Border Immersion, Part 1

This is the first of many posts to come from the 2013 Border Immersion!  We traveled to Arizona to spend a week visiting and learning about the U.S.-Mexico border.  It was an intense and emotional experience, and one that will stick with me forever.  To start off the reflecting, here are a few pictures:

Our first morning in Douglas, AZ we visited the wall that marks the border between Mexico and the U.S.  It's incredibly intimidating, and stretches out as far as the eye can see.  On the U.S. side the wall is lit up by bright lights and closely monitored by surveillance cameras with a 3 mile range.  Border Patrol trucks are a common sight.  Douglas, AZ is the city on the right side of the fence, and Agua Prieta, Sonora is the city on the left side of the fence.  Due to its construction, you can see through the fence.  So people living close to the border can wake up every morning to literally see the homes of their neighbors on the other side of the fence.

Catie looking up at the fence.  This section of the fence was recently rebuilt, and was made even taller.  However, everyone we talked to, Border Patrol agents included, admitted that the fence doesn't stop any migrants from crossing.  It might slow them down, and there has been a drastic increase in the amount of injuries from the fence (broken legs, sprained ankles, etc.).  But the people who are crossing are so desperate that even the threat of injury from the fence, a criminal deportation, or death in the desert is not enough to dissuade them from crossing in search of a better life.

We woke up on Tuesday morning to snow in Douglas.  Coming from Cuernavaca's heat, the desert felt especially cold.  But we had met with migrants the night before who were planning on crossing, and most of them were just wearing a hooded sweatshirt and jeans.  No one was expecting snow.  Waking up to snow, I couldn't stop thinking about all the migrants who slept or walked through the snow in the desert the night before.  It must have been a miserable night.

Painted on the wall of a community center in Agua Prieta.  It reminded me of a quote that stood out to me in The Devil's Highway, that came from St. Toribio's "Prayer for Crossing Without Papers."  "I believe I am a citizen of the world, and of a church without borders."

Another view through the wall.  The landscape is exactly the same on either side.  Lethal desert that has killed thousands of migrants.

While walking in the desert we kept coming across items left behind by migrants as proof of their journey.  The most common items to see were bottles - bottles of water, of pop, of beer.  But we also ran across backpacks, clothing, deodorant tubes, combs, even part of a ladder.  Our guides could tell just by looking at jugs of water how long ago the migrant had passed through.

This is a political cartoon that was on the wall in Borderlinks, which was the organization we stayed with in Tuscon.  Our country's economy relies so much on undocumented labor.  Undocumented workers pick our crops and cook our food.  Without them, costs to consumers would be far higher than we are currently willing to pay.  But at the same time, we have in place a system that punishes workers for being undocumented while still desperately needing them.  The ICE (Immigration and Customs Enforcement, formerly the INS: Immigration and Naturalization Service) agent we spoke to also discussed this a bit.  He mentioned that if we gave everyone papers, then they would move to a new job with better pay and better benefits, leaving behind a job that another undocumented worker would take.  It's a vicious cycle.

This is part of a monument for migrants who have died while crossing the desert.  Each rock holds the name of an individual who died, while the unknown deaths are marked simply by "Desconocido" (unknown).

Immigration

This is a hard post to write. 

Immigration.

 Mexican immigration. 

There are so many negative connotations about this floating around in the the American consciousness right now.  You only need to read the comments section of an article about Obama's push for immigration reform to see some of the sheer hatred, racism, and misinformation that many Americans feel.  From where I sit right now, it's hard to see the justification for some of these comments, if there even is one.  Everyone has a story of crossing to the U.S., of trying to earn a living wage, of walking through the desert, of applying for visas at the U.S. embassy. 

One of my previous co-workers was shot and paralyzed while trying to help someone being robbed.  He was shot while being in the U.S. without papers.  Does this mean that he is an evil individual without regard for U.S. law?  I don't think so.  Was he taking an "American" job?  Sure.  Was it a job that a U.S. citizen wanted to perform?  Probably not.  This issue is complicated and far more muddled than most people want to see. 

Let me help you clear up some myths about Mexican immigration, as I see it:

Myth 1: Mexican immigrants take American jobs.
 Yes, technically undocumented Mexican workers are working in American jobs, that theoretically U.S. citizens could be working at.  But the reality is that most undocumented workers are working jobs for pay that American citizens are unwilling to work them at.  Last summer a lot of the Washington asparagus crop didn't get harvested, because there weren't enough workers willing to spend all day cutting asparagus.  A couple of years ago Stephen Colbert talked about immigration on his show, and put out a job application for a farm worker, doing the type of work many undocumented Mexican workers do.  Only a handful of people applied.  Even documented Mexicans aren't usually willing to do this work; if they can get a legitimate waged job, that's what a lot of people are going to choose.

Myth 2: Undocumented immigrants cost American taxpayers thousands of dollars a year.
Luis Alberto Urrea discusses the financial costs vs. benefits of undocumented workers in the U.S. in his book The Devil's Highway (check out the final chapter of the book for a good breakdown on these issues).  According to the Center for Immigration Studies, the average adult Mexican immigrant costs taxpayers $55, 200 over a lifetime.  Urrea breaks this down further though: those $55,000 equal social services that immigrants use and don't pay for.  However, most migrants pay federal and state income taxes and social security out of their paychecks, and they won't be filing for a tax refund or be receiving the social security later on.  Regardless of where your income is coming from, everyone pays sales tax, and everyone has to buy food and pay for rent somewhere, which again fuels the economy and pays for services that likely won't be taken advantage of.  Undocumented workers are also far less likely to attempt to access social services for fear of being deported.  The American Graduate School of International Management found out that in 2002, Mexican immigrants paid $600 million in taxes, but received only about $250 million in social services.  That means that the U.S. financially profits from undocumented immigrants.  The same study reported that Arizona annually receives $8 billion in economic impact from their relationship with Mexico.

Myth 3: Mexican immigrants are going to take over the U.S.!
You've probably heard the statistic that in 20 years or so, people of Caucasian descent will no longer be the majority in the U.S., and that Hispanics are the fastest growing minority.  I have no reason to doubt these statistics, but there was actually a net loss in the number of Mexicans in the U.S. in 2012, as more people returned to Mexico voluntarily or were deported (Obama is actually the president with the most deportations, despite calls for immigration reform) than actually entered the country.

Americans need to understand the situation around Mexican immigration, and understand the role the U.S. has played in encouraging some of this migration.  Minimum wage in Mexico is 60 pesos a day, which comes to 1200 pesos a month, or about $100.  It's not surprising, then, that many Mexicans look to well-paying jobs in the U.S., where they can make more in an hour than they could in an entire day.  For families fighting for their lives, this sort of decision makes sense, and I don't want to judge someone who has to choose whether to feed their family or cross into the U.S. without papers.  As Americans, we also need to recognize how U.S. policy has played into this.  (I wrote a little about this after our November retreat.)  NAFTA and other economic policies screwed the Mexican economy and helped lead to some of these conditions, while at the same time U.S. immigration policy changed, which forced immigrants to go through the most dangerous parts of the desert and has resulted in thousands of deaths. 

During our retreat, Andrea handed out copies of the ELCA's social message on immigration as a way to help us frame some of our thoughts and reflections.  Reading this document, it was helpful to realize that my church recognizes the brokenness of the system and the need to advocate for immigration reform, along with our responsibility to care for our neighbor and those who appear to be strangers in our midst, recalling that we are an immigrant country and an immigrant church.  "Recalling that our families were once the 'stranger' - and remembering our Lord's call to love our neighbor as ourselves - can expand our moral imagination, enable us to see the new 'stranger' as our neighbor, and open us to welcome today's newcomers" (2). 


I'm not writing this post to tell you to support the immigration of undocumented Mexican workers to the U.S.  Clearly, this is a complicated issue, but I hope we can come together anyways, and work for justice for all people.

I hope we can continue to extend support to our neighbors who have immigrated, whether they have come with papers or without papers.

I hope we can continue to advocate for economic justice for all people, including our Mexican neighbors.

I hope we can agree that separated families are a bad thing, and we should work to keep families together.

I hope we can work for better solutions than sending thousands of people to die in desert in search of a better life.

Walls

Walls are everywhere here.  Homes, parks, gardens, all rest behind walls.  Look down a residential street anywhere in Cuernavaca, and you likely won't see many cars, or people, or grass.  Instead, you will see thick concrete walls with impenetrable gates.  In my home, there are 8 houses that share a driveway and exist together behind a wall.  There's a community back here: my cousins live next door, the dogs are let out to run and play, the kids can play outside without fear of cars, there's even a tiny garden way in the back.  But that's the extent to which I know my neighbors, because every other home on our street is also hidden behind a wall.  You never know what beautiful spaces are just behind that gate you wonder about.

During closing worship during in-country orientation in September, we read Robert Frost's poem "Mending Wall" (it's long, but definitely worth reading!).  Andrea's sermon about the literal and figurative walls we will encounter in this year hit home for me.  I've been trying to not build walls around myself this year, but I know I invariably am.  I feel all too often that people here don't really get me, and try to put me into a box I don't want to be in.  I'm guilty of doing the same thing.  When I see other volunteers interacting with their friends in a way that's so different than how I normally see them, I realize that I'm not the only one here who is probably perceived differently by this group than by my friends back in the U.S.  I try not to build these walls around myself, but the reality is that when I feel like I'm being misrepresented, I tend to withdraw further rather than trying to tear down those walls.

In about 3 weeks I, and the rest of the Mexico YAGMs, will be visiting the Mexico-U.S. border and the infamous wall that marks the border in much of the Southwest.  Do good fences really make good neighbors?  Does this fence really make the relationship between Mexico and the U.S. better?

Do the walls I build around myself really protect me, or do they just make it easier to be misunderstood?

"Before I built a wall I'd ask to know/ What I was walling in or walling out,/ And to whom I was like to give offense." 

Family Blessings

Today is the 5th anniversary of my host brother Iker's death.  Iker died as a result of complications from Down's Syndrome when he was about 2 years old after spending most of his life in the hospital.

Yesterday, when Zury told me about the anniversary, I asked her if this was a sad day for her.  To my surprise she said no, that she's glad because she knows Iker is in a better place.  She and Mauricio went to the cemetery for a little while this afternoon, but they are incredibly open about this loss in their lives.  This day felt like any other in my family.  If anything, it's been one of my better days with my family recently.  Mauricio has been eating lunch at home lately, and today the whole family, plus Estefania, was able to eat together.  As we were finishing our meal, we started playing a game: We took turns asking each other questions, and the first person to respond with "si" or "no" lost.  After playing this for a while, I introduced them to the question game, where you start a conversation with a person using only questions, and the first person to not be able to respond with a question loses.  Our lunch table soon turned into lots of smiles and laughter.  Maury, my 9 year old brother, finds many things hilarious and kept collapsing into giggles.  It was a good afternoon and makes me incredibly thankful for this family that has opened their doors and their hearts to me.

December tidbits

December kind of got away from me, so I'm going to attempt to share a few stories here!

Work at ALEM: ALEM has stayed mostly the same this month.  More research projects, some time helping in the workshop, afternoons watching Rosy cooking comida for the team (I am slowly learning how to cook a few things!), sleeping kittens in my lap, etc.  There was one exciting morning where a group from Portland came to visit us.  They were staying at the convent where the Mexico YAGMs stayed for orientation, so I got to say hi and chat with Hermana Raina again.  She is possibly the sweetest woman ever.  I also just enjoy anytime that I get to talk with people from the Pacific NW, as I miss it so much!  One woman somehow recognized me from PLU (I'm not entirely sure how that happened, but it was pretty cool).  I shared some of my work with them, and even translated a few questions at the end when Mayra was busy.  ALEM's Christmas event this year was a trip to Xochimilco.  Xochimilco is a series of canals in Mexico City.  You rent a boat, and then float down the canal.  We ate lots of food, and just enjoyed life together.  The entire time, different food and souvenir vendors and mariachi bands were floating by on their own boats, trying to sell their products.  It was a fun way to celebrate with the team!

Garfield and Pirata keep me company while I work on my computer

hundreds of brightly colored boats!

enjoying some of the music at Xochimilco

CEDISH: I didn't really work with CEDISH in December.  Lots of things in Mexico kind of shut down in December in preparation for the holidays, and CEDISH was no exception.  However, I was invited over to bake cookies one evening, which was pretty exciting.  We baked M & M cookies, as chocolate chips are difficult to find here.  I was the master baker, and taught everyone how to bake.  Mitzi's son had even invited a friend over so that he could join in on the baking.  I was a little surprised that Mitzi and Magnolia don't really know how to bake much.  Unfortunately, baking (and baked goods) aren't really a big deal here in Mexico, so it shouldn't be too surprising that most families don't do much (my host family is always surprised by the things I like to bake).  Mitzi even showed me a chocolate cookbook she bought but doesn't know how to use, so I foresee many other baking parties!  It's a positive first step in building relationships.  They also invited me to visit Ocotepec with them to view many of the nacimientos (nativity scenes) that families had set up outside of their homes.  They were quite elaborate!

YAGM Christmas Party:  On December 15th we had our YAGM Christmas party!  I attempted baking my family's cinnamon pull apart bread with Casey, and it was a great success!  A familiar taste of home for the holidays.  There was also lots of other delicious food, and I ate so much that I almost felt sick.  We also had a White Elephant gift exchange.  Everyone brought a small gift, and when we arrived Andrea informed us that there were also other presents for us!  Turns out that the Mexico YAGM program has a tradition of leaving behind presents for the next year's group.  A big THANK YOU to the Mexico YAGMs from last year.  It's a little bit absurd how excited we were for Tide to-go pens, half bottles of lotion and hair stuff, and the pop-tarts from Andrea.  But with our stipends, even the simplest presents are exciting.  We finished off the evening by going to St. Michael's for their Lessons and Carols service.  It's still not quite the same as going caroling in the U.S. or attending the Christmas Eve service at my church, but it was the one chance to sing any English Christmas carols, so it was greatly appreciated!

Christmas:  I celebrated Christmas with my host family.  On Christmas Eve I had been told that we were going to Zury's mom's house for comida and then to Mauricio's family's home for dinner.  Although I still had no idea of what to expect, having a general idea of the schedule was nice.  Then Christmas Eve happened, and I remembered that in Mexico I had to throw all my ideas of what my day is going to be like out the window.  Zury was in and out all morning, running errands and prepping food.  She came back from one of her many trips at about 2:45 (we were supposed to have arrived at Ana's house at 2).  I started chopping celery at around 3, and then helped wrap some presents at 3:15 or so.  At 3:30 Zury tells me to get in the car, as we have to go to the supermarket again.  At this point I just assumed she had forgotten to get something for our meal.  I was completely off-base, as usual.  We go into Soriana's (the grocery store by my house) and Zury goes to speak with a manager of some sort.  She then heads to the appliance section, grabs the barcode for an oven, and then takes it over to a cashier.  Turns out we were at the store to buy a new oven as a Christmas present for her mom!  This whole transaction took maybe 10 minutes, but then it took another 20 minutes to figure out how to load the oven into the back of her tiny car.  We finally crammed ourselves in, stopped at home for 2 minutes to grab the presents, and then take off.  It was a pretty chaotic afternoon, and we finally got to Ana's house at 4, only 2 hours behind schedule.  Comida itself was fine; I got a little overwhelmed with the sheer chaos of that family all afternoon.  While handing out presents there was a great deal of chanting and singing (along the lines of "open it, open it").  I got a couple of small presents from my family, which was pretty sweet.  We finally got home around 9 pm, but were only home long enough for Zury to finally take her shower (she had run out of time in the morning).  Then we headed to see Mauricio's family.  4 generations live in the same house, so there are always lots of people around.  There were fireworks for about 2 hours, most of which were just loud bangs, and then we got around to presents by about 12:30 or so.  Maury then fell asleep on the couch, and our "midnight dinner" started at around 1:15 or so.  I didn't really eat much, as I was far too tired.  We finally made it home around 2 am.  Then on Christmas Day I attended church with Catie and Colleen before heading home to skype with my family.  Then we headed to Zury's aunt's home for a quiet afternoon.  We played some video games on the kinect, ate more food, and had a couple of piñatas.  I felt much more relaxed at this family gathering, as it included less awkward small talk, and the games reminded me of my family's holiday celebrations.  Then I raced home to finish packing so I could leave for my vacation!  It was a jam-packed couple of days.

Vacation: I traveled with Colleen to Zihuatanejo/Ixtapa, which is about an 8 or 9 hour bus ride from Cuernavaca.  We took an overnight bus, so were a little exhausted the first day.  Our vacation was full of relaxing days on the beach, lots of reading, snorkeling, swimming, meeting lots of cool people, and my first surf lesson!  Our first night at dinner we started talking to a friendly Canadian man vacationing with his young son.  He secretly paid our bill, which was a great way to start our vacation!  Something I want to pass along at some point...  We also hung out some with a couple staying at our hostel.  They were from the UK, and they had both quit their jobs to spend a year traveling through Australia, Central and South America.  As they had been in Zihuatanejo for a few days already, they were able to give us lots of tips for what to do.  This week was a nice relaxing break from life in Cuernavaca, but it has been so nice to get back home!  It was also a little weird to be spending so much more money than I do on a regular basis here.  I was aware the entire time of how privileged I am to get to go to the beach for a week at Christmas.

Colleen and I ready for our overnight bus!

the main beach in Zihuatanejo - everything was pretty crowded, because most Mexicans have a week or two of vacation around Christmas, and a lot of them head to the beach

welcome to the Pacific coast of Mexico!  So nice to see the ocean again; 4+ months is a long time for a Washington girl!

enjoying the heat

Happy New Years everyone!  I head back to work tomorrow, go back to language school for a week on Monday, and then have another YAGM retreat to look forward to at the end of the month.  I can tell that the rest of my YAGM year is going to fly by...

retreat reflections

Our November retreat was all about globalization and food security issues.  Prior to the retreat we had to read Field Guide to the Global Economy, and then during the retreat we talked about the book, a documentary about food in the U.S., NAFTA, corn farming in Mexico, and all sorts of other related topics.

Things I learned:

• NAFTA has kind of screwed Mexico, in several ways.  Among them: NAFTA allowed the U.S. to flood the Mexican market with super cheap corn (corn subsidies allow corn to be sold at a cheaper price than Mexicans can grow corn.  As corn is the backbone of the Mexican diet, this is a problem and puts many Mexicans out of work).  At the same time, immigration policies were stiffened, basically forcing Mexicans to cross into the U.S. at the most dangerous places, ensuring that only the most physically fit Mexicans (and thus some of the best workers) survive the trip.  This policy has resulted in the deaths of millions of Mexicans.
• Corporations really are people!  Only not in a good way.  In a we-can-now-sue-the-government-for-anything-that-could-possibly-affect-free-trade way.  NAFTA lifted all restrictions to free trade, which means corporations can sue governments for laws that might affect free trade.  As an example, a Canadian mining company tried to sue California for a law phasing out the use of a dangerous chemical, because this was going to negatively impact their business.  In other words, companies have an absurd amount of power and the potential to change laws enacted through the political process.
• Countries are not necessarily allowed to put controls on their imports.  Examples: genetically modified foods can't be legislated against, in Thailand the government was forced to allow cigarettes to be imported which resulted in a 10% increase in cigarette consumption.
• Companies leverage the threat of pulling their factories from a country when there is the possibility of having to accept union workers, higher wages, paying taxes, etc.  When productions costs rise in the host country, many companies leave in the middle of the night, leaving suddenly unemployed workers (I saw this firsthand in Namibia).  Many companies are also enticed to set up operations in a given country with promises of tax breaks (again, I saw this in Namibia).  This means that a corporation receives large tax breaks, and all the country gains is increased local employment.  Granted, this is a good thing, but is it worth the cost?
• Reminders about the (usually) awful conditions in factories around the world: their labor practices, low wages, environmentally suspect policies, and increased questions about what impact I can possibly have as a consumer, especially when it's so hard to learn about individual companies' practices.

Every  morning on these retreats we start the day with some sort of reflection.  One morning Alicia led a short Bible study on part of John 9.  The last verse in the chapter reads:

"Jesus said, 'If you were blind, you would not be guilty of sin; but now that you claim you can see, your guilt remains.'" John 9:41 (NIV)

I know it's pretty dangerous to take just one Bible verse and use it to prove a point, but you'll just have to trust me here that these conclusions came from a longer discussion of the rest of the chapter as well, and reflect the context from which we were thinking during the retreat.

Our group decided that this verse was an affirmation that we are not allowed to claim ignorance on issues of globalization and food.  It's a challenge to us.  Now that we're (at least semi-) educated, we can't be innocent of the actions we take and choices we make.  I believe an exact quote from this discussion was, "Now that we've seen some things, what are we going to do about it?" 

So that's my challenge to you.  Now that you've read this blog, try to educate yourself a bit more on some of these issues.  Choose one that pertains to your home community, a country where a YAGM is currently serving (a list of most of their blogs can be found here), or research your favorite clothing company to see if you can ethically support them.  Try to be an educated citizen of our global community, because the choices you make have greater implications.

Now that you've seen some things, what are you going to do about it?

November Retreat in Photos

Here's the start of my reflections on my first retreat here in Mexico.  It was an incredibly life-giving week with close friends, and here's some photos!

This plaque is on an old building in Mexico City, close to where we stayed on the retreat.  It commemorates the Irish soldiers who fought on the side of Mexico in the Mexican-American war and were later executed by the U.S.  The plaque reads, "In memory of the  Irish soldiers from the heroic Saint Patrick battalion.  Martyrs who gave their lives for the Mexican cause during the unjust invasion by North Americans in 1847."  Just another example of the victors writing the history books.  It's a good thing to be educated!

Mexico City was a lot colder than Cuernavaca usually is, and it was the first time the 8 of us had been reunited for longer than an afternoon since orientation.  Lots of cuddling time!

giant poinsettia Christmas tree - Christmas has definitely come to Mexico!

Metropolitan Cathedral in Mexico City (on the Zocalo): according to my guide book it's the largest cathedral in Latin America, and we had some free time to look around inside.  Like everything else on the Zocalo, it's pretty big.

The Zocalo with the GIANT Mexican flag.  It was a little overwhelming, just because of the sheer size.

We had one short afternoon of sightseeing in Mexico City.  It was just enough time to learn how the Metro system works, visit the Zocalo, walk around inside the cathedral, eat lunch, and visit Templo Mayor/Tenochtitlán.  Templo Mayor was the center of the Aztec world, and the ruins were discovered in the heart of Mexico City in 1978.  We got to visit and walk around a little.  This is part of our group at Templo Mayor, with the cathedral in the background (that's how close it is to the Zocalo!)

Thanksgiving dinner!  While our Thanksgiving was a little late, it was pretty delicious, and well worth the wait.  Dinner with all the fixings!  Turkey, mashed potatoes, sweet potatoes, jello salad, roasted veggies, stuffing, bread, homemade applesauce, and the ever-important pumpkin pie with vanilla ice cream!

I got a few cards at the end of the month that helped brighten my days!  These cards are from the Sunday School classes at Memorial Lutheran Church in Toledo, OH, one of the sponsor congregations for our country coordinator.  It was pretty exciting to get homemade cards, complete with stickers and drawings of tigers.

After the retreat ended we all headed to Tepoztlan to hang out and climb to Tepozteco again.  It's amazing how much easier hiking is when you can see!  It was also just a good time to continue our group bonding with some hiking, a movie, and walking through the Sunday market.

This is what Tepozteco looks like during the day.