A country legend passes

I read the news today that country legend and hall-of-famer Charlie Louvin passed away on January 26th at the age of 83. Charlie died from complications resulting from pancreatic cancer but remained musically active until the day he died.  As one of the two members of the Louvin brothers, Charlie's music has inspired countless country acts and his songs have become staples of the folk and bluegrass repertoire. I thought I'd share a few of his favorite songs to honor his life and his music. 

I was introduced to the Louvin brothers about a year ago by a musician friend at the University of Arizona. One night, while sitting around jamming with a few friends, a left handed guitar player struck up and sang a beautiful traditional song, Katie Dear, that the Louvin Brothers performed on their album, Tragic Songs of Life. This became one of my favorite traditional songs and is special to me as the first Louvin Brothers song I ever heard.  Disarming in its lyrical simplicity, the song conveys the tragedy of impulsive young love with their trademark 'high-lonesome' harmonies.   I also found a nice rendition of Katie Dear on the newest Seldom Scene, the bluegrass recording legends, album.  Seldom Scene headlined the 2010 Pickin' in the Pines festival in Flagstaff, Arizona this past September. 

The Louvin Brothers created a tight sound that did not find immediate success in the commercial world.  It wasn't until they started to include secular songs in their repertoire that they began to get on the charts. Another one of my Louvin Brothers favorite, My Brother's Will, is a great story song that paints a harrowing scene of a man's final wish, to have his brother marry his love and take care of her.  What I love about the song is the way the short, concise lyrics skillfully convey the complicated life circumstances that can block our wishes. 


Despite their commercial success, their gospel songs remained a central part of their music and would help to define the bluegrass-gospel genre. There is an interesting article here on the fervent faith of Charlie and the role of his Christian spirituality in his long career.  While many of their songs might seem tongue-in-cheek to listeners (the chorus line to their hit Broadminded goes "that word broadminded is spelled S-I-N"), they created their own brand of sincere, but self-conscious gospel. 

Louvin Brothers cd, Satan is Real

The Louvin Brothers win the award in my book for the best pre-photoshop album cover. Their cover to their gospel album, Satan is Real, depicts Charlie and Ira in white suits singing in front of a giant fire, a cartoonish looking devil looming behind them.  The story behind the cover is even better than the image itself.  Charlie described the terrifying effort they undertook to make the cover:


"Ira built that set. The devil was twelve feet tall, built out of plywood. We went to this rock quarry and then took old tires and soaked them in kerosene, got them to burn good. It had just started to sprinkle rain when we got that picture taken. Those rocks, when they get hot, they blow up. They were throwing pieces of rock up into the air."


Luckily for the two brothers, and the rest of the world, their artistic ambitions were not their undoing. Had they burned in an out of control tire fire, smothered by a twelve foot satan cut-out, I'm sure they would have still made their way into countless country singers' repertoires, but luckily we can enjoy the fruits of their music-making and pyro-impulses. Charlie's life and music are an inspiration to musicians everywhere, especially this one in Mexico who enjoys an old radio country hit every once in a while to remind him of another place and time. Rest in Peace Charlie. 


You can read a nice biography in honor of Charlie's passing at allmusic.com. I'll leave you with a cover of the Louvin Brother's song, Atomic Power, by the band Uncle Tupelo, a country-folk rock band new to me but prominent during the late 80s and 90s.

A year half over is a cup half full

Today is January 28th, 2011, the exact mid-point of my Fulbright experience. I arrived to Zacatecas on August 28th, five months of books, trips, and meetings ago.  A lot has happened during the past five months. I thought I would share a few thoughts from the mid-term reflection I submitted today to the Institute of International Education.  Reflections are a demanding but very valuable exercise.  I always emerge more focused, more appreciative, and humbled by reviewing the joys and challenges of a part of my life.  A friend once told me that an awareness of time is a fundamental aspect of being human.  I agree, but have learned that there are multiple ways to look at time.  While focusing on the fleeting nature of time can render us depressed and trepid, when we probe our past for growth and challenge, the wheels of time become an engine propelling us into the future.

-

I decided to apply for a Fulbright grant to Mexico because I thought the experience would be a meaningful way to follow up on my undergraduate years.  During my four and a half years at the University of Arizona, I learned Spanish, studied migration in southern Mexico, spent a semester in Argentina, and wrote a thesis on the political economy of immigrant remittances.  A Fulbright project in Mexico on microfinance and migration seemed a good way to synthesize these experiences; I could see a new part of Mexico, keep developing my Spanish, and apply the international studies and economics lessons I learned in college.  Looking at the spectrum of my undergraduate experiences and finding a way to apply those experiences was a way to guide that uncertain step forward, beyond the commencement podium with diploma in hand.

-

In my Fulbright application, I combined four central goals.  My primary goal is to deepen my understanding of microfinance in Mexico.  Paired with this goal is the desire to learn more about the financial, economic, and developmental aspects of Mexican migration to the United States.  I want to carry out a project that is of value to migrant communities in Zacatecas and the Federación Zacatecana de migrantes en los EEUU (Fedzac).  I measure the value of my project by the potential impact of the ideas and research, thoroughness and integrity of my investigation, and uniqueness of the project among the related literature. I will compile my research into an academic paper, a document for in-house use of Fedzac, and a presentation of my results at Fedzac in May.  Some of my more personal goals include learning about the culture, history, and people of Zacatecas; advance my level of Spanish fluency; and share my Fulbright experience with family and friends through emails, blogs, videos, and music.  On top of all of these, I strive to make my research available and accessible to the wider public.

-

Outside of the Development Studies Department, UAZ

     My central motivation in applying for a Fulbright grant was to gain an on the-ground perspective of the economic factors behind Mexican migration to the U.S. and carry out a project that strengthens the economic development of sending regions.  While this motivation has not changed, my project has shifted to match the local needs and opportunities in Zacatecas.  Midway through my grant, my project focus is well refined and has already provided many meaningful cultural experiences, improved my Spanish, and taught me much about Mexico, microfinance, and the nature of research.
     In August, my advisor, Dr. García Zamora, introduced me to Fedzac, the federation of Zacatecan migrant clubs in the U.S., and communicated an opportunity to collaborate with Fedzac on a research project.  Fedzac wanted to explore the possibilities of creating a migrant-funded microfinance bank in Zacatecas, and my professor suggested I make this my research focus.  The opportunity was close to my original interest in financial needs of migrant communities and I eagerly agreed to dedicate my year to this project.
     From August to October, I spent my time reading literature about the global state of microfinance and the microfinance sector in Mexico.  This time was a period of focusing my project and deepening my knowledge of microfinance and migration.  In November, I attended the People’s Global Action conference on Migration and Development in Mexico City.  At this conference, I met with the president of Fedzac, Efraín Jimenez, and connected with Leila Rispens-Noel, a Senior Advisor at a global microfinance network.  Following the conference, I accompanied Leila and Efraín on a trip to visit 3x1 projects in Zacatecas. This trip was a turning point towards realizing my second goal: to shape and carry out a project of direct benefit to migrant communities in Zacatecas.  This trip to a rural area was also a unique opportunity to experience the ‘charro’ culture of Zacatecas, eat new food, and learn regional words and songs– all part of the cultural exchange I hoped to experience on my Fulbright year.
     From November to the end of the year, I worked with Fedzac to develop an outline of a feasibility study to explore the possibilities of a new micro-bank.  In January, I have been writing and distributing surveys of financial needs to migrant clubs in the U.S.  Meanwhile, I am reviewing the microfinance sector in Mexico and organizing visits to key organizations for February.  I am also beginning my fieldwork in the most promising community for the new bank, Nochistlán de Mejía.  I am well on track to complete my primary research, field interviews, and compile these projects into a paper.

-

From one angle, I am a White (non-hispanic), Under-25 Male with a Bachelor’s Degree but no Graduate Work researching Economic Development in Mexico.  From another angle, I am me.

-

Feria Nacional in Zacatecas

     My efforts to get to know people in Zacatecas and the culture were facilitated by the presence of the state fair my first few weeks in Zacatecas.  I went to the fair regularly, listening to Banda music, learning to dance, trying different local foods, and meeting many return migrants eager to practice their English.  In general, I strove to be open to new experiences, conversational, and put myself in as many new situations as I could to experience a different part of the city.  My first few weeks, I regularly visited the museums in Zacatecas and studied in different locations.
     I also learned a great deal about Mexican culture and language from my Spanish courses. I enrolled for three weeks in the Fenix Language Institute with small classes and excellent teachers. We went to hear local concerts together and talked daily about the history of Mexico, Zacatecas, and local culture - all peppered with common regional phrases and sayings.
     I also had the good fortune of joining a basketball team a few weeks into my grant period.  The tortilla shop owner a block away from my house invited me to join his team, Tortillería Guadalupana.  We play every few days in three different leagues, and I’ve been practicing regularly in pick-up games at the parks.   This athletic outlet has been a great way to make friends and learn about the regional customs for basketball.  Sports are a language that transcends borders.

-

Fulbright Researchers in Zacatecas 2010-2011
with Efraín Jiminez (left) of Fedzac

I should mention that I feel very fortunate to have two other Fulbright researchers living with me in Zacatecas. It was a coincidence that all three of us applied not only to work in Zacatecas City, but with the same advisor, Dr. Rodolfo García Zamora.  Our advisor has been excellent at working with each of us separately and equally and we all feel like our institutional support is fine.  We each have desk spaces at our university and meet regularly with our professor. However, there has been a great benefit in having fellow researchers and friends to share our Fulbright experience.  We now live together in an apartment, sharing a passion to experience Zacatecas and carry out meaningful projects. The three of us have been able to host several parties for our friends here and connect with a larger community of researchers and foreigners living in Zacatecas City.  If it weren’t for having two other Fulbright fellows here in Zacatecas, I would not have access to such a strong community of friends and social network.

-

View of Avenida Juárez in Zacatecas, Mexico

     I feel welcomed in Zacatecas and adjusted quickly to life here.  Many of the changes were logistical adaptations. I’ve never had to ride the bus regularly and here the bus is my principle means of transportation.  Learning all the bus routes, fares, and customs for public transport took a bit of effort.  It also took me a good three weeks to learn the layout of the city.  With so many winding streets defined by the hills and slopes, Zacatecas is a confusing city to navigate.  However, the streets and plazas have now become places to me and I can easily find my way.  I have also adjusted my eating habits in line with local culture.  I now eat lunch at the Mexican hour of 2 or 3 PM and enjoy this schedule.  When I returned home for Christmas, it felt like a late breakfast to be eating lunch at noon.

Food stand where I buy fruit, standing

The customs and traditions of Zacatecas have also changed the way I live and eat, though.  I have enjoyed exploring the culinary traditions of Zacatecas.  I cook regularly with different chilies, nopales, prickly pear fruit, tomatillos, and eat everything with a corn tortilla.  I enjoy listening to Banda music and have found a new love for tamborazo and Joan Sebastian. I can’t hear Banda music or tamborazo without immediately being carried back to the state fair in my mind and dancing a little Banda two-step.
Being a gringo in Zacatecas is a unique experience because so many people have lived in the United States.  I’ve grown used to hearing, “Hey dude!” or “What’s up man?” when I am out at night.  I’ve come to expect these short interactions and enjoy the unique bridge they make between perfect strangers.  I am here to study migration and these kinds of exchanges are welcome and interesting.  The recently returned migrants always finish by saying, “Welcome to my city. I hope you enjoy yourself.” I thank them, and say that I am.

-

My first five months have provided a valuable lesson in the nature of research.  I have learned a great deal about a new field and about Zacatecas.  But more importantly, I have learned that uncertainty and perseverance yield confidence.  By wading through doubt, struggling to define my project, and gaining confidence in my skills to carry out research, I have learned a greater sense of patience, humility, and respect for time.

Happy New Year from Mexico!

Foreign Investment in Mexico

This past week, I began the great data hunt.  Right now I'm working on a profile of the financial market in Zacatecas. The goal is to describe the level of access to financial services, both rural and urban, and the types of financial services offered here.  In my past research, I've learned that poring through different data sets can be quite over-whelming, especially when dealing with regional or national indicators.  Especially difficult is learning to handle the different software and data storage systems for each department, each survey, and even for each topic.  Yesterday, I quickly found myself swimming in a sea of tabs, windows, foreign file endings and a very cluttered desktop. It was like Tron 4D. 

Nevertheless, I've started to find some useful data sets and am learning how to navigate the Mexican systems.  I'm primarily looking for data to describe the financial market in Zacatecas, but in the process, have come across some interesting economic data sets. As an exercise, and to reacquaint myself with my old buddy Excel, I put together a few graphs.  I hope you enjoy them.  The data comes from INEGI, the Instituto Nacional de Estadística y Geografia, which is the primary Mexican census and data collection agency.  They have some excellent resources for sifting through the stacks and reams and mountains of data. You can search for data by region, by theme, or by the specific survey or census you're interested in.  My favorite online tool I've found so far is the Directorio Estadístico Nacional de Unidades Económicas (National Statistical Directory of Economic Entities). DENUE is a new geo-mapping tool that uses data from the Economic Census.  You can search for any business or organization by type or name and build maps based on that. Little did I know I live kitty-corner to the Association of Writers and Composers! Most importantly, DENUE will be a useful tool for deciding which banks to interview and finding relevant finance organizations in my field work. I'll write more about my research progress soon. 


On to the data! Here are graphs of two data sets from INEGI on foreign investment in Mexico.  There were a few surprises that become clear in the graphs.   In all the graphs it is easy to see the impact of the global financial crisis in Mexico (2007-2009).  Here are a few interesting questions to preface the graphs: 

• What countries are the primary investors in Mexico?
• What sectors of the economy receive the largest investments from foreigners?
• What sectors of the economy should be most impacted by the 'credit crunch'?

 In looking at overall investment, it was no surprise to see that the USA is the largest investor in Mexico. With NAFTA, Mexico is the US's largest and most important trade partner.  What was surprising was that both Spain and Holland are larger investors in Mexico than Canada (our other NAFTA partner).  Spain's investment makes sense because of the large presence of Spanish banks in Mexico and all of Latin America (such as Santander and BBVA).

The largest investors in Mexico in 2008 were USA (42%), Spain (19%), Canada (12%), Holland (6%), UK (4%), all other countries (17%).  I looked at 2008 because there were some dramatic drops from 2008-2009 (described below). The whole list, averaged from 2000-2009, is as follows: USA, Spain, Holland, Canada, UK, Switzerland, Germany, Japan, Italy, Sweden, France.                                           

From this dataset, it is also interesting to see how foreign investors behaved in the global financial crisis (2007-2009). The data set shows that Mexico experienced a serious decrease in investment from 2007-2009, about a 50% decrease. The greatest change was from 2008 - 2009 which is broken down below by country.  Interestingly, the largest (relative) withdrawal of investment was generally by the smallest absolute investors.  You can almost see an inverse relationship between the size of investment and the percentage decrease in investment during the crisis.  

This suggests that a few things.  One is that countries are financially committed to their large economic partners.  Financial ties between the US and Mexico are deep and long term, so it makes sense the US decrease would be the smallest negative change.  This trend could also suggest that investors from certain countries develop economies of scale as investment levels increase.  That is to say, the more money a country as a whole invests in another country, the more people and resources there will be to collect information on the country, monitor changes, and make 'smart investments',  The smaller investors (like Italy, Sweden and Germany) might be making riskier investments because of poor information and as a result, withdraw their finances more quickly.  

However, there are three countries which buck this trend: France, japan, and Holland.  All of these countries invested more money in 2009 than in 2008. Why is this?  Well, looking at the data, all three of these countries made significant, sharp withdrawals of investment from 2007-2008.  It could be that investors were too quick to react in 2008, pulling out more money than they needed to, and than reinvested their liquid capital as the relative risk of investing in Mexico became clearer. 

Impact of global financial crisis on foreign investment in Mexico

It is also interesting to look at which economic sectors foreign investors most prefer in Mexico.  The order of investment can be seen in the adjacent donut graph, which is like a pie graph but lower in calories.  I was a bit surprised to see that financial services rank number two, ahead of mining and extractive industries.  Agricultural falls last claiming less than 1% of foreign investment. 

In the graph below, Foreign Direct Investment in Mexico by Sector, you can see the pronounced decrease in investment after 2007. 

Foreign Investment in Mexico by Sector, 2000-2009

We can do the same sort of number comparisons as in the analysis above, looking at the relative changes during the global financial crisis.  Interestingly, the sectors where financial investment was concentrated - commerce, manufacturing, and financial services - experienced the smallest relative decreases. Granted, the decreases still weren't small (25% - 40%), but relatively less.  Again, why these changes?  I would guess that the same line of logic holds as above. The sectors where most investment is directed are those that are most strongly linked to the U.S. economy, and where investors can build economies of scale based on experience.  Mining had a large increase, but if you look at the history of investment above, there was a spike in investment that corresponded to a gold and silver boom in Mexico 2007-2009. Right here in Zacatecas, there are several gold companies seeking to re-open, mines. A canadian company, Goldcorp, recently opened a new gold mine.  Interest in precious metals, such as gold and silver, are a reaction to the global financial crisis as more people are turning to metals as a store of value, over riskier stocks and mutual funds.  However, it's possible that there was an investment bubble, or logistics didn't work out, so funds had to be withdrawn.