Story & Photos by Samantha Thom
The woman I encountered in the bathroom at the KOA campsite in San Diego, California, seemed confused about how I chose to spend my spring break. Perhaps she had generally classified college students on break as swimsuit-clad young coeds on the beach, partying in celebration of the ending of a term. This was probably why the image of my fellow students and I spending our time in matching purple t-shirts, crammed into two tents was a hard one to grasp.
“Are you a church group?” she asked.
I explained how Alternative Spring Break is a program offered through the University of Oregon’s Service Learning Program. Participating students spend their week off school volunteering and performing service while learning about a specific issue through hands-on experience.
“Do you get some form of credit for this?” the woman inquired. It almost bothered me that she seemed doubtful of our intentions. I replied no, and that we just wanted to be here to lend a hand and educate ourselves about the issues.
After brushing my teeth and receiving what appeared to be a nod of approval, she still looked at me with a rather perplexed expression. Before leaving, I added with a tone of assurance that there was nowhere I would have rather been.
Providing Shelter and Water
While in San Diego, my group of fourteen focused on immigration and border issues. We quickly realized how dense and complex these topics are after visiting several different non-profit organizations. Our group met with representatives from Casa Familiar, which provides low-income housing for families in need, as well as Water Station and Border Angels. The latter two construct water stations and place them out along the border between the United States and Mexico to try and prevent dehydration among those crossing over.
Our time in San Diego included making signs for Casa Familiar to display in the organization’s
windows. With Border Angels we glued, painted, and decorated wooden crosses with the inscription “No Olvidados,” or “Not Forgotten,” to place on the graves of unidentified migrants at Holtville Cemetery. The graves were marked with a single brick, row after row of John and Jane Does, all who had died during their journey to a new life in the US. Most, if not all, were found dead in the desert regions near the border as a result of dehydration and will more than likely never be identified.
Something that has become habitual for me when I learn about a new topic is to apply it to myself. How would I feel if I were placed in the figurative shoes of that person or group of people? In the issues involving immigration, most of the actual shoes that walk through the desert are ones not sturdy enough for the long distances they travel. Those wearing them are dehydrated and weak from the heat. As shared in the documentary The 800 Mile Wall, which we watched while at Water Station, to travel through the desert in the southern California region, a person must drink at least one quart of water per hour to survive. Wearing heavy-duty footwear is also a necessity to trudge over the rugged terrain. However, this is not known by many migrants who attempt to cross, only prepared with as many goods as they can carry, and almost never enough water.
The thought of my own flesh and blood attempting to cross through the desert, risking imprisonment and death for a better life for me, was a horrifying one that crossed my mind multiple times throughout this trip. Many families of migrants will never know what happened to their family members. Did they make it across safely? Did they die in the desert? Are they in jail? Are they ever going to see them again? I don’t know how I could live with that constant feeling of uncertainty, worry, and knowing the possibility of never having closure. Seeing the more than seven hundred graves in the cemetery with more coffins stacked to the side was heart-wrenching.
Going to Jacumba
The most enlightening part of this trip was the combination of placing the crosses on the graves and then traveling to the Jacumba Wall, an older section of the border between Mexico and the US that we visited with Border Angels. We got to see and touch the wall, which was both frightening and mind-blowing. Other than the gravesite, it was the most concrete, in-your-face form of evidence of what has caused so many deaths, complications, legislation, and social injustice.
Looking through a hole in the wall I saw very rural and modest homes, and thought how I would feel if I had a giant means of separation, a true eyesore right in my backyard. I then looked down at the soil beneath my feet, realizing how valuable it was, and how much standing on it would mean to someone who made the long journey from the south in search of a better life.
After having a difficult and stressful winter term, I initially thought the last thing I wanted to do was go far away to volunteer with a bunch of people I barely knew. I felt burnt out and doubted I was making strides towards anything meaningful during my time at school. This trip shocked me back into reality. I was reminded of how fortunate I am and we all are to be students and citizens of this country. The graves we saw of the unidentified migrants were proof of people who had dreamt of greatness for themselves, for their children, and for their families, but will never see it realized.
