:: rawblogXport ::

:: Wednesday, December 22, 2004 ::

Grapes of Wrath, Revisited / Napa Valley celebrates the good life -- but things aren't quite as rosy for the workers who pick the grapes By Glen Martin, San Francisco Chronicle
But you were lucky; you didn't end up with your throat slit, or your carcass desiccating in the sun along some nameless arroyo because you couldn't find water in time.

You didn't end up asphyxiated in a tractor trailer, tangled together with the bodies of other men, women and children who were also looking for work. You weren't held hostage by sociopathic thugs in some shack in Tijuana or Calexico, waiting for your family to scrape together enough ransom so you wouldn't get a bullet in the head.

Yep, you were lucky: You made it to Napa, valley of dreams. And your dream is: work. Good work. You know that during the harvest, a picker on the right crew working the right vineyard can make from $100 to $200 a day. For the two-month crush, you might clear $6,000 or $7,000: a tremendous sum in rural Mexico, where you send all the money beyond the bare minimum needed for your quotidian survival in the North.

posted 1:54 PM :: reference link :: 0 comments ::

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