Los
Pobres
-Richard
In this autobiographical
story, the writer expresses his own experience as a construction worker. In
order to experience the pain and pleasure of the ‘real work’, he joins
the summer work but he is unable to feel the real experience of “Los
Pobres” i.e poor and powerless. Only after seeing the pathetic condition of the
Mexican Migrant workers, he realizes the real condition as well as exploitation
of Los Pobres.
In this autobiographical
story, the writer speaks for the rights of Los Pobres i.e the poor and
powerless people. Although this story is related with the writer himself, there
is a great empathy with the working class people for the writer himself tried
to feel the real experience of the hard work. Besides, the writer, in the
beginning thought that the workers were
different from what his mother told him about but later he realized that
the real workers were truly poor and powerless.
During his graduation,
the writer was in search of the summer job and one of his friends suggested him
that he should get a job as a worker. In fact, the writer would like to
experience the suffering of the ‘real work’ because he would like to show his
father that he even had the experience of it. During his interview with the contractor,
the writer aid that he had the experience of physical labour though he had
never worked physically in his life. Undoubtedly the people have told him that
the physical the physical labour was beyond his capacity but he enjoyed the
work very much. Moreover, unlike his expectations, he found the workers not
being ‘Los Pobres’ but being middle class as well as like himself. He was ever
surprise that the workers were not of similar interest and skills even though
they were daily wage labours. They had diverse interest and skills for example
some of them were abstract painters where as some others were poet and the
writers.
The writer, in the
beginning felt that he had got the experience of the ‘real work’ but later he
realized that an educated person could never feel the real experience of the
Mexican Migrant work as made him realized that they lack public identity remain
completely and they were the people falling apart. Due to the lack of proper
communication or the language, problem they wrere acting like the puppet in the
command of their contractor. Moreover, they were unaware of the minimum human
rights and consequently they were victimised rudely. Their quietness was the
indication of how helpless they were in the foreign land. Their sweating face
and the hard harsh body really invited the sympathy from the writer. He
obviously got the answer which he was searching for from his childhood. He
clearly knew that he could never be the ‘Los Pobres’.
This story is very
powerful not only in depicting the life of the poor and powerless but also in
advocating for their rights. Indirectly, the writer speaks for the poor and the
powerless people and against their
exploitation by the employers. Despite being an autobiographical story, this
story is able to generalize the common experience of the working people.
Similarly this story changes the perspective of the people towards the working
class people. Instead of heretic and mockery, they deserve love and respect.