Ex-Convict and US Deportee Beats Odds to Become Mexico's Superstar Chef Martin Markovits - CGTN America
go to original April 21, 2017

Eduardo Garcia made his Maximo Bistrot one of the top restaurants in Mexico City’s thriving food scene. Among his customers are Mexican movie stars, elite politicians and other patrons. But for Garcia, the son of Mexican migrant laborers in the U.S., it had not always been that way.

“I actually never went to any school, I always worked. I have vivid memories of picking tomatoes and oranges for sixteen hours a day when I was five years old. It’s modern slavery,” Garcia explained.

An aggravated assault conviction in the U.S. landed Garcia in prison for three years. He was deported twice to Mexico in 2000 and 2007. He decided to stay in Mexico and through cooking, his true passion, turned his life around.

“I have been always told that I could never do that, I was always told I was a convicted felon. So for me I have to be better than everyone else and I always say I’m not the best cook and I’m not the worst cook. But I love what I do,” Garcia said.

Garcia opened his restaurant, Maximo Bistrot, in 2011 with four employees. Garcia and his wife now own three restaurants in Mexico City, and he is about to open two more in Paris and Dubai.

Garcia hopes his story can inspire the millions of his compatriots living illegally and in fear of being returned to their native land. He stands as proof that second chances do exist in a changing Mexico.

Read the rest at CGTN America

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