The Compromised Land: My Father's Stories

By Juan Reyna Tapia

THE COMPROMISED LAND
By Dr. John Reyna Tapia PHD

A compilation of short stories concerned with Mexican life around the turn of the century. The themes reflect the Hispanic tradition and its continuity of values and origins. This volume contains stories about buried treasure, ghosts, the devil, the astuteness of the peasant farmer, fables of extraordinary feats by the Indian, and the legalistic mind of the borrachito or drunkard. The central theme of the volume is that of the immigrant who crosses the border from Mexico to the United States in search of work and a better way of life. The immigrant who, although remains forever in a world of new customs and languages, wishes to retain his sense of pride, personal and ancestral values ,passing them on to successive generations. This book is of significance to all Spanish speaking people in the United States. This collection will also be found in courses dealing with Spanish American literature.

• Language: English
• Publisher: AuthorHouse
• Release date: Dec 18, 2014
• ISBN: 9781496949295

Juan Reyna Tapia

Emily Del Rosario Vansant was born on Ajo, Arizona. She is the niece of the literary author, Dr. John Reyna Tapia, and the granddaughter of Genaro Villa Gomez Tapia, the oral narrator of this book, Emily was raised in Ajo, Arizona by her grandparents, Genaro Villa Gomez Tapia and Guillerma Reyna Tapia. Emily is a retired Secretary, and is the author of several fiction and non-fiction books. “A Widow’s Egyptian Adventure,” “Star’s Gift,” “Star’s Return.” She is the translator of, “The Compromised land.” Coming soon, “Star’s Vision’s,” the last book in the Star’s series. Emily resides in Selma, Oregon with her husband and two Jack Russell’s.

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© 2014, 2015 Dr. Juan Reyna Tapia. All rights reserved.

No part of this book may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted by any means without the written permission of the author.

Published by AuthorHouse   01/19/2015

ISBN: 978-1-4969-4889-2 (sc)

ISBN: 978-1-4969-4925-7 (hc)

ISBN: 978-1-4969-4929-5 (e)

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Contents

Dedication

Introduction

Prologue

Epilogue

About The Literary Author

Addendum

Honored Guest:

About The Translator

Dedication

I wish to acknowledge my gratitude to my wife Bertha Velasco Cervantes Tapia, for her support and her patience, and Professor Ellen Cragile, for the use of her drawings. Also to my niece Emily Del Rosario Vansant for the translation of this book.

Introduction

This book is a compilation of short stories concerned with Mexican life around the turn of the century. The themes reflects Hispanic tradition and its continuity of values and origins, as originally related in the Spanish language. This book contains stories about buried treasure, ghosts, the devil, the astuteness of the peasant farmer, fables of extraordinary feats of strength by the Indian, and the legalistic mind of the borrachito, or drunkard. The central theme of the volume is that of the immigrant who crosses the border from Mexico into the United States in search of work and a better way of life. The immigrant who, although he remains forever in a world of totally new customs and language, he wishes to retain his sense of personal pride and ancestral values, passing them on to future generations. This collection, which is of significance to all Spanish speaking people in the United States, will also find a place in courses dealing with Spanish American literature.

This book is a rich collection of anecdotal folklore. It encompasses what all primary literature seeks to convey: wisdom.

Tomas Rivera

University of California, Riverside.

Dr. Juan Reyna Tapia PHD, is Chairman and professor of the department of foreign Language, at Fort Lewis College in Durango, Colorado. His books include the Spanish Romantic Theater (UPA.1980) The Indian in the Spanish American Novel, and Shadows in Ecstasy, a collection of poems.

One of the tragedies of life for parent’s exiled from Mexico, for any reason, is that they are put into a different culture and a language different from their forefathers. Consequently they have lost the opportunity to know one of the most colorful cultures and civilizations in the world.

The darkness would be total if it wasn’t for some parents that have preserved stories and experiences that they have told their children in the late evening before they are put down to dream.

This literature is not the result of this process of narration, but it is indispensable to complete the totality of a people, because it is a reflex of the experiences of the terrestrial human being. Without literature man will go on walking blindly without a witness of his existence.

The obligation of the North American of Mexican origin is to produce proper literature. That starts with the seed of the plant and universalizes in the orchard, be where it may. Any literature that is read and is recognized in the world in general. This literature should reflex the spirit of the Mexican in a North American context.

With this end these narrative seeds are dedicated to our Mexican parents with their spirit in our eyes, especially to Senor Genaro Villa Gomez Tapia and Senora Guillerma Reyna Tapia.

Prologue

Oral stories have always been preferred by tradition. It is possible to imagine without difficulty the figure of the narrator. He begins his narration and we immediately notice that he is not using the same language, but a diverse range, like that of a poet at a performance. His language becomes poetic, and creative.

There is no hesitation in what he recounts. The muscles in his face, the expression and gestures of his body collaborate in order for him to deliver his story. The voice loyal and cautious, the words that you hear follow a guideline where the pauses, the pitch, the tone and the rhythm are retrieved from the bosom. The tradition of his storytelling is so immemorial that we are delighted by his performance.

The phrases are ritual, the rotation is trivial and the story malicious seriously, almost sacred like a religious story. The auditorium hangs from his lips, they laugh, and they cry and always yell sympathy. The first performance is complete. That’s entertainment.

But his humor is not exhausted. The story can exercise in the audience a species of catharsis, liberating them from Ill-feelings.

There is still more. The stories educate, they help in the configuration and the ideology of the public.

With the stories the language of the ancestors passes to the new generation. May they learn it together with their ancestors near and remote. May they learn and may they think.

In this story you will encounter the child pressing for answers why, how come?

The narrator therefore delivers his story to the moral consciences of the group.

There is a multitude of popular tales. There are fairy tales about magic, heavy works and long investigations. Stories of origins of nature and supernatural things, they go hand in hand. The simplest stories are made up, strange, or even funny.

In The Compromised land, of author Dr. Juan Reyna Tapia…These functions are compiled with excellence.

In the written word, the rumor is perceived almost like a melody of the oral word. It is as if the narrators of the stories that they have composed in their books, all of a sudden are converted into words and they become a story.

Juan Reyna Tapia author of this book is attuned to the ancestral voice that these stories were told to him. There is an identity between the literary narrator author of this book and the oral narrator. Senor Genaro Villa Gomez Tapia, father of the literary narrator.

The stories overlap sometimes, bursting out of the conventional limits of each chapter. The oral rhythm lets you see in the written words the results.

He, her, and he, there, they are not symbols in position. The place compiles with a very different function geography. Opposite directions and problems of the times serve to mark in the mythical space where the stories will occur.

The family tree is plentiful and urges existential human solidarity.

The narrator delights and enumerates for the audience the wealth of the world he is communicating with. Here the distances are measured in time. Sometimes the narrator’s performance is with great skill it is a pleasure to hear.

But don’t believe that the value of The Compromised Land lies in its boundaries of a fabulous ethnic background. It goes way beyond that.

In this book the Hispanic tradition is alive. Where it was born, the last instance, the theme of the stories, as much as the issues of every story. Like the language that it’s narrated in.

This signifies that in a folkloric map of the world, we have to include the Hispanic world, and the geographical sites where the stories are orally preserved and now appear in print. The story teller then manifests, that not only the narrator like the audience, are all part of a larger Hispanic chain. It clearly shows some origins, and a continuity of values above mentioned in the same language that the stories are told. This should be significant for the number of groups that speak Spanish in the United States.

These stories are signs of identity clean and clear. With them we can feel our origins. We look to the past and see that a change in countries has not taken away our conscience, or the knowledge of our roots.

Richard Benavides L.

University of Texas, San Antonio

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CHAPTER ONE

THE SEEDS OF THE SEEDS

I was born in Michoacán, Mexico, in 1890 at Las Palmas ranch, the palms. It’s a small ranch that’s very close to Villa Morelos. There’s a mountain that they call, La Sierra de los Negros or the mountain of the black people. It is situated between Villa Morelos and Puruandiro. The two towns are separated by a distance of approximately three leagues, or you can say, about an hour’s walk. From Patzcuaro, its two days travel on foot. The first day you can travel up to Cipiajo, a town of Tarasco Indians, that’s at the foot of a very large mountain, and covered by pine trees. The next day it is necessary to go across the mountain. On the other side of the mountain is Quiroga, a large and very pretty town. Quiroga is near Patzcuaro. The ranch of Las Palmas is now called La Luz, or "the light." There are other ranches in the vicinity, but Las Palmas ranch is the only one that got its name changed. For example, El Ranch Viejo, or the old ranch, and El Ranch San Rafael, or San Rafael Ranch, still retain their old names. There was another small ranch called Huango. Now they call it New Huango, because Villa Morelos was once named Huango. There was the old Huango and the new Huango. Now El Rancho Viejo, the old ranch, is now called San Rafael.

Other ranches from this area are the Ranch De La Estancia, Rancho Quaremiro, Rancho Del La Cueca, Rancho De La Viga, Rancho De La Palma and Rancho De La Loma. They are now all joined together. Rancho La Palma and Rancho La Loma are now both called La Luz.

Right after Ciraquaremiro is a mountain called El Cuarto, or the quarter, where La Cienega begins. It is at the edge of a lake. To the south is an hacienda called Villa Suertes, or Lucky villa. It’s A bit farther at the edge of La Cienega. There they had a small store they called Herreros. Next is Cuentillo a town that is between the mountains, mostly populated by indigenous Indians. There was a bridge, and then another hacienda, Agua Blanca, or white water.

It’s quite a ways from La Cienega. Next, there’s Padejero, which is on a lagoon, and Zacapu, which is at the foot of the mountain of the owl.

Near Zacapu there was an hacienda named Cantauria. It belonged to some Spanish people named Espinos. Another hacienda was at the edge of La Cienega lagoon. Or at least it was a lagoon then. The hacienda’s there are large like the one the Espinos owned, called San Antonio. At Tariacuri or Patron there were some Tarasco Indians. The owners were a father and son whose family name was Carranza.

To the north is the Aguilar Valley, and the hacienda of Portondaro, still on the edge of La Cienega. There they harvest oranges. Next are Zumbillo and Varacha, further there are some small towns that reach to the state of Guanajuato. The towns start with San Francisco and finishes with San Marcos.

Arios is a small and beautiful town because it is in the middle of orange groves without end. These oranges are excellent, they are called Escalon and Valencia. The oranges they grow there are delicious. It’s the principal industry of the area. All the people of Puerto De Ario work picking oranges because that’s all they grow in that immense valley. The trees are so big and they have so much fruit!

To the north is the Santiago Valley. To get to this town from Las Palmas you had to walk one day to the Amoles, and another day to get to Zumbillo, and one more day to finish the trip to Santiago Valley. Or should I say, it takes three days on foot.

There’s a beautiful town situated in a valley where they also have a lot of fruit. The sweet potato grows year