Fields of tears

Migrant farm workers
移民农业工人

Fields of tears
伤心之地
They came to America illegally, for the best of reasons
出于各种缘由，他们偷渡到美国

Dec 16th 2010 | Arvin and Watsonville, CALIFORNIA | from The Economist  print edition

TERESA VEGA'S first son was two when a flood carried rubbish, dead animals and disease through the canals of Oaxaca, her desperately poor home state in southern Mexico. The boy started vomiting, got diarrhoea and ran a fever. There was a doctor a few hours' walk away, but Ms Vega and her husband, Marco Lopez, had no money to pay him. They could do nothing, she says. They watched their son die.

一场裹挟着垃圾、动物的死尸和传染病菌的洪水，沿着墨西哥南部瓦哈卡州的运河河道，淹没了特丽莎•伟加穷得响叮当的家。那年，特丽莎的大儿子只有两岁。他开始呕吐,腹泻不止，还发起了高烧。虽然走几个小时就能找到医生，但是伟加太太和丈夫马可•洛佩兹却没钱让他给孩子看病。伟加太太说，那时她和丈夫什么都做不了，他们眼睁睁地看着孩子死掉了。

Ms Vega now says this event is the reason for everything she and her husband have done since. When they had another son, Erminio, they decided that they had to make money in case he also fell ill. But Oaxaca offered them no jobs, save for a bit of maize-harvesting every July. Teresa's younger brother Felix had already left for America to find work in California's fruit and vegetable fields. In 2005, seeing no alternative, Ms Vega and her husband set out to follow.

而今，伟加太太说她和丈夫从那以后所做的一切选择，都缘于大儿子的死。当他们又有了儿子埃米尼奥的时候，伟加夫妇决定必须要赚钱，以防埃米尼奥也会生病。但是在瓦哈卡，他们除了每年7月份能收点儿玉米之外，根本找不到活干。早先，特丽莎的弟弟菲利克斯就已经到了美国，而且在加利福尼亚的水果和蔬菜田里找到了工作。2005年，别无选择的伟加夫妇也踏上了去美国的路。

Little Erminio would not have survived the journey, so Ms Vega and her husband had to leave him behind, in the care of Mr Lopez's father. Erminio was one at the time. That was the last time Ms Vega saw him. Now 26, though she looks a decade older, she knew she was running another risk, because she was seven months pregnant again. But she and her husband made their way north nonetheless. Then came the crossings.

如果带着小埃米尼奥的话，这一路上他撑不下来，因此伟加太太和丈夫只得把他留在家里，由他爷爷照看着。那时埃米尼奥才一岁。那是伟加太太最后一次看见他了。现年26岁的伟加太太看上去比实际年龄要老十岁，当年她清楚自己在冒险，因为她又有了七个月的身孕。但她和丈夫还是踏上了北上美国的路。接下来他们夫妇要穿越美国和墨西哥的边境。

The crossings―invariably plural, because most attempts fail, leading to deportations and renewed attempts―are a seminal event in virtually all the stories of the undocumented farmworkers who labour in America's fields. The border is their threshold and their first glimpse of El Norte, the promised land in the north.

这些墨西哥人无一不是穿越边境数次才取得成功。他们大多数的穿越行动都以失败告终后，被遣送回墨西哥，再开始新一轮行动。所有在美国农田中劳作的无证农工的故事，都是以这种穿越边境的行动为开端。边境是他们踏入美国大门的门槛，第一眼看到的萨尔瓦多，则是他们在美国的希望之地。

But for la migra, as they call America's immigration and border officials, it's "like catching deer," says Felix. He and his wife and cousins, six in total, were deported three times before succeeding at the fourth attempt, and the humiliations at the hand of la migra still sting.

然而他们说的la migra，也就是美国的移民和边境官员，"像捉鹿一样捕捉我们"，菲利克斯说到。他和妻子还有堂兄妹一行六个人，被驱逐三次，直到第四次才成功穿越边境进入美国。然而被la migra抓获的耻辱仍旧会刺痛菲利克斯。

Everyone's quarry
他们都是猎物
Once they walked all night through the desert of Arizona, slashing themselves on fences of barbed wire and running out of water, before border-patrol agents ambushed them. The agents tied them up, shouted at them, threw them into a van and then into a freezing jail, where they slept on a bare floor for several nights until enough migrants had been rounded up to fill a bus that took them back to the Mexican side.

有一次菲利克斯在黑夜中横穿亚利桑那沙漠。在遭遇到边界巡逻队的埋伏之前，他们已经被带铁丝网的篱笆划伤了身体，还喝光了带着的水。菲利克斯他们被大声叫骂的巡逻队员绑了起来，先是被扔进一辆货车里，接着又被扔进一座寒冷刺骨的监狱内。连续几个夜晚，他们就睡在监狱光秃秃的地板上，直到巡逻队凑足了一辆客车的移民后，他们才被送回到墨西哥边境。

On another crossing Mexican bandits waylaid them. They pointed guns, stole their food and stripped them naked. Because the Vegas speak an indigenous language called Mixtec and understand little Spanish (and no English), Mr Vega's wife and the other women did not understand the bandits and feared they would be raped. They were not, but then had to cross the frigid night desert without clothes, food or water, until la migra caught them again.

菲利克斯一行人又一次穿越边境时遇到了墨西哥打劫的强盗。强盗们用枪指着他们，偷走了他们的干粮还把他们的衣服扒的精光。菲利克斯•伟加一家人说的是方言米斯特克语，他们几乎听不懂西班牙语，更别说英语了。伟加的妻子和其它妇女听不懂这群强盗的话，她们害怕强盗会强暴自己。强盗没有对妇女施暴，但伟加一家却不得不穿越这片寒冷夜幕下的沙漠，没有衣服，没有吃的，也没有水。等待他们的是再一次被la migra抓获。

Gonzalo Vega, yet another cousin, made the trip with his wife, five months pregnant, and his two younger brothers, who were seven and ten at the time. He carried all their water and food, but the children struggled. After a day and two nights of walking they were desperate for sleep, but Gonzalo didn't let them rest in the freezing cold lest they not wake up again. He could not light a fire, because la migra would have seen it.

菲利克斯的另一个表亲冈萨洛•伟加，也带着他有五个月身孕的妻子和2个7岁和10岁的弟弟，踏上了旅程。虽然所有的水和干粮都由冈萨洛背着，他的弟弟们却还是行走得很吃力。走了一天两夜后，两个弟弟都困得要命，但是冈萨洛不让他们在那么冷的天理睡觉，怕他们会醒不过来。冈萨洛不能生火，因为会被la migra发现。

They threw themselves into ditches whenever the border patrol's SUVs approached. Once Mr Vega's wife fell hard onto her bulging belly. The worst moment came when la migra caught them again, beat Gonzalo and threatened to take his brothers away from him. When the family was allowed to remain together, even the cold jail floor felt good, he recalls. Gonzalo's group succeeded on the fifth try.

每当边界巡逻队的越野车接近的时候，他们就跳到沟里去躲起来，以防被发现。有一次冈萨洛的妻子笨重地压到了自己鼓起的肚子。最糟糕的时刻是他们被la migra再次抓到的时候。La migra把冈萨洛揍了一顿，威胁他要把他的弟弟们带走。当一家人被允许呆在一起后，冈萨洛回忆说，即使监狱的地板再怎么寒冷，他们也感觉到了温暖。冈萨洛一家第五次行动时成功穿越边境。

If and when the border is crossed, the paved but hostile vastness of America is the next challenge. Usually a family member already on the other side will pick the migrants up in a car. Many then make their way to the farm towns of California.

如果可能穿过了边境的话，平整广阔得令人心生畏惧的美国是这些墨西哥人的下一个挑战。通常已经在美国这边的亲人会用车把这些移民接走。他们中的很多人都是直接去了加州的农场。

Often they take the same roads on which the "Okies" travelled en masse in the 1930s as they fled the depressed dust bowl of Oklahoma, Texas and Arkansas to seek a living in California. These Okies are for ever etched into America's psyche as the Joad family in "The Grapes of Wrath". Comparing the Mexicans who toil California's fields to the Okies in John Steinbeck's classic novel is a staple of the Latino left. That does not make it any less accurate. Joads then and Vegas now are pushed by the same need, pulled by the same promise. Now as then, there is no clearing house for jobs in the fields, so the migrants follow tips and rumours. Often, like the Joads, they end up in the right places at the wrong times. Felix Vega and three of his group, including his wife, were dropped off in Oxnard, famous for its strawberries. But they arrived out of season, so they slept on the streets, then in a doghouse, then in somebody's car. For two months they did not bathe and barely ate. Finally, they found jobs picking strawberries and made their first money in America.

墨西哥移民经常选择美国上个世纪30年代的"俄克佬"（俄克拉马州的农夫移民）一齐走过的路。30年代，俄克拉马州农民一路逃离俄克拉荷马州、德克萨斯州和阿肯色州的风沙中心，到达加利福尼亚谋生。《愤怒的葡萄》小说中乔德一家就是这些移民的缩影，他们被永远地铭记在美国人心中。把加州田地里辛勤劳作的墨西哥人比作约翰•斯坦贝克经典小说中的俄克佬主要是拉丁左翼人士。这种对比没有任何有失真切之处。过去的乔德人和现在的伟加人都是被同样的需要怂恿，又被同样的希望诱惑着。现在还和当年一样，田里的活儿都没个准，移民们听从别人的建议或者传言来找活儿干。和乔德一家遇到的情况一样，移民们经常是找对了地方却没赶上干活的好时候。菲利克斯•伟加和他的妻子，还有两个跟他一起逃过来的人被放在了以草莓出名的奥克斯纳德。但是他们来的季节不对，田里并没有活给他们干，所以他们只能露宿街头，后来睡在一个狗窝里，再后来就睡在别人的车里。整整俩月，这四个人没有洗过澡，连肚子都没填饱过。最终他们找到了一份摘草莓的工作，拿到了他们在美国的第一份工钱。

And thus they joined the vast undocumented workforce that undergirds America's food supply. The government estimates that more than 80% of America's crop workers are Hispanic (mostly Mexican), and more than half are illegal aliens. But Rob Williams, the director of the Migrant Farmworker Justice Project (which represents farmworkers in court), considers those numbers grossly misleading because they rely on self-reporting. He estimates that more than 90% of farmworkers are sin papeles (without papers), just as the Vegas are.

他们也因此而加入了美国的无证劳动力大军，正是这些人支撑着美国的食物供应。美国政府估算，超过80%的美国农业工人是西裔人（绝大多数是墨西哥人），而且超过半数的农工是非法移民。但是在法庭上代表农工的"移民农业工人司法工程"组织的负责人罗伯•威廉姆斯则认为，政府公布的这些数据显而易见是误导性的，因为他们是依靠移民"自己上报"的方式得出的结论。威廉姆斯估计超过90%的农业工人都是sin papeles(无证人员)，就像伟加人一样。

The devil's work
魔鬼才能做的工作
Farm work has, for most crops, become no easier since Steinbeck's day. Strawberries, the crop the Vegas started out with, are nicknamed la fruta del diablo (the devil's fruit) because pickers have to bend over all day. "Hot weather is bad," says Felix Vega, but "cold is worse" because it makes the back pain unbearable. Even worse is sleet or rain, which turns the field into a lake of mud. The worst is picking while having the flu.

大多数庄稼地里的农活，从斯坦贝克时代起，就变得繁重不堪。伟加人最开始接触的作物草莓有个昵称是la fruta del diablo（魔鬼的水果），这是因为采摘草莓的人不得不整天都弯着腰来干活。"天气热的话人就很难受，"菲利克斯•伟加说，但是"天冷的话就更难受了"，因为天一他的背就疼的受不了。下冰雹或者下雨的时候也很糟糕，那会儿地里就成了泥巴湖，走都走不动。最恶劣的情形是感冒了还得采摘草莓。

Every crop exacts its own particular discomfort, as this correspondent discovered on an August day picking grapes in the very part of the San Joaquin Valley where Steinbeck's Joad family looked for work. Working with two Mexican brothers and a young Mexican couple, he cut the grapes, collected them in tubs and periodically dumped them into a wagon pulled by a tractor.

8月的一天，正是在斯坦贝克的乔德家庭曾找过工作的圣华金河谷地区，一个记者采摘了一天的葡萄后，他发现每种庄稼都能给人带来特殊的不适。这个记者和两个墨西哥兄弟、一对年轻的墨西哥夫妇一起工作：他剪下葡萄，把它们装进盆里，待盆子一满就把葡萄倒进一辆拖拉机拉着的货车上。

The lanes between vines are exactly as wide as the tractor, so the little group had to duck into and underneath the vines all day long. They crawled alongside the tractor, trying to avoid having their feet run over. Within hours this correspondent's shins were bleeding as the wagon's metal protrusions slammed into them, which seemed unavoidable. With an encouraging smile, a co-worker pulled up a trouser leg to reveal his own scarred shin.

葡萄藤之间的车道恰好和拖拉的宽度一样，因此这个摘葡萄的小组成员只得一整天都猫在葡萄藤地下。他们随着拖拉机缓慢移动，尽量避免双脚被拖拉机碾到。几个小时以后，记者的小腿就被货车的金属突起撞得流血了，这种伤害看起来难以避免。有个一同干活的人带着鼓舞记者的微笑，一把拉起自己的裤管，让记者看他小腿上的伤疤。

Because the pickers were squatting or kneeling under the vines and twisting to reach up for the grapes (the low-hanging fruit proving the trickiest), their necks and shoulders were soon in agony. Standing up to relieve their backs thrust their heads into the vines, which are covered in pesticides. There are many cases of birth defects and cancer in the families of farmworkers. But as the heat climbed above 100°F (about 40°C), the vines, soaked in toxins or not, became allies. The air underneath them is stagnant, as in a sauna, but their foliage is the only available shade.

这些采摘工不是蹲着就是跪在葡萄藤地下，有时还要弯着身子去够葡萄（这种低垂下的水果最难摘），他们的脖子和肩膀不一会就疼得不行。如果站起来舒缓一下背部的话，他们的头就会戳到葡萄藤，那上面可都是农药。农业工人的家庭里有很多先天性缺陷的人，也有很多人患了癌症。然而当气温飙升到100华氏度（大约40摄氏度）时，喷过农药或者没喷农药的葡萄藤，都是有毒的。这时候葡萄藤下的空气不流通，像桑拿房一样，唯有葡萄叶下能提供一点阴凉。

Just as the heat threatened to overwhelm this correspondent, the woman in the group broke into a slow Mexican song, which somehow helped. But heatstroke is common in the fields. In 2008 Maria Isavel Vasquez Jiminez, a 17-year-old Mexican girl who was pregnant, collapsed while picking grapes and died two days later.

正在记者快承受不了高温的时候，一起干活的妇女突然放声唱了一首慢节奏的墨西哥歌曲，她的歌声让高温有所缓解。然而中暑的情形在田地里很常见。2008年，一个17岁的墨西哥女孩，怀孕的玛利亚•伊萨维尔•瓦斯克兹•吉米内兹，摘葡萄的时候倒在了地上，两天后就死了。

Hungry amid food
采摘的食物，却是他人之"嫁衣"

As Tom Joad in Steinbeck's novel discovered, many farmworkers, even as they spend their waking hours picking food for others, can barely afford to eat. Between harvests they have no work. When they do work, their wages are meagre. The workers picking grapes with this correspondent got $8 an hour. That is vastly superior to the $9 a day―not hour―which the tractor driver says he used to get at home in Mexico. But costs in the United States are higher too.

正如斯坦贝克小说里的主人翁汤姆•乔德发现的那样，很多农业工人，即便他们整日为别人采摘食物，他们自己却很难填饱肚子。在庄稼的生长期内，农工们没有活儿干，可当他们有活儿干的时候，他们的工钱又少得可怜。和记者一起摘葡萄的工人一小时的工资是8美元。拖拉机司机说，这跟他过去在墨西哥家乡那会儿一天，而不是一小时才拿9美元工钱相比，兼职是天壤之别！

Teresa Vega makes about $65 a day during the strawberry season, as does her husband. But they now have two daughters living with them, Luisa, four, and Maritza, two. So Ms Vega must, perversely, hire a babysitter while she is working. That costs $50 a day.

在采摘草莓的时节，特丽莎•伟加和丈夫每人每天能挣65美元。但是他们夫妇现在有两个女儿了，4岁的路易莎和两岁的玛丽塔。因此伟加太太必须而且执意要雇一个保姆在她工作的时候照顾她的两个女儿。保姆的工资一天就要50美元。

Most of what remains pays their rent for a trailer in Watsonville, just outside Steinbeck's home town of Salinas. The trailer is dilapidated, but Ms Vega tends to it lovingly. By the door hangs a picture of the Virgin of Guadalupe, Mexico's patron saint. There is even a small television set.

除去保姆费之后的钱，大部分要被用来支付汽车房的房租。特丽莎夫妇租住的汽车防在沃森维尔，就在斯坦贝克的家乡萨利纳斯的周边。汽车房很破旧，但是伟加太太还是很喜欢它。房门边挂着一幅墨西哥守护神圣女娃达露裴的画像，房间里居然还有一台小电视机。

But the trailer has no air conditioning or heating. On this day, after a downpour, it smells musty. Teresa explains, in Mixtec through her brother's translation into Spanish, that in the winter Luisa and Maritza are always ill. On the counter that serves as the kitchen there is no fresh food, only a jar of protein powder.

但是汽车房里既没有空调业没有暖气。那天，一场倾盆大雨过后，房子里有股霉味。特丽莎用米斯特克语解释说（她弟弟将她的话翻译成西班牙语），每到冬天，路易莎和玛丽塔就老是生病。作为厨房使用的吧台上没有新鲜事物，只有一罐子营养蛋白粉。

After their expenses, very little is left over for her husband's blind grandparents in Mexico, for Teresa's diabetic father and above all for their son Erminio, who was the original reason they came. Western Union, a service that remits cash, takes another painful cut whenever they send money home.

除去这些花销之后，特丽莎要寄给在墨西哥的亲人――丈夫失明的爷爷奶奶，自己患有糖尿病的父亲，最重要的是寄给儿子埃米尼奥的钱就寥寥无几了，他们夫妇最初可是为了他才来美国的啊。为他们提供汇款服务的西联国际汇款机构又回从他们寄回家的钱钟扣掉一大部分。

Aside from poverty, the other consequence of being sin papeles is having to live "in the shadows". This is the difference between today's Mexicans and yesterday's Okies, between the Joads and the Vegas (although Tom Joad was also on the run from the law). The Okies were poor, disdained and hungry. But they were American and white, often Scottish-Irish. They could not be deported.

除了穷，作为非法移民地另一个后果是不得不活在"影子里"。这是今日的墨西哥人与往日的俄克拉玛州农民之间，乔德人和伟加人的不同之处，尽管汤姆•乔德也在躲避法律的制裁。纵然他们贫穷，被人蔑视又饥饿不堪，但是俄克拉玛州来的农民仍然是美国白人，很多还是苏格兰和爱尔兰人的后裔，他们不会被遣送走。

"The hardest part is not being free, not being able to go out," says Felix Vega. "It's like being in a jail." Any contact with official or bureaucratic America might lead to deportation and thus separation from his wife and sons―Victor, seven, and Jesus, four― who were born in America and are thus citizens.

菲利克斯•伟加说："最难熬的是没有自由，不能自由的出去。""这就像蹲监狱一样，"他说。任何与美国官员或者官僚机构的接触都有可能导致他呗遣送回国，与妻子和两个儿子分开。菲利克斯的大儿子维克多7岁了，小儿子耶稣四岁，他们是出生在美国，是美国公民。

This anxiety extends to every aspect of work and life. In the fields, undocumented workers hardly ever protest when contractors or growers abuse them. Merely getting to the fields and back is risky. Undocumented farmworkers have to drive long distances, but they don't have driving licences. Any brush with the police is dangerous. Felix Vega stays below the speed limit and comes to a complete halt at stop signs.

这种困扰蔓延到他们生活和工作的方方面面。在田里，承包商或者种植商大肆剥削无证工人的劳动力时，他们几乎没有反抗过。偶尔，他们来去田间干活都得冒着风险。非法移民劳工要开车到很远的地方干活，但是他们没有驾驶证。他们与警察的任何小摩擦都是危险的。菲利克斯开车都在限制速度一下，而且遇到红灯就完全熄火。

His cousin Gonzalo has been pulled over three times―because of "the colour of my skin", he thinks. Like many indigenous Mexicans from Oaxaca, the Vegas are short, squat and dark. Last time the cop claimed that Gonzalo's tyre had touched the centre line as he was driving. Local police are not supposed to enforce immigration law, which is a federal matter, but they can impound the cars of drivers without licences, so they took Gonzalo's. He had to pay a $1,580 fine, then to buy a new car for $1,500. The expense set his finances back by years.

菲利克斯的表亲冈萨洛招来过三次警察，他认为这都是因为"自己的肤色不同"。伟加人和很多来自瓦哈卡当地的墨西哥人一样，黑皮肤，矮个子，身板很宽。上一次遇到的警察说冈萨洛开车的时候，车轮已经触到中心线了。当地警察不会用移民法来管他们，因为那是联邦政府的事儿，但是警察会没收他们没有牌照的汽车，冈萨洛的车就被警察没收了。他不得不交1580美元的罚款，然后再花1500美元买辆新车。这些花费够他攒个几年了。

In Steinbeck's novel, "the migrant people, scuttling for work, scrabbling to live, looked always for pleasure, dug for pleasure, manufactured pleasure," often of a boisterous sort. For undocumented migrants, however, those pleasures are not available, for they might attract attention.

斯坦贝克在小说中写到，"流民们一面东奔西跑寻找工作，一面如饥似渴地寻求快乐，发掘快乐，制造快乐"。他们寻找的这种快乐常常很热闹。然而这种热闹的欢乐对于无证件的移民来说，却是不可得的奢侈，因为他们可能会引起别人的注意。

On those Sundays when he is not working, Felix Vega goes to church, then walks with his sons to a public park. Beyond that, he stays off the streets. He has never been to a cinema. Nor to a hospital: when family members get sick, they use folk remedies. His sister Teresa, who lives quite a distance away, hardly ever lets her girls play outside. Luisa and Maritza spend almost all of their time in the trailer, on the mattress that completely fills the far end of it and serves as a family bed and playpen.

每逢周日不工作的时候，菲利克斯•伟加都会去教堂做礼拜，之后和两个儿子一起走到公园玩会儿。除此以外，他都是离街上的人群远远地。他没去电影院看过电影，连医院都没去过。家人生病的时候，他们就用土方子自己医治。姐姐特丽莎家离菲利克斯家很远。特丽莎难得让女儿们到屋外玩耍一次，路易莎和玛丽塔几乎整天都呆在汽车房里。汽车房的最里边放了一个床垫，把那块地儿挤得结结实实的。两姐妹就在这个既当床又当婴儿护栏的床垫上玩耍。

Gonzalo Vega and his wife and daughters―Diana, two, and Esbeide, ten months―live in a single room with one mattress and one chair. He used to let Diana (with whom his wife was pregnant during their crossing) play outside. But then the American neighbours, who seem generally hostile, complained about noise and threatened to call the cops. "It's always the same: they have papers and we don't," he sighs. So now Diana stays inside and is told to keep quiet.

冈萨罗•伟加和妻子还有两个女儿，两岁的戴安娜和10个月大的艾斯贝蒂，住在只有一个床垫和一把椅子的单间里。冈萨罗曾让戴安娜（她就是当初冈萨罗的妻子穿越边境时怀着的小孩）在街上玩耍，但却招来不友善的美国邻居的抱怨。邻居们抱怨戴安娜太吵闹了，还威胁如果再这样的话他们就报警。"总是这个样子，就因为他们有签证，我们没有，"冈萨罗感叹道。现在戴安娜一直呆在屋里不出去，爸妈还告诉她要安安静静的才行。

Gonzalo's younger brothers―the two he brought over the border―live in another town. They spend almost all their time studying, Gonzalo says, because he has told them that the best students might get papers and become legal. He knows that might not be true, he says, but it keeps them out of trouble.

当初跟冈萨罗一起穿过边境来到美国的两个弟弟，现在住在另外一个镇上。他们把几乎所有的时间都用在了学习上，因为冈萨罗曾告诉过他们，成绩最优秀的学生能拿到签证，成为合法的美国人。冈萨罗说他知道这样说不一定对，学习可以弟弟们不闯祸。

Yet a life without pleasures is not a life without joys. For the Vegas, the children are the joys. Felix's older son, Victor, is trilingual in Mixtec, Spanish and English and has the naughty cheek of a boy who is legal. He goes to a nearby state school. Felix, beaming with pride, worries that its classes are too crowded and its teachers bad, sounding like any middle-class American parent.

生活中没有乐趣不等于没有快乐。对伟加人来说，孩子就是他们的快乐。菲利克斯的大儿子维克多会说米斯特克语、西班牙语和英语三种语言，而且他还有个正宗的美国发小。维克多在他家附近的一所公立学校上学。菲利克斯很为儿子感到骄傲，但他也会和任何美国的中产阶级父母一样，担心公立学校的学生太多，老师教学水平也不高。

"I don't hate Americans," says Felix. "Some are racist, but there are racists in Mexico, too." Here in America, he says, those Latinos who have papers sometimes discriminate against them more than the gavachos (non-Hispanic whites) do.

"我不恨美国人，"菲利克斯说，"有些美国人是种族主义者，但是墨西哥也有种族主义者啊！"菲利克斯还说，在美国，有签证的拉丁人有时候更比gavacho（意即非西裔美国白人）更歧视他们。

But all the Vegas feel hated much of the time. Some people hurl racial slurs at them, give them dirty looks or call them "wetbacks", a term of abuse recalling someone who has just swum the Rio Grande. Felix Vega says that the mood has become noticeably more hostile this year, perhaps because a controversial state law in Arizona has legitimised such animosity. That law, parts of which have been suspended by a federal judge, would make illegal immigration a state crime and oblige local police to enforce it.

但是很多时候，伟加人都能感到人们对自己的厌恶。有些人用种族歧视语破口大骂他们，看他们的目光充满了蔑视，还叫他们是"湿背人"――这是个侮辱性的词，会让人联想到一个刚从格兰德河（美国和墨西哥之间的河流）游上岸的人。菲利克斯•伟加说，今年人们的情绪明显充满了更大的敌意，或许是亚利桑那州通过那部有争议的法律的缘故，它把美国人对非法移民的敌意合法化了。虽然这项立法的部分条款被联邦法官叫停，但是它规定非法移民在亚利桑那州是一种犯罪行为，地方警察有责任依法对罪犯进行制裁。

Its fans correctly call the Vegas and their ilk "illegals". This is often taken to mean "criminal", yet being in the United States illegally is actually a civil offence; it is the illegal crossing that is a criminal offence. The migrants and their sympathisers therefore prefer "without papers" or "undocumented". "They think we're criminals, but we came here to do good and we're all children of God," says Felix Vega, touching the cross around his neck.

推崇这部法律的美国人改口称伟加人和他们的同类为"非法劳工"。这个称呼通常的意思是指"罪犯"，然而非法滞留美国实际是一项民事罪责，非法跨越边境才是刑事犯罪。这些移民和他们的同情者更倾向"没有证件的人"或者"无证移民"这类称呼。"他们认为我们是罪犯，但是我们来这里没有做过坏事，而且大家全都是上帝的子民，" 菲利克斯•伟加摸着自己脖子上带的十字架说。

The stolen jobs no one wants
偷的是没人要的工作
At a time of high unemployment, many Americans are convinced that these aliens take American jobs. As a test, this summer the United Farm Workers (UFW), the main agricultural union, launched a campaign called "Take Our Jobs", inviting willing Americans to work in the fields. In the following three months 3m people visited takeourjobs.com, but 40% of the responses were hate mail, says Maria Machuca, UFW's spokesman. This included e-mails such as one reading: "We're becoming more aggressive in our methods. Soon it may come to hands on, taping bitches to light posts."

现如今高失业率的背景下，很多美国人确信这些外来人口抢走了他们的工作。为测试这种看法的准确性，今年夏天，美国主要的农业联盟――农业工人联合会，发起了一场名为"到我们这儿工作"的运动，邀请有意愿的美国人到田间地头工作。连续三个月内，"到我们这儿工作"网站的访问人次达到了300万，但是农业工人联合会的发言人玛利亚•马丘卡说，40%的回复都是攻击性邮件。这其中有一封邮件这样写到，"我们处理问题的方式越来越具有攻击性，很快这种攻击性会导致我们把妓女绑到火柱上去。"

Only 8,600 people expressed an interest in working in the fields, says Ms Machuca. But they made demands that seem bizarre to farmworkers, such as high pay, health and pension benefits, relocation allowances and other things associated with normal American jobs. In late September only seven American applicants in the "Take our jobs" campaign were actually picking crops.

马丘卡女士说，仅有8600人表示他们对做农活有兴趣。但是他们开出的要求对农业工人来说又太异想天开了，比如他们要求有和美国正常工作相关的高工资，完善的医疗和养老福利金、搬家补贴费以及其它费用等等。九月底，只有七个"到我们这儿工作"运动的申请人真正下地收庄稼了。

That was the point, says Arturo Rodriguez, the UFW's president. America's farm jobs, which are excluded from almost all federal and state labour regulations, are not normal jobs. Americans refuse to do them. The argument about stolen jobs is "just a façade" for a coarser scapegoating, says Mr Rodriguez, and "we demonstrate the hypocrisy."

农业工人联合会的主席阿图罗•罗德里格斯说，这才是问题的关键。美国的农业工作不是普通意义上的工资，它几乎完全被排除在联邦政府和州政府的规章之外。而且美国人拒绝干农活儿。罗德格里斯还认为，关于外来移民偷走美国人的工作争论"只是一种假象"，成了一个更为严重的问题的替罪羊，"我们要揭开这个虚伪的命题，"他说。

Teresa, Felix and Gonzalo Vega only nod sadly when asked about the rancour, the Arizona law, the politics. They feel they had no choice in coming illegally. Would they do it again? "No, not if I had known what lay ahead," says Felix. But after a silence, he corrects himself. Yes, he would, because even though he doesn't think he'll ever get papers, he has two sons who are American and could be lawyers or writers one day, living openly.

当被问及对美国人的仇恨、亚利桑那州的法律和美国政治的看法时，特丽莎、菲利克斯和冈萨洛都仅仅悲伤地点头。他们觉得自己只能非法跑来美国，没有其它选择。如果可以重新选择，他们还会来美国吗？"不，如果我早知道会是这样，我不会来的，"菲利克斯回答说。但是沉默了一会后，他又纠正了自己的答案。是的，他还会来，因为即使他认为自己永远不能拿到签证，但是他的两个儿子是美国人，他们将来有可能成为律师或者作家，光明正大地生活。

Teresa Vega is the most reticent. She admits that her "plan didn't work". She hears that Erminio, at home in Oaxaca, is not doing well. He is often ill. "He needs love" and doesn't get enough, she says. But then she, too, reverses herself. She always thinks of her first son, the one who died because she had no money to save him. Yes, she would come again.

特丽莎•伟加沉默了很久才给出答案。她承认自己的"计划失败了"。她听说埃米尼奥在老家瓦哈卡过得并不好。这个孩子经常生病。特丽莎说"他需要爱"，却没有得到足够的爱。她之后也重新说了答案。她总是想起大儿子，那个因为她没钱给他看病而死去的孩子。如果再让她选择一次，她一定还会来美国！

People like the Vegas will always keep coming, no matter the fences that go up on the border and the helicopters that circle above. For they are like the Joads. As Steinbeck wrote: "How can you frighten a man whose hunger is not only in his own cramped stomach but in the wretched bellies of his children? You can't scare him―he has known a fear beyond every other."

想伟加人一样的人们还会不停地来到美国，不管边界的围墙筑得多高，不管直升飞机如何在他们头顶上回旋。因为他们和乔德一家一样。正如斯坦贝克所写："你怎能吓倒一个不仅自己肚皮空空如也，而且孩子饥肠辘辘的男人呢？你恐吓不了他的，因为他比任何人都清楚恐惧是什么东西。"