Immigration: El Salvador to the United States
I saw this map in an art exhibit on immigration in San Salvador. It tracks the "Ruta del Norte", or "path to the North," from El Salvador through Guatemala and Mexico to the United States. It marks the train routes, the gang-controlled zones, the deserts, the safe houses, and all those things which are important to an immigrant making the journey.
Fully one quarter of El Salvador's GDP comes from remittances, or Salvadorans working in the United States who send money back to their families. In order to travel to the United States, Salvadorans must make the long journey from El Salvador, through the drug gangs in Mexico, and finally across the US-Mexico border into the United States. This trip claims many lives, not only in the deserts by the Texas-Mexico and Arizona-Mexico border, but in deserts of Mexico itself as the immigrants must avoid both police and drug cartels while walking or training, often without a reliable source of food or water.
Here, I will tell the journey from El Salvador to the United States as it was told to me by Salvadorans.
There are two ways to travel to the United States: by coyote, or on your own if you know the path. It takes between two to three weeks either way--hopping a train through Mexico and then walking through the desert without sleep and avoiding border guards for two - seven days until one reaches a safe house.
Coyotes are guides who are paid to take groups of people from Central/Latin America to the United States. The current going rate for a coyote is $7000/person from El Salvador to Mexico, and between $7000-$8000 from Mexico to a major city in the United States. When considering these numbers, please remember that those who work on the coffee fincas in El Salvador are paid $50 every two weeks during the coffee picking season. For the rest of the year, they are often out of work and must support their families of between 4-6 people with that money which they make over these few months in the year. Thus, the payment of $15,000 for the chance alone to get to the United States is an incredible amount. This $15,000 does not in any way guarantee travel to the US--it only guarantees three chances to attempt to make the journey with a coyote. As one man said though, by the time one makes it to the third chance, s/he is either in prison or dead.
The danger of traveling with a coyote cannot be underestimated. One must remember that because this is inherently an illegal venture, there is nothing to which the coyotes can be held accountable for the wellbeing of the people in their group, other than their reputation. They typically transport drugs, and they hold absolute power over their group without necessarily having a reason to ensure that they all make it to the United States alive. Women in these groups are often raped, young children die, and people who just were not well prepared for the journey are often left in the desert. This inequality of power means that those immigrants who collect $15,000 from their family and friends to make the journey and pin all of their hope on this one person are an incredibly vulnerable population with almost no way to hold the coyote accountable. The journey is even more dangerous for women.
Whether traveling with or without a coyote, one must avoid the Mexican police, the drug cartels, and navigate the desert. Since crossing the border is quite difficult, immigrants often walk across the desert for several days straight until they reach a major city where they can usually obtain assistance.
Near the end of my time in San Julian, I spent the night with the family of one of my friends. She worked as the cook at San Julian, and her husband/accompanada had made the journey to the US, worked there as a painter for three years, and returned. He told me that he walked across the desert for three days straight without sleep until he arrived. Several people he knew who had tried to make the journey with him had died or been left along the way. That night, we watched the movie Siete Solas together. It tells the story of a group of around 20 immigrants from Mexico who have paid a coyote to take them to the US, following a mother and her two children who are going to join their father in Chicago. Half of the immigrants die on the way--killed by the coyote or others in the group, thirst, illness, rattlesnakes and scorpions, etc., and two of the women are raped. When they arrive to the US after facing death, the house is raided and they are all deported. Only the little girl makes it to her father--her mother and brother died in the desert.
This movie impacted me because I knew that everything it portrayed happens every single day to friends and family of the people whom I befriended. Although those events do not normally all happen to people in the same traveling group, rape and death are very real risks of immigration. Although immigration is quite a controversial issue in the United States, I don't believe that one can truly understand it unless they have seen it from the other side of the border.
For the liberation of those looking for a better life--may they find it.
Here, I will tell the journey from El Salvador to the United States as it was told to me by Salvadorans.
There are two ways to travel to the United States: by coyote, or on your own if you know the path. It takes between two to three weeks either way--hopping a train through Mexico and then walking through the desert without sleep and avoiding border guards for two - seven days until one reaches a safe house.
Coyotes are guides who are paid to take groups of people from Central/Latin America to the United States. The current going rate for a coyote is $7000/person from El Salvador to Mexico, and between $7000-$8000 from Mexico to a major city in the United States. When considering these numbers, please remember that those who work on the coffee fincas in El Salvador are paid $50 every two weeks during the coffee picking season. For the rest of the year, they are often out of work and must support their families of between 4-6 people with that money which they make over these few months in the year. Thus, the payment of $15,000 for the chance alone to get to the United States is an incredible amount. This $15,000 does not in any way guarantee travel to the US--it only guarantees three chances to attempt to make the journey with a coyote. As one man said though, by the time one makes it to the third chance, s/he is either in prison or dead.
The danger of traveling with a coyote cannot be underestimated. One must remember that because this is inherently an illegal venture, there is nothing to which the coyotes can be held accountable for the wellbeing of the people in their group, other than their reputation. They typically transport drugs, and they hold absolute power over their group without necessarily having a reason to ensure that they all make it to the United States alive. Women in these groups are often raped, young children die, and people who just were not well prepared for the journey are often left in the desert. This inequality of power means that those immigrants who collect $15,000 from their family and friends to make the journey and pin all of their hope on this one person are an incredibly vulnerable population with almost no way to hold the coyote accountable. The journey is even more dangerous for women.
Whether traveling with or without a coyote, one must avoid the Mexican police, the drug cartels, and navigate the desert. Since crossing the border is quite difficult, immigrants often walk across the desert for several days straight until they reach a major city where they can usually obtain assistance.
Near the end of my time in San Julian, I spent the night with the family of one of my friends. She worked as the cook at San Julian, and her husband/accompanada had made the journey to the US, worked there as a painter for three years, and returned. He told me that he walked across the desert for three days straight without sleep until he arrived. Several people he knew who had tried to make the journey with him had died or been left along the way. That night, we watched the movie Siete Solas together. It tells the story of a group of around 20 immigrants from Mexico who have paid a coyote to take them to the US, following a mother and her two children who are going to join their father in Chicago. Half of the immigrants die on the way--killed by the coyote or others in the group, thirst, illness, rattlesnakes and scorpions, etc., and two of the women are raped. When they arrive to the US after facing death, the house is raided and they are all deported. Only the little girl makes it to her father--her mother and brother died in the desert.
This movie impacted me because I knew that everything it portrayed happens every single day to friends and family of the people whom I befriended. Although those events do not normally all happen to people in the same traveling group, rape and death are very real risks of immigration. Although immigration is quite a controversial issue in the United States, I don't believe that one can truly understand it unless they have seen it from the other side of the border.
For the liberation of those looking for a better life--may they find it.