Photograph 1: Northern Mexico

I chose my first photograph because there aren’t any faces in this photograph, just some tennis shoes resting just above a speeding train track in Northern Mexico. I chose this picture because it scared me in more ways than one. What’s really terrifying about this picture isn’t that the people riding above the tracks on “the Beast” could fall at any moment or the “tiny fragments of metal thrown up by…the wheels on the track [that] can cause serious eye injuries” (Salgado). It’s not the border patrol or the wilderness or the dehydration (Salgado). All these are horrible risks, but they aren’t the worst things about this picture. The most distressing part of the photograph is that they are willing to brave all of these dangers for a chance at a better life. 82% of the ‘passengers’ who try to get into the U.S. are minors, some of whom are younger than fourteen (“Donate”). The risks are nothing compared to the possible escape.

Although this photo was taken in Mexico, the same drive exists all over the world, the drive to go somewhere better, a place they may have only heard rumors about. Everyone is willing to risk his or her life to go somewhere to live--really live. As Father Rigoni, an Italian priest serving in Mexico, said, “They are seeking the possibility to survive" ("Donate"). These migrants are willing to brave border patrols and the perils of the trip—getting robbed, raped, kidnapped or killed—to escape gangs and violence for the slightest chance of something better, and to me, it reveals just how bad their lives were (“Donate”). The real question, then, is what we can do to help make their lives just a little bit better.

"Donate." Top Stories RSS. N.p., n.d. Web. 23 Jan. 2013.

Salgado, Sebastião. Migrations. New York: Aperture. 25. Print.