Calexico - confounded national identity issues prepacked and served to you at a boil right in the name. Cal.Exico. Not quite here nor there. A different species of cities. Calexico is small and humble - clean and accomodating to the crossers who work their ways through the four-road downtown trip of one dollar clothing shops and pharmacies to get to the Walmart across town. Peddling down E Zapata st on the Barajas' borrowed bike draws a lot of attention. Or is it being a white girl. Either way I get waves and stares as I jam towards the border. The fence is unimaginably tall, rusted and double-enforced. Border Patrol parks every 30 feet or so, resting in the dotted shade of the border wall. They crane their heads as I ride by along the metal, reaching out my hand to feel its presence. I've seen pictures, I've heard stories, all of which unravel into the same metaphysical and often mellowdramatic sensation of being wronged. And now i feel it - trite and popular are just euphemistic sisters-in-law, right? Chilled in 95 degrees Fahrenheit. Goodbumps beneath my dripping sweat. My hair is soaked and on edge.
But the birds eye - there's the real thriller. Calexico is made for Mexicali. A one-bar town adjacent to miles of big-lane highways, malls, a mess of varying neighborhoods rich (errm, comparatively?) and poor. Supposedly known for its chinese food? I'm still digesting the thought. "So, let's talk about crossing," I slide into the conversation over carne asada with the Barajas. Twice a week they go over for date night - no real restaurants in calexico. Elvia is a regular at the music venues, diehard EDM fan. Diego and I moved easily across the border, he ran up to his old house, lifted the gate to the roof entrance and weaved up the spiral staircase. "This is where we used to shoot our BB guns at passing cars." "This is the house we used to ding-dong-ditch. We stuck to her house, she got so mad." A nice duplex, half a block from the governor's house. They send security out while i'm taking pictures - the PRI seems on edge these days. "Ten cuidad eh," they say when i tell them i'm traveling, holding an extended finger up to one eye. The Barajas moved for better schools and border wait times - hours in line in the morning to cross to the United States. And for safety - Diego recounts two friends of his who were kidnapped in Mexicali. His ease and comfort with the words were more unnerving, but he doesn't seems like a man inclined to sensationalism in the first place.
Tensions in each city gurgle over Mexicanity - you're either not American enough or not Mexican enough in either space. The Mexicans in Calexico don't like the Mexicans in Mexicali - too big city, too self-involved, says Elvia. But we are better, she laughs. The Mexicans in Mexicali don't care about the Mexicans in Calexico - they live across the border. They are just fine. People, goods, tech, entertainment all zigzag across the border, tracing a looping infinity symbol of tire marks and footprints. And tensions - shared tensions - among kinship keep the communities neatly knit.
But the birds eye - there's the real thriller. Calexico is made for Mexicali. A one-bar town adjacent to miles of big-lane highways, malls, a mess of varying neighborhoods rich (errm, comparatively?) and poor. Supposedly known for its chinese food? I'm still digesting the thought. "So, let's talk about crossing," I slide into the conversation over carne asada with the Barajas. Twice a week they go over for date night - no real restaurants in calexico. Elvia is a regular at the music venues, diehard EDM fan. Diego and I moved easily across the border, he ran up to his old house, lifted the gate to the roof entrance and weaved up the spiral staircase. "This is where we used to shoot our BB guns at passing cars." "This is the house we used to ding-dong-ditch. We stuck to her house, she got so mad." A nice duplex, half a block from the governor's house. They send security out while i'm taking pictures - the PRI seems on edge these days. "Ten cuidad eh," they say when i tell them i'm traveling, holding an extended finger up to one eye. The Barajas moved for better schools and border wait times - hours in line in the morning to cross to the United States. And for safety - Diego recounts two friends of his who were kidnapped in Mexicali. His ease and comfort with the words were more unnerving, but he doesn't seems like a man inclined to sensationalism in the first place.
Tensions in each city gurgle over Mexicanity - you're either not American enough or not Mexican enough in either space. The Mexicans in Calexico don't like the Mexicans in Mexicali - too big city, too self-involved, says Elvia. But we are better, she laughs. The Mexicans in Mexicali don't care about the Mexicans in Calexico - they live across the border. They are just fine. People, goods, tech, entertainment all zigzag across the border, tracing a looping infinity symbol of tire marks and footprints. And tensions - shared tensions - among kinship keep the communities neatly knit.
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