After almost 3 hours of walking the picket line in front of the hotel, I was sitting with one of the strikers - we'll call her Providencia - trying to calculate the number of hours she still needed to work to fulfill the weekly quota and receive her weekly strike pay. She calculated how many hours she had already worked (9 hours and 35 minutes) meaning that she still had 5 hours and 25 minutes more to get her goal of 15 hours at the end of the day. She had come in at 11 with a baby and a stroller - so I told her to just stick around until 25 minutes after I left (was leaving at 4pm) and she would be okay.
Then she looked at me, angry and disgusted, and shouted:
'Que pinche dices?! YA me voy!'
What the fuck are you saying?! I'm getting outta here!'
'Hey, hey, hey, hey... No need to talk like that!' smiling as I said it. In situations like these I can't cop attitude or authority - these strikers have a pride and a misery I can never understand or touch - but I'm the strike captain for this shift so I have to do something. 'I'm new to this job, and I'm trying to figure out what to do. If I'm doing something wrong show me.'
She looked away.
'Hey.' Still looked away.
'Hey.' Nope.
'Hey, look at me!'
'I DON'T NEED MY EYES TO HEAR YOU!' Break point - she's mad. So now I either stop and come across as a heartless jerk, I apologize and seem insincere and weak, or I keep going and maybe get to something. It's all or nothing.
'Did you hear me? I'm sorry if I upset you, and I realize that I'm just some student that's going to go back to his life and I may never see you again, but I'm here to learn and unless you help me I will gain nothing - and you're gonna stay angry. So either you help me figure out what's going on and we both leave happy, or I write down something in the pay-roll book that makes you or my bosses angry and we're all screwed. Your choice...'
At this point her friend piped up - la Fria or 'Ice-lady'. When she came in that afternoon there were no hello's or smiles, only an abrupt 'I can only stay until 1:30 today, so don't tell me to stay longer!' Then she picked up a sign and started walking next to Providencia. Her eyes were the worst, though, dense with anger and apathy. Passionate anger can be dealt with because it still feels and reacts to what's around. Apathetic anger is dead and cold and can be moved only by miracle.
'You don know da kine-uh tings we do here ah da strike!' she began, shouting in English. Though she'd doubtless heard me speaking Spanish to Providencia I was still just another pinche gringo to her. I kept on in Spanish.
'But that's why I'm here, aren't you listening at all? What do I have to do to get someone to talk to me like a person, and not like a gringo?'
That did it.
In a rush of emotion they shared their stories - stories of frustration, hardship, impatience, the grind of raising kids and providing a decent life while balancing their strike-hours with new jobs. I thought about mentioning that though picketing isn't easy at least they're paid to walk out here, that they only have to walk and not scrub floors and be yelled at by management, that they can even talk to their friends while picketing, that even as a picketer their wages are better than those who actually work at the hotel they've left, that by being here every day they are fighting for their dignity and are a source of inspiration and strength for thousands in the city.
But in the face of hard reality stuff like this is just so much shiny, worthless propaganda - more annoyance than comfort.
Instead I shared my story, how my mom had been exactly like them - struggling to feed and clothe her youngest son in an indifferent world, shadowed by an abusive dead-beat dad, bad boy-friends, and dead-end jobs. It helped to smooth over the moment, but there was no peaceful resolution. When we restarted the picket line silence and awkwardness, linked arms akimbo, crashed our not-so-happy/united little march - locked into each step during the last hour or so before Providencia left.
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