When signing up for a revegetation project in Nogales, Sonora, Mexico, I didn't know what to expect. Maybe a few hours planting in the sun and then a chance to explore the local shops looking for souvenirs, but the trip turned out to be completely different.

In fact, we did not actually participate in the revegetation project because the Nogales Sonora Municipal government assigned our group to kilometer 23. However, Mexican law only allows you to enter 21 kilometers into Mexico unless you have a visa or Tourist Card, which some the members of our party did not have. In the words of Carol Bender, it "was shaping up to be a true Nogales experience."

We departed from the University of Arizona at roughly 7:30 am. The group included our guide Sara Curtin-Mosher, a graduate student affiliated with the Ambos Nogales Revegetation Project (ARAN), who spends a great deal of time working in Nogales, eight UBRP students, and Carol.

Upon arrival in the city, it was surprising to see how densely packed the area was. However, the majority of our day was not spent in the city, for our activities we traveled further into Mexico -- to areas beyond the city center where many of the citizens make their homes. Not far from the U.S. border the roads turn into narrow dirt alleys barely big enough for one car to move through safely, let alone two. Then add all the cars parked along the sides of the road, and it makes for a very interesting driving situation! It was easy to tell that the area was poverty stricken, made apparent by the lack of access to running water or electricity. In my mind these conditions would most likely foster discontent and a sense of loathing, but this was not the case. Everyone was extremely friendly and would wave at the van as we drove past. Some of the residents would even practice their English with us, asking us how we were doing.

The first house we visited was the home of a woman who was one of the first to begin composting, a project ARAN is trying to expand. In a true show of hospitality, our group was fed a traditional Sonoran breakfast of eggs, beans, and bacon on a tortilla, all washed down with fresh squeezed lemonade. After our breakfast, we walked to where a meeting of composters was to be held, however the meeting had started an hour earlier and was finished by the time we arrived! Our first experience in how difficult communication and planning can be.
We traveled further into the residential area to check on another project in which trashcans were supposed to be supplied to an area where, at this time, there was no trash service. From the top of the hill it was easy to see why the focus is trash cleanup in this area. There was trash littering every hillside and crevice as far as the eye could see. Another thing we noticed when traveling up the hill into the next area was that the houses were not as permanent as those at the bottom of the hill. They tended to be made of wood rather than cinderblocks like the homes at the lower elevation. We were told that this was because people at the higher elevation had been there for less time and that as a family stayed in an area longer they invested more into their home making it more permanent. Once again everyone was full of smiles and waves for us as we walked down the narrow streets, despite what many would consider even worse conditions than we had seen earlier.

After a brief visit to an established green area, improved by a revegetation project in the neighborhood, we traveled to another part of town to work on the papercrete project. This project is a push to develop an inexpensive alternative construction material that would use less concrete by mixing paper, a little sand, a little concrete, and water to produce blocks or poured walls for building dwellings. The material was a great deal lighter than concrete but apparently held up against the weather, including better insulation from the cold and stability in the rain. However, once again our efforts to help were foiled by communication difficulties. When we arrived at the construction site, the man, whose home we were to work on, was not there (his family was but they were less knowledgeable about the process) so we could not proceed.

Finally, while the van waited in line for two hours to cross the border back into the U.S. Carol gave the students a guided tour of downtown Nogales. We were able to haggle with the stall owners, visit a Mexican candy shop, and were all amazed by how inexpensive the tacos were at an open-air restaurant! Just before crossing the border we saw the wall that lines the border from the Mexican side. The wall bears a white cross for the people who try to cross the border but succumb to the harsh desert. The number of crosses was astonishing and gave a new perspective as to how desperate some people are to escape poverty in Mexico and attempt to gain a better life in the U.S.

The trip back gave us all a well-needed rest after walking around in the heat all day. Half of us fell asleep while the other half talked with Sara about what its like to work on the border and also about the problems and possible ways to reduce illegal immigration. I was in the sleeping group!

Greg Ratti, Visiting UBRPer from Washington & Jefferson College, Washington, Pennsylvania, working in Dr. Carol Dieckmann's lab, Biochemistry & Molecular Biophysics.