In my own words by

Childhood experiences

amartinez847_1 — 2025-05-24 02:21:57 UTC

My father (Victor Martinez Plata) was Mexican born in the year 1979, December 21st, There he lived with both his parents and his three other siblings. He resided there through only most of high school; having the desire to become a physical chemist but got in with the wrong people (bad influences/he dropped out). During that time he stated that the teachers and overall education system was very strict but taught the students almost "everything" they needed to know. He says that in Mexico kids were brought up for success, to give it their all and take advantage of what they were given. Apart from this my father when able to work, got a job in construction with his neighbor and later his tios. The job wasn't taken quite out of necessity but instead interest in buying his own things, like food, clothes, etc.

Modernization and Migration

amartinez847_1 — 2025-05-24 03:44:42 UTC

Heading into the mid 1990s-2000s, technology had begun to sprout heading from cassettes to CDs, Big bulky telephones to flip phones (AKA Motorola). My father experienced these through his time in Mexico up to the point where he Immigrated to the United States of America. The reason's behind the move being nothing but a classical young adult wanting to explore and have fun. Originally he had expected a stay of a minimum of two years before heading back to his home country but that was quickly replaced with the rest of his life here.

Digital Revolution

amartinez847_1 — 2025-05-24 04:10:28 UTC

The Digital Revolution was the 20th century shift from mechanical technology to that of digital ones. The world was massively changing, computers, internet, mobile phones all you can't live without being shared upon the world for the first time. It started with computers, from the 1980s to 1990s companies like Apple, IBM, etc. had made computers more accessible to the public allowing people to communicate with each other via internet and emails. This form globalization enabled International trade to prosper (using websites like Amazon or Ebay) or even allowing the spread of culture via trends with fashion, music, slang, etc.

Political Situation (USA)

amartinez847_1 — 2025-05-24 04:36:40 UTC

My father migrated to the United States of America during the year 2001, before the fatal event of 9/11. He states that it was a good time to gain papers (documents/citizenship) because of the leniency with migrant reforms. It was also the closest opportunity they've (immigrants) had since the "Amnistia del 86". The Amnesty of 1986, as known, was an immigration reform and control act law signed by the president Ronald Reagan. Under the law, 2.7 to 3 million undocumented migrants were given U.S. citizenship.

Peso Crisis

amartinez847_1 — 2025-05-25 01:33:10 UTC

During my father's stay in Mexico, it was very common for parents to allow their kids to drop out of High School. This made me slightly more curious on whether it was due to need for money or something else, so I googled the economic state of Mexico during the 1980s-1990s. I came Across one possible answer, The Peso Crisis of 1994. The Peso Crisis was the event in which the Mexican Government suddenly decided to drop the value of a Peso. Part of this was due to a semi-fixed exchange rate system that stabilized the peso but to keep this up they would spend their U.S. dollars and by the time the 1990s came around their dollars were almost completely gone. This lead to many families to go into deep poverty basically overnight, connecting back to the reason that during this time it was very common for teenagers to drop out and work.

Early 2001

amartinez847_1 — 2025-05-25 23:18:12 UTC

During this time my father had settled into America with a job in an Italian restaurant as a cook. Short after, 9/11 happened. I asked how this had affected his daily life or at work, he said it didn't really affect his daily life but work wise business went down. It wasn't as busy as usual. People were scared to go out.

9/11

amartinez847_1 — 2025-05-26 01:15:37 UTC

The events of 9/11 consisted of a coordinated terrorist attack orchestrated by an extremist group called; Al Qaeda. They hijacked four plans, two plans flown into the twin towers in New York, one into the Pentagon, the other hijacked plan never arrived at its destination. The aftermath led to millions of deaths as well as the creation of fear among U.S. citizens, mainly creating stereotypes on behalf of foreigners. But leading back to businesses many declined (in terms of lack of customers) because of the fear Americans had. Some fears came from foreigners which is why I asked my father if it his job had lost customers because of it being an Italian (foreign) restaurant but other times it was just the knowing fear that there could be more attacks which in his case he said that was the main reason for work decline.

Continuation-2003

amartinez847_1 — 2025-05-26 01:34:39 UTC

Later on in the interview my dad brought up the attack on Saddam Hussein, I looked it up and this is what I found. After the events of 9/11, the United States took to attacking Saddam Hussein. He was a president and Dictator of Iraq, from 1979-2003. It was thought that he was developing chemical, nuclear, and biological weapons, and after facing the events of 9/11 the U.S. was under the idea that Iraq was a threat and that they supported terrorist groups (there was no proof). The end result for the U.S. was that 4,000 American soldiers died, as well as the fact that trillions of dollars were spent to cover the war.

The loss of houses and money

amartinez847_1 — 2025-05-26 01:41:30 UTC

I asked my dad if there was anything he remembered that affected his neighborhood or the people that he knew. He spoke about the 2008 financial crisis that caused many people to lose their homes and although he himself did not own a home at the time he knew many people in this boat. He said apart from this he himself was affected because not a lot of people were willing to spend their money which in the restaurant business (or just general work business) meant that many people didn't get to work many hours, leaving people with less pay.

The Crisis

amartinez847_1 — 2025-05-26 01:50:18 UTC

The 2008 Financial Crisis, or better known as The Great recession was a "massive worldwide economic collapse" that begun in the United States. The cause was a little mix of different things starting with; Banks giving mortgages to people who couldn't afford them, leading to the housing boom (prices rose way up) Again banks making risky decisions (bundling risky loans) and of course people began defaulting their mortgages. In the end this lead to a major bank going bankrupt. Other banks stopped lending to each other, stock markets crashed and then well the U.S. economy shrunk. People lost their homes added to the fact that people who had kept their home ended up paying way more than what their houses were worth. Leaning back to jobs not giving enough hours to make money, people who were in this boat often times turned to credit cards or personal loans to get through things like college or just everyday life.