RENÉ CORADO: “ Education is the key that opens the door to your dreams.”
El Lustrador, written by René Corado, is the current book selection for Casa De Español’s Grupo de Lectura. Corado, the manager of collections at the Western Foundation of Vertebrate Zoology in Camarillo, CA, will join the group on December 7 to discuss his memoir with students and answer questions. Before the event, Casa interviewed Corado about the inspiration behind his book, the foundation the book spawned, and his uplifting views of life. The following is our interview.
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INTRODUCTION
When I spoke for the first time with René Corado, author of El Lustrador, I recalled the line, “I contain multitudes,” from the poem Leaves of Grass by Walt Whitman. Because Corado is a man whose life story contains multitudes: the many stories and tragedies of his childhood companions in the streets of Guatemala where he was born; his struggles for opportunities; the successes of his family; the hopes of the hundreds of children in Manuel Marcos Martinez school in Guatemala; which is funded by his foundation–even the million eggs in the collection at the Western Foundation of Vertebrate Zoology that, in Corado’s hands, seem to symbolize the potential that Corado sees in every being.
His book, El Lustrador, published in 2014, is a memoir of his life of challenges, sadness, joy, success and generosity. Corado writes about the poverty that he overcame in his youth; his immigration to the United States in 1981; his wife, four children and seven grandchildren; and his adventures as a shoeshine boy, a gardener, and manager of a museum. In 2016, Corado published another autobiographical book entitled, Las aventuras de René Corado, The Shoeshine Boy, a bilingual book with colorful illustrations.
INTERVIEW
CASA DE ESPAÑOL: Your book is a very personal, intimate memoir. When you began writing it, did you intend to reveal so much about the difficulties in your life?
CORADO: No, this book began by accident. I went to a conference on ornithology in Louisiana with my new friend, Dr. Linnea Hall, who is the executive director of the museum. The plane was the last to leave the airport. There was an incredible storm and I thought that the plane was going to crash. I was very afraid, and I had never told the history of my life to my parents. My wife didn’t know either, nor my children, what I had overcome in the streets of Guatemala.
Given that the plane was going to crash anyway, it didn’t matter, and so I began to tell my friend Linnea the story of my life, and she began to take a lot of notes because she was also afraid.
But the plane didn’t crash and I had told her the whole story. And she said, “You know, your life is full of a lot of experiences, and you should share them with others so they can see that so many of their dreams can be achieved.”
So it was she who pushed me to write this book. I didn’t have any idea of writing a book about my life.
CASA: When you began writing the book, did you intend to write a book for adults or teenagers?
CORADO: When I began writing, I only began to write about my life. I didn’t have any idea as to who I was writing the book. I only wanted to put on paper all that had happened in my life, without putting it in order, simply remembering the good and the bad that had happened. I had no idea what I was going to publish. I had no idea it was important to share with the public. So, I had no idea at first who the book was for.
CASA: And the second book, The Shoeshine Boy, is that for children?
CORADO: Yes, it is a bilingual book. This book is for children and it is in Spanish and English, and is illustrated with very nice drawings, very colorful and very beautiful.
CASA: You have worked as a shoeshine boy, but also in journalism, gardening, construction, and other jobs. Why did you choose El Lustrador as the title of your memoir?
CORADO: The shoeshine boy was what gave me so many experiences in the streets of Guatemala. And as a shoeshine boy I managed to survive, which many didn’t, many of my friends failed to survive on the streets. And also the word “shoeshine boy” has a very bad reputation in Guatemala, we were considered thieves, drug addicts, poorly bred. So I thought: I’m going to give the shoeshine boys a good name.
CASA: What are the messages or lessons of the book that are most important for you?
CORADO: The most important messages are: love yourself, have confidence in yourself because you have incredible, unrecognized potential. And fight for your dreams, don’t give up before you start. Try more than one time, one of your dreams is going to come true. And education is the key that opens the door to your dreams.
CASA: Your father taught you the value of work as a way to overcome poverty, no?
CORADO: Yes, I learned a lot from my father because he believed in being a hard, honest worker, and that with a little education you could get ahead. Also, because of my father I wear a sombrero. My father always wore a sombrero because he said that the hat is a man’s crown. I continue honoring him. My father was very hardworking, very honorable, a man who, despite not having gone to school, thought that education would get one ahead.
CASA: And your family is very strong, very united, isn’t it?
CORADO: Yes, because, for example, we were eight brothers and sisters. My parents gave them the same opportunities that I had, but I was the only one who believed in education. I inculcated this belief in my own children. I have four children, two daughters and two sons, and I taught them from my own experience that education is the only key to opening the door, the door to success.
CASA: And like you, your children have also been successful.
CORADO: My children, yes, because they had the good fortune to have embraced two different cultures, that of the Guatemalan and the United States. They are bilingual and that was what opened doors more quickly. And of course they wanted to work and get ahead, and they have been quite productive and all are professionals.
CASA: When you were young, you read a lot. Who are your favorite authors?
CORADO: My favorite authors are Gabriel Garcia Marquez and Miguel Ángel Asturias, the first winner of the Nobel Prize for Literature from Guatemala. Of course, when I was young, I read everything. I always say that reading saved my life because reading transported me to places or planets or countries where there was no hunger, where there was no discrimination.
CASA: The books that transported you to other places without hunger, was that a very important aspect of your reading?
CORADO: Very important because, growing up on the streets of Guatemala, I experienced a lot of discrimination and I asked for food to take to my siblings. Many times, they didn’t give me enough and I had to go to the garbage dump at the city market to find food, where I had to fight with the dogs for a piece of food.
So when I read a book, there was no such thing, there was no discrimination, there was no hunger for an eight-year-old child, because the stories I read were love stories, stories of success, and that told me: you know, you can also make it in the future if you continue fighting.
CASA: Did your father suggest that you go to the United States?
CORADO: No it wasn’t my parents’ idea. I got married very young. And also in Guatemala, there were 36 years of civil war and there were no opportunities. I didn’t want my first daughter, Claudia, to grow up in that war, in the poverty of Guatemala.
And then some friends that lived here in the U.S. lied to me, saying that in the U.S. it was easy to live, easy to earn money, even sending me photos of new cars and houses. But when I came to the U.S., I saw that there was another reality, that they had lied to me and that it was very, very hard here in the U.S.
CASA: You crossed the border three times, didn’t you?
CORADO: Yes, I crossed the border three times and one time I was in prison–in prison, not jail–in Mexico for not having documents, for not having the money to pay the Mexican police. They put me in with highly dangerous criminals like murderers. And I was a young boy who only wanted an opportunity.
CASA: And you saved the life of a woman.
CORADO: Yes, Naty fell off the train and I saved her life and now we are very good friends. We visit each other and drink coffee together. But she survived and succeeded in crossing the border and I was caught by immigration and ended up in prison. But I saved her life and that was what made me happy.
CASA: That is a very emotional story in the book. Do you think the Beast–the train that Naty fell off–needs to be safer? What do you think about the problems at the border?
CORADO: So much has been said about border walls. I agree with building walls, but walls of schoolrooms. That is what we need in our Central American countries. We need education. These are the walls we need, not walls at the borders. We need to educate our children so that our children are the future of the country, so that our children don’t have to climb onto any Beast, so that our children don’t have to cross into another country, that children stay in their countries and enjoy them.
That is the reason I decided to create the El Lustrador Foundation to provide scholarships in Guatemala to give these children the opportunities that I never had.
CASA: Several of your fellow shoeshine boys died as a result of drugs and alcoholism. How did you avoid that destiny?
CORADO: I always listened to my father. My father was a very correct guy, a working guy. I always respected my family, respected my father and mother, and I think that love was what got me out of the streets. That love has kept me alive, and for that reason alone, despite how things went, I left that war in the streets of Guatemala alive.
CASA: You said in your book that your life changed forever after the death of your brother, Alfredo. How did your life change?
CORADO: I decided that each moment counted in life, that every day was an opportunity, that there was no age for living or dying, that in whatever moment I also could die because two days before completing 24 years, my brother died. I decided not only to live life, not only survive, not just pass through life— without leaving a mark. That’s what changed after the death of my brother.
CASA: Of all of the awards and recognition you have received, which ones are the most important to you?
CORADO: Well, two have been very, very important. One because I left Guatemala because of the lack of opportunities and because of the civil war in Guatemala. A couple of years ago, I was recognized as the Ambassador of Peace. I left fleeing Guatemala because of the civil war and I returned as the Ambassador of Peace.
The other was the Order of the Quetzal, which is the greatest recognition given by the Guatemalan government. It is like a knighthood in England. I love it because it is the most important of all, because I worked on shoeshing across the street from the National Palace and the guards there didn’t let me walk through or cross the street because I was a boy who was cleaning shoes yet had no shoes. But I wanted to see what was inside the palace, I wanted to see through the doors. But they never let me. It took me fifty years–fifty years–to cross that street because I went to receive the Order of the Quetzal.
CASA: What motivated you to create the El Lustrador Foundation?
CORADO: It was incredible. I never thought that the book was going to sell. My friend Linnea told me, “Your book is going to sell like hotcakes. “ And I told her, “Ha ha, only you are going to buy a copy, and the accountant. I am going to sell two.” I never thought that the book was going to sell so many. It was a bestseller on Amazon— it remained on the list of the ten most sold. I was in second place on the bestseller list and (the biography of) Steve Jobs was in third place.
So when the book sold so much, it was like a dream, a dream that I had to share with those who haven’t had the opportunity. Because to me it gave me more than I was expecting, more than was in my book of dreams. I decided that the sales of my books would start the El Lustrador Foundation. I also used the El Lustrador Foundation to give shoeshine boys of Guatemala a good name. And so that was how I started the El Lustrador Foundation in 2015.
CASA: The foundation has three programs: sponsor a child, environmental awareness and community aid. Talk to us about these programs.
CORADO: One of them is education. I give educational grants to very low-income children in Guatemala, especially children who work in the biggest garbage dump in the capital. We are giving these children more than opportunity and money, we are giving them confidence, that sense they are important, that we believe in them. But I don’t do what those politicians do, who come one time and never return. I return constantly to see how the progress is going. I exchange ideas with them and at the same time I dignify them. For example, now with GlobalGiving, we are going to build a multi-purpose room where they can have their activities, where they can eat, and we are also providing them meals.
The other part, because I work in conservation and I believe in what I do and love the planet, I believe that starting with these children, it’s the next generation that is going to save the planet. They are going to save the country.
CASA: So the school and environmental awareness are interrelated?
CORADO: Yes, but it is not only in this school, because we also have other groups that we are working with in Morazán, the town where I was born. We have connections with other non-profit organizations. We are now working with these young people, with new NGOs [non-governmental organizations] there. They are continuing the chain, this effort working with the environment because I took up the fight to clean up the largest river in Guatemala. It is the Motagua River. Many people didn’t believe that I could do it because they told me that I was crazy. It was good that I was crazy, that I didn’t think the same way that they did. One person’s power is more than many think because one can make many links or chains, and those chains make you stronger.
CASA: Your foundation encompasses some very big problems where there is a lot of need in Guatemala. What are the most important achievements of the foundation to date?
CORADO: The most important achievement is having maintained a great number of children in the school, to have been able to take these children that were working in the garbage dumps and being able to keep them in the classroom, for them to finish at least the primary grades. And many of them have continued on to Junior High.
There are hundreds of children and these children have believed in me, that they can do the same because I am not just a biologist in a white coat. I’m the guy in the sombrero, with boots, who goes there with them, who eats with them, who they hug, who jokes with them and tells them they can do it. I return again and again to see how they are doing and read with them. I believe that they see me as one of them.
CASA: Is your family involved in the foundation?
CORADO: Yes, all of my children are involved with the foundation and two of my nieces are volunteers with the foundation and work as teachers at the school.
CASA: What message do you want to leave with the students and staff of Casa De Español?
CORADO: As I said before, education is the key that opens the door to your dreams. To those at Casa de Español, I say that knowing two languages opens a large horizon. I am bilingual, and I have opened doors that I never thought I could open. But the most important thing is that you are not going to learn if you don’t believe in yourself and you don’t believe that you have this incredible capacity. And never give up before beginning. Today is the day to start fighting for our dreams.
Another thing: Live! Live! Don’t just pass through life. You have to leave a mark.
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Final Note: Recently, El Lustrador Foundation won the recognition of GlobalGiving, a non-profit organization based in the United States, that provides a global platform for the “crowdfunding” of charitable projects based in 170 countries. El Lustrador Fundación had to pass a very robust screening process in order to become a member of GlobalGiving, and now can receive funds for its projects through the GlobalGiving platform. The Foundation’s current goal is to raise $50,000 to help feed the children at Escuela Manuel Marcos Martinez in Guatemala and to construct a dining room and multi-purpose room at the school for assemblies and where the children can eat and get together during bad weather.
You can visit the GlobalGiving website to donate here:
https://www.globalgiving.org/projects/build-a-lunchroom-and-feed-poor-kids-in-guatemala/
