Thread: Another Denver feel good story.....

Today's SPORTS section of the Denver Post/Rocky Mountain News has a story of a 26 year old Mexican national and her swearing in ceremony as a U.S. citizen. She runs marathons or something and had a scholarship at Adams State here in Colorado.

OK so what is the beef? Well, this story mentions that she came to the US at age 16 from MEXICO. The article says she "joined her brother.." here in California and "enrolled" at a High School there! This is the second article in the POST/NEWS about her. The last one mentioned how her mom is still in Mexico and she has like 15 brothers and sisters.

I could be wrong BUT, did she enter the U.S. at age 16 as an illegal immigrant? Did she then start to run track at the Costa Mesa High School in California and then Adams State here in Colorado somehow got her a visa as a student athlete?

I could be wrong but 16 year old girls from poor Mexican families DO NOT get visas IN MEXICO at our consulate orr EMBSSY to enter California High Schools or do they?

I wish our Congressman Tom Tancredo would look into this to see if she initially entered the U.S. illegally? Again, I could be wrong, but the article just says she "joined her brother' in California but how? Legally and or illegally? Adams State gave her a scholarship and how? Of course, was aother American citizen and citizen of Coloradoo denied a scholarship because they gave it to her? The track coach in the previous article said "...we deny no one..." meaaning maybe we don't care if she was illegal?

I would love to see someone here in Colorado investigate this but I don't know if Tom Tancredo and his people would want to look into this...? Might not be politically inviting publicly but then again...?

If she violated US law when she entered the country would that not be grounds to deny any later visa and or citizenship? Costa Mesa High School must have records on her and she must have some prove of initial LEGAL US entry correct? If ICE only has paper work saying Adams State obtained a track VISA when she was 18 and she applied in Mexico then there are grouunds for refusal of citizenship or am I wrong?

Again, maybe she did come her LEGALLY but I have my doubts! Poor woman in Mexico with 16 kids and 16 year old daughter gets visa to enter US? NO WAY! The LAW does not work like that!

If I am right some heads could roll if someone wanted to make a big enough noise of this but again I could be wrong!

If you think about this person something just doesn't add up LEGALLY?

BTW Now that she is a citizen and she can now start the proccess to bring MOM and her 16 brother and sisters here too right? The Denver Post and its writers never saw any ILLEGAL they did not like!

http://www.denverpost.com/sports/ci_3057673

Immigrant runner (re)born in the USA
By John Meyer
Denver Post Staff Writer

Her eyes welled up during the "Celebrating Citizenship" video. Her emotions caught in her throat during the national anthem, and she wept while taking the oath of allegiance that anointed her a U.S. citizen. She dabbed away tears during the Lee Greenwood "God Bless the USA" video that concluded her naturalization ceremony Thursday in Denver.

With the solemn ritual a memory, Zoila Gomez sobbed in the arms of her sister, Alicia.

"Oh, it feels so good," said Gomez, 26, a native of Mexico and budding elite runner who had an outstanding collegiate career at NCAA Division II power Adams State in Alamosa. "You don't know how much this means to me."

It was obvious from the tears, the sniffles, the way she clutched the tiny American flag and wouldn't let go. There were 60 other "candidates for citizenship" in the room, including an 89-year-old woman from Kosovo who could barely walk and a young Peruvian in the U.S. Air Force who will be deployed to Iraq this week, but none was as visibly emotional as Gomez.

"I feel ... it's indescribable," Gomez said. "A lot of emotions, a lot of memories. You think, 'Wow, I'm in a very, very special group.' Every single one of us has a story. I wanted to start asking everyone else, 'What's your story?' You feel like you're not alone for the first time."

She says there are two Zoilas. One was born in 1979 in Charcas, a town of 10,000 in north central Mexico, the second youngest in a family of 16 children whose father died when she was 6. The other Zoila came to life after her arrival in the United States in 1996 when the runner within her awakened, even as she was learning English.

"Here I discovered something I learned to love," Gomez said recently during lunch at an Alamosa sandwich shop. "I guess it was in me, even when I was in Mexico, but I got to discover it here. I always said the runner was born here; Zoila Gomez was born in Mexico. Running is my other half, the part that completes me as a person."

Gomez knows she has a powerful story to share, and she wants to be a role model for other Mexican immigrants.

"I really think that's the reason I am who I am," Gomez said. "I really believe in God having me here for a reason ... the reason Zoila Gomez got the opportunity to discover her talent and to be successful."

Gomez left Mexico when she was 16 to join a brother in California and enrolled in high school in Costa Mesa. There she discovered her affinity for running, competing on a state champion cross country team. After high school she went to Orange Coast (Calif.) College, a community college where she won conference titles and caught the notice of Adams State coach Damon Martin.

Working for a better day

At Adams State she became a six-time national champion in track and cross country. In 2004 she was named the NCAA Division II woman of the year.

"When she came here, I thought she was a pretty good recruit," Martin said. "Right away she started doing things that were a lot better than I expected. I saw her talent was still really untapped."

Martin says what sets Gomez apart is her desire.

"So many kids in college, they still want to be a little bit of a student, and by that I mean the social part," Martin said. "She wasn't. She was just really committed to trying to do everything right from the get-go."

She wasn't afraid to get her hands dirty, either. Competing on a partial scholarship, Gomez helped pay for her education through a work-study program, sweeping floors and cleaning bathrooms on campus. She was happy to do it.

"I know people do it forever, old people, immigrants who come here and that's what they do," Gomez said. "The money they make, they send it to Mexico. Here I am, I'm sweeping floors, but in my heart I knew it was just temporary. If you can go down to the level of these people, and you can learn how to do that, things are going to be so much easier for you."
Taking the Big Apple

After earning an undergraduate degree last December in sociology, Gomez worked as an intern teaching English at Alamosa's Immigrant Resource Center, which provides legal assistance and other services in the San Luis Valley. When she finished the one-month internship, she continued working there as an AmeriCorps volunteer while pursuing her master's degree in counseling. She left this month when the center got a new crop of AmeriCorps workers.

"Her students just loved her," said Flora Archuleta, director of the center. "She's so energetic and she's so kind. Everybody just loved her."

Gomez got her first taste of big-time running in May when she ran for the Mexican team in the Bolder Boulder. There she met Mary Wittenberg, race director of the ING New York City Marathon, who would recruit Gomez to make her marathon debut in New York on Nov. 6.

"Her eyes say it all - sparkling, bright, energetic eyes that scream intense desire to be an excellent runner," Wittenberg said. "We think (New York) is the ideal place to celebrate her new citizenship. This will be her coming-out story."

Success in the long run

Former Adams State coach Joe Vigil, a legend in the running world who coached former Alamosa resident Deena Kastor to a bronze medal in the marathon at the 2004 Athens Olympics, hopes Gomez's American citizenship will help her attract sponsorship so she can begin to train like an elite runner.

"If the same type of thrust goes into her marathon training that she's had in everything else, you can't help but think she's going to be a success," Vigil said. "I've been totally impressed with her attitude toward life in general. She doesn't expect anything, like most people do. She's willing to work for it; she's willing to pay the price. She's got an attitude and an aura about her you don't see too often."

So far the adjustment to marathon training has gone well.

"On long-run Sundays, I become someone else," Gomez said. "I don't know what happens to me. Even if it's too long, even if my body is aching, I'm just really, really happy to be out there. One time Coach Martin said - and I'm always going to remember it - he said, 'I'm telling you, you were born to be a marathoner."'

In the days leading up to her naturalization, Gomez said she started wondering if it really would happen.

"I pictured myself in Mexico, in my room, waking up and being like, 'Mom, guess what? I just had a long, nice, incredible dream.' I'm like, 'Zoila, no, pinch yourself. You're not in Mexico, and you're not going to wake up."'

Staff writer John Meyer can be reached at 303-820-1616 or jmeyer@denverpost.com.

click here for the orginal story

http://www.rockymountainnews.com/drmn/c ... 12,00.html

and http://www.alipac.us/ftopic-6672-0-days ... zoila.html

OK Thanks TMS for posting the article! The "original article" basically admits she entered the country illegally since "..she applied for her legal residency....at age 17....upon arrriving ...." in Alamosa? See my point anybody?

So on what basis could she enter illegally and apply for legal residency when her father had died at age 6 and mom is in Mexico with 14 other brothers and sisters?

Obviously, the TRACK coach, this Martin who says "..who don't turn away anyone..." must have known he had an illegal immigrant?

Can anybody tell me how she was able to apply HERE in the US when she was illegal?


This is just another example of why we have no immigration policy whatsoever...just about anyone who wants in gets in and once they are here they stay.

Tom Tancredo should be asking someone, starting with this Colorado PUBLIC OFFICIAL, yes the track coach, why he may have abided and abetted an illegal?

Somebody HERE in Colorado should be screaming over this case but like so much with immigration nobody will probably bother to notice! There probably is some INS clause that lets her stay illegally while she applied for residency but for a 17 year old?