& it is so sweet that, for a second, you forget

As a Border Encounter participant, you step off the plane at the El Paso International Airport and could be greeted by scorching temperatures, howling winds, dust. Other times it’s a perfect day. When you arrive at our apartments, maybe you get to meet our neighbors. Maybe you go out to eat that first night – L&Js, Carlos & Mickeys. Something classic El Paso. Then in the morning the neighborhood smells like fresh bread because of the factory to the east. In the morning the Encuentros Room door is propped open and music floats out into the street. You sit down with your coffee and you are asked why you have come. “To understand”, you might say, or maybe you say “To stop misunderstanding.” You listen to Sami talk about the Middle East, about peacemaking, about the history of the border and of this little group called Abara. About the dream of the property on the border. You settle in and feel your pulse quicken when you learn about root causes of migration – how could I not have known? – you think to yourself.

Soon you are climbing into a van and you tumble out at some beautiful old church called Sacred Heart. A man who was once a border patrol chief is now directing one of the largest migrant shelters in El Paso. He shrugs it off. You eat homemade pozole for lunch. You pack drawstring backpacks with hygiene supplies in the basement of another church. You listen to a presentation about Immigration Law 101 and it slowly starts to become apparent that the pathways are so, so much more narrow and complicated than you realized. You sing in the car on the way to the memorial to the Walmart Shooting of 2019, and you ride back in silence. You wake up the next morning and are whisked away to Ciudad Juárez, you meet an energetic and passionate woman named Rosa, you explore a museum paying homage to the Mexican revolution. You walk into a shelter and feel so useless in the faces of the guests, you could scream. But you don’t, because soon you are having a water balloon fight. You are eating mango ice cream with Chile and gummy worms. Your head is spinning with Spanish, with stories. You walk back across the bridge and stand in line holding your blue passport and a group of deported men is escorted past you, each walking without shoe laces. You learn that this is so they cannot take their own lives in detention. And after they are deported, their un-laced shoes make them an obvious target for smugglers and other bad actors to exploit. After dinner you go for churros con cajeta, and it is so sweet you forget for a second about the no shoelaces. You wish you could forget.

The next day you are welcomed into a community center where you are taught about the Theology of Migration, by an Social Worker and Masters of Divinity named Bethany. She says things about the Bible you’ve never thought about before. You smile through your fatigue. You are taken to meet the United States Border Patrol, and you listen to them speak in front of that wall – you see straight through it, to Juárez. There’s a few moments where the music from Juárez drowns out their voices. You think of the water balloons, of the laughter of the children from that one shelter that shares space with an air conditioner factory. Suddenly you are at UTEP, in a museum. All around you is art, and stories. Your last presentation is down by the river again. By that fence. You realize the ground you are standing on has been a space of violence and conquest, of oppression and the idea of discovery, of ownership. Of dominance. You eat homemade enchiladas. You sit in a circle and talk about what you’ve seen, what you’ve felt. The next morning, you walk back into El Paso International Airport. You just might be changed. You watch the mountains as you fly away. And then one day, you get an email from Abara – Border Stories, Issue #12.

Participant Testimonies