IT IS ALL THEY HAVE
Culture Is Their Only Valuable

An instructor leads the children in a traditional Mexican dance. Tribune Photo by Ellen Thompson

By Ellen Thompson
Long boat rides and the family members many immigrants left behind as they set out on a life-changing voyage to America were a just a few of the images that came to Samantha and Miranda’s minds.

“We haven’t gone over anything like this in class,” said Samantha, 10, staring wide-eyed at Juan as he shook a tiny sombrero draped in bright strands of fabric.

“I remember learning about all the people who came to Ellis Island and couldn’t get in if they were sick, cause we were afraid they would get everyone else sick,” said Samantha’s classmate Miranda, 10.

“Yeah, we also learned how lots of people had to leave their stuff behind cause it wouldn’t fit on the boats and they couldn’t bring it all here,” Samantha added. “But they never taught us about symbols and how they bring that over.”

Juan, an instructor for the Calpulli Mexican Dance Company in Jackson Heights, put down the vibrant sombrero, a symbol of the sun to those from the state of Michoancan in central Mexico, and began describing other subtle symbols that might not be seen but are important to Mexican immigrants and their culture.

Pointing to his poncho, Juan explained to a room full of students how its patterns and the colored stitching lining the bottom of his pants represents the different regions in Michoancan. As part of the Queens Council on the Arts’Children’s Introduction to American Immigration, Juan explained how even the dances Mexican immigrants and other immigrants take part in are sometimes the only thing they have taken with them from their homeland.

“It’s really important to have things like dance and culture and art to make us understand where we come from and why that makes us special,” said Juan, whose parents are immigrants from Mexico.

Juan turned to Andrew, a fellow dance instructor, and asked for a cane to show the students a dance rooted in Mexican agriculture symbolizing the lifecycle within the culture and the little old men it honors.

“In the beginning we are very weak and fragile. We’re trying to find inspiration and we found it in the music, an energy that gives weak little old men the ability to dance powerfully,” Juan said. “In the end the rhythms come down and we once again become very fragile old men. Like the seasons, the beginning and end are seen in the dance.”

Andrew and Juan quickly went over the dance steps and encouraged the students to try them out. Samantha and Miranda sprang from their seats excited to transform themselves into weak old men planting seeds beneath the hot Michoancan sun.

Thinking about her family members that came to Queens from the Philippines before she was born, Samantha started comparing the Mexican dance to the ones she sees her parents and grandparents take part in at family celebrations.

“I don’t remember the dances exactly, but I do know the sing-alongs my family does and I remember the stories my grandparents tell me about how it was much harder to work in the Philippines, because they really didn’t have jobs there,” she said. “I guess dances and symbols really did matter to the immigrants that couldn’t bring all of their stuff with them.”