WEBVTT

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And now it's my
very great pleasure

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to introduce an
old friend of mine

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and probably an old
friend of many of yours,

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or at least it will
seem like that.

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As a journalist,
Ernesto Portillo, Jr.,

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writes compelling stories
about the people and places

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of his hometown,
Tucson, Arizona,

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a place we all love
and know, and know

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better because of Ernesto.

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As host of KXCI's Onda Suave,
he puts on Tucson's very best

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Latino music radio program,
one that I often find myself,

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when driving around, having
to do that usually NPR

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thing of sitting in
the car and waiting

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to hear out the end of a
story or the end of a song.

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Ernesto.

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[APPLAUSE]

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Gracias, Jenny.

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Among the many contributions
and gifts and accomplishments

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of the UA Poetry Center is the
annual Bilingual High School

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Corrido Contest.

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It started in 1999
by Frances Sjoberg,

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who was then at
the Poetry Center

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and now at the U
of A Law School,

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and continues today under the
direction of Executive Director

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Gail Browne, Renee Angle.

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The contest brings together
high school students

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to write corridos.

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Corridos is our borderlands
form of ballads,

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a way of telling
stories about people,

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about heroes, about
horses, about events.

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As Big Jim Griffith
has often put it,

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the corrido is the
newspaper of our times,

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of yesterday, and today.

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Or as Celestino Fernández of the
University of Arizona Sociology

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Department has sometimes
put it, the corrido

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is the editorial pages.

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I had the pleasure in 2008
to be a judge in the contest,

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and I selected as a
winner of that year

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a corrido written by Gamaliel
Rabago, a student of Desert

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View High School in the
Sunnyside Unified School

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District.

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And like many corridos, he
wrote of an actual event

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which had taken place
just a few years earlier

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here in Southern
Arizona, in Arivaca,

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when an undocumented immigrant
from Magdalena, Sonora,

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did something noble at the
risk of being deported.

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And he wrote, Gamaliel,

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El Ángel Ilegal.

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Voy a empezar a cantar y
vale más que no se rían,

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porque les voy a contar
algo que ni yo creía.

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En el desierto de Arizona, al
norte de la línea fronteriza,

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un pobre inmigrante encontró
lo que nunca pensaría.

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Manuel de Jesús, su nombre,
de humilde casa venía,

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pero no porque fuera pobre
piensen que se rajaría.

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Ya casi al anochecer de
esa tan triste noche,

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muy cansado y sin comer.

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Y a nadie le hacía un reproche.

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Su cuerpo entero temblaba
por el frío de aquella noche,

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pero en el fondo del barranco
parecía haber un coche.

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No se detuvo.

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No se detuvo a pensarlo.

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Para esto hay que ser valiente.

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Él solo quería saber si
había un sobreviviente.

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Atrapada entre los fierros
una madre se encontraba,

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mientras desesperadamente
su pobre niño lloraba.

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Dios pone a todas las cosas,
eso no hay por qué dudarlo,

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Manuel de Jesús fue el ángel
que al niño mandó cuidarlo.

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Manuel de Jesús Córdoba
venía a buscar trabajo,

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pero esto fue más importante.

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Debía cuidar a este niño
aunque él fuera un inmigrante.

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Hoy mucha gente que nos odia
solo por buscar trabajo.

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Yo no sé qué pensarían si
ellos fueran los de abajo.

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Yo respeto a todo el mundo.

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No me importa la apariencia.

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Lo que pasó aquella noche
que le sirva de experiencia.

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In the tradition of the
Bilingual Corrido Contest,

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the corridos are translated.

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Some of them are
written in Spanish,

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and some are written
originally in English.

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And this one is translated by
Wendy Burk of the UA Poetry

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Center.

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"The Illegal Alien."

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"I am going to begin
my song, and please

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don't laugh about it.

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It's such an incredible story,
even I can barely believe it.

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In the Arizona desert north
of where the border lies,

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a poor immigrant found
a terrible surprise.

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His name was Manuel de Jesús.

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From a humble home, he came.

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But just because he was poor,
don't think he wasn't brave.

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On this saddest of nights,
as the dusk began to fall,

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he was very tired and hungry,
but he never complained at all.

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Trembling from the cold,
he knew he must travel far.

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But at the bottom of a ravine,
he seemed to see a car.

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Without even stopping to think,
he ran to look for the driver.

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With all of his
courage, he searched

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to see if there was a survivor.

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Trapped in the twisted metal,
he found a mother lying wild

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with desperation.

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Her poor child was crying.

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God puts all things in place,
the sorrow and the joy.

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Manuel De Jesus was the angel
God sent to care for this boy.

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Manuel de Jesús Córdoba
came to look for work,

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but this was more important.

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He had to take
care of this child

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even though he was an immigrant.

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Because we come here to work,
many people hate us, I know.

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I wonder what they would think
if they were the ones below.

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I have respect for everyone.

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It's what's inside
us that is true.

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What happened on that night
is a lesson to me and you."

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[APPLAUSE]

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