Our trip was hosted by an organization called BorderLinks. The BorderLinks' educational philosophy to these type of trips that they hope will incite delegations to forge a path towards dialogue and social change is simple: ver, pensar, y actuar. See, Think, and Act. Which is the way I will present my experiences of visiting the border. In this post, I will focus on what I saw, what I heard, and the type of experiences I took in. In two following posts, I will address my thoughts and what I'm still thinking about; and what I hope to do with the stories I heard and that really hit me hard with a plethora of emotions and feelings.
Prior to 1994, a wall never separated the cities of Nogales, Arizona (US) and Nogales, Sonora (MX); however, today a wall nearly 10-feet tall separates both cities in a region embedded in a history of movement and migration from the South to the North. This wall has changed the culture of the area and the lives of families and individuals. If the wall isn't an obstacle enough for migrants coming into the United States, then lets consider the vast Sonoran desert that they must cross by foot. The journey is about 5 days, and the sad and painful reality is, most don't make it. Many are arrested and deported in the process, but even more lose their lives in the process of enduring the extreme conditions of the Sonoran desert.
In a region, where migration is enrooted and embedded in the cultural history of the land, the enforcement of the border and the wall has affected the lives of everyone living in this area. One of the recurring themes I heard as to why migrants still cross into the U.S. is for work. But I heard this put a different way while hearing the story of a young mother who once while pregnant and again with her young daughters. She explained that migrants cross over the wall para sobrevivir. To survive. I realize that survival is such a complex concept to describe and talk. But as heard more stories from migrants, the concept of survival became an emotional concept to wrap my head around.
I spoke with a young man by the name of Victor, he was recently deported back to México, but had crossed into the U.S. when he was 15 years old (he was now 24). I heard how he crossed via Tíjuana and stowed away on a train from San Diego to Los Angeles. During his first year in L.A., at the age of 15, he slept in the cargo trains. Everyday, he'd try to find work, collecting cans in the meantime to cash in for change and food. He eventually landed a job cleaning house, but the pay still wasn't enough to find an affordable apartment. His second year, he moved from the trains to sleeping in Echo Park, following the same daily routine of going to work and then back to park just to sleep. Eventually his sister joined him in East L.A. and together they were able to find a small place. Survival. Is this survival? Back in Puebla, his hometown in México, he had escaped an equal amount of poverty, family abuse, and what perceived to be a dead-end life. He came to the U.S. para sobrevivir.
On my flight from Boston to Tucson, I did some reading about gay Mexican migrants. The topic of political asylum came up in my readings. The United States does not grant political asylum on the basis of state-sanctioned homophobia. I read stories about men that had been violently handled by their neighbors, raped by the local police, beaten and left to die without any legal intervention on the part of the local government or law enforcement. As I think I about survival, I think about surviving as queer person. For many, the United States is the promised land. We certainly have our own issues to work out here in the U.S., but how are we being a good neighbor to those that truly do need sanctuary; that truly need a place where they survive. We talk about how things will get better for some, but what are we actually doing to make it better now for our neighbors that need our support.
Photos by John Coggin and myself.
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