The Story of Two Brothers From Mexico

The Daily

The New York Times

Daily News, News

4.4 • 102.8K Ratings

🗓️ 26 May 2020

⏱️ 44 minutes

🔗️ Recording | iTunes | RSS

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Summary

Two brothers, Javier Morales, 48, and Martin Morales, 39, died of coronavirus within hours of each other in their adopted home of New Jersey. Their last wish was to be buried at home in Mexico, but, to make that happen, their family must navigate the vast bureaucracies of two countries, international airfare and the complications of a pandemic. Guest:Annie Correal, an immigration reporter for The New York Times, spoke with Shaila and Melanie Cruz Morales, twin sisters from New Jersey who are the men’s nieces. For more information on today’s episode, visit nytimes.com/thedaily Background reading: In Mexico, being buried near home is a sacred rite. These are the obstacles the Morales family has faced as they try to return their uncles’ bodies home.

Transcript

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0:00.0	So I cover immigration in and around New York City and over the past few months like everybody
0:09.5	I've been covering the coronavirus crisis and not too long ago I started looking at how
0:15.5	that experience has been different for Latino immigrant families.
0:24.6	One thing I noticed pretty much right away is that hundreds and hundreds of families
0:30.0	were turning to go fund me to the crowd funding site and they were setting up pages to pay
0:36.1	for funerals and hospital bills and also to send their relatives remains back to their
0:42.6	home countries to maybe mothers or grandmothers.
0:48.6	So I started just sending emails to the people who had created these sites and one of the
0:53.4	first responses I got was from a girl in New Jersey and her twin sister.
1:00.6	I got a very polite text saying that they were willing to speak so I gave them a call
1:06.8	and quickly I learned that their story was just wrenching.
1:12.3	Melanie?
1:13.3	Melanie, can you hear me?
1:15.6	Yes.
1:18.3	From the New York Times, Unmicable Barrow, this is the Daily.
1:24.7	Today, the experience of immigrant families during the pandemic.
1:33.4	Annie Coriel with the story of one of them.
1:39.2	It's Tuesday, May 26.
1:42.2	Hi, Melanie.
1:49.1	How are you?
1:50.1	Hi.
1:51.1	I'm okay.
	...

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