Journey to America
It was the first time in her life that she would travel so far away from home, and she did it alone. The journey to the States was brutal. Isabel still remembered vividly the house they made her and seven other immigrants stay in after she crossed over the border. As she waited there for the coyote to take them where they needed to go, she saw so many horrid things. A small fourteen-year-old girl was getting beaten in front of them by a cholo who accused her of stealing a shirt from him. There were men coming in and out of the house at random hours to get drugs. Additionally, the house had no windows or heater to fight the December cold. That’s when a man of Asian descent came to take her to her final destination. Isabel was surprised to see he spoke perfect Spanish. She sat in the front with him in his little car, and every time they came across a check point, he would make her crouch down on the floor and he would throw a black blanket over her. Isabel laughed as she remembered this and said the necessity makes you do some crazy things. When you look back, you have no idea how you even managed to do it.
Settling In
Finally after eight hours passed, Isabel was taken to Montclair, California. There she met up with the man who paid Isabel’s coyote. Her first job in the U.S. was picking strawberries, but she only lasted three days. Isabel's friend got her a job at the car wash where he worked. She was there a year and a half, having an income of only $3.50 per hour and getting a paycheck of $130 per week. With that salary, she had just enough to pay bills, rent, and a bit left over to pay back her debt to her friend. Later on Isabel and that same friend got married and had a daughter together. Even though she stopped working at the car wash, she always picked up little jobs here and there to help her husband.
Isabel loved living in California, and she stayed there for a couple of years until life grew difficult for her , her husbandand, and millions of other immigrants living there due to immigration crack-downs. Officers would regularly pull over people who seemed “suspicious." They would get arrested and soon after deported back to Mexico. It got so bad that people would stop going outside after 5PM. Any errands they had, they would wait until the evening to do them. It seemed to Isabel and her husband, that there was no other option safer and smarter for their family than to move. Her husband was not alone in the States and had a brother in Iowa. He graciously offered his home to them and promised opportunity in Sioux City, Iowa. At that time packing plants were eagerly looking to hire.
Turn Around Now?
A few years after relocating, Isabel’s second husband was arrested. Life is hard, and sometimes people make bad decisions with good intentions. She was shocked to learn that he had been involved in selling drugs to earn extra money for the family. He was sentenced to three years in prison and deported after his sentence was done. At this point she felt lost. She felt defeated and didn’t know how she was going to manage to pay the rent on the apartment they just moved into and keep up on the bills. She decided to sell everything and take her daughter back to Mexico with her. Isabel thanks God that one of her good friends talked to her out of it. She remembers her friend asking her “What are you going to do back in Mexico with your daughter? What kind life does she have waiting for her there?” Isabel knew her friend was right. She had nothing waiting for her or her daughter in Mexico. Isabel was not about to give up on her dream to give her daughter more then what she had as a child. She was ready to conquer anything
and anybody that got in her way.
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