UNITED STATES—The frontier was an obstacle to this pioneering wave, that spread across growing country. Manifest Destiny—what a nonsense word to defy grammar and meaning, no better flag for the land of the savages. In an 1830 Presidential address, Andrew Jackson highlighted this attitude when he stated, “What good man would prefer a country covered with forests and ranged by a few thousand savages to our extensive Republic, studded with cities, towns and prosperous farms.” Indeed.
Juan Guillermo Andino Sanchez had almost finished his university studies in marketing with a minor in communications. His fiancée Marjorie Solis Raya had earned a degree in economics, fine studies that would be valued less in Bananaland than to where they dreamed of going. Where citizenship of that Green Dollar Republic is still a coveted possession round the world.
“I want to go there.”
“I want to go there, too.
The engaged young couple, both Marjorie and Juan Guillermo saw education as a means to a dream. It would give them the means to launch careers and overcome their humble origins in Honduras. They would say goodbye to land where poverty and crime held back ways to make a better life.
In Honduras, few opportunities and most doors closed to the young couple with big dreams. Two major hurricanes in the last couple of years had only dimmed prospects in the small nation which excels in poverty, which it virtually criminalized in the Dollar Republic. So Andino and Raya, both in their early 20s, though Marjorie was a year older for some of the years because of the way her birthday fell. So, for that part of the year, when Juan Guillermo hadn’t yet caught up with her, they set out for the United States, the Yunai States, along with Marjorie’s 17-year-old brother who saw something better in his future and joined them.
The three left on July the 4th with Marjorie’s mom accompanying them as far as Guatemala. She wanted to be there to say goodbye before they crossed the border into Mexico.
“I thought that years and years would pass before I would see them again. That’s what I had in my mind. Because when a person goes to the Yunai States, the return is difficult, depending on success and other factors. Sometimes success means getting stuck there for citizenship. I knew that 5, 10, 15 years could slip by just like that, before we were reunited again.”
Also, she knew because of her health too, maybe her daughter and son-in-law would be there, but not her because of her bad health, and that’s why Marjorie made the trip for her. I didn’t want her to go. I preferred that she stayed working at the call center, where she had just gotten a raise. No, mama, she said. I am going to look for a good job to pay for your operation, so you can get better. Oh, bread and tears, it’s always bread and tears. A family member offered to pay for the coyote to get them across the border, so the blame and guilt get spread around along with the tears now.
In those final moments in Guatemala, Sharon reassured Juan Guillermo, who was nervous about the trip. She told him, nothing will happen. You are not the first person, and you are not the last to make the trip to the Yunai States. She said goodbye to them and wished them to do well on el otro lado. She stayed in touch with them via their phones.
Marjorie and Juan Guillermo met when they were in high school. Both left their hometowns to attend university 60 miles from Las Vegas in San Pedro Sula. Marjorie’s degree netted a low-paying job at a call center. Andino had trouble finding a job and occasionally helped out at the family tortilleria.
The younger brother, Marcos, had been initially keen about going north. Unlike his older brother, he had little interest in school and had already dropped out. He saw the emblems of success in fancy trucks and the family who was able to install plumbing because they had kin up north, pa’alla. In the newspaper, the three were among the 55 people from Central America and Mexico who died after being brought in a sweltering tractor trailer, discovered at the outskirts of Nuevo Laredo.
It got all over the news, “the death trailer.” Going to the other side, in spite of the hazards, here had always been see as the surest way to get a leg up in the world. Those who stay are unambitious; those who leave strives and seekers, driven to improve their lot and help family at home. It’s a time-honored tradition in Bananaland, ever since America first visited their provinces so profoundly in the form of the American banana plantations, where on the other side of the electric fence you could gaze at the neat hedgerows, and the prim grid of streets and burn inside coveting the life on the other side of that fence which would leave a ghost-pale line on your palm. However, briefly you might’ve touched it.
To be continued…
Grady is the Wizard of Fiction.
