For years, families on both sides of the border have lived apart, with Mexicans in the US without papers afraid of visiting home and then being unable to cross back. But new laws could change this.
From the public radio collaboration Fronteras Desk, Jude Joffe-Block reports from Mexico about families hoping for long-awaited reunions.
— Enrique Morones, border activist on Friendship Park, which he calls a “sacred place” for divided families
The US-Mexico border divides family members for all kinds of reasons. Some are undocumented. Some have been deported - one study found that half of all deportees leave behind family in the US. Others, like Luis and Jimena, just get stuck in the tangles of bureaucracy and their own complicated lives.
For decades, loved ones separated by the US-Mexico border have met at Friendship Park. In this photo, Jimena Angulo meets her father Luis for the first time, at a ceremonial opening of the border gate. (Photo by Peggy Peattie)
What was your first reaction when you reunited with a loved one after a long separation?
President Obama is visiting Mexico this week, the United States’ third largest trading partner.
Most of the back and forth in trade originates from big multinationals. It’s much harder though for small Mexican entrepreneurs to sell their products in the United States: http://ow.ly/kCxv6
Discarded chewing gum is a common eyesore, and removing it from city streets and sidewalks can be costly. A Mexican congressman wants to solve the problem by borrowing a concept widely used in environmental regulation: making the polluters pay. http://ow.ly/jp2Cd
Mariachi music is a quintessential sound of Mexico. But in Mexico, it’s a style of folk music that’s never been taken all that seriously and certainly not among music educators. It’s considered bar music, unworthy of academic study. But it’s becoming different story just north of the border in Texas.
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Journalist and blogger Jennifer Schmidt on stray dogs in Mexico City.
Listen to Schmidt talk about the social media backlash after authorities in Mexico City jailed 25 stray dogs accused of the recent mauling deaths of a young couple, a mother and her baby in a local park: http://www.theworld.org/2013/01/dogs-blamed-in-mauling-deaths/
Stray dogs in Mexico City have been accused of the recent mauling deaths of four people. Journalist Jennifer Schmidt tells host Marco Werman why hundreds of thousands of strays are a dangerous and growing problem in the Mexican capital.
(Source: theworld.org)
