At Savoy, there are two fantastic Guatemalan men who work as the dish prep guys. Guillermo is 19 and speaks incredibly good english for only having been here 2 years and learning it as his third language. He is possibly the funniest person I've ever met. Tino is his older cousin, we have less language in common but have a system of communicating through noises and hand gestures that can be pretty comical. They work harder than any of us, longer, and more often. Needless to say, they are highly valued members of the savoy team.
On Saturday, Tino was quiet and kinda down but didn't say anything about it. After we closed ( and after dos cervezas) he came out with his story. Apparently, his 17 year old brother was caught trying to get over the border and was in jail in Phoenix. This caused quite an uproar through the whole restaurant, plans began immediately for fundraisers and lawyer friends and such. It's quite interesting that we would immediately assume that because we are white people, or citizens of this country, that our opinion on whether that kid should be able to stay here would make any difference. Tony, the voice of reason, was the one who eventually pointed out that, even though it's super common, sneaking across the border is completely illegal. Doing it constitutes breaking a law and breaking laws gets you put in jail. A phone call from a bartender friend of the family of an incarcerated illegal alien thousands of miles away is not likely to get him released. That being said, Sean, the bartender and only Spanish speaker among us, got the 800 number from Tino and is going to call and try to get info on the situation. Scary. And sad. It has definitely brought the giant immigration debate closer to home. I may pay a bit more attention. Updates to come.........
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