La Frontera: The Border

I notice four women huddled in a corner quietly devouring the savory cocido, a Mexican chicken stew. It is breakfast at the comedor, and the place is a beehive of chatter and clattering dishes. Except for these four women.

Cocido for breakfast

They make no eye contact when I approach them. One woman has long curly black hair braided in a hundred tiny braids reaching down to her waist. She speaks a little English; I speak a little Spanish. She tells me that the women did not know each other and were not traveling together, but all four were picked up in the desert yesterday by US Customs agents and deported. One woman speaks up and tells me she has been walking alone for “ocho dias”, eight days. Shivering in the cold morning air, she leans into her soup and shuts down. And I am speechless.

Eight days? Alone?

The rest of the women also confess that they have been crossing the desert alone with no coyote or group to guide them. It is too expensive.

Women of the comedor

So here’s the deal: if you cross into the United States without paying a coyote, and you are caught by a coyote somewhere in the desert, you are often beaten, raped, assaulted, robbed, and left to die. There are harsh lessons to be learned in the world of migration.

I ask, “Where were you trying to go in the US? Do you have family across the border?”

One woman tells me she has a husband and baby in Nevada. Another has three children in California and is trying to “go home.” The woman with the long braided hair is not going to try and cross again. She has children in Phoenix, but….and she cannot finish her sentence. She is getting on a bus and heading to Guatemala, her place of birth. She knows no one there. All four women were picked up in the United States during “sweeps” in their workplace and were deported.

Madonna and child

A Samaritan colleague approaches the woman who has been walking alone for eight days and puts her arm around her. The woman turns and clings to the Samaritan. And this is a hug for dear life. She is weeping as my Samaritan friend holds her and tries to comfort her. We all step back and give this woman some space. Father Rodrigo approaches and speaks quietly with the woman for a few moments. Later he shares with us that this woman—this mother trying her best to return to her family—has not been touched or comforted like this for a very long time. Maybe never. She is overwhelmed with the hug and the caring and cannot speak right now. We are all quietly witnessing the pain and the sadness, not knowing quite what to do.

A Samaritan hug

I thought about these four women today at a Samaritan’s meeting in Green Valley, Arizona. They are all mothers risking their lives to be with their children. They were walking alone, without a map, in the desert in November. Temperatures hover at 32 degrees these nights.

And so today I sit in a Samaritan’s meeting and hear this story:

A Border Patrol officer reported to one of the Samaritans this past week that a two year old child had been found wandering alone in the desert, lost, dehydrated, and “sleeping on the rocks.” A group of eight migrants had found this toddler and flagged down the Border Patrol for help.

A child lost and alone in the desert. I am horrified.

The child was taken immediately to a medical facility. No one knows what happened to the parents. I do not know the fate of this child.

"To my Mother"---a Nogales cemetery

The illegal entry of non-nationals into the United States is a misdemeanor according to the Immigration and Nationality Act, about on par with a speeding ticket. We pay a fine for a speeding ticket. Why not pay a fine for entering the US illegally? What happened to our sense of what constitutes a serious crime?

Now I ask you, is death in the desert a fair and just sentence for a person entering this country illegally?

We have crossed a line here with our Homeland Security and our walls. I struggle with how we are going to get back “home” again—back to the country I remember where we had the biggest and most generous heart on the planet. It keeps me awake on these cold desert nights.

UPDATE:

This is an update on the two year old babe that was picked up “alone” in the desert. The toddler was found “sleeping on the rocks” in a remote area of the Sonoran desert. The baby has been returned to its mother in Mexico. The story is convoluted and of course there are details that I do not understand. An officer of the Border Patrol gave a Samaritan colleague this report:

The mother was deported to Mexico with the child many days ago from a city in the US. After a period of time she went to the US Consulate and reported that her child was missing. Upon investigation, the Consulate discovered that a two year old toddler had been found in the desert and taken to Child Protective Services in the US. Further questioning of the mother revealed that she had “hired” two men to smuggle her baby back into the United States to be delivered to family members. The two men were picked up by the Border Patrol, and nearby was the baby, perhaps “sleeping on the rocks.”

The babe has been returned to the mother in Mexico. I do not know how this sad tale ends. The whole thing reeks of desperation and danger. I am thankful that the baby is doing well. Putting a positive spin on this story is not possible for me. I will light a candle for all the desperate souls wandering our desert tonight.

~ by Peg Bowden on November 28, 2011.

Posted in Uncategorized