Biking the Border

I met Katy and Eric in Tucson back in August with No More Deaths. At that time they had just come off of a 5 week stay in Nogales, MX helping newly deported migrants make phone calls home, locate their confiscated personal items, and document border patrol abuses. The efforts in Nogales is another major humanitarian project within No More Deaths. I spent one day there serving lunch in a soup kitchen and talking to men who waited at a dusty bus station all day for a chance to make a 5 minute phone call home from a pay-as-you-go No More Deaths cell phone. The one thing that stood out to me in Nogales was the waiting.

When I met Katy and Eric at a Tucson migrant half-way house, they told me of their plan to bike the entire border. I'm relieved to know they made it, and I'm impressed with their conviction to get up close and personal with immigration reform. I only wish more people would be willing to see for themselves what the border and the "illegal-immigration issue" really looks like.

“I think people in the north don't really understand what's going on in the southern borders,” said Katy. “Hearing politicians talk about a wall might sound feasible to people.”

“But when you come down and you witness it, it seems kind of crazy."