Rain of Gold - purchases

At the car lot, the three Anglo salesmen saw them drive up and they were ready for them, realizing that this was payday, now that they were coming in with the women and children. For no matter how often the men came in, kicking the tires and looking the trucks over, the salesmen knew that the Mexican people never bought anything until they shoewd up with all their children and women, and their old mama standing over to one side, clutching her purse full of wrinkled bills. Mexicans always paid in cash, no matter how poor they were. The bills were damaged from all the years of hoarding. (402)

turks

Turks have taught Christians how to be moderate in peace and gentle in victory.

-Voltaire

¡Ask a Mexican! - premarital

There, University of Texas-Austin professor Gloria Gonzalez-Lopez examined why Mexican fathers in the United States wanted their daughters to remain virgins until marriage. Contrary to myths about machos expecting their daughters to be forever maidens, Gonzalez-Lopez argued, Mexican dads "expect their daughters to practice sexual moderation and to delay premarital sex. For them, this is a strategy that their daughters may use to attend and complete college, and thus improve their living conditions and socioeconomic future as they survive in an increasingly competitive society." Mexican men want their women to remain pure, therefore, because that shows a committed, serious lady who, unlike men, has mastered her libido. (66)

¡Ask a Mexican! - drive slow

Accuse Mexicans of any other driving sin--accuse us of loewring cars until the steering wheel scrapes asphalt, of adorning windows with Pissing Calvin decals, of driving without insurance. But don't say we drive slowly. Vieja Gringa, why do you think Mexicans make the sing of the cross before starting the car? (42).

¡Ask a Mexican! - democracy in america

Your sentiment is just another manifestation of American exceptionalism, a syndrome Alexis de Tocqueville noted in his 1840 classic, Democracy in America, which argues this country is unique from every other nation and therefore can do whatever the fuck it wants--violate international treaties, invade sovereign countries, ignore the FIFA World Cup. In the case of reverence for one's roots, it boils down thusly: gabachos long-removed from Ellis Island can love their ancestors without shame because they're the descendants of immigrants, and immigrants made this nation great: Mexican's can't because they are immigrants, and immigrants are turning America into the Third World. (40)

¡Ask a Mexican! - stretched vowels

Resourceful Mexicans already stretch out everything in their lives--under-the-table salaries, privacy in houses shared with seventeen other people, fake Social Security cards passed around dozens of friends--so why not vowels and consonants? (30)

¡Ask a Mexican! - language conundrum

Dear Gabacho: Thus is the linguistic conundrum of the Mexican in the United States: Speak Spanish, get accused of separatism. Speak English, get laughed at for thick accents and limited vocabularies. Many Mexicans speak English to Mexican workers out of gratitude--the fast-food counter is the only place Mexicans can feel like Americans by speaking the shared language of haggling with Mexican workers over the cost of fries. (24-25)