Welcome to Phoenix

Flying into to the Phoenix-Mesa airport was a little surreal. At first all that could be seen as mountains and deserts, which were absolutely striking--it's been years since I've been near real mountains, and I didn't realized how much I've missed them until we arrived. Then, of course, we flew lower, over the farming areas outside of the capital. Enormous green rectangles and circles were spread out over the flat desert, with man-made poker-straight irrigation canals carrying water away from the distant Colorado river. It was unsettling, and it felt wrong. A simultaneous testament to man's ingenuity and idiocy to be sure.

After we landed, found our luggage (my mother's suitcase, a solid metal silver contraption that looks like it could survive a nuclear explosion, was brought out personally because of it's unique appearance,) collected our rental car and checked into a hotel.

Being absolutely starved, we decided to go in search of a meal. Not just any meal--we have decided that throughout the trip, every meal (except breakfast) we will endeavour to try something completely new. We got exactly that. We found a restaurant (Texas something or other) which not had a tacidermied armadillo drinking a bear as decor but gave us free peanuts which we got to throw on the ground (mum was horrified,) brought us fried pickles and about half a pound each of pulled pork. Needless to say, we'll be eating left overs for days--if it survives the heat.

The event of the day was going to the Desert Botanical Garden where we walked through carefully groomed trails detailing blooming cacti, wild flowers, a desert oasis, and even a small mountain of a rock.

It was stunning, but the best part was the wildlife. Birds everywhere, even some feeding their young in cacti, hares, lizards, butterflies, and small squirrel like creatures. As the night came on, bats appeared to swoop in and catch moths and other night insects above our heads.

Live flamenco music and dancers made the evening a complete experience. It was a lovely introduction to the landscape and the variety of life in the desert as well as the entertainment of Phoenix.

First day in Arizona was an overall success.

Crossing into the US

Since I just crossed the Canada/US border today, I thought that a post about the actual border crossing as I encountered it might be pertinent.

The border crossing itself is located between Thunder Bay and Grand Marais right near Pigeon River. Pigeon River used to be a portage route and later trading post for the first voyageurs in the area before they went a little farther North East to where Fort William was founded on the Kaministiqua river. Now Pigeon River is an abandoned conservation area where the remnants of a camp ground facility are slowly falling apart over time. It's a lovely place to go hiking, scenic views from the hill and a waterfall to boot, and I am forever tempted to swim across (which, of course, would be an illegal crossing). Not this time, though. We had a destination to get to. And a border to cross.

Passports at the ready, my mother, father and myself drove to the check point where all kinds of technological apparatuses are aimed at the vehicle, including a camera which flashed as we pulled up to the window. Names, passports, reasons for entering the United States, and the relationships between each other were all handed over. Because my father is a Belgian, he was forced to park the car and go into the small building to be finger printed. Since this trip was my idea, I went with him.

It was surprising how very oppressive the space was when we entered. Photos of the president alongside a bald eagle flying against the stripes and stars were on the wall. Warnings and threats of what is done to smugglers or illegal weapon carriers are everywhere. About seven officers all geared up with bullet proof vests, army boots and guns sat around watching as one officer questioned my father and I about the reasons for the trip while he filled out paperwork and took fingerprints and a retinal scan of my father's eyes. To go to Duluth. Overnight.

What was surprising to me (since I was merely the onlooker for this process- having had the option of not coming into the building at all) was the number of questions directed to me personally. "Why is it important for you to go to Arizona for your thesis?" because it's a creative thesis, I'd like to see a desert, and I've got a meeting with a graduate coordinator at the Arizona State University "Who is at the Arizona State University that you're meeting with?" The School of Theatre and Film graduate coordinator "Why can't you do this in Southern Ontario?" Because it is a specialized area of interest, and there are certain texts I can't access from Canada "Do you have copies of your correspondence with ASU?" No "Why is this trip necessary?" I'm checking out the university down there, doing some research and having a holiday with my Mum "You're doing your Master's in what?" English Literature "Why do you have to go to ASU?" Because it's a specialized program. "What school do you go to?" I'm doing my MA at the University of Guelph "Why were you in Thunder Bay?" My parent's live here, and I'm visiting right now "Why didn't you fly from Toronto?" We were already in Thunder Bay and the flights from Duluth were more practical "Who is this woman and why doesn't she have your last name?" That's my mother's passport and she just preferred her own

Thank god he didn't interrogate me on what my thesis was about. Can you imagine having to explain to a border guard who is already being overly inquisitive (and not in a pleasantly curious kind of way) why borderland theory, identity performance and illegal immigration is even remotely important? Or why several texts on my reading list are banned in the state I'm travelling to?

This is going to be an interesting trip. I was going to take photos while I was at the border, but considering I was already getting so much attention, I thought it would be prudent to avoid drawing any more attention to myself.

Stay tuned: tomorrow I have to get through airport security.

My apologies on not having posted in a while. Rest assured, I have not been idle during this break, but rather have been focusing my efforts on my "real" academic writing.

I will be travelling to Arizona and New Mexico on Friday where I hope to accomplish a few things, including sight seeing, visiting border towns, volunteer with Humane Borders, go to the Ancient Ways Arts Festival and Market in Zuni Pueblo, and meet with a few graduate coordinators at Arizona State University. Along with this, I intend to read Leslie Marmon Silko in public, and see if I can purchase a copy of Rethinking Columbus: The Next 500 Years. This is, of course, in direct reference to the Tucson Unified School District's banning of texts (mostly by Native American and Chican@ authors), and I'd love to know how easy it is to find copies of these books in book stores, even though they were only officially banned in the school system.

I also am heading there to do some of what Monique Mojica would refer to as "body research". If I'm writing about the desert, the border, and the people who live in borderlands every day of their lives, I should really go and be there. Not to gain any sense of authority or authenticity, since that would of course position me in a colonial-tourist overseer kind of role, but to reconfigure my internal landscape that right now is based on the fiction I read, the photos I see, and the videos I watch.

I will be documenting the trip with photos, blog posts, and anecdotes (both theoretical and personal). It's about time I crossed some borders.

Violence on the Home Front

"Do you have to read all of that awful stuff? It's so depressing."

I was recently asked this as I sat hunched over a stack of books including Charles Bowden's Juarez: The Laboratory of Our Future, Diana Washington Valdez's The Killing Fields: Harvest of Women, and Marjorie Agosin's Secrets in the Sand: The Young Women of Juarez. As can be inferred from the titles, they are indeed depressing and deal with horrific content, but nevertheless, I was surprised at the question. It is understandable, I mean, I could have found something far more enjoyable to do rather than watch Lourdes Portillo's Senorita Extraviada: Missing Young Women and nearly throw up at a description of torture.

Despite all this, I firmly believe it is important to read this information. I have the privilege (like the person who asked me) to ignore this information. I could very easily continue my academic career without actually letting accounts of kidnapping, rape, torture, and murder bring me down. These are stories that happen to someone else, in another time another place. What can Thunder Bay and Juarez possibly have in common?

In December of 2011 Thunder Bay took on the title of Murder Capital of Canada, due to the number of homicides that occur due to the drug trade and gang activity. As a border town Thunder Bay shares many similarities with Juarez in terms of violence the publicity of said violence.  The Mayor of the city has argued that the issues plaguing Thunder Bay are unlikely to reach national headlines because of their origins in alcoholism and drug use...an interesting comment, to be sure. It makes me question how these origins somehow make the acts less publishable, and what (racial, cultural, age, economic) demographic is being stigmatized and therefore ignored by the media. While I attended high school in the city the number of suicides alone in young First Nations women of my age group was staggering. The number of rapes that I personally am aware of are equally so. Good luck finding any investigation on either of those problems.

Although femicide, gang violence, substance abuse and the drug trade in Juarez is far more extreme than in Thunder Bay, it too is unlikely to reach national headlines for different reasons (namely, police and governmental corruption). It is so extreme and so horrific that it borders on desensitization. It is easy then, to say that life in the "first world" is different, less violent, etc. We assume that because we live in a location that we are aware of the problems around us, and if you are privileged enough to be safe from violence it is seductive to assume that there is no violence nearby. It's depressing and uncomfortable to even think about, so why not slip into something a little more complacent, like ignorance.

In Senorita Extraviada, the groups of family members of the murdered girls try to bring this information forward, in an effort to educate those around them and protect other women. Their argument is that "to remain silent is to acquiesce" and that it is entirely unacceptable.

So, to the person who asked me if I had to read all that awful stuff: yes, I do. Not just because I'm writing about it in my thesis, but because it's happening in my world, and what happens to others affects me. It's absurd to think that we are ever completely removed from other human beings in this world--especially when such atrocities are being committed. It's easy to ignore them, to turn a blind eye when looking at reality depresses us, but what this does is create a sterilized fiction for ourselves. And I refuse to perpetuate that.