As disaster surrounded them, the indentured laborers continued to work to pay the bills

As thick gray smoke rose thousands of feet from the nearby Palisades fire Wednesday afternoon, blotting out the sun and turning everything north of Santa Monica an apocalyptic shade of orange, a small army of hired hands went about their business. like it was just another day at work.

Amidst the chaos and anxiety in this normally cozy seaside town — Santa Monica looks and feels like a thriving Midwestern town carved into a cliff overlooking the Pacific Ocean — landscapers keep cutting, builders keep building, and delivery trucks circle electric cars full of fleeing people. citizens.

The weather was “perfect for cutting down trees,” said Adrian Rodriguez, as he tossed a coiled garden hose into the back of an antique Nissan pickup. Sparks have not yet fallen.

It was 3 p.m., and Rodriguez, who lives in Los Angeles but is originally from Querétaro, Mexico, had already put in an eight-hour day as one of the worst natural disasters in California history loomed around him.

Most of his work was a little further from the fire line, he insisted.

Such is the case this week in west Los Angeles, which is usually a dream of beautiful beaches and spectacular sunsets. Those who seem to have everything you could ask for have reason to fear losing it. The unemployed must continue to work to survive.

A few blocks from the beach, on Palisades Avenue, David Salais and a team of Spanish-speaking construction workers pulled out their tools on a $13-million home (according to Zillow). They were loading their trucks when a Santa Monica Police Department boat overturned, prompting a mandatory evacuation order.

“We work with wind, rain, fire, natural disasters. We don’t stop. We keep going until the police chase us away,” said Salais, leaning on a 6-meter-tall carpenter’s level and nodding his head towards the police car.

Salais, of Santa Paula, said he was born in the US and is “part Mexican.” He was the only person among the workers who came and went from the house who was willing to be interviewed in English, especially.

Mexicans are wired differently, he joked, gesturing to the boys next to him. “Tienen ganas pa trabajar – they really want to work!”

A few blocks south, as residents struggled to get the valuables stored in their beautiful homes — financial documents, irreplaceable family photos, a large double parking space — out of cars waiting on the street, Marvin Altamirano steered his UPS delivery truck among them.

With a sun visor on his back and a pen attached to an elastic band, he patiently removed one of his earbuds to better hear the reporter asking why he was still bringing it.

“We have to pay the bills,” he said. “It’s not like they’re going to pay us to stop working and go.”

He was making deliveries in Pacific Palisades on Tuesday, when the fire was at its worst, but he wasn’t too close, he said. The smell of smoke was the worst in Santa Monica at 3 p.m. Wednesday, he said.

Could he deliver the goods if the road was on fire?

“It depends,” he said with a laugh. “How, how close, really? If it was down the road, yes, I would drop it and walk away.”

Just before the evacuation order reached their work site, on Marguerita Avenue near Ocean Avenue, a construction crew calmly repaired a damaged balcony in an apartment building, and a team ladder climbed the building to help stabilize the building.

“We have to survive; that’s why we’re still here,” said Josue Curiel, an Inglewood resident originally from Jalisco, Mexico. About half a dozen people in his group were also born south of the border.

“If you’re a worker, you’re hungry, so it is.”