Day 17

Well this is it everyone! The last day in Arizona! We're all sad because there is no way we are ready to go back to Elon. We started the day out early again, going to the library right after breakfast. It was awesome today though, because Tammy and me went to a section of the library called the Special Collections. It's a separate building next to the main library and it holds all the books and articles that you're not allowed to take out of the library. So what we had to do was fill out a form for each of the books we wanted to look at, then the lady told us each which desk to sit at (we couldn't sit at the same desk), we had to lock our bags up.
 We were allowed our laptops and our phones, but we weren't even allowed to use our own paper and pen! If we wanted to write something by hand, we had to use what they provide! It was really cool though, it felt like we were in the forbidden section of the library in Harry Potter. I'm really glad we went to the Special Collections though because I actually found a book that helped me the most with my final project so far! We spent the whole morning in there and finally left around 1 in the afternoon. We were on our way to lunch when we spotted the campus book store. It was the biggest campus store I've ever seen. So much bigger than the one at Elon! They had great clothes, books, they sold Toms and backpacks and basically everything. It was amazing. I ended up buying a really cute U of A shirt! Then we grabbed some lunch and went back to the hotel.

When we got back to the hotel, Tammy, Ana Sofia and I all went into the pool for a while. It was so nice in the water. First off, it's a heated pool, so that in itself is wonderful! Second, the sun was shining and it was so nice outside. It was the perfect pool day and I'm so glad we got to enjoy it. We finished the afternoon by jumping in the jacuzzi for a bit, and then we went back to our rooms to clean up for dinner.

 For our last meal here in Arizona we went to a place called El Minuto cafe. Naturally it was a Mexican restaurant and it was absolutely delicious! I'm definitely going to miss the food here. We went home after dinner and then spent a little more time in the hot tub. We were planning on going to karaoke tonight, but you had to be 21 to be in there! We were not happy about that. Finally, it was time to pack up before leaving in the morning. It's hard to believe that our course is finally over. We have learned so much in such a short amount of time, and I'm so grateful for having this opportunity. I've gotten so much closer with all of my International Fellows after going through this entire amazing course and I couldn't be happier. I hope so many more people with be able to do this course because it really is so worthwhile. It's been real, but it's time to go back to reality. Thanks for reading! I'l see you all next time!

Day 16

Well there's only one more day left here in Arizona and things are starting to slow down. The internet at the hotel was down last night, so that's why I couldn't post my blog until today! After an early breakfast, we headed straight to the university to start doing some research. Something about the U of A library...it's absolutely giant. I thought searching for things in the Elon library was bad enough, but this place is insane! It took forever to find just three books to help with the research, and then there were other books we couldn't even get because they were in some Special Collections section of the library. Nothing too exciting happened while we were at the library because we were just sitting in a room looking up different books and different articles online. We took a lunch break, and that was another adventure. Ana Sofia and me decided to get something from the university food court, and that was terrifying! There were so many people everywhere! I have to say, after going to a school as small as Elon, I don't think I could ever go to a school this big. It is very overwhelming to say the least. After we got something to eat it was back to research! Then at around 5, four of us were done for the day and we all headed back to the hotel. On the way back we saw a frozen yogurt place so of course we had to stop in and get some! It was delicious. Tammy and Ana Sofia were going to get the Dark Chocolate flavour, but of course once they decided that, the machine decided to stop working. They both ended up having to get different flavours, but it was just as good!

Once we got back to the hotel we all crowded into Jorge and Johnathan's room and tried to figure out what we were going to do for dinner. We ended up ordering Chinese food and all ate it in their room. Then after dinner, it was back to jacuzzi time! Definitely my favourite time of day is jacuzzi time. We spent a while in there, and then went back to our rooms! The internet was down so that kind of sucked so we just hung out for a bit and then went to bed! My entries are getting shorter and shorter but that's because there's not much left to talk about! We aren't doing nearly as much as we were so there's less to talk about. Unfortunately, my next entry will be my last one for this trip because today is our last day. I hope you've all enjoyed reading and look out for my last entry!

Day 15

Today was the day we left Borderlinks, so we're really getting to the end of the trip now. We had a slow morning, basically just packing up our things and coming back to the hotel. This time I'm rooming with Tammy, instead of being in a room by myself! After moving our things into our room, we headed to the University of Arizona. Along the way we got to stop for lunch, and I finally got to eat at Chipotle! It was so good! Then we all met up outside the Arizona State Museum, which is where we went the first day we were here. Maria came back from Borderlinks to show us around the campus and we got to see the library where we will be spending basically the next two days together. We definitely felt like tourists though, all filing into the library and being showed around. I'm sure some people thought we were in High School. Then, if we didn't look touristy enough, we all took a group photo in front of the Wildcat statue!

 It's a huge school and after being at Elon, I don't think I could handle being there! It was probably 5 times the size of Elon! It is a very beautiful campus though, I'll give it that. After our tour, we went back to the hotel and settled in to our rooms. Then some of us went to the pool to swim! It was a beautiful day and we sure took advantage of it! The pool was nice because it was heated! So I could actually stand to be in it!

After time at the pool we relaxed a little more before going out to dinner. We went to this English-style pub called Frog and Firkin and it was really interesting! I had these things called Polo Sticks and it was basically shredded beef, wrapped in tortilla, fried. It was delicious! I have to say, the food in Arizona is delicious. I'm going to miss it very much. After dinner we all headed back to the hotel and then jumped into the jacuzzi! I think the jacuzzi was the thing all of us missed the most while at Borderlinks. The jacuzzi. The last thing we did tonight was all of the girls hung out in mine and Tammy's room and painted our nails. Tomorrow is going to be a research day so we're going to try and get a lot of work out of the way tomorrow so that we can have some time on Thursday to just relax and tour around the whole campus and stores on our last day!

Day 14

It's hard to believe it's already been two weeks since we left for Arizona! We've done so much in such a short time it seems like we've been here forever! Unfortunately, today was our last day at Borderlinks. As skeptical as I was about it during the first couple days, I'm actually really going to miss this place. Today was Martin Luther King Jr. day so to start off we went to do some service. Our group was assigned to picking up trash in the assigned area. The thing was though, that there were too many people so our group was kind of just there. We picked up the trash that the other trash group forgot, and then our group leaders decided we didn't have to be there, so instead we went to a fair to celebrate the day! We got there around 12:00 so just in time for lunch. We ended up going to the Mexican food booth and most people got burritos, but I got a carne asada taco! It was delicious, as usual. We all sat in the shade under a tree and had a cute picnic!

 It was funny because at one point there were these two people who came around and tried to get us to sign something to show our support for Obama and his Immigration Reform policy. The thing was, his policy is trying to increase the security around the border so naturally, after all we've learned, we weren't going to sign that. But to make it better, Jorge and Alessandro started telling them everything about why they weren't signing. These two people didn't even know what Streamline was! They also said that Border Patrol is one of the smallest law enforcements and well, we all know that is the farthest thing from the truth. They actually seemed genuinely interested in what the guys were telling them though, Before leaving the fair, we went and got snow cones. I can't remember the last time I had a snow cone, but it tasted great!

After we got back, Borderlinks had actually already prepared us a lunch so some of us sat down and tried to eat some more. It was great though, because Tito brought out a guitar and played and sang for us! It was really great, but it was all Spanish songs so I didn't know any of them. Except for La Bamba. After lunch we had our final group reflection. We each told Maria about what we were doing for our final projects, and then we talked about what we remember most, what we did to cope with all the more emotional times, and what we can do in the future to make more people aware of what's going on. Then after group reflection, we went back to Gate's Pass for sunset! I thought Gate's Pass was beautiful before, but it was absolutely stunning at sunset.

 One of the most beautiful moments of my time here in Arizona. We went back for dinner, and then as a final outing as a group we went to a really good gelato place! Even our resident Italian was impressed with it! Then we just came back to Borderlinks for our last night here! We move back to the hotel tomorrow and start research for our final projects at University of Arizona. It'll be another busy few days before returning home!

Day 13

Yesterday was quite the day so I didn't get the chance to post before now! It started off pretty slack though because we really didn't need to do anything until 3:30! We all got to sleep in, which was amazing and then we still had a whole morning/afternoon free, so a couple of us went to the cafe to work on some homework until it was time. At 3:30 we had a presentation from an undocumented resident named Dario, who works with an organization called Scholarships A-Z. Their mission is to provide resources and scholarships to students, families and educators through online and community interactions in order to make higher education accessible to all, regardless of immigration status. They give undocumented citizens the chance to attend university or college. He also told us about something called DACA, which keeps someone from being deported for 2 years. It enables them to be able to work, but they can't have a license or health insurance. The card is only effective of 2 years. Only people aged 16-31 are eligible, they have to have lived in the U.S. before they were 16, they need to have had continuous residency for 5 years, and weirdly enough they had to be able to prove they were in the United States on June 15th, 2012. I didn't quite understand that part, but neither did Dario so that was fine!

 He then told us his own personal story, about how his family moved to the United States when he was 9 because his father had lost his job in Mexico. He, his twin brother and his older brother all enrolled in school. His older brother was in his last year of college, with only 11 credits left to earn, when Prop 300 was introduced. Prop 300 asks people to prove their legal residency in Arizona, and if that's not the case they are not eligible for in-state tuition. Since Dario's family were undocumented, this meant that his older brother had to pay out-of state tuition, but since his dad still didn't have a steady job yet, he decided to drop out. His brother, not having anything to do, decided to go back to Mexico and get a job over there. Dario and his twin continued on through school, they graduated 6th and 16th in their class and got accepted into every university they applied, but because of Prop 300 they couldn't attend. Dario was feeling hopeless and was going to follow in his older brother's footsteps, but that is when he discovered Scholarships A-Z. He is now attending Pima Community College to fulfil his general requirements and is planning on becoming an engineer.

After dinner, we got to meet Mike Wilson of the Tohono O'odhma nation, who we had already seen in the documentary Crossing Arizona before going on this trip. Mike previously served as a lay minister for the Presbyterian Church on the Reservation and is an active member of the Humane Borders. Because the Nation denied Humane Borders access to the Reservation land, Mike has taken it upon himself to place water stations on the Reservation. Mike has been putting out water on the Reservation for the past 12 years. He started putting out water bottles, but those were getting slashed by some people on the Reservation. He then started putting out 50 gallon barrels of water, but those keep getting confiscated by the Nation's governments. He only has one other person helping him, David Garcia, who has been helping him of the past 8-9 years. He told us about how one day, after putting out two of his 50 gallon barrels, he was driving past a fire hydrant where someone was filling up their own barrel. It was a 4000 gallon barrel that he was filling up to water cattle. So this cause Mike to ask himself the question "One cow on the reservation is worth how many migrant lives?" Mike feels it is his moral obligation to help the migrants who stumble upon the Reservation. In 2010 there were 253 human remains recovered. 125 were recovered on the Tohono O'odham reservation. It's really incredible that Mike will go against what his tribe government believes, because he believes moral law ranks higher and I agree with him.

After all of the days excursions, most of us went out for a night on the town and we had a great time! It's sad that we've started counting down the days to leaving here, but I am so thankful for everything we have learned on this trip.

Day 12

The end of another day and we keep getting closer and closer to the end. Today was great because we went to the 10th Annual Border Issues Fair. We had to wake up early in order to get there on time, but man was it worth it! We got to hear multiple people speak. The first was Sandra Lopez, a young woman who was raised in Tucson since she was two weeks old. When she was 19, one of her friends asked her to deliver a package for her and she did it. However, what she didn't know was that the package was full of marijuana. What happened then was that she was deported, even though her step-father was a U.S. citizen. She was living on the streets of Nogales for about a week, until one day a man approached her with a knife and she ran through the lines of traffic at the border to one of the U.S. authorities. He took her to a holding place for people who request asylum in the United States and told her to wait until someone came for her to ask some questions and fill out some paperwork. No one ever came and she was arrested for illegal re-entry into the United States. She had to serve time in federal prison and lost two years of her life. She is now allowed to remain in the country, but she could be deported at any moment. Her lawyer is working on getting her a better deal, but for now she is just grateful to be back in the U.S. She went through all of this, even though she had been living in the United States her whole life.

 We also hear from James Duff Lyall, who is a Border Litigation Staff Attorney in Tucson. He was telling us about the corruption with the Border Patrol and he told us a story of this one woman, a U.S. citizen, who was driving home with her two kids when she got pulled over. The officer came up to the window and told her to get out of the car. The woman wanted to know why, because all they need to know is if she is a U.S. citizen, but the officer just told her again to get out of the car. Again, the woman asked why and the officer said that if she didn't take off her seatbelt and get out of the car that he would take his knife and cut off her seatbelt and drag her out. Then he turned to his partner and asked him to get the taser because she was being "difficult." Obviously the woman just got out of the car, they questioned her for 45 minutes, and then let her go. She kept driving, and then discovered that one of her tires had been slashed! It was completely ridiculous. Our last speaker of the day was Christian Ramirez, Director of Human Rights Programs, Alliance San Diego, and Southern Border Communities Coalition. Each of the speakers were incredible and enlightened us even more about the issues on the border.

Along with all of the speakers, we also got to speak with people from different Humanitarian groups. I got to speak with another person from the Green Valley Samaritans and actually Shura, who we met a couple of days ago, was there also! Everyone who came and spoke to us kept saying how happy they were that so many young people were interested in the immigration problem between the U.S. and Mexico. 

After the Border Issues Fair, we had the rest of the day free. The first thing we did was go to a park and have a kind of picnic for lunch! It was a beautiful day out and we had a lot of great food! After lunch we all divided into doing different things. Ana Sofia, Alessandro and I all went to 4th Avenue to check out all of the stores. We found a lot of really cool stuff and I bought a really awesome new pair of pants! All of  the stores were very bohemian in style. After shopping, everyone went out to dinner and a couple of us stayed at Borderlinks and just relaxed. It was a great day to recover from all the busy days we've had so far! Tomorrow we get to sleep in, which I am more than excited about. We also get to have dinner with Mike Wilson, who was featured in one of the documentaries we watched before we came here! It should be another great day!

Day 11

I can't believe I only have a week left here in Arizona! It's kind of unreal all of the things we've done here in such little time. We had another early morning today, but that was fine because that meant we had an early finish! We started off with talking to Raquel Rubio Goldsmith. She specializes in research and teaching on Mexican-American women's history, human rights, and immigration issues. She has also won numerous awards for teaching excellence. She has presented papers on Mexican women on the U.S./Mexico border, before national and international conferences, and published the results of her research in several scholarly articles. In fact, the article we had to read last night was written by her! She spoke about human rights and the Border Patrol and one thing that she said really stuck out to me. "Where do human rights start and where do they end?" It's true though. Who decides what human rights should be? Who decides who these rights should be exempt to? It was humans who made the border after all. It was not created by nature. These people were not meant to be divided. She told us things about who is crossing the border, and actually it seems that more women are crossing recently. The women also have a higher rate of death than men. Something else that stuck out to me was the fact that the children that are apprehended are being deported unaccompanied. They are sending children, without their parents, back over the border into dangerous places at dangerous times. She was a great speaker and I'm really glad we got to hear from her!

After lunch we heard from another speaker, Chelsea Halstead from the Colibri Centre for Human Rights.

 The Colibri Centre for Human Rights owns the most comprehensive dataset of missing persons last seen crossing the U.S./Mexico border. Along with access to information about unidentified remains found along border, this data allows them to successfully match families searching for loved ones with unidentified remains and informs the public of a continuing human rights crisis on the border. She told us how there are only a few things that lets them positively identify a body and those are tattoos, fingerprints, skeletal radiographs, and dental radiographs. This organization actually deals with more migrant deaths than anyone else! 

After this presentation, we got to go to this really cool artsy place that sold a bunch of different Native American art and jewellery. The outside was really pretty too!

 Actually the weather today was perfect and I could have stayed outside all day. When we got back we got to have PIZZA for dinner! With pepperoni! Oh I was so happy. The reason was because it was our other guide, Tito's birthday! So we were celebrating! It was nice having pizza. I've missed it. And it was Little Caesar's so that made it all the more better. Then after dinner a bunch of us went to the movies again! We saw devil's Due and it was pretty bad. But it was nice to get out of the house! Tomorrow is going to be awesome because we are going to the 10th Annual Border Issues Fair! I can't wait to go!