Wikers Tire
IRRIGATION AMOR
Amor for the irrigation ditch, Mesilla Valley, October 2020
Amor is where you find it.
The Mesilla Valley is known for its high quality cotton production, its incomparable Chile and, increasingly, its huge pecan orchards with a winery thrown in here and there.
The valley straddles the path of Camino Real, the Royal Road of the Spaniards, as they marched to the north, conquering (and being defeated, notably by the fierce and excellent cavalry of the Comanches of the Empire of the Comancheria).
SELFA
Dr. Selfa Chew Ph.D.
Visiting Assistant Professor,
Department of History
at University of Texas-El Paso (UTEP)
PHEW! WE’RE BACK!
THIS SITE HAS BEEN DOWN FOR TWO MONTHS. WE’RE BACK. THE SITE WAS SUSPENDED AND IT TOOK THIS LONG TO RESTORE IT TO TOTAL BUG-FREE HEALTH. TO BE HONEST THERE HAS BEEN VERY LITTLE “ME.” THE BORDER BLOG WEBMASTER, MANNY RIVERA, FOUGHT THE MALWARE FORCES OF EVIL… AND AS HE ALWAYS DOES, BROUGHT US BACK TO LIFE.
SO GLAD WE’RE HERE. SO GLAD YOU’RE HERE.
1951 Ford hood, Navajo Reservation, Utah, 1974
So here we are, searching for borders again. It’s been a long time since I began this photo journey in 1968. First there was the “border” of Appalachians in Chicago.
Then there was the Five Nations of Oklahoma and the last refuge of the Buffalo in southwest Oklahoma.
Eventually I found my way to El Paso/Juárez. That one’s took thirty-five years plus.
And now?
Not sure. Usually I have wandered into my “forward.” Been stuck lately, taking care of business, being a professor, thinking, living in the old paradigm.
I suspect it’ll be that way again. I’ll bumble into the “next.”
I just mentioned -above- all the stuff that’s in the rearview mirror.
Looking out, over the hood… well you have to get the car into first gear first.
It’s coming.
Stay tuned. The Border Blog is back.
So am I.
ALEX WEBB ON THE JUAREZ-EL PASO BORDER
Alex Webb
Man in Juarez. Chihuahua. 1975
FRANK OSCAR LARSEN: STREET PHOTOGRAPHY FROM THE 1950s
All photographs are ©FrankOscarLarsen2015
U.S./MEXICO BORDER: BORDER MONUMENT #258
Whiffs: I Can See Tomorrow
Mariachi, Juárez, 2002
There was a day when you could think of Juarez and think in color. I get whiffs of it lately, but one is so cognizant that under that shiny surface is a black and white heart that has been ripped open for all to see and it will take a long time fill with the energy and joy that was -and will be again- the hallmark of Ciudad Juarez. It will happen. It is happening now. A generation has now come that learned to live abajo, and carefully. There has been damage. No one can live under that cloud forever.
It’s nice to look back, now and again. But here, on the border, it has been years since people have allowed themselves to look forward.
There are “whiffs.”
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Three Generations In Juárez
Man in a Gown
Jesus and Headphones
Jesus and headphones, El Paso, Texas, 2011
Shiho Fukada and Japanese Unemployed
photo by Shiho Fukada
VIDEO
by Shiho Fukada:
Segundo Barrio Yo Yo Boy
Segundo barrio Yo Yo boy, Halloween 2011
Text by Bruce Berman (in full snide mode)
Halloween is The Great Day in El Segundo barrio. The ‘hood comes alive. People are pouring over the bridges heading from Juarez on the candy quest. People in the neighborhood put on the costumes and come out of invisibility. The first block of America (6th and El Paso) is a riot of laughing and color and wild abandon.
Nothing is sure on this border in this neighborhood anymore. “They” are back! The Developers. “The 180s” aren’t around on this day. The Developers, their Pol puppies, the Gov. employee “Good Germans,” even the The Do Gooders (even if they are really the Do Badders). That’s what I have come to call them all. They say something and if you want to find out what they just said just think 180 degrees opposite from what it was. Most of them are up in Kern Place handing out candy, their yearly contact with the rabble. They’re all afraid of the people when they have fun.
Don’t Entertain Me!
El Tri Sodas 3X 1.00
Commentary by Border Blog Editor
El Paso Street in El Paso. It’s the first block of America. Or the last block of America. It depends on which direction you’re headed.
Going north it’s the first. Going south, it’s the last, the next block is Mexico.
This is a street of life, bulging with people, an array of goods from school and household supplies to clothes to audio stuff to high heels to T-shirts with everything from Revolutionaries to cartoons on them. It’s juicy, alive and has texture and odor.
It’s 3D street.
The Fast Disappearing Authentic Segundo Barrio: Mailbox Kids
Mailbox Kids, Segundo Barrio, El Paso, 2012
©Bruce Berman
The Shrinking Segundo Barrio
by Bruce Berman
El Barrio, The Segundo, is shrinking.
It’s getting the squeeze. The squeeze has been coming for a century or more but it’s a full assault now, and a generation that had roots in the ‘hood, that was born of a time and place that demanded they fight, is no longer there in numbers and possibly not there in energy and historic resentment.
The neighborhood is being squeezed from the north with the Dreamland Downtown Plan back on Premium and from within. A proposed Science museum in the old Armijo School would be the death blow.
If the deathblow can be delivered to an already dead corpse.
Boy At The River With Two Names
Man With A Box
Man with a box, Juarez – November 2012
©Bruce Berman
Centro Chicano Gone (In More Ways Than One)
Doroteo in front of the ruins of Centro Chicano
2011 ©Bruce Berman
Centro Chicano gone. Rosas’ place gone (goodbye early 19th century, hello Denver to El Paso bus station). Flea market gone (it was so, “messy”). Museo Urbano, barely here and now gone. Koreans on S Street seem to be throwing in the towel, going. Can’t sell to Juarenses that aren’t there. The bi-national plan rising like a phoenix, unchanged and in better shape than it was (thank you Cartel War).
I know where “El Paso,” is right now. Bright New World. Shiny. All’s they need is a theme park and it’s on its way.
But Chicano El Paso, the turf south of Paisano, south side, El Segundo?
A Way Through The Times
Back From Teacherland: Watch Out!
Low Rider’s Crucufix, east El Paso-May 2012
©Bruce Berman
One sees the world through one’s own window. This is the Low Rider’s punta de vista. What’s your’s?
Rato Vato….I’m back!
Lost And Looking For Redemption In The Mountains of Juarez
Man#26, The Other Truth series, Juarez, May 2011
Christmas Eve/El Paso
A Personal Narrative
Lost and abandoned. Christmas Eve reminds me of that, right now, as I look out my south-facing window to Juarez (three blocks away) across the valley of Juarez, to the foothills of the Sierra Madre, where Creamac sits, CREAMAC, the “mental Institution” there, where the people huddle, people with trouble, trying to be warm, trying to make sense of the world, trying to live. CREAMAC, the House of the Abandoned and Troubled and Hurt.
I should be there. Today. Often. More often. I struggle with that. It’s snowing outside. Excuses to stay home, safe, just wrestling my own demons. I should cross the bridge (would my car get back over the ice on the bridge later tonight?), I should do SOMETHING!
Do I?
Crossing the Rio without Confusion
Undocumented Women CrossingThe R2, Juraez-El Paso, 1984
Text and photograph by Bruce Berman
The river with two names: Rio Grande/Rio Bravo del Norte. Depends where you begin and where you end and where you return to. These women are heading north. It was a long time ago. Everything has changed and nothing has changed and I suspect it will continue to change and not change forever.
The river with two names, the R2, is also the place of the personality with two halves.
Confusing, no?
It is the place of bifurcation. But even that has two sides: twice as much insight.
Where are these women now? Which side happened to them? What happened to me? What happened to Juárez and the U.S.?
What happened to me?
I know this: people will cross going north no matter what and no matter the year. People will cross less, going south, depending on the year.
The river will flow south from Colorado (a Spanish name) to the Gulf of Mexico (an English language name).
And none of it matters to anyone living here except that one government makes it hard for another people to do what they have done for thousands of years and another government makes it necessary.
Who’s confused and who’s doing the confusing?
Man In The Segundo
Man in the Segundo, El Paso – Sept. 2011
Photo and Text by Bruce Berman
Man from Anthony, New Mexico, describing his younger days in the Segundo barrio.
The Segundo barrio is El Paso’s most historic neighborhood, hugging the border with Juarez, Mexico and architecturally intact from the 1880’s “railroad boom,” that brought fired brick architecture and “Chicago Brick (which is atypical red).” Some adobe structures go back to the early 19th century. This part of the city has had human habitation for thousands of years. Spanish travelers began European settlement at this place in the Rio Grande/Rio Bravo in the mid 1600’s.
The real significance of the Segundo barrio, however, is the Latino community and it is significant. The barrio, historically, was the first “stop” on the journey north to “El Norte,” whether it was a matter of days for rest or for a generation of orientation. Many people in El Paso trace their roots to family who lived in El Segundo barrio in their first years in the United States.
FOR CAFÉ TACUBA VIDEO (and the rest of this article):
An Iconic Survey of the Border Funklands:1975-2011
Prom Night: The Boogie Man Is A Long Way Away
Prom Girl, El Paso, Texas -May 2011
Murder schmurder! It’s Prom Night in El Paso.
Those buildings in the background are downtown El Paso. The space behind, the mountain, that’s Juarez. That girl there, in the foreground, the one with the whimsy and the joy and the hopes and the fragility, she’s a million miles away from this borderland desert, that stupid and brutal war (Juarez), that trying parking lot monotony (El Paso), at least for this night.
What is the news anyway? Is it what “they (in my case, us)” say it is? Or is it the dreams of a young girl (or boy) on one of the most remembered nights of one’s life?
I’m thinking the news, the significant events of our world are days and evenings, like this. Viewpoint. Remember that (!) as we become addicted to trouble and stress and our live’s of “quiet desperation (you wouldn’t know it if you looked at TV commercials would you?).”
One can hope it’s that way.
Domes The Multimedia Man
Gator Skin And Diamonds And Color
Gator skin and diamonds, El Paso – May 2011
©Bruce Berman
El Paso –Six blocks to the border. There are diamonds. Well, they ought to be diamonds. He says they cost $250. I believe him. Sunday drive. Family in the Dodge. Stylin’ on Paisano Street by Bowie (Boooie). If you know El Paso you know the references. If you don’t it wouldn’t matter. Chuco street.
One of the riddles of photography for me is that every once in awhile there is an image that must be in color. Most everything I see and shoot is in B/W, but every once in awhile…
This dude is in color.
2 Princesas Practicing
2 Princesas practicing on Mother’s Day, El Paso ©2011 by Bruce Berman
Juarez Through The Fence
Boy contemplates the murder of “Our Daughters”
in Juarez, through the fence, from El Paso, 2010
by Bruce Berman ©2011
Go Japan: Life Goes On
The Tragedy
Keita before the rain
Japan –One takes one’s blows. Japan, oil-less for so long, bitten by the need for energy for so long, powered by spirit, hard work and, now, uranium, has received a blow. A blow is either fatal or forgettable.
We will see.
I receive a message from my old student, in Osaka. He is going to have an exhibition in September (and begin his studies in photography anew). Yeah! Forward. The horizon. Onward. His show will be work that he began in my documentary class: Smokers. Pure defiance! So cool.
What do you die from first: smoking, radiation or loss of defiance?
Go Keita! Go Japan! Live your future. It’s good .
Life goes on.