Mexico. (World).

Meet Adrian and Maria, teenagers in Mexic . They live only 50 miles apart, but their worlds are almost totally different.

Adrian Padilla Jimenez, 13, lives in a tiny village about 50 miles southeast of Mexico City. He and his family share a small house at the end of a dirt alley, where dogs and chickens roam.

A single room serves as living room, dining room, kitchen, and bedroom for Adrian, his parents, and four younger brothers and sisters. Adrian's grandparents, aunt, and uncle live in the two other rooms.

Adrian's mother earns $47 a week shucking corn. His father once worked as a driver, but there has been no work for months. Now he too shucks corn.

About 40 percent of rural Mexicans don't have jobs, and 58 percent live in poverty. No wonder Adrian has modest (humble) goals. "I'd like to work and make money for my family," he says.

The Luxury of School

Each morning, Adrian walks to school up a dusty mountain road. The snowcapped peak of Popocatepetl (POE-poe-KAH-tuh-PEH-tel) looms before him. The famous volcano smolders, and sometimes erupts, spewing ash over Adrian's village of San Diego Huehuecalco (way-way-KAHL-ko).

Adrian is in eighth grade, but he doesn't have real teachers. Since the village is too poor to afford teachers, students watch classes on Only about half of the children make it as far as middle school. "Sometimes I think about continuing my studies," says Adrian. "But at other times, no."

After school, Adrian eats what his parents have left for him--usually rice and beans. Then he goes to work. When corn is in season, Adrian shucks with his parents. When it's not, he tends the family's sheep.

"Work is OK," he says. "I don't mind."

Adrian's home has no running water inside, so after work he washes up in a tin basin outside. Sometimes, dinner is no more than tortillas, the cornmeal pancakes that Mexicans use like bread.

But Adrian is content with his life. If he had more money? "Maybe I'd buy a pair of jeans," he says. "Or candy."

Rich and Poor

Maria Rodriguez Hernandez, 15, lives a world away from Adrian, in Mexico City. She shares a spacious apartment overlooking the city with her sister, Monica, 11, and their mother, Sylvia, a government employee.

The girls attend a private Catholic school. "The teachers care about your behavior a lot," says Maria. "You have to behave very well."

Maria expects to attend college, where she wants to study advertising. "When I grow up," she says, "I want to get married and have a beautiful house. I don't want to have children. I want an expensive car, and I'd like to travel."

Maria's family is part of Mexico's growing middle class, but most Mexicans would consider them to be rich. Mexico has one of the world's widest gaps between rich and poor.

The wealthiest 20 percent of Mexicans earn more than half of the national income. They drive luxury cars, live in mansions in exclusive neighborhoods, and send their children to the best colleges in Europe and the U.S.

Big Problems, Big Promises

The gap between rich and poor began with the Spanish conquest of Mexico in 1521, when the Spanish took the land for themselves.

After Mexico won its independence from Spain in 1821, a series of Mexican leaders promised to help the poor. But most leaders were corrupt (dishonest and unethical).

In 2000, after 71 years of rule by the Institutional Revolutionary Party (PRI, by its Spanish initials), Mexico held its most democratic election ever. Voters chose a dashing newcomer to politics--businessman Vicente Fox--as their new president.

Fox promised to end poverty and corruption, but so far he has been unable to make much progress in fixing either problem.

Widespread police corruption has made fighting crime difficult. Mexico is a major route for illegal drugs bound for the U.S. Smugglers often pay the police to look the other way.

Robbery and kidnapping are rampant (widespread) in Mexico City. Two years ago, Maria was beaten and robbed on a public bus. "A man came up to me," she recalls, "and hit me in the face and started cursing at me and demanding my money. When I gave him the money he hit me again."

Shortly after that, Maria's mother was attacked on her way to work. Her taxi pulled over, and two police officers jumped in. One held a knife to her stomach, while the other took her purse, jewelry, and ATM card.

Across the Border

Fox's fight against poverty has been an uphill battle. He promised to create 700,000 new jobs, but Mexico's economy has shrunk instead of grown. When the U.S. economy hit hard times last year, Mexico lost 500,000 jobs because of cutbacks at American-owned factories.

Each year, some 300,000 Mexicans cross the border in search of better-paying jobs, joining the 9 million Mexicans already living in the U.S.

However, the U.S. has strict immigration laws. So, many Mexicans, desperate for work, cross the border illegally--often under dangerous conditions.

Mexicans don't think this is fair. Mexican students learn that the U.S. invaded Mexico in 1848 and took what are now the states of Texas, California, Utah, Colorado, and most of Arizona and New Mexico.

According to a recent poll, 58 percent of Mexicans believe the Southwestern U.S. still rightfully belongs to Mexico. Most Mexicans think they should be able to cross the border without U.S. permission.

Spread of American Culture

Immigration is just one of the many tricky issues that complicate relations between the two countries. Because Mexico is so poor and the U.S. is so rich and powerful, many Mexicans have mixed feelings about their neighbor to the north.

For her part, Maria loves American movies and TV shows. She also loves Domino's Pizza, which delivers to her home. But she fears that this spread of American culture could swallow up her own country's traditions.

One of her favorite traditions is the celebration of El Dia de los Muertos, "The Day of the Dead," on November 1 and 2. Families build shrines with food and photographs to honor their dead relatives. "It's a celebration," says Maria, "to remember the people you love who died."

And what does Maria do on the eve of El Dia de los Muertos? Last year, she celebrated an American holiday: Halloween.

Your Turn

WORD MATCH

1. modest     A. windespread
2. rampant    B. pancakess
3. corrupt    C. humble
4. tortillas  D. newcomer
5. immigrant  E. dishonest

THINK ABOUT IT

Should the U.S. government allow more Mexicans to live and work in the
U.S.? Explain.

ANSWERS

1. C
2. A
3. E
4. B
5. D

RELATED ARTICLE: Mexico.

The northernmost country in Latin America, Mexico is part of North America. Of all the countries in the Western Hemisphere, only the U.S. and Brazil have more people. A majority of Mexico's people are mestizos--of mixed Indian and European (mainly Spanish) ancestry. Spanish is the official language, but 6 million Mexicans speak Indian languages primarily.

FACTS TO KNOW

AREA: 756,062 square miles, almost three times the size of Texas.

POPULATION: 99,600,000; 74% urban.

GOVERNMENT: Presidential-legislative democracy; Vicente Fox is President.

ECONOMY: Tourism and service industries are the fastest-growing parts of the economy. Oil is a major export. Agriculture provides less than 8% of Mexico's GDP. *

PER CAPITA GDP: $9,100.

MONETARY UNIT: peso, worth about 11 U.S. cents.

OFFICIAL LANGUAGE: Spanish

RELIGION: 90% Roman Catholic; Protestant and others, 10%.

LITERACY: Males, 93%; females, 89%.

LIFE EXPECTANCY: 73 years, males; 78 years, females.

* The value of all products produced by the country in a year, divided by the population. (GDP stands for gross domestic product; per capita means per person.)

QUESTIONS

1. What body of water borders the northeastern coast of Mexico?

2. What are Mexico's two largest peninsulas?

3. What river separates Mexico and Texas?

4. The Mexican Plateau lies between which two mountain ranges?

5. What city is closest to 20[degrees]N, 100[degrees]W?

6. Which U.S. and Mexican cities border both the Gulf of Mexico and the Rio Grande?

7. What countries border Mexico an the south?

8. What city lies closest to the Tropic of Cancer?

9. What is the approximate distance in miles between Leon and Mexico's capital?

10. What river flows into the Gulf of California?

ANSWERS

1. the Gulf of Mexico

2. the Yucatan Peninsula and Baja California

3. the Rio Grande

4. the Sierra Madre Occidental and Sierra Madre Oriental ranges

5. Mexico City

6. Brownsville, Texas, and Matamoros, Mexcio

7. Belize and Guatemala

8. La Paz

9. 200 miles

10. the Colorado River

Decide whether each sentence is true, false, or an opinion. Write your choice on the line provided.

___ 11. About 40 percent of rural Mexicans cannot read or write.

___ 12. Adrian and his family earn money by selling souvenirs to tourists.

___ 13. Mexicans should be allowed to freely enter the U.S.

___ 14. The gap between rich and poor people in Mexico is one of the biggest in the world.

___ 15. Most of the Southwestern United States once belonged to Mexico.

ANSWERS

___ 11. false

___ 12. false

___ 13. opinion

___ 14. true

___ 15. true