ASSIGNMENT

Make a comments about those assignments.

For example

ASSIGNMENT

Through the poems, we notice several times when José Olivarez accentuate about how kids were ignored by their mothers who sometimes were focused on something else. Ex: “all the Mexican women refuse to cook or clean or raise the kids,” or “my mom puts on makeup & she is not my mom, not a mom at all, she is admiring how good the red lipstick looks on her lips,” or even “so for the next few hours she will not worry about me & my brothers, so for the next few hours all she will have to worry about is the color of her lips and the handsome men admiring them.”

COMMENTS

The points you brought up about Child Education on the poem “On My Mom’s 50th Birthday” are very meaningful. And the passages you quoted on your comment explains perfectly your point of view. I would like to add that when Olivarez writes “cold water in a cold country she adopted, and for what – tonight the what ifs melt with the snow and it is not winter, tonight my mom is not my mom, nor does she know any children”. The mother figure is seen as a symbol of love, affection, care etc. But today, because it is her birthday, all the warm affections melted away and she wants to get rid of her responsibilities as a mother and being a woman celebrating a special date. 

1) The following line struck me “they dream of another heaven, one they might be allowed in if they work hard enough.”  The sentence shows the point of view of Jose Olivarez about how hard Mexicans (immigrants in general) work aiming a better future in America which he names “Heaven”.  On the passage, he also implied that there is another Haven, and if the Mexicans work properly, they will be able to enter it. Another very interesting point I’d like to comment is the way Olivares mixes up Spanish and English which makes the readers feel the way the does “living in two different worlds”. Also, when he writes “Saint Peter lets Mexicans into heaven but only to work in the kitchens” he is describing what job positions most of immigrants work at for not being “qualified enough” to assume different positions just for not being North American. Just like on his other poem “Mexican American Disambiguation”, Olivarez condemns the labeling of people in America. On page 50, he writes “there are white people in heaven too” and “I’m just kidding. There are no white people in heaven.” emphasizes that if you are an immigrant, no matter what you were before crossing the borders, from that day on, you have become an immigrant and that is your label now.  

2) According to the course material provided, “Pedro waits at the gate with a shot of tequila to welcome all the Mexicans to heaven, but he gets drunk & forgets about the list. All the Mexicans walk into heaven, even our no-good cousins who only go to church for baptisms & funerals.”

After I read the poem and my experience from my job, I realized that tequila is the most favorite drink for Mexicans. The way to drink tequila is filled in a shot glass and then by taking small sips of it. Sometimes they drink tequila as a welcome shot to celebrate. In this poem, I believe that heaven means when they walk to America. They believe that is heaven for them. The poem also showed us about their religion, which is Catholicism. Jose mentions that people go to church for baptisms and funerals.