Run for the border

Run for the border

Paul Pitcher – Guatemala

It was a picturesque breezy afternoon in early May and I was sitting on the side of the road next to a tumulo (speed bump) chucking rocks over the edge of a 30 foot drop-off. Below me was a field where a few mules were grazing. Not a very exciting scene unless you consider the fact that I was literally 2 minutes walking distance from the Mexican border in the northern tip of western Guatemala at a small town called Gracias a Dios.

Paul Pitcher – Guatemala

It was a picturesque breezy afternoon in early May and I was sitting on the side of the road next to a tumulo (speed bump) chucking rocks over the edge of a 30 foot drop-off. Below me was a field where a few mules were grazing. Not a very exciting scene unless you consider the fact that I was literally 2 minutes walking distance from the Mexican border in the northern tip of western Guatemala at a small town called Gracias a Dios.

I had just come back from an hour and a half walk along the border to the community of Buena Vista 15 de Mayo. We had been so close to Mexico that I almost considered jumping over the border just to say I had been in Mexico. My friend Mateo and I were sitting in this spot waiting for a pick-up to come by, headed for Nenton, so that we could thumb a ride. Unfortunately our planning had been a little off since it turned out that that day was the “Día del trabajo (Day of Work)” in Guatemala, which, a little ironically, is a holiday where really no one works. So, we had been waiting for an hour with no luck. Finally, a regular sized pick-up came flying down the road in the opposite direction, headed for the border. Its tailgate almost scraped the ground as the truck bed was packed and the back bumper could barely be seen due to the amount of feet on it from people standing and holding on for dear life. Everyone on the truck was dressed in nice casual clothing, jeans and a t-shirt (since they were all men from what I could see) and no one carried any luggage. Mateo looked up for a second and shook his head.

“Son Salvadoreños pasando por a los Estados Unidos,” he said. “They are Salvadorans on their way to the United States,” my mind swiftly and simply translating the words. “They have traveled far already,” he continued, “And still have far to go.”

On the heels of the first pick-up came another bursting pick-up, kicking up dust as it raced up to our speed bump, and then swiftly slamming on its brakes to crawl one set of wheels at a time over the tumulo.

Mateo and I again watched this pick-up move by us. Many times I have been asked by Guatemalans, both friends and strangers, about the magical land of fantasy called the United States. Everyone wants to know if you really can make Q40 ($5.30) an hour at a job, or if it’s true that everyone has two cars, or if it’s factual that if you have two kids then the government pays for all of their education. They want to know if what they see on television is accurate. I find myself going over the same answers over and over again. Yes you can make Q40 an hour but you have to have your green card, find a job, and, much of the time, speak English, plus its costs Q55 an hour to live and eat (just a random number I came up with). No, not everyone has two cars but some people do, etc. I try and give them a realistic picture that the United States is not this dream world but I really don’t know how much good I do. It seems like until the economy in Guatemala picks up and the media stops portraying the states as a place where material dreams can come true that Central Americans will keep making the trip and selling themselves into indentured servitude. The latest statistic is that 1 in 10 Guatemalans live in the U.S.

The second pick-up came flying back from the border, its wheels gliding along the pavement without the weight of the 30 passengers. And, in that same pickup that had taken the group to the border, that had put them on a long and dangerous path through Mexico, Mateo and I raced back to La Laguna. The driver was eager to get home and we made the trip in half the time that it had taken us to get there, our hair plastered to our heads like helmets as we whipped back through the countryside.

It was only as I lay back down in one of the hammocks at Mateo’s in-laws house in La Laguna, with sweat dripping down my cheeks from the intense heat, that I thought about what had just happened; that I cried inside for those fleeing north, for their families that, most likely, would have no idea for months whether their loved ones made it to the states or not; that I reflected upon the increasingly disillusioned tale that is spun here about the Disney Land that is the United States. I meditated on how the people must pay Q40,000 to the coyotes to get them across the border. I remembered the stories that I continue to here from the other side of the border of coyotes dumping the people in the desert and leaving them without shelter and water. Put all these things together and it seems to be a very dismal picture but, as I lay in that hammock and looked around the meager kitchen/living room/dining room, as I saw the poverty epitomized by the tiniest malnourished skinny baby kitty sitting in the middle of the floor and staring up at me, I guess I sort of understood why that fantasy world just seems like so much better of an option, even if it is only a dream.

Pablo
Paul Pitcher is a missionary with the Christian Action of Guatemala (ACG).  He serves as a communication and youth worker with ACG.