How Migrants Navigate Dangerous Crossings as US Politicians Debate Borders

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A few years ago, while traversing the Americas from the Arctic to the Antarctic on the Pangea One World Expedition, I drove along the Mexico-US border for over a thousand kilometres and got a first-hand feel of the treacherous terrain and the dangers faced by the migrants attempting to cross illegally into the US.

From San Ysidro, on the US side of the Mexican border, I crossed into Tijuana, a Mexican outpost known for its drug violence. My baggage was scanned by the customs department but the passport was not checked. "Hey! This is Mexico, a free country. You don't need any passports and visas over here. We welcome everybody. Not like the gringos," said a Mexican passenger, pointing to the long rows of crawling vehicles lined on the other side to enter the US.

From Tijuana, I got on a bus for the long haul to Guadalajara, a 36-hour journey covering 2,400km. Soon after leaving the city limits, we got into the mountainous region of La Rumorosa. It seemed that all the rocks and boulders in the world had been brought here and piled high into heaps.

Many of the corpses are eaten away by scavenging birds and animals. Pieces of denim – with which their feet had been bound to ensure they don’t leave any trace in the desert – provide the only evidence of their existence.

In the shallow depths of this desolation were tunnels used for smuggling drugs and migrants into the United States. A few months earlier, Mexican authorities discovered a tunnel, 10 metres deep and 300 metres long, complete with a lighting and ventilation system. Its entrance was located in a warehouse, close to the Mexicali-Calexico border.

A Mexican lady, working as a maid in San Diego, had boarded the bus from San Luis Colorado and was going to Mexico City. "These gringos keep us away after usurping half our country! California, Arizona, New Mexico, Texas, Florida... the land all the way to Canada belonged to us. They made such a fuss about the Berlin Wall in Europe. Here you see, they have constructed their own Berlin Wall," she said, agitated, and followed it up with some fluent profanities in Spanish.

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