes they die. After that girl hurt her knee, I had to carry her. But there were many rats and I fell, so I hurt my shin and I told her I couldn’t carry her any longer. I told her that, so she started crawling and watching that broke my heart. I couldn’t do nothing for her. So I told somebody, ‘please take that girl’. We carry her maybe half an hour running because if ICE coming then we have to go back.”

“Around 10pm, we finally got to a place where many trucks were waiting for us. Then we go. There was a helicopter around us, looking for us, but we got away. We got to a home and they told us we were lucky because nothing happened. You can celebrate, eat and drink. Those people gave us beers.”

“Then we got to Phoenix. We still had to get to L.A., which is another trouble. It’s not really sure to come here. So they say we cannot take another ride. They drive like crazy with the car. Those guys -- God bless them because they do a good job. I think it’s illegal and I don’t know why they do it but they do it.”

The people Narciso refers to are part of the group that he paid to get him across the border and eventually to his brother. After arriving, it was time to figure out where everyone has to go next.

“I came with 75 or maybe 80 people. When we got together, there were like 100 people in one house. They all go to different places.”

Narciso gave the organizers the phone number to verify the place where he is headed, his brother’s house in L.A. and after they made the call, they agreed to take him. He had to pay up front to be taken to L.A.

When he arrived in L.A., he hadn’t seen his brother in two years. He said seeing him was great. “It broke my heart.” It had been too long.

I asked him if he ever thought about bringing his son to the States and he said it’s expensive, but it’s not a matter of money. It was a high risk due to the excruciating circumstances in the desert. His nephew was on his way the previous year and died in the desert. I shared with him my father’s experience of crossing all the borders from Bosnia to Germany to come to us and all the sacrifices my parents have made for me and my sister in eventually coming to America, and he simply replied by giving me this advice: “Follow your dreams, for your parents. Nobody will hand them to you, you have to go and get them.”

When discussing the political climate in the States, he said it wasn’t as bad as in Guatemala where people can kill you for being indigenous.

Here, he said, they just complain.

When he arrived in the United States, America’s prejudice toward him wasn’t foreign because he had already experienced it in Guatemala too, being indigenous.

Narciso is of Mayan background from a small village where they speak the Mam language. He left his family to go to Guatemala City when he was 14 years old. After a dispute with his alcoholic father, he decided to leave the small village to go to Guatemala City.

“In my little town we can live however we want. But in Guatemala City there is too much discrimination. Now they can’t tell me anything because my Spanish is great now.” Initially though he encountered many problems in Guatemala City due to the language barrier. He eventually got a job at a factory sewing Levi’s jeans while going to school and studying Spanish.

Some of the money he earned there, he sent to his family back home.

He worked at the sewing factory for nine years during which he completed four years of college at Universidad San Carlos de Guatemala studying accounting. Ironically after he graduated college, he could barely find a job in Guatemala City, but he decided to leave the factory. His manager told him he couldn’t come back if he left.

“I tried three times to go back and they said no. So I said, ok, start again, start again, start again.”

He ended up getting a job as an accountant at a construction management company where the pay was not as great.

“I had to accept I was making half as much as an accountant as I was in the factory,” he said.

Initially, in Los Angeles, he worked at a sewing factory, but during the recession the factory closed down and he was forced to find another job, so he sought out work in the restaurant industry.

“At that time I didn’t speak English. But when I got there, there was a restaurant with two girls who were nice and gave me a job. I didn’t speak a word. But a busser translated to me. When they saw me work hard and fast, they told the bussers to only speak to me in English, so I can learn. Six months later, they put me in the kitchen.”

When I asked if he plans on opening up his own restaurant with all of the experience he acquired, he said, “I thought about it but there is too much crime, and it’s too dangerous. It’s better for me to be in an office.”

I asked him about his marriage. He was married to his wife for eight years. She was from Guatemala City and of Spanish background. They were very much in love, but her family disapproved of him because he was short and darker-skinned. His son looks very much like him. That’s why his wife’s family said: “Your son is not our family.”

He blames the divorce on working too much, her family’s pressure, and he has long forgiven her decision to have an affair.

“It’s my fault, I think. I always work and study. She needed to go out. I wasn’t doing that. I was always working and studying. That’s why I am not telling her she’s bad. I didn’t fight. She’s now with someone else. When I remember her, it breaks my heart. When I started work, I always work. I have to change that. That’s why I am trying to get my business going, so I have more time for me. Go out with someone, somewhere.”

In the ten years he’s been here in the Unites States, he hasn’t dated.

“Because I had my goals, so I focus on my goals. Now when I get to Guatemala, I’ll start seeing people. Right now I am talking to a couple of girls from my country. They send me a message, like ‘Hi, how are you?’ We keep in touch. So many people now are happy when I see them on Facebook and I put up pictures, everyone is asking for me. ‘When will you come?’ Or ‘I’m so happy to see you.’ But I was so serious here in L.A. Maybe sometimes I go out with someone here, but really a serious relationship I can’t do. Because I didn’t think about staying here. Because I respect girls, I can’t play with girls. My heart would break.”

On his days off, he worked in the home and prayed.

“I just had one day off. Sunday. I would normally wash my clothes, clean the house. Sometimes I go out. Sometimes I would have a beer. I never go to nightclubs. I went to church many times. I played soccer a little bit.”

He got a chance to explore a couple of other US cities.

“November, one year ago, I went to San Francisco for four days and then came back to work again. I love San Francisco, the bridge. When I walk around, it was real. I went to the beach. I also went to Las Vegas. I spent money in Vegas. I lost maybe $500. But I was happy. I started winning. I stayed maybe 8 hours playing” and then with a sweet, contagious laugh, he states “when I lost everything, I go out.”

He says that despite the challenges, it was still better for him to come to America to help his family.

“For me it was better. Because I could help him [financially]. My son always asked me, ‘do you come back’, I always say ‘yes.’ I never say maybe. I always say yes, I will come.”

Despite everything, he still tells his own son to follow his dreams.

“I tell to him, I want to see you as an engineer, doctor, someone important. I always talk to him, tell him, when I was a child I had a dream to be an auditor and I still have that dream. That’s why I try to tell him to have that dream.”

I dropped Narciso off in order to rest for a couple of hours before picking him back up to take him to the airport. On the way, our conversation was lighter and I was playing James Blunt. He said he loved him and was a fan of his music. He liked many American musicians and different foods. He had been exposed to different cuisines working in the kitchens and living in L.A. in general. Some of his favorites remain a good old steak and Tikka Masala.

As we were waiting in line to check in, he told me he never flew in an airplane before and that he was excited. He also bought a first-class ticket home, leaving the country with a bang.

On the other end, he was to be received by his son and his ex-wife.

He remembers the last time he saw his son and the expression on his son’s face was of fear that they’d never see each other again. Only a few hours away that fear would be eradicated. As soon as he arrived in Guatemala, he planned on taking a small nap and then heading to his son’s soccer game. When I asked him what the biggest thing was that he is bringing back to his son he said, “to have good dreams because in my country everyone thinks about finishing high school and that’s it. If your dream is too small, you will get small things. That’s what I try to tell him.”

Although he is going back to his home country, the theme of starting again follows him.

“I was a manager at the construction company before I come here. Same thing here, I started as a dishwasher, kitchen, orders, going up. Now, I go back, and I start again. It’s ten years after, I don’t know how the laws have changed. But I have to start again.”

I watched him cross the security line and get lost in the crowd. As I drove back from the airport teary-eyed, I reflected on the day. Part of our conversation took place at Universal City. We were both mesmerized by the lights and that American Dream that was so perfectly manufactured and imported to us in our home countries through American movies and music. We now know the amount of labor and darkness it takes to make those lights shine bright, but we truly believe this is the best country despite its faults.

I am so lucky to be able to live here and while it’s sad he had to go back, Narciso is taking with him a true American gift, its biggest export, and that is to dream big.