A Walk in Their Shoes

On Wednesday, we spent eleven hours with Grupos BETA, a Mexican-government sponsored organization that operate in several cities and towns across Mexico to aid migrants in need and to inform them of their human rights. Grupos BETA established an official office in Palomas about 7.5 months ago. For twelve hours a day, the six members of Grupos BETA travel the route common for migrants and talk to them, take down their names and origin for a list used in the event that something happens, pass out pamphlets on safety and human rights and assist anyone in need of food, water or medical attention. Alex Esquinca was our main guide. We originally met him on a migrant bus. He passed out information to us without question or discrimination even though later admitted we didn't exactly fit the description of the typical passenger. I have met few people as proud as he of the work he does. He was inspiring in his passion and eagerness to share with us all the challenges and rewards of his work.

Grupos BETA gave us a tour of this route that most migrants take when crossing from Las Chepas. Las Chepas is about a half hour drive from Palomas. It is a small village that was basically on its way to a slow extinction. Once a farming community, the families that once lived there are now only survived by its oldest members. There is a school there, but it is closed because there are no longer any children living in the village. As children grew up, they left Las Chepas and no one new is moving in.

The school with no children.

But, each day hundreds of people stop in the Las Chepas before leaving Mexico and attempting to enter the U.S. After the bus from Palomas drops people off in Las Chepas, people spend the remaining daylight hours there. We spoke with one couple that has lived in Las Chepas for thirty-five years. Their door is always open to anyone passing through. They have blankets, sheets, candy, drinks and tea to offer. When we knocked on the door to the little house, we were immediately ushered in and offered sodas and a chair. The hospitality was overwhelming and it was hard to say no to these extremely generous people. Although Las Chepas faces the U.S., there is a road that leads from the back of the town, passes the town cemetery, and winds through a mountain corridor towards a part of the border that is not as patrolled.



Above the village cemetery. The cemetery has more people buried there than the current population of Las Chepas.

Along the road, we were taken to a spot where an altar honoring La Virgen de Guadlaupe is and where migrants come and light a candle and pray before embarking on their journey. Candles on the altar were still lit from the night before. The area around the altar was piled of broken and discarded candles. A box of medicine was found on the altar with a couple of phone numbers written on it, presumably left as a message to someone.







Further down the road, we stopped at a memorial where a man was shot by a bandit while driving fifteen migrants to the border. We learned that the mountain corridor at night is often plagued with border bandits that wait high up in the mountain with guns to rob the migrants as they pass by. I was disgusted to hear how common this type of robbery was, but even more disgusted when we told that some of the bandits may be American, as well as Mexican.

Moving further down the road, we were taken to a lake with a shady spot under a solitary tree that is about two kilometers from the actual border. The rare shade is a popular resting spot for migrants as they wait for night to fall and begin the long miles of walking they have ahead of them. Sometimes people will drink water from the lake and as a result end up sick. We then continued onto the border, where a white monument and a short barbed wire fence marks the division. This particular section is chosen as the best place to enter because there is a small hill blocking the view of the U.S. Border Patrol cameras. Once in the U.S., the length of the journey depends on arrangements made with a coyote and the success of not being detected by U.S. patrols. If successful, we were told that the typical journey is three days and three nights. People travel by night through the desert avoiding roads and lights at all costs. Daytime is spent resting and hiding in bushes.

Cat, production manager, Alex from Grupos BETA and Me at the border