borderlinks
Stephanie Napolian
Borderlinks Report
On Wednesday February 25th our class visited
Nogales, Mexico. The culture change from here to
there is very drastic, and
it really made me appreciate how good we live in our country. One aspect of
the trip I found very interesting was at the Borderlinks house when we
listened to Jen Allen from the Border Action Network, and then following
that listened to the US Border Patrol. Another aspect I thought was very
impacting was eating lunch in the home of a poor Mexican citizen.
In Tucson we listened to Jen Allen speak out against the Border Patrol, and speak for the immigrants coming into our country. The things she said about Border Patrol were horrific. These included incidents of Border Patrol attacking people for no reasons on their homes and in their neighborhoods. It was very disturbing for me to hear of a government agency that is supposed to protect people, and what they are doing is physically and mentally attacking people some that are even innocent. After hearing all that we visited with Border Patrol in Nogales, AZ. We spoke with one of their agents, and he told us some information about some of their goals. He made it sound like they never use violence or excessive force, and that they are helping immigrants by politely bringing them back to Mexico. He wasn’t very convincing to me, and I also thought he answered questions very vaguely, almost like he was trying to hide stuff. The article Justice on the Border had a lot of good information, facts and statistics that backed up all the Border Action Network’s information. Jen Allen had a more solid argument, and was much more convincing than the Border Patrol agent. After hearing all that makes me lose faith in our government agencies that are supposed to protect people.
Another part of the trip I found very impacting was having lunch in the home of a poor Mexican citizen. What a culture shock! They didn’t even have running water in their house. The women whose house we were in scooped the water out of a garbage can that had been brought in from somewhere else. She had three kids and no job. One of her daughters was living in Nogales, AZ and hey hadn’t seen each other on months. I am not sure of the mother’s status, but compared to us she was very poverty stricken. There were kids playing with old toys right next to garbage and stray dogs. They did all seem happy, and probably grateful for what they do have, even though to us it is not very much. Between our group we knew some Spanish, but there was defiantly a language barrier. She didn’t know any English, but it was fun to try and figure out what each other was saying. I did think her lunch was very authentic and delicious!
This trip was very impacting, and it was a great way to understand everything we are learning about in class to actually experience it first hand. After spending the day there with citizens and in their neighborhoods it really made me realize why people want to migrate into the United States, and why some people are willing to risk everything just to get here in search of the American dream.