Fifteen Minutes: Working to Seguir: Luis Alberto

Most students endure Harvard classes so that they can work one day. Luis Alberto endures his Harvard work so that he can study here. His job as a dining hall employee at Kirkland and Eliot House allows him to study at the extension only $40 dollars a semester and pursue his principal passion--estudiar, to study.

"What I get here is just above minimum wage so I pursue other ways to make money," he said in Spanish. "I'm not studying the way I want. I want to work less and study more." To supplement his income he invests in the stock market. "I've been investing for the last twelve years. Right now I have Internet access and a broker." His current hot pick? AI solutions, a company that provides human resources. "Last year was very bad, because of the markets in Asia," he explained. "This year, I'm not sure. The governmentis threatening to raise interest rates, which would hurt'things. They donit want the market to go up."

Alberto has balanced his financial needs with his desire for an education ever since he came to Boston from El Salvador 14 years ago. He came during the throes of a civil war to visit his sister. "I wasn't sure I was going to stay, but I knew there was that chance. It was a new world. The people weren't amigos. You'd talk to them, and they wouldn't answer." He worked to a high school diploma at Arrow High School in Brookline while washing dishes in Jamaica Plain. He then worked at the Newbury College dining hall, simultaneously amassing two years worth of college credit.

Alberto speaks English proficiently but prefers Spanish. At Kirkland, he wears the standard dining hall uniform--black shoes, black pants and apron over a standard-issue maroon polo. His hat covers his black curly hair. These curls and his boyish grin belie his actual age of 30.

He changes out of his uniform to go dancing--at Ryles on Thursday nights and at a Columbian club in Everett on Saturdays. Look for him. He will be the smooth dancer twirling his partner as he listens to her stories. "I like salsa, merengue, cumbia and even flamenco and tango--the older, formal music. I like these rhythms because you can dance close, suavecito, and talk to the chica. You ask questions -- What's your name? Where are you from? Where do you work? If she's not Latina, why does she like el ritmo Latino?"

Alberto deems American rock music acceptable when there is no sexual tension between a couple. With a large group from Kirkland, it would suffice, he suggested. For dancing with a partner, though, it is a poor "What are you going to talk about? There's so much noise," he declared. Salsa is his favorite rhythm. "There are so many pasos (steps). Merengue is only one rhythm. But with salsa, you can dance to the front, to the side, or back. You can dar muchas vueltas (twirl around and around)."

Where Alberto finds time to go dancing is unclear. In a frantic day at Harvard, he lays out desserts at Kirkland and races to the connecting hallway. From there he pushes a stack of plates to the Eliot dining hall. Then, he starts cleaning, or acting on someoneis request, or issuing orders himself. One Saturday, Luis declared, "Today, I'm the general manger." On Saturdays and Sundays, the managers come in only for five minutes or so, to make the payroll. "It's hard, because I have to do my job, and also tell other people what they should be doing."

The renovation of the Kirkland and Eliot dining halls, widely lauded by students, has made work even more difficult for Alberto. "Now there's no room to move around. They took away space. And the plates are much, much heavier," he said. "We have it hard here already because we're working two different dining halls."

Alberto works Thursday to Monday from 11:45 a.m. to 8:45 p.m. On Monday and Thursday mornings, he takes a class in English composition at the extension school. He drives a limousine for Commonwealth Limousine Service on his two days off to the airport, hotels, New Hampshire and other far-flung destinations. "Driving here is the worst," he said. "In New York, at least the roads are one way, but, here there are lots of rotaries. It's very dangerous. There will be three exits, and you have to memorize the route, or you just go around, and around."

Alberto leaves his car on the street near the football stadium every morning and hurries to Kirkland on foot. "I can't drive any farther," he said. "There's traffic, no parking and all one-way streets." His shared apartment in Allston gives him parking privileges there. Alberto lives with a Korean and a Cuban college student. "We never see each other because we're all so busy. We all cook for ourselves," he said.

He is almost too busy to foster an intimate relationship. "I went out with a girl from B.C., who works in Montpelier, Vermont, now. And I was with another girl from Newbury College for one and a half years," he said. "But you have to have time, which is impossible if you're always working. And you have to be close to them, all the time, or they're going to leave." He broke into English to explain, "It's like a flower. If you don't put water on it, it gets dry."

Alberto reads popular magazines, complex novels and hometown news in whatever spare time he finds. "I like W," he declared. "You figure out what styles arecoming out." He recently finished Cronica de Una Muerta Anunciada (Chronicle of A Death Foretold), by Gabriel Garcia Marquez. "He's Columbian," Luis explained, "but heis lived in Spain, Mexico and Cuba. He told Fidel he was going to help, and he did. Fidel adores and admires him. He started a school of cinema there and has a house." Many stores in the area sell publications from El Salvador. "I keep up with the sports there, new projects, and how the economy's going."

Last month, he became an American citizen. Brimming with pride and emotion, he explained the process. "Some people take a class to pass the test, but I just read a book, and then answered some questions. It was easy," he said. The test starts locally and ends nationally. Alberto revisited some of the questions he faced and then answered them, "Who is the governor of Massachussetts? Paul Celucci. Where is the White House? 1600 Pennsylvania Avenue. Who was Martin Luther King? A civil rights leader. Who freed the slaves? Abraham Lincoln. Easy questions like that." The most difficult part of the process was dealing with immigration workers. "Those are bad people," he said. "They don't treat you well."

Luis easily articulates differences between his former and current countries. "In the United States, people work all the time. They even think about work in their sleep. You can't take time off to go fishing, like you can in El Salvador." He added, "The United States is number one in the world, in terms of wealth and technology. And in terms of the equality of women. Women here are much more business-minded than in Latin America, where they tend to just take care of the house."

"I want to continue working and studying," Alberto said. "It would be really boring to stay at this job. I want to seguir (advance)." He has vague notions of what he might be doing in 10 years. "I'd like to have a place in a school," he replied. "Not as a teacher, I don't know if I have that ability, but maybe recruiting students, or motivating them, or giving them advice. Something in a school, though."

Tim Warren lives in Lowell House. He has recently cut his hair to keep with the latest fashion trends. This is the final article in a series on Harvard workers.