Zach Henak

Brownsvill By Bus

1-7-05

Reflection

I have never before taken a trip with such a dynamic group of individuals. People take trips all the time, but I have never gone anywhere to learn about a portion of land and ended up finding out more about myself and those around me than I thought humanly possible. I found that with this group we all had such divers backgrounds and hopes for our future that any and every time we would sit down for a meal or get in to our long days of driving, there was always a good discussion on some portion of a persons life or another. We always had something to talk, argue, or fight about. It wasn’t like we were at each others throats the whole time. It was just that everyone had a different perspective on life, and backgrounds to match those perspectives. This meant that anytime someone expressed their opinion there were at least three if not more people who really couldn’t grasp what they were saying.

As diverse as everyone on the trip was, we all did find some common ground on one subject, the boarder. Not that everyone felt the same way about it but that everyone stood in equal aw of the landscape and culture that seemed to be so foreign to us but really when you take down the language barrier there isn’t that much different between the us and Mexican sides. We think the same; we learn the same, and even urinate the same. It isn’t a sudden change. The boarder is more of a very slow acculturation of a slightly different set of values. While down there; I realized that all people need to look inside themselves and know that they are special, and so is everyone else. This sounds corny and you are probably laughing right now. But that only further proves my point. If no one ever felt insignificant or that anyone else was it would eliminate racism, and let people be happy with who they are and what they do. This in turn would make poverty less of an issue because people could live happily on less money.

This however could not solve the boarder’s problems on its own. The biggest thing that really got me on the boarder was all the garbage. It was everywhere, self-confidence and mutual respect wont solve these problems but it will help. There needs to be a revamping of the governmental structure. Ether they need to get a new waste management system or modify the one they have. But most of all they need to stop the corruption. No institution can work efficiently with the amount of corruption they have in Mexico. The leaders of Mexico at this point probably feel like the chess club president at some big football school. He is inferior and oppressed and gets so caught up in that that he doesn’t care much for the country because he sees no hope and doesn’t really want to try. He then gives over this failing country to the next person, which is even more overwhelming and intimidating. It is simply a giant, swirling funnel.

But this is only the case when looking at it from a distance. From a distance it looks like no one wants to be there, and that they would all leave for good if they had the chance. But this is simply not true. Lots of people come across to the United States, but this doesn’t mean they stay. A majority of them come across for making money, only because the economy in Mexico is horrible. So they come across for money. But then they go back once they make their money and have a better life for their family. The people in Mexico love their country. When we toured the Factory in Mexico there were these workers that were getting paid 5-7 dollars a day, and yet when we walked by they were yelling and hollering about how much they love their country, and welcoming us to it. Mexico just doesn’t provide for the needs that they have so the breadwinners are forced to come to a country they don’t know and most of all aren’t welcome.

The trip that I thought was going to be simply an experiential tour of the Mexican boarder, turned out to be an event that gave me insight into a whole new world of thinking. It let me see others views on topics that never would have been possible without the awesome group of individuals that made up our Brownsville By Bus team.