2. Los Activistas
John Alvarez
JT: Yo nací en Torre, Puerto Rico. Uh, fui a las escuela allá en Puerto Rico y después nosotros nos mudamos a los Estados Unidos, el primer sitio fue Arizona. Y eso fue bien difícil para mí porque fui de isla tropical a desierto. Después, nosotros nos mudamos mucho, aquí en los Estados Unidos. Y, mi papá se retiró en Orlando, Florida.
EF: Entonces, ¿Hace cuánto tiempo que usted vive aquí en Ohio?
JT: Uh, casi ocho años.
EF: ¿Cómo puede describir su niñez en Puerto Rico y en otros lugares?
JT: En Puerto Rico fue difícil porque yo, yo sabía mucho … el problema era que, yo quería más, en la escuela y no me podía ayudar. Y después mi madre me dijo, “Tú sabes, lo mejor es mudarse para los Estados Unidos porque allí vamos a tener la oportunidad de hacer lo tenemos que hacer, y para que los niño crezcan como nosotros queremos.” Así que era difícil en Puerto Rico pero no supe lo más difícil que era vivir aquí en los Estados Unidos. Por algunos años yo quería regresar pero, tú sabes, me acostumbré.
EF: ¿A qué edad vino usted aquí a los Estados Unidos?
JT: Ah, siete años.
John Turner Alvarez Youtube Interview
EF: ¿Ohio es el primer estado donde usted vive que es frío?¿Cuál fue esa experiencia … en qué temporada llegó primeramente?
EF: Siete años. Un gran cambio me imagino. Pensando en estos años después su niñez, ¿Qué canciones, historias o chistes, siente usted que son parte de usted y su familia?
JT: Pues, voy a decir esto en inglés: The part of my life that I miss and that I loved when I was a kid, that is so different here in the United States was Christmas. Christmas in Puerto Rico, there’s no place on the planet that I would rather be than Christmas in Puerto Rico. It is just a more… over a month filled of just partying, people coming together, singing, dancing, great food, and it just seems like everything starts … everything’s commercialized here after Thanksgiving and, in Puerto Rico it’s just not like that. It’s just that coming together and then, the song that always rings in my head and I sing it, and I don’t sing it too much here in Ohio because there’s nobody to sing it with (risa) um, but I always sing uh, “Alegre vengo de la montaña de mi cabaña que alegre está. Y a mis amigos le traigo flores de las mejores de mi rosal.” That’s a typical Christmas song and, and it brings back the smells, the feeling that you get, that just … it’s just unique.
EF: ¿Usted ha tratado de mantener, por lo menos una parte de eso aquí en Estados Unidos o en Ohio?
JT: Pues, aquí en Ohio es muy diferente. En Florida, sí, pude hacer mucho de eso. Pero en Ohio es bien difícil porque, nosotros comemos cosas muy diferentes. Yo odio ese jamón que hacen aquí con miel y, (expresión de asco). Nosotros en Puerto Rico comemos pernil y, ellos no tienen eso aquí. Y así que yo soy homosexual, yo soy gay, y yo tengo una pareja de catorce años y la familia de él son bien alemán, y ellos comen todo eso y yo dije un día, “Oye, vamo a comer comida tradicional de Puerto Rico en estas Navidades” (risa) y, ellos dijeron, “Okay. ¿Qué va hacer?” I go, “Suprise” okay. So I called my mama, and then I called my sister and I said, “I need to know how to have the perfect recipe to do a pernil” sure enough they gave it to me. I did it, I followed it from everything I remember my grandma doing, yo lo hice. I have never seen people devour a pernil and I’m telling you they ate the cuero, cause we leave the cuero and everything, and I went out to a butcher out in the country of Portage County and I was in shock cause they actually gave it to me fresh and I said, “You must’ve killed a pig back there because that’s fresh” (risa) and it just, they just devoured it and they loved it. Lo único que no les gustaron fue los pasteles que eso es diferente de lo que se acostumbran, que esto no es un ‘cake’ this is a, esto, es como un tamal hecho por los tainos. And so uh, they didn’t like that because it is an acquired taste. So, I love it and that’s all that counts—it reminds me of being back in Puerto Rico. Even reminds me of being back in Florida.
JT: I came to Ohio uh, I, this is awful: I came to Ohio January the 1st, okay, about eight, seven, eight years ago, because I got hired for a company up here. It was so ungodly cold. Cuando me dio esa, ese viento … And I was like, “What the hell is this!?” (risa) Y después, guiando. Eso fue …driving in the snow and in ice it just, it didn’t compute to me. Yo puedo guiar en una tormenta de Florida. Pero esto de tormenta de invierno, mum (no). Especialmente, I didn’t know what black ice was and I was going down, cause you know Summit County is like the highest point in Ohio. It has all the biggest hills and stuff like that so we were going down a hill and all of a sudden I was just sliding all the way down, I was screaming, I was like, “Oh my God, what is this!?” I stopped and I called my mom—I said, “Mommy, quiero regresar, quiero regresar (risa) no puedo con esto.” But I got used to it, I got used to it.
EF: ¿Cuál fue su primera impresión de Ohio?
JT: I fell in love with it. And, me gusta la naturaleza, especialmente aquí en Akron. Uh, aquí en Summit County tienen tienen towpaths, hiking-trails, the ski trails, it just, it’s awesome. It’s everything that I like, me encanta vivir al lado del río por mi religión, porque mi religión es indígena de Cuba y de Puerto Rico. Uh, que viene de Nigeria. Um y, tener un río al ladito de mi casa es perfecto porque puedo hacer mis cosas religiosas. Um, y, me encanta. Es tan diferente y no tengo que preocuparme de los cocodrilos, de las serpientes. Sí, los mosquitos, esto es totalmente diferente. Sí, y aunque en Puerto Rico no hay serpientes, tú sabes, porque eso lo arregló Cristóbal Colón trayendo mongoose, y se comieron todas las culebras, no hay culebras en Puerto Rico. So, I didn’t have to worry about that down there in Puerto Rico but here, in Florida it’s awful, you never know if a little floating thing is really an alligator. In Cuyahoga National Forest up North there’s little plants that you can use, indigenous plants within our religion and that you think you can’t find anywhere else but in the tropical region but there’s, you know, there’s hybrids that are growing there and, and so it’s fun looking for the stuff that you need, las hierbas para la religión de nosotros.
EF: ¿Cuál ha sido el momento más feliz de su vida al llegar aquí en Ohio, por ejemplo?
JT: I think the happiest time of my life, yo creo que fue cuando … me aceptaron en esta universidad y me gradué con mi maestría. Ese fue el día, and it was the coldest day too, it was minus 20, pero ese fue el día más feliz de mi vida porque eso yo lo hice sólo en un sitio que yo no conozco. Y las personas que me ayudaron para obtener ese degree, fue increíble. Me encanta Akron, me encanta la universidad por eso, pero cuando tuve mucho problemas que no tenía ni electricidad ni nada de eso, una manager de McDonalds allí en, Market St, ella me vio y ya me dijo, “¿Tú no tienes electricidad?” And I go, “No” “Quédate aquí. Usa nuestro wifi para que tú hagas tu research” and, and I was able to stay there and, and work three, four, five hours just there and I would go get something to eat and then I keep working, and when I graduated with my Master’s degree I went over there and I said, “I want to thank you—I got a 4.0 and I worked my butt off, even without electricity for 12 days I worked my butt off—thank you so much” And, and so, I can tell you that’s something that would not happen in Florida. They would’ve kicked me out. And here they saw that I was trying to better myself and they said, “Stay here. We’ll take care of you” And that’s what I love about this place, you know, the people are real, they don’t have façades, they are genuine people and that’s what I like.
EF: ¿Cuál ha sido de los momentos difíciles de estar aquí? Aparte de no tener electricidad y del clima.
JT: Sí, sí. Um, yo creo que fue el día que me dio un ataque corazón, aquí. Y eso fue, dos meses antes de graduarme con mi maestría, me dio un ataque al corazón, yo estaba haciendo una filantropía por la universidad aquí, Make a Difference Day, y estaba ayudando a arreglar una casa y, me dio un ataque al corazón por lo que estaba haciendo. Lo que me enfogonó fue que…nadie en la universidad supo lo que estaba pasando o me llamó, hasta los hispanos, porque yo estaba en el club de los hispanos, no me llamaron. Yo estaba bien solo y nada más que mi pareja me ayudó, me estaba ayudando y, hasta una profesora—yo estaba trabajando con ella—me llamó en el hospital gritándome porque tenía que trabajar, y yo dije, “Oye, ataque al corazón” um, y fue un tiempo muy difícil para mí que a ella, yo estaba pensando, “¿Debo de quedarme aquí? porque si me están tratando así, yo creo que … I may have misperceived what they were saying, what they were thinking about me.” I got a sour taste in my mouth and that’s when I decided after I graduated, I’m going back to Florida. I went back to Florida … and I missed this place, I missed this place, I missed everything about what I loved; the grass isn’t greener on the other side. So I went to Miami to teach, I’m glad I did that because I got a chance to teach, Haitian students are very, very poor, but when Lee Gil called me, the vice president here, to come work for him up here, he didn’t even, I don’t care if it was 20,000 a year, I would’ve come up because I just love this place so much.
EF: ¿Cuál es la persona más importante en su vida en este momento?
JT: En este momento, yo creo que el reencuentro de mi papá. Uh, es bien difícil ser gay, y ser latino. Bien difícil. Usted sabe que la cultura de nosotros es bien, el machismo, y tradicional uh, y mi papá es Pentecostal. Y … fue bien difícil—muchos años sin hablar con él uh, muchos años. Y ese reencuentro fue algo que pasó cuando yo estaba viviendo aquí uh, fue cuando me dio el ataque de corazón que mi papá me, me dijo, “Oye, por poquito perdí a mi hijo mayor” Y en ese tiempo eso fue bien difícil para él, y bien difícil para mí. Y empezamos a hablar y ahora quiere conocer Ohio, él está viviendo en Puerto Rico, mis padres son divorciados. Él quiere conocer Ohio, empezó a hablar con mi pareja, catorce años no hablaba con mi pareja y empezó a hablar en Facebook, little by little (risa). So that is probably the biggest impact while I was living here. Um, la cosa más difícil es también no hablar mi idioma. Eso me molesta mucho. Me encuentro bien perdido estando en un sitio donde no hay personas que hablen mi idioma. I don’t know but, despite all that, I love this place.
EF: ¿Qué trabajos ha tenido usted aquí en, en Ohio?
JT: I’ve had three: This first one was what brought me up here. I was a corporate trainer for a company here that taught companies all over Ohio about workman’s compensation and what they can do to keep themselves from workplace accidents and stuff like that … That was an awesome job. The other one was kinda funny cause, I got laid off when economy tanked and, when you get laid off here in Ohio it’s hard to find a job. So I got a job at Target just to try to make ends meet and the, and the first thing they asked me, I couldn’t believe this, and they asked me, “Do you have a green card?” I’m like, “I’m Puerto Rican” “Yes, do you have a green card?” I’m like, “Dude, Puerto Rico’s been part of the United States since I can’t even tell you how long …” That job didn’t last too long cause I ended up coming here and, and getting a graduate assistantship and working here, but I also noticed that there’re a lot of people here that don’t know about Hispanics, they don’t how we learn, they don’t know how know how we interact, they don’t know anything about our culture. They assume that every Hispanic person eats tacos … Okay, and that’s just so offensive to me, you know, it’s not that I have anything against Mexicans, it’s that I don’t want to be considered a Mexican. I’m Puerto Rican, I’m Boricua. Through and through born on the island, and it bothered me a lot. And so I’ve been on campaign to teach people that we all, just like the United States has their individual subcultures, the Hispanic world has their subcultures and, they’re cultures and subcultures and even more than, not every Puerto Rican is Catholic, not every Hispanic is Catholic. We have the tough culture that we have cause I mean, even with the girls, the females, you have these females that come to this school and the parents are wondering, “Hey, why are you there so long? Shouldn’t you be going to class and coming back home?” And I have to call these parents and say, “No, this is actually good. They have to do the extracurricular stuff so they can get a job.” So it’s not just teaching the people here but it’s teaching them [Hispanics] as well. And so, it’s a distinct job, I love it. I’m a teacher at heart, I’ve been a teacher for a long time now so, this is just the next step for me. And hopefully I get to be vice-president one day. I wrote it down (risa) so I can look at it every day.
EF: Se podría decir que este es el trabajo que, pues, más le ha gustado hasta el momento.
JT: Sí, el trabajo de educación, de ser maestro, de este programa hispano, me encanta todo eso. Si me dan trabajo donde no puedo estar cerca de estudiante, I’ll probably quit. I have to be near students.
EF: Um, Si pudiera tener, retener una de las memorias por siempre, ¿Cuál sería?
JT: Here in Ohio?
EF: In Ohio or wherever.
I look to the heavens and I look, “Abuelita, I made it” Cause she always wanted to see her grandchild get a Master’s degree. So, you know, it was awesome. I will never forget that.
JT: I think I will never forget when…see I dare to do stuff. When people say that I can’t do it, I do it, I don’t care. I got to interview our president, and he sat down and talked to me and I knew that he was Mexican but I wanted to know more about him before the interview and I was looking and I saw his background. And so I used that to get close to him and break the ice, and he did something that is very, very, very, very Latino—he started talking to me in Spanish which, he knew I was Puerto Rican. He started talking to me in Spanish, and the first thing he asked me is about my mother. “How’s your mother?” I was like, “Dude” No president does that, you know, and I saw a side of our president that nobody on this campus has seen, you know, and, he may not remember me now from Adam, but I will always remember that experience that made me fall in love with this university, people may not like him, but I can’t forget that he came to our student meeting for Hispanics, you know, people may not like him, but I remember that when I got my Master’s degree, and a 4.0, and I walked on that stage, I was the only student he embraced. And so, those are things that I will always remember. It’s something that’s timeless and it’s a precious moment for me because it’s not family that’s applauding you, eso fue el presidente de nuestra universidad. Y eso fue un reconocimiento que fue increíble para mí porque para mí, una persona de tal altura, como él, porque trabajaba para el presidente Bush, eso fue una experiencia que … I look to the heavens and I look, “Abuelita, I made it” Cause she always wanted to see her grandchild get a Master’s degree. So, you know, it was awesome. I will never forget that.
EF: Mhm, that’s awesome! You’ve mentioned that you’re a gay man, and you practice Santería. How has that been? That combination, I mean, you mentioned that it’s been difficult practicing, do you think that this place has been a little more accepting of that?
JT: They have no earthly idea. Okay, they have no earthly idea what locumi is, what Santería is, they didn’t understand when a student who actually practices a religion, but is not a priest, like I am, came to throw themselves to me, like they literally tried to prostrate themselves to me and I’m like, “You can’t do” they don’t understand the animal sacrifices involved, in fact, I wanted to bring a program on this campus, cause there was a case in the Supreme Court about that has passed 9-0 and it’s part of our religion. It’s accepted legally in the United States, and I tried to bring this person, very important person, a very pivotal case that’s being studied in all law schools, and this law school said, “Well I’m not sure that we want to sponsor something like that because of the possible ramifications with PETA” I’m like, “Dude, it’s, first of all, you’re a law school, you thrive on controversy and secondly, who cares? That’s what the university’s about, we study.” Um, so, I’ve gotten push-back, I saw the micro-aggression a bit, for instance, the Voodoo comments I heard from administrators, it doesn’t bother me because I’m a very self-assured priest. I teach, first of all Voodoo is a religion, it’s a sister religion of ours and you just don’t insult, because there’s some people that come here from West Africa that practice it. Um, my religion and being gay. I can tell you that I practice two religions: Santería and Catholicism and that’s normal in our religion. Catholicism, because I owe everything to Jesus Christ, and God. Santería, because I’m not accepted in the Catholic Church, and I am in Santeria. You can be gay and you’re accepted, it doesn’t matter. You can be a priest, you’re accepted. And, this is something I’ve always needed to find in my life, you know, acceptance, and so, being gay and being a Santero in Ohio right now … all I can tell you is a big-ole question mark. Because the day that I have to do my first matanza, for my orishas, we’re gonna see the reaction of what happens. Even though this is kept very secretive and it’s done behind closed doors, it’s still something that is not seen unless you go up to Cleveland, Columbus, or Cincinnati, the urban centers where there’s more Hispanics that practice the religion. Especially down in Columbus I heard there’s some Cubans down there and Cubans and Puerto Ricans predominately are the ones that practice the religion.
EF: So, there’s not a large group here in Akron?
JT: Um, there is not a large group, I’ve heard that there’s some. I actually met a priest, that came to play at one of the drumming’s here for Africa night, and he lives in Kent State, and he’s an African American though, he’s not Hispanic. But he is in the religion and he’s an elder and so when I saw him and I saw him playing, I was entranced. I have been accepted by the African American community in Ohio that really want to go back to their roots. What I was surprised is, I haven’t been accepted by the African American community that is very church-going, Christian community. So there is a dichotomy there. Um, the Hispanic community, they don’t care. They just find somebody to speak Spanish, “Welcome! We need more of us”, you know. So I don’t throw my religion out there, I really don’t, if I go to the Catholic church to mass, I won’t wear all this stuff, I’ll hide it. That’s the tradition in the religion, we have to hide it from the masters cause it’s an African religion brought by the Africans as slaves, so everything’s hidden behind the orishas. Practicing here has been okay so far um, I think people see me very weird when I go walking by a cemetery, I gotta do immediately a prayer because there is a prayer for that. If I go walking by the Cuyahoga river here, I am a priest of Ochún which, who owns the river so, of course, I have to pay my respects. I’m not doing anything that they get offended by. The animal sacrifice will be very difficult here though. I have not done that, in fact I was supposed to when I brought my orishas in, through my house up here, I brought them up from Florida. I had to feed the door with two doves but, I didn’t. I do have two orishas that are outside of my door, my front door, they’re shells, conch shells, and the orishas face is on there, is cemented on there, and they found out that my partner’s gay, and at first it was the talk of the street (risa). We were accepted
because later on I found out there’s another Puerto Rican family on the street.
EF: Tell me about the experiences of Latino students here on this campus. What do you feel is your role in improving or changing the experiences of Latinos here?
JT: Es bien difícil para ellos. Bien difícil. Y es bien difícil porque aquí, no hay nadie que conozca la cultura de los hispanos. No entienden que nosotros tenemos una, you know how they say cut the umbilical cord once you’re …? We don’t do that in the Hispanic culture, okay. When they say cut the umbilical cord, I get offended by that. Y ellos no entienden esto aquí, no quieren aprender de eso. No quieren conocer la verdad. Mira que, el departamento de admisión en esta escuela, todos son blancos. Y ellos van para buscar hispanos para esta escuela, pero no entienden. Si no tienen a alguien que pueda hablar el español, conozcan la cultura, y puedan convencer a la madre y el padre de eso ¡muchacho! ellos no van a venir aquí. Tú puedes hablarle a ese muchacho hasta que, the cows come home. And if the parents say ‘no’, it’s ‘no’. Y ellos no entienden esto aquí. Ellos se creen que todo el mundo son lo mismo. Y, convencer a estas personas aquí, es bien difícil. I’m gonna tell you a story that made me very sad: I had a student, and I was the graduate student, I was the graduate advisor for, at the time it was called ALÓ, Hispanics and Latinos Organize, it’s now called HOLA. He was the first president of ALÓ, and he came to me one day and said, “John” y me lo dijo en español, “Me voy de esta escuela” Y yo dije, “¿Por qué? ¿Qué, qué está pasando?” “I’m failing.” “¿Y por qué? Why are you failing?” “Because they didn’t give me the tools to do well here. I have to go to ESOL classes that don’t count, these professors don’t understand me when I’m trying to tell them I don’t understand something.” And I go, “Pero yo no entiendo. Si tú fuiste a la escuela en Cleveland.” “They had me in bilingual class the entire time, teaching me in my native language but not teaching me in English too so that I have the tools to succeed here” so they bring him here. He gets accepted here because this used to be open-enrollment, it’s not anymore. He gets financial aid, and then he fails out, with debt and no degree. So what does the kid do? He tells me, “I’m leaving because nobody helps me, and nobody at the Office of Multicultural Development helps me because nobody speaks my language, and, I’m going to the Army, because they’ll help me become a chef.” That’s all he wanted to be— a chef. It broke my heart. I mean, that shouldn’t happen, to anybody. And … so I see my role as being, cause I can’t be an advisor, cause that’s against the rules, but I’m there as support.
Just today, it happened today, I was almost late because a student came to me with an immigration issue, and I didn’t know how to answer that question, but they keep making our students cry, on this campus—our Hispanic students. So I decided, you know what? “Tell your, that advisor at the Office of International Programs that I’m coming to your meeting” and I went in there. The hell that any foreign student has to go through is awful. But when mom got a green card, sister got a green card, and she didn’t, and then on top of that they tell her that, she needs to get a job by a certain date, but she can’t find it anywhere and nobody’s helping her to find a job, and then she’s realizing the fact that while she’s carrying her heavy load—she’s an engineering student—that she might end up having to leave her family here…it’s, I can’t bare it. It bothers the hell out of me. It shouldn’t happen. No kid, I’ve always said this as a teacher in K-12, no kid should ever suffer because they want to learn. Okay. And I feel the same way about the kids here so, I’ve become an advocate for them.
EF: Si usted pudiera hablar de ese momento de orgullo, ¿A quién le agradecería usted?
JT: Mi abuelita, mi abuelita. Ella, ella fue como mi segunda madre. Ella siempre fue mi cheerleader. Cuando yo estaba para mi bachillerato ella conocía a mis profesores, yo vivía con ella cerca de la universidad de Central Florida, y ella siempre iba a mis cosas y también ella traía amigos míos para que le haga comida (risa) uh, típica abuelita. If you yawn, you’re hungry, she makes you food. (risa) I know I did this for her because she would be so incredibly proud of what I’ve become. I was the apple of her eye and I’m, gonna cry now, I was the apple of her eye and she was just absolutely the most supporting person I have had in my entire life. I can’t say that about my parents, I can’t say that about a lot of people that have been in my life. But my grandmother, even dead, okay, I know she’s alive and I read the last birthday card she gave me and that’s what kept me going, no matter what, “I’m gonna get a 4.0, abuelita. I’m gonna get a Master’s degree, I’m gonna graduate, and it’s for you” and I did. When I was graduating I was like, “Abuelita, this is for you.” There’s a picture of me where I’m walking down the line, that the student-body president of the university took of me, and I look very serious and, it’s because in my head I was talking to her. I said, “This is for you. I did it. This is for you” And I looked good on that day too (risa) cause I had all my honors stuff on there and I was like, “I look good and I have a right to be proud” and it’s all because of my grandma. Hands down, my grandma.
EF: ¿Cuál ha sido el momento o la cosa más divertida o chistosa que le ha ocurrido a usted, aquí?
JT: THIS is hilarious, en dos mil diez, había una nevada, ¡y su madre! and I didn’t know that the trucks push all the snow up in hills and mounds, so I parked my car. When I went walking to my GA job, and I was walking and I thought I looked good dressed up in winter clothes and stuff like that, and I was just walking, and I was walking on the sidewalk, and then next thing I knew ‘whoosh’ I fell ten feet in a snow drift (risa).
EF: Usted, como ha tenido experiencias con latinos, tal vez que son de este estado y latinos inmigrantes nuevos… si usted le tuviera que dar consejos a nuevos inmigrantes, ya sea, nuevos inmigrantes de otros países o nuevos inmigrantes a Ohio, ¿Qué consejos les daría?
JT: Learn everything you can. Aprende todo lo que puedas de los Estados Unidos. Aprende la historia, aprende the, I don’t know how to say this in Spanish, the colloquialism, aprende todo. Porque yo todavía estoy aprendiendo. Hay cosas que personas aquí dicen, I didn’t know that pop was soda (risa) I had no idea. Eso es lo más importante, si quieres ser ciudadano, tienes que aprender la constitución de los Estados Unidos, eso—that is the greatest document that was ever created on the planet. Um…you can be proud of where you’re from, but be proud that you’re an American.