CPTnet
21 June 2006

U.S./MEXICO BORDERLANDS: Walking the Migrant Trail

by Kim Christman

[The author, of Fairview, NC, was part of a Christian Peacemaker Teams
(CPT) delegation to the Arizona borderlands, 25 May-5 June 2006. Delegates
joined a 75-mile trek along a major migrant route 29 May - 4 June sponsored
by a coalition of advocacy groups to draw attention to the migrants'
plight.]

Even though our CPT delegation experienced only minor difficulties,
nonetheless our time in the desert was challenging, exhausting, and
transforming.

What follows are reflections that we wrote as a group when we met together.
Everyone took a slip of paper and wrote a word, phrase or sentence to
articulate our experiences, feelings, and dreams on the journey. Then we
put the slips of paper into a hat, drew one out that was not our own and
read what was written. The writing formed a poetic picture of our
experiences.

Tuesday, May 30th, the second day of our walk, having completed 18.5 miles:

"I loved the locals who followed us in Sasabe--chance to be with Sasabe
folks and walk through town. The People! Lord, the People!"

"Cactus cross against Babo Quivari and a vast blue sky."

"Disappointment and weariness after realizing that we were at a stop instead
of our campsite."

"The ever-changing and unique desert which reminds me of the Savannah
grassland of Africa."

"Crescent moon over the mountains at sunset. The many pinpricks of stars
last night that ran together into one another."

"Meeting wonderful people as we walk. The lump in my throat when I looked
for the cross of Hugo Rodriguez that I have been carrying and someone else
had picked it up."

Thursday, June 1st, the fourth day of our walk, having completed 45.2 miles

"Desert heat cannot be contained or controlled in any moment. It is
unbridled and headstrong and destructive and beautiful and brutal."

"Hot dusty air through the bandana. Lower the cloth and sip from the water
bottle. Let the warm mud slide down your throat."

"The 'sound' of our footsteps the first time we walked in silence."

"Remembering that the people crossing the border and the ones guarding it
need love."

"As a few comrades sang 'We shall overcome," I asked, 'Lord, may we one day
truly be the land of the free and the home of the brave, a people of
hospitality rather than hostility.'"

Saturday, June 3rd, the fifth and next to last day of our walk having
completed 69.2 miles

"A line of people moving through the desert, united as a community to honor
the many people who have died attempting to migrate over the border and
working to change the system that allows these deaths to happen."

"Gambrel quail and their chicks move freely back and forth over the
'border.' The line drawn by 'right of conquest' is meaningless in their
daily search for food and shelter, to their family's survival. Likewise
human beings migrate to feed themselves and their families, to better their
lives."

"This trip affirms my commitment to working to create social change on the
border. Try to find a way to keep CPT alive in the Arizona borderlands."

"We are present with each other, with the dead, with this borderland, with
the Spirit moving. We ask a prayer for healing and life together. Rain."

Other members of the delegation included James Batterton ( San Antonio, TX),
Danielle Books (Albuquerque, NM), Renée Borsberry (El Paso, TX), Scott
Kerr
(Tucson, AZ), Claire Marich (Downers Grove, IL), Phil Miller (Conrad, IA),
Janice Sevre' Duszyaska (Lexington, KY) and Michael Simpson (Madison, WI).

CPT has had a seasonal presence along the Arizona border since 2004.