Last Sunday, I was feeling antsy, so I asked my roommate Quan if he wanted to go over to the tourist market in downtown Juárez. Quan hadn't been over there yet, and I have been trying to find some small gifts for friends to bring back. Our other roommate Eric explained to me where the tourist market is, and off we went. It was super hot (and even humid!) outside, which made for two very sweaty tourists, but we found the market easily and were excited to start shopping. The market is in a big warehouse-type building and looks exactly like every other tourist market I've been to in Latin America...with all of the same goods, too. I always feel uncomfortable in places like that, especially when the vendors are each calling out, "Pásale, buen precios," or, even more uncomfortably, "Hello, you come here, I give you good price." And, to make it even more uncomfortable, it was immediately obvious that at least half of the little booths were closed. At Eric's suggestion, Quan and I went to the back corner of the market to talk to a guy who's originally from Oaxaca, lived in the U.S. for more than a decade, and then moved to Juárez after being deported. His English is nearly perfect and he didn't harass us to buy things, probably because he lived in the U.S. long enough to know that most estadounidenses hate feeling pressured to look at things when shopping. I asked him how business was these days, and he said the past few years have been horrible because the city barely sees any tourists anymore. He and everyone else who sells stuff at the market have to also find other work in order to meet their expenses; for example, he sells ice cream during the week. I felt really guilty not buying anything from him, but it was clear that everything being sold in the market was mass-produced (perhaps in factories in China?)
When we left the market, I wanted to go across the street to buy a Michoacana (popsicle). As we were crossing 16 de Septiembre, the main street in the city, we looked to the left and saw throngs of people walking towards us. It turns out that it was a protest against the recent presidential elections in which the PRI candidate won after what many Mexicans say were fraudulent practices. Many of the protesters appeared to be university students and were donning shirts that say "Yo soy 132." It seemed awkward to take a picture of the protesters, but I can tell you that there were hundreds and hundreds of them and that the whole thing remained incredibly peaceful (besides the fact that traffic was backed up so people were honking their horns incessantly).
I haven't really taken many pictures in Juárez, but here's a view of 16 de Septiembre (after the protesters moved over to the parallel street):
And here's a picture of the cathedral on the main square on 16 de Septiembre:
Since I was with Quan, I also felt more comfortable taking pictures on the bridge in the middle of the day. A random guy actually came over mid-picture and said, "Don't do that; they'll take your camera" but I don't know if he meant the people in cars driving by or Border Patrol. Anyway, it was too late by then, so it didn't really matter.
Here's a picture of my favorite temporary mural on the Rio Grande. It's hard to see, but pictures of individuals who have been "disappeared" in Juárez were used to spell out paz. We had rain this week, so the whole thing is already completely washed away:
And here's a picture I took of downtown El Paso from about halfway down the US-side of the bridge:
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