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Mexico Quotes

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Mexico Quotes

“Spanish is the lovin’ tongue, Soft as music, light as spray. ’Twas a girl I learnt it from, Livin’ down Sonora way. I don’t look much like a lover, Yet I say her love words over, Often when I’m all alone— “Mi amor, mi corazon.” Nights when she knew where I’d ride, She would listen for my spurs, Throw the big door open wide, Raise them laughin’ eyes of hers. And my heart would nigh stop beatin' When I heard her tender greeting, Whispered soft for me alone— “Mi amor! mi corazon!” Moonlight in the patio, Old señora noddin’ near, Me and Juana talkin’ low So the Madre couldn’t hear— How those hours would go a-flyin’! And too soon I’d hear her sighin’ In her little sorry tone— “Adios, mi corazon!” But one time I had to fly For a foolish gamblin’ fight, And we said a swift goodbye In that black, unlucky night. When I’d loosed her arms from clingin’ With her words the hoofs kep’ ringin’ As I galloped north alone— “Adios, mi corazon!” Never seen her since that night. I kaint cross the Line, you know. She was Mex and I was white; Like as not, it’s better so. Yet I’ve always sort of missed her Since that last, wild night I kissed her, Left her heart and lost my own— “Adios, mi corazon!”

“ask how much the mafia pays to carry out murders. Fríjol tells me without stopping for a moment. One thousand pesos. That is about $85. The figure seems so ludicrous that I check it out in several other interviews up in the barrios with former and active gang members. They all say the same thing. One thousand pesos to carry out a killing. The price of a human life in Juárez is just $85. To traffic drugs is no huge step to the dark side. All kinds of people over the world move narcotics and don’t feel they’ve crossed a red line. But to take a human life. That is a hard crime. I can at least comprehend assassins killing to jump from poverty to riches. But for someone to take a life for just $85—enough to eat some tacos and buy a few beers over the week—shows a terrifying degradation in society. To try to get a handle on how this has happened, I talk to social worker Sandra Ramirez at a youth center in the westside slums. Sandra grew up in the barrios and worked on assembly lines before trying to steer young people away from crime. She says the teenage sicarios are the result of systematic alienation over the last two decades. The slums were a convenient place for factory workers but got nothing from the government. As the factory jobs slumped with the economy, the slums were left to rot. One 2010 study found that a stunning 120,000 Juárez youngsters aged thirteen to twenty-four—or 45 percent of the total—were not enrolled in any education nor had any formal employment. “The government offers nothing. It can’t even compete with a thousand pesos. It is only the mafia that comes to these kids and offers them anything. They offer them money, cell phones, and guns to protect themselves. You think these kids are going to refuse? They have nothing to lose. They only see the day-to-day. They know they could die and they say so. But they don’t care. Because they have lived this way all their lives.” ask how much the mafia pays to carry out murders. Fríjol tells me without stopping for a moment. One thousand pesos. That is about $85. The figure seems so ludicrous that I check it out in several other interviews up in the barrios with former and active gang members. They all say the same thing. One thousand pesos to carry out a killing. The price of a human life in Juárez is just $85. To traffic drugs is no huge step to the dark side. All kinds of people over the world move narcotics and don’t feel they’ve crossed a red line. But to take a human life. That is a hard crime. I can at least comprehend assassins killing to jump from poverty to riches. But for someone to take a life for just $85—enough to eat some tacos and buy a few beers over the week—shows a terrifying degradation in society. To try to get a handle on how this has happened, I talk to social worker Sandra Ramirez at a youth center in the westside slums. Sandra grew up in the barrios and worked on assembly lines before trying to steer young people away from crime. She says the teenage sicarios are the result of systematic alienation over the last two decades. The slums were a convenient place for factory workers but got nothing from the government. As the factory jobs slumped with the economy, the slums were left to rot. One 2010 study found that a stunning 120,000 Juárez youngsters aged thirteen to twenty-four—or 45 percent of the total—were not enrolled in any education nor had any formal employment. “The government offers nothing. It can’t even compete with a thousand pesos. It is only the mafia that comes to these kids and offers them anything. They offer them money, cell phones, and guns to protect themselves. You think these kids are going to refuse? They have nothing to lose. They only see the day-to-day. They know they could die and they say so. But they don’t care. Because they have lived this way all their lives.”

“I ask how much the mafia pays to carry out murders. Fríjol tells me without stopping for a moment. One thousand pesos. That is about $85. The figure seems so ludicrous that I check it out in several other interviews up in the barrios with former and active gang members. They all say the same thing. One thousand pesos to carry out a killing. The price of a human life in Juárez is just $85. To traffic drugs is no huge step to the dark side. All kinds of people over the world move narcotics and don’t feel they’ve crossed a red line. But to take a human life. That is a hard crime. I can at least comprehend assassins killing to jump from poverty to riches. But for someone to take a life for just $85—enough to eat some tacos and buy a few beers over the week—shows a terrifying degradation in society. To try to get a handle on how this has happened, I talk to social worker Sandra Ramirez at a youth center in the westside slums. Sandra grew up in the barrios and worked on assembly lines before trying to steer young people away from crime. She says the teenage sicarios are the result of systematic alienation over the last two decades. The slums were a convenient place for factory workers but got nothing from the government. As the factory jobs slumped with the economy, the slums were left to rot. One 2010 study found that a stunning 120,000 Juárez youngsters aged thirteen to twenty-four—or 45 percent of the total—were not enrolled in any education nor had any formal employment. “The government offers nothing. It can’t even compete with a thousand pesos. It is only the mafia that comes to these kids and offers them anything. They offer them money, cell phones, and guns to protect themselves. You think these kids are going to refuse? They have nothing to lose. They only see the day-to-day. They know they could die and they say so. But they don’t care. Because they have lived this way all their lives.”

“To take showers, one needs to heat water in a bucket by using two induction cables, which are either connected to a socket or plugged directly into a power generator. If this method sounds dangerous, rest assured, it is. One time, I touched the water while my cousin was warming it for his shower. The electric shock threw me back.”

“Kamishna … karibu," alisema Nafi huku akisimama na kutupa gazeti mezani na kuchukua karatasi ya faksi, iliyotumwa. "Ahsante. Kuna nini …" "Kamishna, imekuja faksi kutoka Oslo kama nilivyokueleza – katika simu. Inakutaka haraka, kesho, lazima kesho, kuwahi kikao Alhamisi mjini Copenhagen," alisema Nafi huku akimpa kamishna karatasi ya faksi. "Mjini Copenhagen!" alisema kamishna kwa kutoamini. "Ndiyo, kamishna … Sidhani kama kuna jambo la hatari lakini." "Nafi, nini kimetokea!" "Kamishna … sijui. Kwa kweli sijui. Ilipofika, hii faksi, kitu cha kwanza niliongea na watu wa WIS kupata uthibitisho wao. Nao hawajui. Huenda ni mauaji ya jana ya Meksiko. Hii ni siri kubwa ya tume kamishna, na ndiyo maana Oslo wakaingilia kati." "Ndiyo. Kila mtu ameyasikia mauaji ya Meksiko. Ni mabaya. Kinachonishangaza ni kwamba, jana niliongea na makamu … kuhusu mabadiliko ya katiba ya WODEA. Hakunambia chochote kuhusu mkutano wa kesho!" "Kamishna, nakusihi kuwa makini. Dalili zinaonyesha hali si nzuri hata kidogo. Hawa ni wadhalimu tu … wa madawa ya kulevya." "Vyema!" alijibu kamishna kwa jeuri na hasira. Halafu akaendelea, "Kuna cha ziada?" "Ijumaa, kama tulivyoongea wiki iliyopita, nasafiri kwenda Afrika Kusini." "Kikao kinafanyika Alhamisi, Nafi, huwezi kusafiri Ijumaa …" "Binti yangu atafukuzwa shule, kam …" "Nafi, ongea na chuo … wambie umepata dharura utaondoka Jumatatu; utawaona Jumanne … Fuata maadili ya kazi tafadhali. Safari yako si muhimu hivyo kulinganisha na tume!" "Sawa! Profesa. Niwie radhi, nimekuelewa, samahani sana. Samahani sana.”

“Quetzalcoatl, the Feathered Serpent, [...] came to teach [the ancient inhabitants of Mexico] the benefits of settled agriculture and the skills necessary to build temples. Although this deity is frequently depicted as a serpent, he is more often shown in human form--the serpent being his symbol and his alter ego--and is usually described as "a tall bearded white man" ... "a mysterious person ... a white man with a strong formation of body, broad forehead, large eyes and a flowing beard." Indeed, [...] the attributes and life history of Quetzalcoatl are so human that it is not improbable that he may have been an actual historical character ... the memory of whose benefactions lingered after his death, and whose personality was eventually deified. The same could very well be said of Oannes--and just like Oannes at the head of the Apkallu (likewise depicted as prominently bearded) it seems that Quetzalcoatl traveled with his own brotherhood of sages and magicians. We learn that they arrived in Mexico "from across the sea in a boat that moved by itself without paddles," and that Quetzalcoatl was regarded as having been "the founder of cities, the framer of laws and the teacher of the calendar.”

“[Mexicali is] a town like an American town, like the American town just across the river, in fact, if you drained half the money out and let it sit awhile. See it in fast motion: Stores close, streets go dirty, entropy increases, dark moneymaking schemes multiply, people's dreams begin to be of leaving. This may be the one clear truth of the so-called border issue: Put a poor country next to a rich one and watch which way the traffic flows. Add impediments, the traffic endeavors to flow around them. Eliminate disparity, the traffic stops. If Mexico were as rich as we are, we'd only be getting their tourists.”

“Hide yourself in God, so when a man wants to find you he will have to go there first.”

“I call it the Margarita Road. It's the course your heart sets when you want to leave the past behind and start over someplace new and warm. Usually the path heads south to blue water and white sand, with any bumps along the way smoothed over by rum and tequila. It's not for everyone. This is a highway traveled mostly by runaways and drifters. I know, becuase I'm one of them.”

“As I got to know my new neighbors, I found saints and sinners of every degree of good, bad, and strange. These aging adolescents thought of themselves as Peter Pan’s lost children, and the beach was their Neverland. Having run away from home, they now were refusing to grow up.”

“Life down here is kind of a permanent Halloween where you choose a costume more fitting for your self-image than reality could ever offer. Do you want to be a captain or a cowboy? No problem. People will call you by whatever title or name you choose. You say you’re a reincarnated pirate queen or the abandoned love child of a famous entertainer? That’s fine with me. We believe each other’s stories about who we were and who we are. Being an expat means you can have a whole new life. It’s a little like being in the Witness Relocation Program only with flip flops and margaritas.”

“Most of the pilgrims I met in Mexico were running from something: financial woes, a pissed-off spouse, or a life that hit a dead end. Regardless of the reasons for the journey, the Margarita Road will take you far from all those problems. Still, there are no guarantees. A funny thing about the past--it can catch up to you even on a remote tropical seashore. Sometimes you bring it with you.”

“For some time now, people like me had been drifting south, ending up in Mexico with Jimmy Buffett songs playing in their heads. They left behind mortgages, failed marriages, and a lifetime of disappointments. Some of them came looking for a fresh start, and some were searching for a place to hide. A few were pulled by a dream they could never quite understand, until they walked down the beach to that crystal-clear water for the first time.”

“Oh sure, there was a gringo gulch where the sunbirds lived in the winter months. But if you avoided them, you might hook up with the small community of Margarita Road refugees: a group of wanderers from up north; a crazy Irish sailor; a few Italians; some young, fast-living kids from Mexico City; and one beautiful girl from Brazil. All in all, it was a nice place to stay—or hide, if that’s what you needed.”

“He kept ordering beers and making what he thought were humorous jokes about how Mexicans sleep all day, all the while telling me how great my life was without a ‘real job.’ After an hour or so of this, I was ready to pour the next drink over his head.”

“(We loved Mother too, completely, but we were finding out, as Father was too, that it is good for parents and for children to be alone now and then with one another...the man alone or the woman, to sound new notes in the mysterious music of parenthood and childhood.) That night I not only saw my Father for the first time as a person. I saw the golden hills and the live oaks as clearly as I have ever seen them since; and I saw the dimples in my little sister's fat hands in a way that still moves me because of that first time; and I saw food as something beautiful to be shared with people instead of as a thrice-daily necessity.”

“Quienes hemos pasado más de tres días en el extranjero conocemos una verdad fundamental y, tristemente, poco estudiada: el correcto funcionamiento del organismo del mexicano depende del suministro, suficiente y de buena calidad, del complejo T. Este conjunto de aminoácidos esenciales, presente en los alimentos que comienzan con esa grafía -tacos, tortas, tamales, tostadas, tlacoyos, tlayudas, totopos- y en otros tantos con una inicial distinta -chalupas, chilaquiles, enchiladas, enfrijoladas, garnachas, gorditas, huaraches, memelas, molletes, pambazos, quesadillas, sopes, etcétera-, parece ser el gran catalizador y desencadenador de nuestras descargas de endorfinas, a cuyo encanto estamos tan habituados que, cuando la distancia -o la dieta- nos privan de él, nos embarga una tristeza profunda, una sensación como de orfandad, de vacío en el alma... y en la tripa.”

“My novels are set in a global space and pace. However, I have never visited most of the places. I wrote my first book in London but the story took the reader to places in Mexico, Denmark and Russia, and carefully avoided London. I access these global locations with my feet planted in front of my computer. I will use my internet connection to carefully enter the streets of a foreign city and find out how long it will take my main character to get from the airport to the city center – and if there are any shortcuts on the way. I wanted to do something new. The world is becoming a global village and we have to understand these different cultures. There is a Danish culture, an Israeli culture and so on. So if you want to go to Denmark, then read the book.”

“One can seldom look at terrain and think of it, "This is France," for instance, but in looking at the landscape south of Nogales I had the feeling unmistakably. The land itself was Mexican. It was dry, sandy, rocky, hot, and heavy with many kinds of desert plants. It had repose, dignity, and a sense of the fierceness of survival--not just human survival, but all survival, animal, insect, bird, and plant. And then, when the people of Mexico appeared beyond the train windows, this isolation, struggle, and heroism was clearly marked in their faces.”

“The landscape started hard, sharp black mountains over my shoulder and thirsty young saguaros hugging patchy dirt. Gradually it let go, began to green on me a little. I crossed a river, watched succulents get fatter and farmland start to wave, hoarding the blue above and the few clouds it had to spare. I knew the route somehow, knew the curves, the directions, the exact way to go. I knew it the way you know the stars are still up in the sky even though white sun obscures them. Everything that had happened before Lukeville and Sonoita began to liquify in memory, feeling more like fiction than personal history. Funerals and pain, girlfriends and mothers, roommates and priests all tumble away with the desert behind me. The only thing that's real is the road I see ahead. The only person in my life is the man sitting silently beside me. The place I'm going is the only place I've ever wanted to go.”

“For the narcos, getting a ballad about them is like getting a doctorate,” Conrado says. Conrado tells me the story of one low-level trafficker who paid to get a particularly catchy ballad made about him. Soon everyone played it on his car stereo. “The crime bosses were like, ‘Bring me the guy from that song. I want him to do the job for me.’ So he rose through the ranks because of the song.” “So what has happened to him now?” I asked. “Oh, they killed him. He got too big. It was because of the song, really.”

“To have a man kiss you in a women’s jail is a gift better than any birthday or Christmas present. It’s better than a bouquet of roses. It’s better than a warm shower. I could imagine living in this jail for years and living for every workshop day and that male kiss on my cheek. That kiss was rain, sunshine, and the sweet air of outside. Yes. I knew I’d even sit there and glue stupid things onto cardboard sheets just to get that kiss again.”

“Va a sonar muy cliché o muy bobo, pero las cosas no suceden sólo porque sí, o tal vez sí lo hacen, y nosotros sólo le damos ese sentido al decir esa frase tonta que usamos para justificar lo que nos sucede, pero no sé. Tal vez ésa sí sea una de las pocas cosas que pasaron por algo y no sólo porque sí. Pero cuando unos hombres abrieron mi puerta y me jalaron mientras yo comenzaba a gritar, supe que nada podía mejorar y en ningún momento se me cruzó por la mente ese: Tal vez esto está pasando por algo.”

“...very soon he went to sleep. He dreamed that the priest whom they had shot that morning was back in the house dressed in the clothes his father had lent him and laid out stiffly for burial. The boy sat beside the bed and his mother read out of a very long book all about how the priest had acted in front of the bishop the part of Julius Caesar: there was a fish basket at her feet, and the fish were bleeding, wrapped in her handkerchief. He was very tired and very bored and somebody was hammering nails into a coffin in the passage. Suddenly the dead priest winked at him - an unmistakable flicker of the eyelid, just like that.”

“She worked there for several months as a slave in a Mexican family until they sold her to a wealthy Hispanic man from Santa Fe, N.M. He also purchased another young captive Apache woman from New Mexico to accompany them. Both women were loaded onto an oxcart bound for Santa Fe in a journey that could take at least three months.”

“Kofia za chuma au sandarusi zenye uwezo wa kukwepesha risasi za wadunguzi na kuzuia mpaka risasi tatu za AK-47, ijapokuwa zimetengenezwa kuzuia risasi moja tu, ni miongoni mwa vitu 17 vilivyobebwa na makomandoo wa Tume ya Dunia; wakati wakitekeleza Operesheni ya Kifo au Ushindi Kamili (operesheni ndogo ya Operation Devil Cross ya Tume ya Dunia) katika Msitu wa Benson Bennett, Salina Cruz, Oaxaca, nchini Meksiko. Thamani ya vitu vya komandoo mmoja wa EAC ('Executive Action Corps') akiwa vitani ni zaidi ya dola za Kimarekani 65,000; ikiwa ni pamoja na magwanda ya jeshi ('Ghillie Suits'), kofia za chuma, miwani ya kuonea usiku (yenye uwezo wa kubinuka chini na juu), redio na mitambo ya mawasiliano migongoni mwao juu ya vizibao vya kuzuia risasi, vitibegi vya msalaba mwekundu ('Blowout kits' – katika mapaja ya miguu yao ya kulia, ndani yake kukiwa na pisto na madawa ya huduma ya kwanza), vitibegi vya kujiokolea ('Evasion Kits' – katika mapaja ya miguu yao ya kushoto, ndani yake kukiwa na visu na pesa na ramani ya Meksiko) na bunduki za masafa marefu.”

“Jessica also supplied chopped fruits and vegetables to the lounge of lizards in the garden. She’d read that amusing expression on YucatanLiving.com. A group of lizards was called a lounge. So, she supposed, a group of lizards hanging around could be thought of as a lounge of lizards lounging in a lizard lounge. Oh-kay then, she really was spending way too much time by herself. Tormenta Isla Book #3 of Isla Mujeres Mystery series.”

“Meli ya kwanza kuondoka katika Bandari ya Salina Cruz kusini mwa Meksiko katika Bahari ya Pasifiki ni 'La Diosa de los Mares', 'Mungu wa Bahari', au 'Goddess of the Seas', Tani 6000, iliyoondoka saa tisa kamili usiku kuelekea Miami nchini Marekani; wakati ya mwisho kuondoka ilikuwa CSS ('Colonia Santita of the Seas', Tani 10000), na SPD ('El Silencio Depredador del Profundo', 'Mnyama Mtulivu wa Kina Kirefu', 'The Silent Predator of the Deep' – nyambizi ya Panthera Tigrisi), zilizoondoka saa kumi na moja alfajiri kuelekea Guatemala na Kolombia. Salina Cruz ni sehemu iliyopo kandokando mwa Bahari ya Pasifiki kusini kabisa mwa Meksiko na kaskazini-mashariki kwa Reparo Jicara katika jimbo la Oaxaca. Kambi ya Panthera Tigrisi ilijengwa ndani ya Msitu wa Benson Bennett – katika ufuko wa bahari kubwa kuliko zote ulimwenguni, iliyopuliza hewa na kuyumbisha miti anuai juu ya maabara kubwa kuliko zote katika Hemisifia ya Magharibi; ya kokeini, heroini, bangi, eksitasi na hielo ya China na Kolombia. Panthera Tigrisi alikamatwa katika Bahari ya Pasifiki. Kahima Kankiriho alikamatwa katika Msitu wa Bennett.”