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Boys from Little Mexico
Writer Steve Wilson spent a year chronicling the ups and downs of this determined team from heavily-Hispanic Woodburn. His new book, "The Boys From Little Mexico," is a portrait of a community struggling with immigration and acculturation issues.
Front Street in Woodburn, Oregon, is lined with taquerias, stores displaying Mexican-style cowboy boots and hats, signs in Spanish and a bus station that offers tickets to the heart of Mexico. Migrant farm-workers started coming to Woodburn about 50 years ago to work the harvest. So many ended up staying, the town became known as Little Mexico. But just a few blocks down from Front Street, at Woodburn High School, the scene is no different than any other American suburb.
More than a dozen teenage boys practice soccer, preparing for what they hope will be a deep run into the playoffs. Senior Jaime Velas is trying not to be over-confident.
After deciding to shadow the team for an entire season, WIlson got to know the players, coaches and supporters. His book, subtitled "A Season Chasing the American Dream," was the result.
Don't mess up, his coaches told him. And not just on the field. Don't confirm anyone's preconceived notions about what being an Hispanic kid means.
"At first I didn't know what to think. And then you really think about it, and you still don't know what to think," says Maldonado-Cortez.
"You know, you can only do what you can do and hopefully people get to know you and see you in a different way."
'Pocho'
Maldonado-Cortez was born in Los Angeles. His family moved to Woodburn when he was three. He found that the American suburbs weren't the only place he was treated like an outsider. He learned that lesson during a summer playing club soccer in Mexico.
"They gave me a nickname. It was...called me Pocho. And I didn't know what it meant until I actually asked them," he says.
He found out that Pocho is slang term used in Mexico for Mexican-Americans and refers to someone who has lost touch with his roots. Maldonado-Cortez found he wasn't fully accepted in the white towns or in the Mexican towns.
"Yeah, it was pretty difficult. They really saw you differently. They saw you like if you were some rich kid that can just cross over the border like nothing."
That Maldonado-Cortez sometimes blended in better with his American classmates than with Mexican kids comes as no surprise to Wilson.
"Most of the stuff that's important to them and that they're going through - problems with their parents, trying to find girls, doing your homework, having their aspirations on the field, thinking about college - all of that stuff is the same regardless," says Wilson.
Still chasing the dream
Maldonado-Cortez was one of several seniors on the team during the season chronicled in "The Boys from Little Mexico."
The Woodburn Bulldogs fell short once again at the state championship that year, but Maldonado-Cortez graduated and headed off to college. However, in another setback, he had to quit when his parents lost their jobs.
He now works at a local retirement home, but he's still chasing the American dream. He follows his old team closely, and coaches a youth soccer team: boys who may one day help the Bulldogs finally win the top prize.
