An inter-Mennonite newspaper, putting the Mennonite world together every week since 1923 |
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Last Updated February 10, 2004
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THE VIEW FROM THE BORDER
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Where two worlds collide:
A report from the Above, Roman Catholic priest Luis Rene Castaneda Castro oversees a community center in the town of Altar, in Mexico's Sonora state, where hundreds of migrants arrive each day on their way north toward the U.S. border. STORIES, Part 2: »» A road to dreams or perdition? STORIES, Part 1: »» Economic hopes or social justice in Nogales? »» Increasing militarization along the border EDITORIAL: »» Open eyes and hearts needed for churches to address border issues »» VIEW photos from the Nogales, Mexico, area. PHOTOS, FROM TOP: »» 1. Strips of paper trimmed from a Mexican government report adorn a cross at the Community Center for Migrant Services in Altar. Each strip contains the name and cause of death of a person who died in the Sonoran Desert while attempting to enter the United States illegally. In recent years, more than 2,500 lives have been lost in the desert. »» 2. The town plaza in Altar where buses from southern Mexico drop off migrants headed north. At the heart of the plaza is Altar's Church of Our Lady of Guadalupe. »» 3. Metal frames with pieces of carpet serve as bunks in private "guesthouses" where migrants can spend a few nights in Altar. Each level on the bunks can sleep two people. »» 4. This rudimentary shower, which opens onto a rear courtyard, is offered for the use of migrants staying in one guesthouse in Altar. »» 5. These migrants, shown in the courtyard of a guesthouse in Altar on Jan. 28, said they were preparing to head north in search of jobs in the United States. Most said they were from the southern state of Chiapas. »» 6. Handlettered signs advising migrants about making trips across the Sonoran Desert are posted in the Our Lady of Guadalupe church sanctuary in Altar. The signs offer advice on desert travel and on what to do if arrested by border authorities. |
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»» 7. Migrants in the Altar town plaza wait for their times of departure for the next leg of their journeys toward the border. One man at left shows off his new winter coat, probably purchased at one of the many tent stores in Altar offering various articles of cold-weather gear, essential for crossing the desert at night during the winter. »» 8. Migrant children, one wearing a new backpack, play in a street near migrant guesthouses in Altar. »» 9. Vans like this one, often with "Altar-Sasabe" written in the windows, are a common sight in Altar. The vans offer rides to the border town of Sasabe, Mexico, about 90 kilometers to the north. »» 10. Two migrants wait for a ride on the unpaved toll road leading from Altar to Sasabe. This road is the final leg of any journey to the border. Many of the more than 2,500 people who died in the Sonoran Desert in recent years went by this road. »» 11. Members of an interfaith tour of Altar pause for a prayer service at a memorial for migrants who have died in the Sonoran Desert. Gerald Kicanas, at center in black, bishop of the Roman Catholic Diocese of Tucson, Ariz., led the service. — All photos by Robert Rhodes/MWR |
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