On The Street - San Luis, AZ

On The Street
In the border towns life is still lived on the street, much the same as it was across the United States during the 1950’s. There is a constant movement of people and vehicles crossing the border and back again. Although it slows somewhat later in the evening it continues into the night. Here a man talks on a pay phone, something rarely seen in this age of mobile communication, while another man waits his turn.

De Colores Rivera

In the middle of nowhere between Tucson and the Mexican border sits this memorial to a young man who lost his life trying to cross the desert into the United States. Countless immigrants lose their lives on the dangerous journey. Some are never identified and some are never found but they are never forgotten.

Los Desconocidos (The Unknown)

Los Desconocidos (The Unknown) 2007
This cemetery sits along side the interstate that runs between Phoenix and Tucson.

El Medallón (The Medallion)

In August of 2007 I accompanied a group from Humane Borders on a Saturday clean-up excursion. Our mission was to clean what is referred to as a “lay-up” site. A lay-up site is where Mexican migrants wait for a ride for the final miles of their journey to the United States. The landscape between Tucson and the Mexican border are covered with these sites and are littered with discarded clothes, back-packs and personal items of every description. Ten of us picked up enough trash to fill two pick-up trucks. One of the personal items picked up that day was the St. Christopher medal you see in the photograph.

The Fence !

The fence. The infamous fence. Why does it just end here and why are the gates open. Actually I believe this to be what they refer to as a secondary fence that serves to slow down the border crossers if they have actually made it into the United States. There are always more questions than answers.

http://www.flickr.com/photos/11060581@N02/?saved=1

Checkpoint

I was stopped and questioned by two customs agents as I was photographing the border checkpoint at night. They were polite but very firm. I was not to photograph any U.S. Government personnel. I was informed that, in the old film days, they would have just confiscated my film, but in the digital age they wanted to take a very close look at my images on the camera monitor. Evidently I was pointing the camera in their general direction and they wanted to make sure that I didn’t get a recognizable photo of them. Life is different at the border.

San Luis, AZ

I just returned from the Yuma/San Luis area with a ton of great photographs. Spent two days looking and photographing. San Luis is not your typical, tourist border town. Stay tuned for the photos, coming tomorrow.