Borderzine (https://borderzine.com/tag/sonora/)
In Ambos Nogales the narco-violence prevalent in most U.S. – Mexican border cities is less; the lower level of violence is a direct result of the community connection that existed before and since the “Battle of Ambos Nogales” on Tuesday, August 27, 1918.
I saw them, the ghosts, or so I thought, and my illusion resulted in a new fantasma “living” on this highway. What I realized later, is that he, my fantasma, was just another victim of the American drug war on Mexico at the border.
Spending two hours at the school to see the challenges faced by rural schools in Mexico opened my eyes to reflect on my own teaching experience. What I saw was that education as the great equalizer is often unequal in the resources available to a school, but poor schools often equal equal academic success.
“Your daughter has problems, she needs to go back to catechism.”
It is faith that leads hundreds of Mexicans from the state of Sonora to walk 50 or more miles each October in a little-know yet significant religious pilgrimage from Nogales, Sonora to Magadalena, Sonora.