Confessions of a Wannabe Professional Host Daughter

Photo Courtesy of Hannah Ebling-Artz

            Not everyone wants to migrate to the U.S.  This sounds like a simple enough statement, I know.  But with words like the immigration “tide,” “wave,” and “flood” inundating media coverage today, this is a truth so quickly obscured!  Currently, net migration from our southern neighbor hovers right around zero.  And yet, this immigration “wave” is overwhelmingly equated with Mexico in particular, leaving many with the unconscious impression that everyone there would come here in a heartbeat if only they could.  This, I would argue, is why we need stories, stories of people who live contentedly in Mexico and other Latin American nations, people who can help us to debunk the myths percolating around the issue of immigration.[1] And so it is that I would like you to meet José and Rosa, the couple with whom three other students and I had the honor of staying during our two nights in Mexico.

            I am going to be honest: when BorderLinks first shared with us the news that we would be staying with families instead of in an office building as originally planned, my initial response was apprehension.  This might sound out of character for me, given the enormous role my Senegalese (host) family has played in my life.  However, literally all I could think in response to the news was, “I don’t speak Spanish!  And two days is too short a time!  This just isn’t going to work!!”  However, these fears melted almost immediately in the warmth of the couple’s welcome, and soon I was dreaming up ways of making a career out of being a “professional” host daughter, or at the least, of delaying my departure!

            Both retired, José and Rosa live within sight of the Border wall in Nogales, Sonora, with a parrot named Parrot.  Having previously worked at a bank with a significant clientele base of English-speakers, José had a pretty expansive English vocabulary.  This, when paired with the Spanish of two of the other students staying in the house, enabled us to communicate almost (well, kind of) seamlessly.  Though I definitely had to rely on the translating help of my friends when trying to ask more involved questions of Rosa, my favorite thing was when I was able to communicate with José directly.  Drawing from the similarities between French and Spanish, it was almost a game to try to decipher what was being said and then string along my own halting, ungrammatical Spanish phrases, with José meeting me in the middle with no small amount of laughter!

            As might have been the case with any U.S. family, we spent the vast majority of our brief time together in front of the T.V. and around the kitchen table.  We bonded over the Mexican equivalent of Dancing with the Stars—except in this case, El Gran Chapuzon, the stars dove off of high boards instead of dancing!  Around the table, we talked about everything from their children to our classes in seminary, from their thoughts on the Border wall to our favorite places to travel in the U.S. and Mexico alike.  We learned about their residential visa, which allows them to cross back and forth to the U.S. to buy clothing and groceries at cheaper rates, not to mention Subway, which is Rosa’s favorite!  Perhaps the story I loved hearing most of all was that of José’s Christmas car, which came to him a few years back when Rosa surprised him with a state lotto ticket that turned out to be the lucky winner!  (In contrast, my story of having once won a goldfish at an elementary school party could hardly hold water, though goodness knows my parents did not feel that way about it at the time!)  Through it all, Rosa plied us with delicious and seemingly endless amounts of food, José regaling us with stories of friends and family come ostensibly to visit, but who in actuality were most of all there because they were craving Rosa’s famous beans!

            All this is to say, well, quite simply, that things do not magically stop or change somehow when you arrive at the U.S.-Mexico Border.  We humans created that border, after all, so it only makes sense that life would continue to connect and spill over across the divide, and so it does.  The land, the weather, my allergies—the same on both sides!  And in so, so many ways, so too are the people.  Were it not for the difference in language and latitude, José and Rosa could easily be another couple in my family’s church, or in our neighborhood, with countless shared hobbies, concerns, and hopes.  Moreover, I think I can fairly make the argument that this dear family is just about as likely to move to the U.S. as my American one is to move to Mexico, so deeply rooted are they in their community!

            During our brief time in Nogales, we had the chance to speak with an activist artist association called Taller Yonke.  Referring to a mural they had once constructed on the wall itself that depicted what things looked like on the other side, they poignantly declared, “With art, we erased the wall.”  Looking back on the time shared with José and Rosa, I would like to think that, in our own small yet real way, we too erased the wall, through a mélange of shared learning, human connection, and joy.

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[1] Stories on their own, I realize, cannot bring resolution to the quagmire that is our policy reform debate.  But they can capture our imagination and equip us with new vision, and in these role I find their power to transform.

Dreams in the Desert

The Border Wall
Photo courtesy of Hannah Ebling-Artz

Standing still in the desert that spans much of the U.S.-Mexico border, I heard the sound of the ocean.  No, not the Pacific Ocean—its roaring, surely, is not quite that loud.  Rather, as we stood solemnly circled around the make-shift grave of a 16 year-old who had died in the crossing, the wind siphoning over the rugged desert hills became crashing ocean waves in my mind.  Walking in the desert in the middle of a temperate day, led by an expert guide and sporting water bottles as full as our energy levels were high, in many ways I could not imagine what it would be like for the migrants—so many of whom are children and youth—compelled to make this journey for reasons of economic survival or physical safety.  The panic of being lost in this inhospitable terrain, the strain of weathering the extreme highs and lows that characterize the region, the terror of discovering one’s water supply has ended long before the voyage has, all of these realities resisted my ability to grasp.  But I could wistfully, wonderingly hear the ocean, and in this I imagine I am not alone. 

Along with the eight other students and two professors in our Church on the Border class, I spent Spring Break on both sides of the Arizona-Sonora, Mexico divide.  We were hosted by a group called Borderlinks, who helped us to pass the week gathering up stories as a way of learning on the ground about undocumented migration and the implications this movement across borders has for people of faith.

Our first full day of the trip, we worshipped at Southside Presbyterian in Tucson, the church that pioneered the Sanctuary Movement in the 1980’s.  The churches who joined the movement provided shelter for the refugees fleeing torture in Central American countries (and whom the U.S. initially failed to recognize), eventually serving as the impetus for the U.S. government’s decision to extend protection to these asylum-seekers.  In the interim period prior to this decision, however, the congregations that chose to offer safe-haven were technically breaking the law, and many of the participants risked federal prison sentences in order to act in the way they felt their faith to demand.  Speaking to two of the movement founders, Ken and Elna, after the Sunday morning service, I was struck by their passion and patience, not to mention humility, as they described themselves as “just normal people who never intended to get involved.”  Afterwards, I found myself feeling irrationally yet undeniably jealous. Only later through reflecting with friends was I able to puzzle through this unexpected gut reaction, and this with the help of words from the sermon we had heard earlier that morning.  Urging us to see Lent as an opportunity for discernment, Southside's minister asked us to consider whether we are currently living our most real lives, that is, the lives we long to live.  And I think that was it— here it was so beautifully and inspiringly clear that Ken and Elna were and are living in such a way, a thing I want terribly badly to be able to do.  How greatly I want to find ways to live my life in light of my convictions, to make use of all that I am learning, to honor the deep investment placed in me by family, mentors, teachers, and friends!  And yet somewhere deep in my very core I worry that that I’ll miss it somehow, that I’ll wind up being too busy, too sleepy, too oblivious…

Throughout the week, we had the opportunity to meet with migrants on both sides of the border, so many of whom were willing to vulnerably open themselves up to us and share their stories.  The stories I heard were beautiful, full of sacrifices made for love of family, signs of immeasurable resilience, and an abiding faith in the God who promises to lead us from the desert into green pastures.  In many ways, too, the stories were ragged and raw, highlighting the often inadvertent yet inherent cruelty of an immigration system that builds bridges for capital and goods to cross the border but not for humans.  A system that has militarized our border, downplays our complicity in creating some of the economic factors that fill people with the hopelessness that makes leaving homelands and crossing the border feel like the only option, and that ultimately violates human dignity by turning people into problems.  As I write this, please do know that I understand that U.S. immigration policy is an extremely complex, not to mention controversial, topic.  I am not writing to advocate for a simplistic and sadly doomed approach say, of opening up the border entirely and having no restrictions at all, nor even am I necessarily trying to change anyone’s mind.  What I do long to do, and hope to try my hand at in the next few weeks, is simply to invite you into some of the stories I was so blessed to share in last week, to help put a face on the issue—or, rather, the faces of those whom I met that remain profoundly imprinted on my mind. 

It’s hard to say, but who knows: maybe doing so is part of what it looks like for me to live my most real life?  Regardless, my goal is to write one (hopefully) short post each week for the duration of Lent, if anything to help myself continue to process the crazy and heartbreaking and wonderful experience that was my last week—we’ll see how it goes!