to be honest..

I still feel the same way. I wrote this back in December 2007 after my experience with the Farmworker's in Southwest Florida.

to be honest

i went down to miami on thursday night. walked around south beach solo the first night. very fun actually. but there is a limit to the amount of fun one can have alone...so enough said there.

the next day, friday there was to be a 9 1/2-mile walk from Goldman Sachs office to the Burger King HQ in Miami where a rally would start until around 6pm.

I awoke from my hotel room close to where the walk would start and joined the large group of yellow shirts. The usual BK logo was slightly altered to a more appropriate slogan.... EXPLOITATION KING.

I arrived alone and sought out an acquaintance of mine, Greg Asbed, who is an organizer from the Coalition of Immokalee Workers. I found him and we spoke about a current project I am working with concerning fair foods and a corp. It was good to finally put a face to an email address.

We walked and I made friends and short conversations as I meandered through the crowds, especially when we got to the halfway point. On the last leg of our walk (there were about 600-1000 people marching along the streets of Miami and at the rally) I met a young man who happened to be one of the workers from Immokalee.

So, I cannot tell you his name. Not for any protection reasons, I just really couldn't understand him when he tried to tell me what it was. But with what little Spanish I know, "cuantos anos?" he was 28. "donde estas?" he was from Acupulco, Mexico. He was not married and had been living in the United States for 8 years. He only had one more year left until he went back home. He also liked to dance.

We walked along for the last 3 miles together, often saying to eachother, "muy caliente" and "si". He would hold the sign I had and then he'd give it to me (it had a double use, to display a message to onlookers and to block the hot, hot sun).

Along this path, there were a couple of college students I had gotten to know a little. They passionately and awkwardly chanted our staple phrases, "UN CENTAVO MAS!" and "Get outta the way King, Get outta the way!" they urged my new friend to chant along with them but he politely declined and stayed silent during most of the walk.

I started feeling out of place. Here I was, staying at a nice Marriott (thanks to my discount from work) going to sincerely support a cause I feel passionately about for a day. I was supposed to walk, cheer, yell, hold signs, and then go back to my hotel and have a great time in Miami...wow, sounds like something is missing.

Maybe I am being too cynical of this situation, I mean, what am I supposed to do? I can't help the fact that I am not a tomato picker. I felt as though if I was one, I would have a right to yell for JUSTICIA!! It was almost as though I was an outsider, wanting to be the one who WANTED JUSTICE, the one who DEMANDED FAIR WAGES, the one who wanted UN CENTAVO MAS!

I started looking around me, looking at my new friend. Wondering what he made of all this. I started wondering if I wasn't here: no one would really notice (not in a woe is me type of way!) just the actual presence of one more body. Then I thought- Diana what the hell are you saying, if you honestly believe that for one second, what does your life mean from this point? I then QUICKLY realized my momentary lapse of beliefs; what if everyone else pursued that thought? There would not have been such a HUGE turnout!

We got to the BK headquarters. Never had I felt such a sickening feeling at such a big building. I had a mix of emotions. I looked up to the glass offices and saw outlines of individuals looking down at the huge glob of yelling yellow. Maybe they were completely unaware? I can imagine the embarrassment. I can't feel bad for that long though. Many different groups and individuals spoke on that flatbed truck that served as a stage. We were there for about 3 hours. Robert Kennedy's daughter, Kerry Kennedy, was one of the speakers as well.

After my new friend and I said our goodbyes at the end of the night and I got on the bus to return to my car and safe hotel on the bay (please understand my sarcasm here) I realized that although most of us there that day could not necessarily understand how grueling the work is as a FL tomato picker, and could not understand the frustrations they have, we are sympathizing with them. Maybe we had been "exploited" (definition suiting each individual, of course) at one time in our life, or something close to it, or maybe we had seem a family member treated unfairly.

We were doing what humans should do for each other. Instead of man being a wolf to man (a quote I read from John Bowe's book: Nobodies: Modern American Slave Labor and the Darkside of the New Global Economy) we were expressing compassion for their struggles. We were disgusted by big corporations like Goldman Sachs (one of BK owners) whose top 12 executives earned well over $200 million in BONUSES ALONE in 2006. More than twice as much as 10,000 FL tomato pickers made in a year. We were outraged by corporations who underhandedly and sickly sell us the slogan that we can "have it our way".

I felt it all. I know I do not have to worry about the workers from Immokalee thinking we were just poster-children from middle to upper-middle class America, "doing the right thing" and feeling the rush of a great march and rally. That is just an evil thought trying to seek its way into hearts to prevent change from happening. People know sincerity, even if it's not in their language.

To be honest with you, never before in my life, have I felt more compelled to look at my possessions and think of where they came from, of who made them. It is such a difficult thing to get used to. I know I have been an advocate of "fair trade" and human rights for some time now, but maybe I was being passive and still "growing up".

It's hitting me hard now. Like a painful growth spurt. I think more and more consumers are also in their "pubescent stage" if I can loosely use that term. ha.

With great hope, I believe more and more in the power of an individual.

I saw this tattoo on this guy's leg. It looked like a math problem. On the first line it said "Compassion" the next line, followed by a plus sign, was the word "conscience". A line followed under that word. Okay I have to say this tattoo was located on this kid's calf and it was in Spanish, so sue me, I could not see what it all equaled, but if I took some time I'm sure I could think of a good word. Either way, what a great combination.

Today I hope you will move others to also have a compassionate conscience.