Thursday 8 March 2012

Immigrant janitors

Walnut Creek once again commended itself as a hotbed of political activity when I was roused from my mid-morning nap by the sound of drums!  A quick investigation led me to discover a large and noisy march passing the end of our road.  Traffic had been held up in all directions, and I'm not sure the beeping of motorists was in support or annoyance.

I wandered down to discover that it was the immigrant janitors who are currently up in arms.  As an immigrant janitor myself, albeit exclusively for one client, I was naturally interested.  Unfortunately my Spanish isn't quite up to scratch, so it was hard to understand what was being shouted, although I did manage a "gracias" when handed a flier.

On further reading, much of the fuss is about Alabama Law HB 56.  And quite right too!  Apparently, just for having a British accent, I bring enough suspicion on myself to be racially profiled and have all my immigration documents checked!  So I will be staying away from Alabama until I have my southern accent properly worked out.  "Howdie y'all."

Anyway, the law only applies to undocumented immigrants, so it was worth standing in line in the London embassy despite the boredom, but given that the US economy stays afloat on undocumented immigrants this is really the country shooting itself in the foot.  And there'll be no janitors there to clean up the mess afterwards.


A reasonable proportion of the 99%.


Por favor, ¿Puedo unirme a su marcha y llevar una camiseta?