Oh Mexico!

Whew! The whirlwind tour of America's borderlands is over, and here I sit trying to encapsulate the weekend in order to share it with all of you faithful blog readers. So here goes!

To Mexico via Limosina

At 5:15 PM Valentine's Day, we gathered in the prayer room for a brief reflection and prayer before embarking. At 7, we were snuggled into the bus, ready or not, Mexico, here we come! Our route headed south out of Denver via highway 25, with stops in Colorado Springs, Pueblo, and Albuquerque. Suffice it to say that early into the 12-hour bus ride, all comfortable positions were utterly exhausted. Our bus driver drove his rig with gusto, and we arrived in El Paso an hour ahead of schedule, good news for our cramped limbs!

Where's the line in the sand?

We were met at the station by West Cosgrove, a former Maryknoll missionary who now, with his family, runs Casa Puente, a center for education about border issues for groups such as ourselves who travel south to see immigration up close. West treated us to a delicious breakfast before engaging us in conversation about what we knew about the border and what we would like to know. After whetting our appetite, he drove us to three 'snapshots' of the border.

The first was high aloft a ridge. El Paso lay at our feet, with Juarez not far beyond. In fact, from this height, it was nearly impossible to tell where one country ended and another began, besides for the skyscrapers absent from Juarez's skyline. West pointed out to us Monte Cristo Rey, a peak divided between Mexico, Texas, and New Mexico. At its pinnacle stands a large cross, and every year on the feast of Christ the King, pilgrims from both countries climb to the top for mass and fellowship.

Our next snapshot was the border as fence, demarcating the boundary between Juarez and Sunland Park, New Mexico. For all the rhetoric about border enforcement, this fence was shockingly inept. Only about a mile long, it is easily walked around; only about eight feet tall, easily surmounted; and the best irony came from the two-foot tall drainage tunnel that offered an unhindered passageway under the fence for those humble enough to crawl. All in all, it was easy to wonder what exactly the purpose of such as structure was.

Finally, we met the border at the Rio Grande, known locally as Ni Grande Ni Brave for its paltry stream of water that snakes through Texas, having been ransacked for irrigation in New Mexico and Arizona. The Rio Grande forms the border the Gulf of Mexico and El Paso, where it heads north through US territory. Hence, at the breaking-off point, there begins a series of 276 concrete posts that deliniate the border through the desert lands past El Paso. We posed by the first marker, which stands next to a plot of dry soil used by Mexicans for weekend soccer games. The ball often escapes onto the US side, and is chased by futbolistsas.

And the Word became flesh and dwelt among us

We visited the Annunciation House in El Paso, a shelter for migrants and their families from Mexico. One of four current volunteers, Charlie, gave us a tour of the cramped dormitories and sparse chapel. From the roof, he pointed out where one of their former residents, a 19-year-old, was shot and killed by the Border Patrol while taking out the trash. Several other residents were witnesses to the shooting, and when they testified at the local police office, they were arrested by the Border Patrol and deported.

Theoretical questions about immigration policy, border enforcement, and migrants' rights become concrete and unaviodable in El Paso, the third-poorest city in the US. Charlie spoke of the fine legal line he and the other workers walk every day. As a private residence, they are protected from entry by the Patrol without a warrant. The legal quandry hinges on whether they are offering food and shelter to migrants who entered the states illegally, and passions run high on both sides. One sign that frequented El Paso read, "Humanitarian aid is never a crime."

Do bridges divide or unite?

At 5 PM, we walked the five-minute stroll from US to Mexican soil, over one of several International Bridges. We paid 35 cents for the priveledge, and didn't have to show passports, id, nothing. At the bridge's peak, where it rises above the middle of the Rio (not) Grande, the view beneath gives a glimpse into Mexico's opinions about US policy. Painted onto the Rio's concrete shores were slogans decrying the numbers of migrants killed in the journey each other, others exalting Latin American heroes such as the iconic Che, Fidel Castro, and Simon Bolivar, and still others denounced Bush as the real terrorista.

At the end of the bridge was Juarez, loud and cramped, with no buffer before the plunge into sensory Mexican cityscape. We met our Juarez guide, Jim Weaver, who with his wife and three small children serves as a Maryknoll missionary for a Juarez parish. Together we hopped on a public bus until we arrived at the Centro for Derechos Humanos, a human rights advocacy center where Jim also works. By this time, I was feeling drained, over-stimulated, and ready for a long extended siesta. Thankfully, after a talk about domestic violence and workers' rights in Juarez, we were treated to a delcious meal of stuffed meatloaf, and then - finally - a flat and stationary place to rest my head!

Saturday: Un Perfil de Juarez

'Perfil' - a profile, snapshot, outline sketch. Such we received Friday of the sprawling metropolis south of the border, Ciudad Juarez. Named for the first and only indigenous president of Mexico, Juarez is a city of children, migrants, and Catholics, explained Oscar, a former seminarian who now works at the human rights center. In the last few decades, the population of Juarez has exploded, mainly with migrants from poorer rural states in southern Mexico, propelled north by financial distress. Juarez is in the desert, and with little infrastructure in place to accomadate such a population boom, has undergone growing pains on a massive scale.

In brief: why do they come?

Mexico's social stability has long been tenuous, having endured a civil war and several revolutions in her short life as a republic. The majority of her people have lived for generations as subsistence farmers, surviving but without much excess profit. Hence, disasters both natural and manmade have long had potential to wreak havoc on her economy. However, when in 1994 leaders from the US, Mexico, and Canada signed a free trade pact known as NAFTA, the bottom fell out of Mexico's economy. While NAFTA is not the only factor in mass migration, it is a huge one.

Immigration analysts speak of 'push' and 'pull' factors in migration. The 'push' factor during the '90s in southern Mexico was that farmers whose crops had previously been protected by national tariffs were subjected to a tariff-free international economy with countries like the US, who heavily subsidizes their farmers. Unable to compete in the race to the bottom, countless rural farmers gave up the ghost.

But why move north? Hence the 'pull' factor: Juarez is a mecca for foreign companies because of its proximity to the US market, the tariff-free economy and (the pull) supply of steady low-wage labor (read: bankrupt peasants). Yes, jobs are widely available in Juarez, which attracts a steady stream of immigrant workers. However, the salaries of such jobs are not enough to support a family unless mom, dad, and maybe a few kids are working fulltime. Employment alone does not mean comfortable standard of living.

To be continued...