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Speaker 3: Women tend to stay in small rooms that are rented,
Speaker 3: you know, not so much in the shelters that they
Speaker 3: have the option. Women tend to try to get false
Speaker 3: documentation that will help them get on buses or ride
Speaker 3: in cars, or go around checkpoints walking that kind of thing,
Speaker 3: but in different routes then men would traditionally take. You know,
Speaker 3: the women who I've talked to over the years, they
Speaker 3: absolutely are thinking about how to protect their bodies, but
Speaker 3: also how to use their bodies to move through extremely
Speaker 3: difficult situations.
Speaker 1: From Fudro Media and PRX it's Latino USA. I'm Mariao Posa.
Speaker 1: Today she migrates the stories from women making journeys north
Speaker 1: to the United States. Before we start, there is a
Speaker 1: mention of sexual violence in this episode. In a new
Speaker 1: migration reality, the one that we're living through, women and
Speaker 1: children are requesting asylum in Mexico it higher rates than men.
Speaker 1: But even as more and more women are crossing borders
Speaker 1: on long and dangerous journeys, many hoping ultimately to get
Speaker 1: to the United States, you rarely hear about their stories
Speaker 1: and what it's like, specifically to migrate as an undocumented
Speaker 1: person when you're a woman or you identify as one.
Speaker 1: For women, their bodies take on a central role when
Speaker 1: they're in transit, regardless of their age. Some, for example,
Speaker 1: are forced to disguise their gender for their own protection.
Speaker 1: Others end up using it as a form of survival.
Speaker 1: But in the end, so many are victimized just because
Speaker 1: of their gender, and because so many of them are mothers,
Speaker 1: many will end up carrying their children with them. Latino
Speaker 1: USA editor Marta Martinez and reporter Alejandra Sanchez in SUNSA
Speaker 1: traveled to chap Us in southern Mexico. Here's their reporting
Speaker 1: about migrant women in different stages on their way north.
Speaker 1: Part one Girlhood, the body as a disguise and Marta
Speaker 1: Martinez is going to take it from here.
Speaker 2: It's midday in Palinke Chiappas, and it's very hot. There's
Speaker 2: a group of some eight boys sitting on the sidewalk,
Speaker 2: cramped under the shade of a small tree, just yards
Speaker 2: away from the migrant shelter where they spent the night
Speaker 2: a few days earlier. Last May, they had left on Luras,
Speaker 2: their home country, crossing first into Gatemala and then into
Speaker 2: southern Mexico. They walked more than one hundred miles through
Speaker 2: the humid, mountainous jungle to get to the city of Palinke,
Speaker 2: mostly known for its Mayan ruins, but also especially two migrants,
Speaker 2: as one of the few cities along Mexico's southern border
Speaker 2: with shelter facilities. The boys are between fifteen and twenty
Speaker 2: one years old. They all have the same destination goal.
Speaker 2: One of them even wears it stamped on his converse sneakers,
Speaker 2: the red, white and blue pattern of the US flag.
Speaker 2: One of the boys has a fresh haircut, the bottom
Speaker 2: half of the skull shaved, the top half tied in
Speaker 2: a high bun. It takes a while to realize that
Speaker 2: he is actually a girl. Her name is Amaya. Amaya
Speaker 2: recently turned fifteen, but she didn't celebrate with a big
Speaker 2: party like girls in Latin America usually do when they
Speaker 2: turn this age. Less than a month after her birthday,
Speaker 2: she packed her things in a backpack and left her
Speaker 2: parents home in a rush, joining a couple of friends
Speaker 2: and two distant cousins. She left with five thousand lampitas
Speaker 2: some two hundred dollars, but when we talked, she already
Speaker 2: had no money left.
Speaker 4: Co suky oh no, yeah, different, Amilia.
Speaker 2: Her dream is making it to the United States, where
Speaker 2: she believes she'll be able to work and earn more
Speaker 2: money than she could ever do in Honduras. In her
Speaker 2: hometown of Santa Barbara, there are no jobs. There's nothing. Amaya.
Speaker 2: Sasas is the most unequal country in the Americas. Sixty
Speaker 2: percent of the population is poor, and for over a decade,
Speaker 2: the country has held one of the highest murder rates
Speaker 2: in the world, especially against women, and one in six
Speaker 2: girls has experienced sexual violence. Its population is also very young.
Speaker 2: Almost half of all Hondurans are younger than twenty, but
Speaker 2: the increasing violence by organized crime, the unsustainable stortion and
Speaker 2: recruitment by street gangs, high unemployment and inflation are leaving
Speaker 2: young Endurance without opportunities in their home country. If all
Speaker 2: that wasn't enough to push thousands of Hodurance to migrate
Speaker 2: every year in twenty twenty, the COVID nineteen pandemic and
Speaker 2: two devastating back to back hurricanes sun Conduras even deeper,
Speaker 2: driving even more people like Amaya to leave. In the
Speaker 2: first seven months of twenty twenty, nine hundred and four
Speaker 2: unaccompanied minors requested asylum in Mexico, almost double the number
Speaker 2: for all of twenty twenty. The vast majority were Hondurant children.
Speaker 2: Amaya had her hair cut for free at the migrant
Speaker 2: shelter in Balinki the day before we met her her
Speaker 2: big sister Verlo.
Speaker 4: Okay, as you know, I think muchon yeah, Maria Jongwood.
Speaker 2: I mean the short hair is an advantage, Amaya says,
Speaker 2: because she doesn't stand out on the road. She wears
Speaker 2: a gray hat, only the shaven half of her head exposed.
Speaker 2: Her black T shirt is actually more revealing. It has
Speaker 2: a mini mouse bow printed on her chest and the
Speaker 2: pink brass trap picks out from her t shirt neck.
Speaker 2: On the migrant road, being a young woman is an
Speaker 2: added risk, and Amaya knows it.
Speaker 5: Calica cont.
Speaker 6: Yo.
Speaker 2: Amaya knows that men pray on girls like her and
Speaker 2: that she must stay alert at all times. She feels
Speaker 2: safe with this group of boys, though she says she
Speaker 2: trusts they won't abandon her when they walk together. She
Speaker 2: always walks in the middle on their long tracks across
Speaker 2: southern Mexico. Migraines try to walk in big groups to
Speaker 2: avoid getting mugged, kidnapped, or worse. Women and girls are
Speaker 2: also overwhelmingly exposed to sexual abuse and targeted by traffickers.
Speaker 2: It's hard to find reliable data on sexual violence against
Speaker 2: migrant women because they don't usually talk about it and
Speaker 2: they're often too scared to file police reports. According to
Speaker 2: Mexico's National Health Institute, almost half of women migrating through
Speaker 2: the country have been sexually abused or have exchanged sex
Speaker 2: for food, shelter, and anything else that would help them
Speaker 2: along their journey. It's even harder to find data on
Speaker 2: human and sex trafficking. One of the most obscure criminal
Speaker 2: networks in Mexico and in many other countries. One of
Speaker 2: the few reports available is the US State Department's Trafficking
Speaker 2: in Persons Report, which shows that in twenty twenty, almost
Speaker 2: eighty percent of six hundred and seventy three victims identified
Speaker 2: in Mexico where women and girls. The figure barely scratches
Speaker 2: the surface. Advocates say when Amaya left Onduda's she had
Speaker 2: already dropped out of school. She says that it took
Speaker 2: her half an hour to get there, and she didn't
Speaker 2: like her classes very much either. She enjoyed babysitting, though,
Speaker 2: especially taking care of her niece, who still calls.
Speaker 4: Her mom is Mama, I won't dabia.
Speaker 2: Amaya says she'd like to have children one day, but
Speaker 2: not until she's twenty five because it's a lot of
Speaker 2: hard work.
Speaker 4: Leventi sinko yeah, mayor de la momentore.
Speaker 2: In Honduras, one in four girls has been pregnant at
Speaker 2: least once before turning nineteen. The morning after we meet
Speaker 2: Amaya and her group at fourth in the morning, one
Speaker 2: of the years, but enough it's still pitch dark upside,
Speaker 2: but they want to get going before the sun is
Speaker 2: too harsh. Their goal for the day is getting to
Speaker 2: Salto Iagua, which is thirty five miles away, because that's
Speaker 2: where the next migrant shelter is. They sip some black
Speaker 2: coffee in plastic cups and smoke cigarettes. The group has
Speaker 2: shrunk a bit. Some didn't want to wait and decided
Speaker 2: to leave the evening before. There are now six boys
Speaker 2: Plasa Maya. Their ultimate goal is to jump on La
Speaker 2: Vestia or the Beast, the train heading to northern Mexico.
Speaker 2: Part of the train route in Chiapa's has been discontinued
Speaker 2: to give way to El Trenmaya, a big federal infrastructure project,
Speaker 2: so now migrants have to walk an addition of two
Speaker 2: hundred and twenty miles to the first train station in
Speaker 2: quat Sa Quadkos. The group walks following the train tracks,
Speaker 2: increasingly covered by weeds and stones due to the lack
Speaker 2: of use. Several of them, including a maya whole thick
Speaker 2: woodsticks the size of baseball bats to protect themselves in
Speaker 2: case they're attacked. And that sound in the background, those
Speaker 2: are the hauling monkeys hiding in the luscious trees. You
Speaker 2: rarely see women walking on the train tracks by themselves,
Speaker 2: let alone teenage girls like Amaya, and when they do,
Speaker 2: they hide their gender. We meet the group again in
Speaker 2: Salta the Iyawa the day after their fourteen hour track.
Speaker 2: There are now only four boys plus a Maya. Two
Speaker 2: of them decided to continue on their own no breaks,
Speaker 2: but Amaya isn't feeling well. She needs to rest a bit.
Speaker 2: She looks exhausted and her feet are very swollen.
Speaker 5: Am I.
Speaker 4: You know?
Speaker 2: Amaya says that for a moment she thought she wouldn't
Speaker 2: be able to make it. Her friend had to drag her.
Speaker 2: She got some burned, her head hurt. She tells us
Speaker 2: that she needs a favor, but she's ashamed to tell
Speaker 2: us what it is. Has just gotten her period and
Speaker 2: asks if we could help her get contraceptive pills to
Speaker 2: make her period stop. A similar hike awaited them the
Speaker 2: next day and she couldn't walk like this anymore. We
Speaker 2: tell her that pills won't really stop her period right away,
Speaker 2: but what about tempons? Amaya has never used a tempon
Speaker 2: the shelters. They only have sanitary towels, and Amaya says
Speaker 2: they're very uncomfortable in this hot weather.
Speaker 3: As people grow, especially in adolescents, women are so so vulnerable.
Speaker 2: This is Gretchen Kuhner, director of the Institute for Women
Speaker 2: in Migration based in Mexico.
Speaker 3: We've seen all different kinds of violence, you know, starting
Speaker 3: with extortion, which is just the highest, and then women
Speaker 3: also have the extra vulnerability of sexual violence.
Speaker 2: Many times though women don't realize when they're victims of
Speaker 2: sexual violence.
Speaker 3: Some women are so accustomed to being touched. Other women
Speaker 3: will say, well, the truck driver gave me a ride
Speaker 3: from Tabacula to Saltillo, and so of course in exchange
Speaker 3: for that, I had to sleep with him. But that's
Speaker 3: not sexual event, that's sexual violence.
Speaker 2: A recent change in Mexico's immigration law has directly impacted
Speaker 2: girls and boys traveling alone. Since January of this year,
Speaker 2: minors cannot be held in immigration detention centers. Now they
Speaker 2: must remain under the supervision of Mexico's Child Protective Services
Speaker 2: known as DIEF. Child rights activists have been pushing for
Speaker 2: this for over a decade, but its implementation has not
Speaker 2: resulted in the kind of change advocates expected.
Speaker 3: What we have is a situation in which there's especially
Speaker 3: in Chiapas, you know, whether there's just the largest flows,
Speaker 3: a lot of confusion about who should be doing what,
Speaker 3: insufficient resources.
Speaker 2: Because child protective services are overwhelmed, they sent many of
Speaker 2: these children to private shelters for immigrants, which are also overcarded,
Speaker 2: and we're living conditions might not be up to standards,
Speaker 2: especially for an accompanied children. During our reporting in Chapas,
Speaker 2: two shelter coordinators said that they had stopped accepting an
Speaker 2: accompanied minors from THEEF because they were quote too hard
Speaker 2: to deal with. Many have suffered violence or sexual abuse.
Speaker 2: They can be aggressive or unruly due to that violence
Speaker 2: and need special attention, the coordinators say, and the shelters
Speaker 2: don't have enough resources nor trained staff to help them.
Speaker 3: Some of them they receive a cursory interview and then
Speaker 3: they're turned back over to the National Immigration Institute and
Speaker 3: they returned to their countries of origin. The word I
Speaker 3: think that everyone understands would be deportation. But I also
Speaker 3: have the sense that, especially with unaccompanied children, that some
Speaker 3: of them are being released because if they can't be
Speaker 3: an immigration detention, there's no capacity to go through the
Speaker 3: correct system, then they're being released.
Speaker 2: Still, Gretchen things, keeping miners out of the tension centers
Speaker 2: was the right thing to do.
Speaker 3: So we have the right framework now, but we don't
Speaker 3: have the right resources. And there's also, you know, the
Speaker 3: larger issue, which is that we have to think regionally.
Speaker 3: A lot of parents and family members of children in
Speaker 3: our region are in the United States, and if it's
Speaker 3: in their best interest to be reunited with those family members,
Speaker 3: we need to accept that as a region, because there's
Speaker 3: regional responsibility for the reason that we're in the situation
Speaker 3: in the first place.
Speaker 1: Coming up on let you know usay the rise of
Speaker 1: migrant child trafficking, and then a group of women and
Speaker 1: the choices they make when their body is the only
Speaker 1: current they have to pay for the journey north. Stay
Speaker 1: with us notes, Hey, we're back, and before the break,
Speaker 1: we met Amaya. She's a teenage girl from Ondudas, migrating
Speaker 1: on her own and hiding her gender for protection. We
Speaker 1: continue the journey across southern Mexico now to learn about
Speaker 1: the experiences of migrant women. Now in the city of Tapachula.
Speaker 1: Editor Marta Martinez picks up the story from.
Speaker 2: Here at Jesus Elwen Pastor shelter in Tapachula, the city
Speaker 2: with the highest number of migrants and asylum seekers. We
Speaker 2: meet another fifteen year old girl from Honduras who is
Speaker 2: also on her own. We're gonna call her Christina Aga Sanchez.
Speaker 2: The coordinator of the shelter, says that a coyote had
Speaker 2: charged the girl two thousand dollars to get to the
Speaker 2: United States, where she has a brother she's trying to
Speaker 2: reunite with, but the coyote tried to sell her and
Speaker 2: then abandoned her in Whatatemala. The coordinator says, Christina is
Speaker 2: shy and afraid of talking.
Speaker 7: Well, no, I'm familia manna intensiforess.
Speaker 2: Her parents abandoned her when she was a child. She says.
Speaker 2: She grew up with her grandmother. More recently, a criminal
Speaker 2: gang started harassing her.
Speaker 7: For quego lasi interns and nan fear in Ternsi and
Speaker 7: matan in ternsi the America.
Speaker 2: The gang members tried to rape her, Christina says, and
Speaker 2: they threatened to kill her if she didn't leave the country.
Speaker 7: The next day, Alista and Maleta tredia caminando Ilo and
Speaker 7: in Esol, she.
Speaker 2: Packed her things and left. She walked and hitch hiked
Speaker 2: for three days. During those three days, Christina says she
Speaker 2: didn't sleep.
Speaker 7: With one pass ombresi internsi.
Speaker 2: Christina says she didn't sleep because she had heard that
Speaker 2: men could attack her. Auga says the number of teenagers
Speaker 2: arriving at the shelter has grown in twenty twenty one,
Speaker 2: and so has seinage trafficking.
Speaker 8: Liscente yesta or momentous.
Speaker 2: She's been doing this job for over thirty years, and
Speaker 2: she says it's never been this dangerous for migrant teenagers
Speaker 2: and children before. The shelter rarely commits to taking in
Speaker 2: an accompanied teenagers because they can guarantee their safety.
Speaker 8: Persi lot tratas persis the best part. Mafioso traffickers are
Speaker 8: waiting for them.
Speaker 2: They go after them. Alga says, when traffickers see migrants,
Speaker 2: they see money Science.
Speaker 1: Part two Adulthood the body as currency.
Speaker 2: The main square in Tapachula is always busy. Many of
Speaker 2: the people sitting on the benches selling food or cleaning
Speaker 2: the sidewalk are migrants from Central America and the Caribbean,
Speaker 2: but also from farther away, including African countries and India.
Speaker 2: Tapatula is also a big bottleneck for people who cross
Speaker 2: into Mexico through its southern border, often on their way
Speaker 2: to the US, which is still more than eleven hundred
Speaker 2: miles away. The majority of migrants asking for asylum in
Speaker 2: Mexico do it in this city, but the number of
Speaker 2: requests has grown so much in recent years that the
Speaker 2: process can take up to a year. That's why so
Speaker 2: many of them get stuck here too. In the first
Speaker 2: half of twenty twenty one, Mexico received nearly fifty two
Speaker 2: thousand asylum requests, and more than thirty five thousand of
Speaker 2: those in Tapatula. The numbers are already twenty five percent
Speaker 2: higher than those of all of twenty twenty. The country
Speaker 2: with most applicants is on Duras with forty four percent,
Speaker 2: followed by Haiti, Cuba, El Salador and Venezuela. But Chiappas,
Speaker 2: where Tapatula is located, is also the poorest state in Mexico,
Speaker 2: so job opportunities are really scars for migrants who are
Speaker 2: waiting for their humanitarian business or simply making a stop
Speaker 2: to earn some money after having spent everything they brought,
Speaker 2: or being extorted by the local police in Guatemala before
Speaker 2: they crossed into Mexico. For some migrant women, their body
Speaker 2: becomes currency. Some choose to look for clients on their own,
Speaker 2: often not the main square. Many others are forced into it,
Speaker 2: but it's hard to know exactly how many. Here's Gretchen
Speaker 2: Kuhner from the Institute for Women in Migration.
Speaker 3: Again, we've seen all different kinds of trafficking along the
Speaker 3: migration route in Mexico. So little is known about the
Speaker 3: different types of criminal structures that exist that force women
Speaker 3: into trafficking situations. Who might begin in a situation in
Speaker 3: which they're leaving their country, maybe they're traveling with a smuggler,
Speaker 3: and then from the smuggling situation they're trafficked. Then it
Speaker 3: could be in Tapachula, you know, or other towns along
Speaker 3: the southern border of Mexico. We've also had some a
Speaker 3: couple of cases of women who are kept in safe
Speaker 3: houses so they're not allowed to leave, so they're in
Speaker 3: a trafficking situation, but their job is either sex trafficking,
Speaker 3: you know, for the smugglers themselves, or it could even
Speaker 3: be you're not allowed to leave and you have to
Speaker 3: help us cook or clean or other kinds of domestic
Speaker 3: work that is needed in any kind of a situation,
Speaker 3: even if it's a criminal encampment.
Speaker 2: But for migrant women, there are also situations where the
Speaker 2: way they use their bodies as a currency is blurrier.
Speaker 2: Taskuanitas is one of those places. It's early on a
Speaker 2: Wednesday afternoon and the waiters are setting up for the evening.
Speaker 2: At this bar in the north of Tapatula. Some four
Speaker 2: girls in tight pans and lay stops or mini dresses
Speaker 2: start coming in. They wear heavy makeup despite the unbearable
Speaker 2: humid heat. They sit around one of the wooden tables
Speaker 2: and for the most part they look at their phones.
Speaker 2: A woman in a breezy white dress and curly hair
Speaker 2: is behind the counter. Her fingers are full of rings
Speaker 2: and her nails are long and monicured. Her name is
Speaker 2: Floor and she's the owner of the bar. She explains
Speaker 2: how Laskubanitas works.
Speaker 9: Jes gulfstan jests any sales is the refresco Navaho yes
Speaker 9: Eccellina un.
Speaker 2: According to Donia Floor, she pays the women who work
Speaker 2: for her a basic daily salary of two hundred pesos
Speaker 2: some ten u s dollars for eight hours of work,
Speaker 2: but they make most of their money off taps clients. Basically,
Speaker 2: men can buy the women drinks, but only if the
Speaker 2: women want to. Donia Floor says. The women's drinks are
Speaker 2: much more expensive than the regular ones, which costs one
Speaker 2: hundred and eighty five pesos so a little overnight dollars,
Speaker 2: almost as much as what Donia Floor pays them for
Speaker 2: a day of work. The women get to keep one
Speaker 2: hundred and sixty five pisos or a little over eight
Speaker 2: dollars from every drink Donia Floor takes the rest. Most
Speaker 2: of her profits really come from the drink's clients order
Speaker 2: for themselves. Both Donya Floor and the women told us
Speaker 2: that only if they choose to in exchange for the
Speaker 2: drinks men buy for them, they spend some time chatting
Speaker 2: with them, having a love Sometimes the women also dance
Speaker 2: with them or they let them touch their bodies. At
Speaker 2: any time. The women can leave the table if they
Speaker 2: feel uncomfortable. Both Donia Floor and the women say the
Speaker 2: waters at Las Cuanitas are all men, and they also
Speaker 2: keep an eye on the women who work there. Whether
Speaker 2: or not women have sex with clients, that's up to them,
Speaker 2: Donia Floor says, and they cannot leave the bar during
Speaker 2: their working hours. There are some ten women currently working
Speaker 2: at Lascuanitas, but despite the name, only two of them
Speaker 2: are actually from Cuba. Most of them are from Central America.
Speaker 9: Yes DNN, the Sentra America Albunasavena, Salida Delante, Lucha Boro
Speaker 9: Borguea with the ISSIL.
Speaker 2: Many of the women have children who depend on them.
Speaker 2: Donia Flor says that's why they have to do whatever
Speaker 2: job they can or decide to do.
Speaker 9: The Sionastos.
Speaker 2: Two girls started working at Laskuanita's just five days earlier.
Speaker 2: One of them is Kati. She's from Hondudas and she
Speaker 2: wears a nudleg stop that matches her high heeled shoes.
Speaker 2: Her nails match her clothes too, an intricate design in gold,
Speaker 2: orange and brown tones. She has been living in Tapachula
Speaker 2: for over a year and a half. Her dream, though,
Speaker 2: is making it to the US. Katy says this is
Speaker 2: the first time she's doing this kind of work and
Speaker 2: she doesn't like it.
Speaker 3: No.
Speaker 2: Katy says she's doing it because she has to take
Speaker 2: care of her six year old daughter, pay rent, and
Speaker 2: send money back to Ondua's. Her older child, an eight
Speaker 2: year old boy, is still there living with her mother.
Speaker 2: Life in tegui Alpa, the capital of Honduras, became unsustainable
Speaker 2: for Kati when a gang began forcing her to pay
Speaker 2: an extortion fee. They asked for one hundred dollars a month,
Speaker 2: an amount she couldn't make by selling tortillas. Her life
Speaker 2: was in danger, so she left the country with a friend.
Speaker 6: I do this if you're not support abercn coming as
Speaker 6: a pal.
Speaker 2: But shortly after Kati went back Toudas to pick up
Speaker 2: her daughter. The girl missed her too much and would
Speaker 2: cry all the time. It was the first time they
Speaker 2: had ever been apart. Before Laskuannita's Katy was working at
Speaker 2: a burger joint in Tapatula for eight hundred pisols per
Speaker 2: week about forty dollars. Sometimes it wasn't enough to feed
Speaker 2: her daughter, let alone send money back to Onduda's were.
Speaker 6: Not Yeah, mom, eating rayo, keeps h heavy, fishing and waiting.
Speaker 2: Fishing at the bar. Katy can make more money in
Speaker 2: one night than what she did at the restaurant in
Speaker 2: one week, and she says they treat her better too
Speaker 2: if she has an emergency.
Speaker 6: They're flexible, super different. The males quando amenza.
Speaker 2: You know, it's not been easy for Kati to get
Speaker 2: used to this kind of work and to make sure
Speaker 2: that men respect her depend ah. She hasn't told anyone
Speaker 2: about her new job, not even her daughter, who thinks
Speaker 2: Katy works selling tacos.
Speaker 6: Yeah, okay, mommy, and.
Speaker 2: Well she works. The woman who first offered Kati shelter
Speaker 2: in Tapachula takes care of her daughter. She's an angel,
Speaker 2: Katy says, man.
Speaker 6: Okay on a personality and forma.
Speaker 2: Sitting on the table with the other women. There's also Carrida,
Speaker 2: one of the only two Cubans around. She's twenty four, restless,
Speaker 2: and has appierced in the crosses her tongue horizontally. She
Speaker 2: hasn't told anyone about her new job either. Karidath has
Speaker 2: only been in Tapatula for a couple of weeks. She
Speaker 2: applied for some jobs, but they asked for an identification document.
Speaker 2: She didn't have a friend who had worked at Las
Speaker 2: Cuanitas told her that they were looking for women in Cuba.
Speaker 2: Karidad worked at a day care center, making sixteen dollars
Speaker 2: a month. She left for Brazil with her cousin, looking
Speaker 2: for a better job, but her goal was always the
Speaker 2: United States. If a comp my family, your women. In
Speaker 2: late March, Karida and her cousin left Brazil and ventured
Speaker 2: into a dangerous journey that took them through nine or
Speaker 2: ten countries. Karidath has lost count The worst part was
Speaker 2: crossing the Darien Jungle, a wild territory between Colombia and
Speaker 2: Panama that is considered among the most dangerous migrant roots
Speaker 2: in the world, not only because of the rough mountains
Speaker 2: and wildlife, but also because of the presence of criminal gangs.
Speaker 2: Karida accidentally lost track of her cousin the day they
Speaker 2: entered the jungle, and then the group she was walking
Speaker 2: with got stopped by a band of armed meno I
Speaker 2: just the men took their backpacks, and then they selected
Speaker 2: three women from the group. One of them was Karidad.
Speaker 2: Another one was a thirteen year old from Haiti, yeah
Speaker 2: by Anse but Yo Karia said she was lucky that
Speaker 2: she was raped by only one man. The thirteen year
Speaker 2: old Haitian girl was attacked by several.
Speaker 7: In Donceevre in came.
Speaker 2: Eventually, Karida reunited with her cousin in the jungle and
Speaker 2: they walked for four and a half days, borrowing food
Speaker 2: from others. The Hitian girl never made it out of
Speaker 2: the jungle. She drowned when the group crossed the river
Speaker 2: the first time that Karidad mentioned she had been raped
Speaker 2: in our conversation, she did it casually, as if it
Speaker 2: were just one more thing that she went through in
Speaker 2: this extreme journey she was still on. It felt like
Speaker 2: her mind was in survival mode, like she hadn't really
Speaker 2: processed everything she had been through. She seemed to be
Speaker 2: just as sad about having lost her phone while crossing
Speaker 2: the jungle as having been raped. She knows her life
Speaker 2: is what matters most, and she thinks God that she's
Speaker 2: still here. Sometimes Kadida shares some of her journey with
Speaker 2: the clients at the bar. It entertains them. She says,
Speaker 2: dealing with men when they are drunk gets more difficult.
Speaker 2: Sometimes they get annoying, or they might want to spend
Speaker 2: the night with her. No, when that happens, Kadida tries
Speaker 2: to move the conversation into another direction. She believes there
Speaker 2: are women who have it harder than her while migrating,
Speaker 2: mothers who make the journey with their little children. She
Speaker 2: doesn't have any yet and decide, look, you know, her
Speaker 2: focus is getting to the United States to work so
Speaker 2: that she can make sure her grandparents and her mother
Speaker 2: are taken care of. Only then she'll feel ready to
Speaker 2: start her own family. She says, motherhood can wait.
Speaker 1: Coming up on Latino USA, we head to Denosike in
Speaker 1: the neighboring state of Dabasco and meet a group of
Speaker 1: single moms taking the risky choice of migrating with their children.
Speaker 1: It's a dangerous decision, but is there another option? Stay
Speaker 1: with us, hey, we're back. Before the break, we met
Speaker 1: Kati and Kharidad in Tapachula, two migrant women who are
Speaker 1: using their bodies to finance their journey north. We're gonna
Speaker 1: move on now to the busy migrant routes along the
Speaker 1: Usumacinta River, which forms the natural border between Mexico and Guatemala.
Speaker 1: Part three, Motherhood The body as a forever bond. Here's
Speaker 1: Marta Martinez again.
Speaker 2: When media attention grew exponentially around migrant caravans crossing into
Speaker 2: Mexico and towards the United States in late twenty seventeen,
Speaker 2: Tapatula became the face of Mexico's southern border, a face
Speaker 2: that became increasingly aggressive. Starting in twenty nineteen, military presence
Speaker 2: increased in the Tapatula area. Former President Donald Trump brokeered
Speaker 2: a deal with Mexican President and Jasminuel Lopez Obrador to
Speaker 2: deter migrants from coming to the United States by stopping
Speaker 2: them early, even before they made it into Mexico. But
Speaker 2: the move didn't stop migrants, it just led them into
Speaker 2: tougher roots across the mountain and the jungle. Two of
Speaker 2: the most used routes right now are on opposite sides
Speaker 2: of the Yusumacinta River, which serves as a natural border
Speaker 2: between Mexico and Guatemala. Centuries ago, the Yusumacinta River was
Speaker 2: an important trade route for the Mayan civilization back when
Speaker 2: rivers were the main way to travel across the jungle. Today,
Speaker 2: the Usumacinta River is still busy, but for different reasons.
Speaker 2: At Frontira Corossal, on the Mexican side of the border,
Speaker 2: tourists used to take colorful boats to visit the Mayan
Speaker 2: ruins of Yaksilan, but the pandemic brought tourism to a
Speaker 2: sudden and unexpected halt. Now those same boats are busy
Speaker 2: transporting migrants from the Watemalan side of the river to
Speaker 2: the Mexican one, and business is booming. We spoke to
Speaker 2: one of the Lantido's the men who drive those small boats.
Speaker 5: Mill As Via.
Speaker 2: The Boatman says there are more than one thousand migrants
Speaker 2: crossing each day, day and night, and many of them
Speaker 2: cross with the help of coyotos or coyotes. At around
Speaker 2: eight pm in the evening, when it looked like the
Speaker 2: river would turn quiet as the sky went dark, a
Speaker 2: boat arrived on the Mexican docks. A group of some
Speaker 2: twenty migrants descended. There were several women in the group
Speaker 2: and at least three little children. A red car awaited them.
Speaker 2: They seemed to be traveling with a coyote. There was
Speaker 2: no police or military presence around me. People pay as
Speaker 2: much as fourteen thousand dollars per person, sometimes even more
Speaker 2: since the pandemic to travel with a coyote to the
Speaker 2: United States without any guarantee that they'll safely make it
Speaker 2: into the country. Women tend to travel more with coyotes,
Speaker 2: experts say, or at least in groups. Padalupeare Inas heads
Speaker 2: the Migrante program at Medicos El Mundo and Ango and Tapachula.
Speaker 2: She says that before twenty eighteen, Micritian in Central America
Speaker 2: was understood as a purely male phenomenon, but then women
Speaker 2: started taking the road more. For example, there were a
Speaker 2: lot of women in the caravans that became more popular
Speaker 2: in twenty eighteen. Wadalupees is a connection there, Oh.
Speaker 10: Yeah, No migran sols. Yes, migr compass simprevido collectives and
Speaker 10: simpre or back on la familia or bas or.
Speaker 2: Pero nozle. There have always been women collectives. What a
Speaker 2: Lupez says, women tend to get together when they migrate.
Speaker 2: They go with family or with friends, but they don't
Speaker 2: go alone. Wadalupees is migration as an empowering action, sort
Speaker 2: of an act of rebellion.
Speaker 10: Migradisna format resistant, na forma de kiro no kiro is,
Speaker 10: tavida is yokorokel mayorato revelda is migras as daglas conditions.
Speaker 10: Estado to pais is the colorno.
Speaker 2: On the other side of the Usumacinta River. There's Lasitendaidos,
Speaker 2: the biggest migrant shelter in southern Mexico. They serve over
Speaker 2: thirteen thousand people every year. It's in a relatively small
Speaker 2: city called Tenoske in the nearby state of Tabasco, not Chiapas.
Speaker 2: Where we met Amaya and the women of Las Cuanitas.
Speaker 2: When we visited Las Tendaidos, the shelter was closed due
Speaker 2: to a coronavirus outbreak. Over one hundred migrants roamed around
Speaker 2: in the sprawling grass bigger than a soccer field. They
Speaker 2: had turned the concrete grandstand into an improvised encampment where
Speaker 2: they slept under blue plastic tars and blankets or in amas.
Speaker 2: The night before, a storm soaked them and people were
Speaker 2: hanging their clothes to dry. There were lots of children
Speaker 2: running around playing soccer, and wherever there are migrant children,
Speaker 2: there are a lot of mothers, often single mothers. We
Speaker 2: sat down on the grass with three single mothers as
Speaker 2: the son started to fade away. They had all requested
Speaker 2: asylum in Mexico and were waiting for the decision. One
Speaker 2: of them is Mcgdalena. She's twenty one years old and
Speaker 2: she's from a rural area in eastern Guatemala called Los
Speaker 2: a matte Isabel. As we speak, she holds her daughter
Speaker 2: Juliana in her arms.
Speaker 11: It's the Jomarina Bouquet Mexico Mario Son and Michumpeao.
Speaker 7: Maghosve.
Speaker 2: When Magdalena starts talking about her ex husband and how
Speaker 2: he used to hit her. Her daughter can stand seeing
Speaker 2: her mother cry, and she begins to cry too. Magdalena's
Speaker 2: father died when she was eight years old and attend
Speaker 2: She started working to help her mother and five siblings.
Speaker 2: Her relationship with her ex husband was violent from early on.
Speaker 2: Magdalena wanted to leave him, but then she got pregnant
Speaker 2: at just seventeen years old. He wouldn't let her go anywhere,
Speaker 2: not even to church. He was weary of every man
Speaker 2: and even suspected that she was having an affair with
Speaker 2: the priests. He isolated her from the world comunitus.
Speaker 8: He will be.
Speaker 11: Meghamura Natania comunica zukomuma.
Speaker 2: If she left the house to buy food, she couldn't
Speaker 2: take more than five minutes. If she got home later
Speaker 2: than that, her husband hid her until her skin was
Speaker 2: all bruised. She couldn't communicate with her mother because he
Speaker 2: didn't let her have a phone. One time, her mother
Speaker 2: saw her with her face bruised and told her to
Speaker 2: report him to the police, but Magdalena was too scared.
Speaker 2: He had threatened multiple times to cut her head off
Speaker 2: with a machete if she spoke out.
Speaker 11: Majok formosa Policii Juquno Okaya Asaua Santo juke La Carezl.
Speaker 2: Eventually, Magdalena was able to escape and she spent some
Speaker 2: time living with her mother, but he found her and
Speaker 2: asked her to come back, swearing he would stop hitting her.
Speaker 2: But it wasn't the first time she had heard that.
Speaker 2: She decided to leave the country with her daughter, looking
Speaker 2: for safety and a better future for Juliana.
Speaker 11: By Yomebmemuskara Massa da Misakoa Atlante.
Speaker 2: Magdalena fled Guatemala with two of her sisters, her daughter,
Speaker 2: and her nephew with only one extra set of clothes
Speaker 2: on the road. They were lucky, she says, they found
Speaker 2: people who gave them food. Now they work for a
Speaker 2: man who has a farm. They take care of his garden,
Speaker 2: clean his house, work the fields. With the money they
Speaker 2: get from their daily work, they're able to buy some
Speaker 2: nachos from the food carts by the shelter. Sometimes they
Speaker 2: don't have enough, but it's still better than having stayed
Speaker 2: in Guatemala with her ex husband.
Speaker 11: Felice Miscino Masseura.
Speaker 7: Yosta.
Speaker 2: Here in ten Magdalena is happy, She feels safer. She
Speaker 2: says they're going to stay in Tenosiki for a while.
Speaker 2: She wants to go to the US in the future
Speaker 2: if possible, but she wants to do it safely.
Speaker 11: The primer Ca caestrellasmiliar.
Speaker 2: Dinga Magdalena says she's heard that it's more dangerous farther north,
Speaker 2: that they take the children away, they rape and kill
Speaker 2: the mothers and the girls. Magdalena says it's best to
Speaker 2: be patient, get their documents and then head to the US.
Speaker 2: Kidnappings and disappearances of migrants in Mexico have been on
Speaker 2: the rise in recent years, and they've also become more violent.
Speaker 2: According to the country's National Human Rights Commission, fifty four
Speaker 2: migrants are kidnapped every day on average in Mexico. In
Speaker 2: the case of women, they're often targeted by kidnappers and
Speaker 2: sexually abused and sometimes trafficked.
Speaker 3: Since about twenty sixteen, there's been much more family units,
Speaker 3: and a lot of the family units are headed by
Speaker 3: women who are heads of households and they're on their
Speaker 3: own with their small you know, their young children.
Speaker 2: This is Gretchen Kunner again from the Institute for Women
Speaker 2: in Migration.
Speaker 3: I mean, can you imagine traveling on your own without
Speaker 3: funds in a place that you don't know. That's scary
Speaker 3: with your little children. I mean, I think it leaves
Speaker 3: a psychological wound on every single person as well as
Speaker 3: the children.
Speaker 2: These single mothers often carry several children from different fathers.
Speaker 2: They're the only ones forever in charge of the care
Speaker 2: and well being of their kids.
Speaker 3: Even if you leave your children behind with the family member,
Speaker 3: you know, that's still something that's stigmatiz So women are
Speaker 3: expected to be the caretakers of their children, and that's
Speaker 3: why they're moving together because that's the expectation, and it's
Speaker 3: their societal responsibility to do so, and there's no extra
Speaker 3: support from their government to have any other options except
Speaker 3: to do that.
Speaker 2: For these mothers, taking their children with them when they
Speaker 2: migrate entails risks, but so does leaving their kids in
Speaker 2: their home country, And either way, they feel deeply guilty
Speaker 2: about the decisions they make.
Speaker 3: Women are really stigmatized. It's just amazing. You know, how
Speaker 3: could you take your children without any money? Well, how
Speaker 3: could you not take your children if you're in a
Speaker 3: dangerous situation and you need to leave. So I think
Speaker 3: that as a society, we're stigmatizing women and children and
Speaker 3: we're not asking the right questions or we're not providing
Speaker 3: the right resources.
Speaker 2: At the migrant shelter, we also meet Irma. It's not
Speaker 2: the first time Irma sits on the lawn of lasitent Taidos.
Speaker 2: It's her second time living on Duras, but this time
Speaker 2: she's on her own with her two children. Denosike doesn't
Speaker 2: bring back good memories. The first time she emigrated, she
Speaker 2: did it with Arnold, her husband and father of her
Speaker 2: youngest child. They applied for asylum, and while they waited
Speaker 2: for a decision, Arnold started working at a local supermarket.
Speaker 2: One day after his shift, Arnold Irma and her thirteen
Speaker 2: year old ran into some young drunk men on the street.
Speaker 2: They got into a fight and one of the men
Speaker 2: had a knife.
Speaker 12: Yeah, Ike eltchaop was.
Speaker 2: They killed? Arnold Irma tried to start from scratch once
Speaker 2: again in her home country of Africa.
Speaker 12: Savas.
Speaker 2: She looked for jobs at several factories, but the pay
Speaker 2: was never enough. She felt her only option was to
Speaker 2: leave again. She had to do it for her children
Speaker 2: and for herself too. She didn't want to get stuck
Speaker 2: thinking about her late Husbando.
Speaker 12: Pensando Ke The inl finnwras fortes gay gang in talb depression.
Speaker 2: Irma and her children took the same route they had
Speaker 2: taken the previous time. Everything reminded them of Arnold, but
Speaker 2: this time it was harder. Irma felt defenseless.
Speaker 12: Made fisil macomos como de san Parano, passe rode la
Speaker 12: Montana amerce tongsiving solidos komini solos irmaces.
Speaker 2: They were lucky that migration authorities didn't detain them. They
Speaker 2: circled mountains in the middle of the night to avoid checkpoints.
Speaker 2: They slept on the floor until they made it to
Speaker 2: Tenessiki again. Her oldest son is not doing well psychologically.
Speaker 2: He blames himself for not having done more to say Arnold.
Speaker 2: But at the shelter there are psychologists Irma sees, and
Speaker 2: she's trying to get him help.
Speaker 13: Mira que.
Speaker 12: Alisado guantank elby this imolavastante.
Speaker 2: None of the single mothers we spoke to in Tenosek
Speaker 2: knew how long it would take to hear back from COMAR,
Speaker 2: the Mexican Refugee Commission, about their cases, But something else
Speaker 2: was clearer to them. As soon as they got their papers,
Speaker 2: they would continue their journey North. Most of the women
Speaker 2: we spoke to during our reporting believe that migrating when
Speaker 2: you're a woman is harder than when you're a man.
Speaker 2: Some said it's carrier because they feel unprotected. Others agreed
Speaker 2: that they face more risks like sexual violence or trafficking.
Speaker 2: Many said their children were their biggest worry, but also
Speaker 2: their biggest incentive to live in search for a better
Speaker 2: future for their families. Women are migrating in new ways
Speaker 2: in groups, jumping on buses instead of trains, avoiding shelters
Speaker 2: and massive places that we still know or hear little about.
Speaker 2: In August, Cariat, the Cuban migrant who was working at
Speaker 2: Las cuan Nita's bar, after traveling through nine or ten countries,
Speaker 2: finally made it to the United States, where she plans
Speaker 2: to start all over again. Many more women are on
Speaker 2: their way. That's it for today.
Speaker 1: This episode was produced by Marta Martinez and Alexandra Sanchez
Speaker 1: in SUNSA. It was edited by Andrea Lobez Gruzado and
Speaker 1: mixed by Julia Caruso. This reporting was supported by the
Speaker 1: Reproductive Health Rights and Justice in the America's Initiative from
Speaker 1: the International Women's Media Foundation. The Latino USA. Team also
Speaker 1: includes Victoria Strada, Rinaldo leanoz Junior, Dori mar Marquez, Mike Sargent,
Speaker 1: Nor Saudi and Nancy Truchuillo. Benileei Ramirez is our co
Speaker 1: executive producer. Our director of Engineering is Stephanie Lebou. Our
Speaker 1: marketing manager is Luis Luna. Our theme music was composed
Speaker 1: by Zane RINOs. I'm your host and executive producer Maria
Speaker 1: jo Hoosa. Join us again on our next episode. In
Speaker 1: the meantime, look for us on all of your social media.
Speaker 1: I'll see you there and remember none Bay Yes Chiao.
Speaker 13: Latino USA is made possible in part by the chan
Speaker 13: Zuckerberg Initiative. The Anni E. Casey Foundation creates a brighter
Speaker 13: future for the nation's children by strengthening families, building greater
Speaker 13: economic opportunity, and transforming communities, and the Heising Simons Foundation
Speaker 13: unlocking knowledge, opportunity and possibilities. More at hsfoundation dot org.
Speaker 10: M Lapa Larceola pas mon Alaka, m