A few years ago, I went on a trip to the borderlands between Mexico and California and visited a migrant shelter in Tijuana. At the entrance of the shelter, a quote from St. John Baptist Scalabrini read, “Para el migrante, su patria es la tierra que le da el pan.” Translated:
"For the migrant, his country is the land that gives him bread.”
It’s a thought I’ve come back to again and again. As an immigrant person, it’s so hard to know where you belong. In my case, this lack of place led to romanticizing a return to Latin America, to a place where the people look like me, and I’m not constantly asked where I’m from. The reality has been…complicated.
Reality Check #1: Language
As a writer and a person who has always loved words, I have grown accustomed to being a competent communicator. My sister has often told me that I have the gift of gab. It’s a nice way of saying I’m a talker, and it’s true. But only in English! I was educated in the United States from the time I was 9-years-old, which means that basically my entire education has been in English.
This has never been a problem for me on my visits to different places in Latin America because I know the language fluently and can navigate different cultures within Central and South America. However, these days I find myself working next to Mexican colleagues whose entire education, including university degrees, has been in Spanish. In addition, they’re all fluent in English at a fairly high level. I, on the other hand, have studied more French grammar than Spanish grammar (thanks to high school and college second-language requirements).
And so I find myself understanding nearly everything they say, but I don’t quite have the vocabulary to respond in Spanish. In fact, sometimes, I respond in English. I’m feeling a little bit like that scene in the Selena movie where the Texas-born and raised singer is asked how it feels to be back in Mexico, and she says, “Me siento muy…[long pause as she searches her mind for the word in Spanish]…excited.”
For some reason, I can’t shake the shame of looking like what many people think a Latina looks like yet not being competent in the first language I learned, the only language I knew till I was 9.
Reality Check #2: Universal Problems
In my naïve mind, moving back to Latin America was going to be a bit like moving to a TV sitcom land, where you live in community; everyone loves each other; and every problem is resolved in 30 minutes or fewer. Ok, I didn’t actually think all of that would be true, but I did overemphasize the positive aspects of my return to living here. In fact, I felt a bit like Hagar must have long ago when she and her son returned to Egypt after being mistreated in foreign land among strangers (Genesis 16).
Because President Trump made xenophobia great again, hospitality toward refugees and other immigrants in the US has shifted considerably and not for the better. But it turns out xenophobia exists here, too—it’s just directed at Central Americans, Haitians, Venezuelans, Colombians, and African immigrants, many of whom aren’t even seeking to stay in Mexico. I’ve learned about these unpleasant realities while volunteering at a migrant shelter just outside the city.
I somehow thought that some of the burdens of the world wouldn’t be felt here. The reality is that I feel some of the same burdens here, and I’ve exchanged others for new ones! Classicism, anti-Blackness, anti-Indigeneity, machismo, and internalized as well as externalized racism are huge issues here, as they are in many places in the world.
No Country for Immigrants
In the Selena film (and in real life, I’ve since learned), Selena’s father expresses a truth a lot of us immigrants feel: in the US we are regarded as not being American enough, and in our countries of birth or those of our parents, we are regarded as not being Mexican, Guatemalan, Korean, Indian etc. enough. I have felt this here in Mexico as well as in the US—I’m often treated like a person without a country.
Don’t misunderstand me—there are absolutely wonderful things that I love about Mexico. Every country has beauty and rich cultural traditions, and these are my favorite things about living here. But as an immigrant, my people are those who live in-between, in the figurative borderlands.
I felt this truth deeply on a recent trip I took to Houston, TX for a speaking engagement. I encountered several immigrants and children of immigrants on this trip and I felt a kinship with them that I just don’t feel among the people here. Those are my people. it’s in these borderlands that I find belonging.
Perhaps this is what St. John Baptist Scalabrini was expressing in the idea that for the immigrant, home is where you find bread—and maybe also where you share it with your people who are also without a country.
I hope you’re doing well and enjoying this changing of the seasons. I’m looking forward to celebrating Día de los Muertos soon. More on that later.
with hope,
Karen
Some good stuff you should check out:
Anything for Selena podcast: The episode on Spanglish relates to some of the things I’ve discussed in this newsletter.
My comadre, Sandy Ovalle Martínez wrote an excellent article for Sojourners: “My Latine Christian Faith Embraces What Western Faith Demonizes”
Casa Migrante Tijuana is the shelter I visited in Tijuana. They are doing God’s work, and if you have the inclination, I encourage you to donate to support their work: https://casadelmigrantetijuana.com/
A great show on Netflix about a Palestinian asylum-seeker in Houston—it’s so well done:
I relate to so much of this, particularly the idea of the complex layers around language and identity — I’ve felt the same shame for my language skills not being what I want them to be, or what they “should” be because of what my heritage is. Also a fellow fan of Anything for Selena and Mo on Netflix!