In the daytime, when you drive through Beverly Hills or Brentwood, you could think that you were in another country. 
Everyone you actually see on the street is Mexican. An army of Mexicans keeps Los Angeles running. It's the quiet reason people here don't really want to deport illegal immigrants (a popular issue back in West Virginia, where there are no immigrants to speak of).
This book tells you how to talk to your housekeeper, gardener or pool boy in Spanish.
Often when I'm switching stations on the radio, I hear an eerily perfect English phrase in the midst of a long roll of Spanish, and realize I am hearing a second-generation speaker. Or sometimes third-, or fourth-, or fifth- -- for I've met older people here who were born and raised in Los Angeles and don't speak English. They were here first, like Zorro.
They don't need English to live here, and that's what scares people.
It's the same in the San Francisco Bay Area. And in Arizona and probably Texas. A few years ago I was driving through North Carolina, and I went through entire counties where most of the businesses had Spanish-language names and Spanish-language signs.
Posted by: Ken B. | 28 August 2007 at 19:48
Really? In North Carolina? Now that's amazing to me. That is a big change in the past ten or so years, isn't it?
Posted by: Sedulia | 29 August 2007 at 00:00
Welcome to my world! Southwest Florida. I guess you will not be surprised by that...
Posted by: isabella | 15 September 2007 at 18:51