Day one!

It’s day one of the expedition. We’ve decided to start referring to this as an “expedition” because the word “film” doesn’t quite do justice to what’s about to go down. We’re in Juarez to meet up with Luis, an old friend who has lived in Minneapolis for the last few years. Luis is from Mexico, like so many people who’ve come to the US looking for work and opportunity. He recently married his girlfriend Sharon and is headed back home to straighten out his legal status in the US and to see his family for the first time in years.

Juarez is a border town just across from El Paso, Texas and is damn big one at that, probably 2 million people. It’s a bit notorious these days because of the drug trade, border crossings and governmental corruption. It’s also become a huge NAFTA area as large numbers of US corporations have settled just across the border. Cheap labor is abundant and the prized American consumer markets are just miles away.

So it’s here that this “listening” project begins. We follow Luis’s path home and maybe experience a little of what people feel about their neighbor to the north.

Filed under Journals, Dominic Howes, Mexico.

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