Upon their arrival in Ciudad Juarez, just across the border from El Paso, Texas, a group of predominantly Venezuelan refugees and migrants eagerly disembarked from a freight train, known as La Bestia (the beast), and set foot on solid ground.
Over the course of a 10-day journey through Mexico to the United States border, this freight train had carried more than 1,000 ”train surfers” on its roof.
The trip was far from easy. In addition to spending days and nights precariously balanced on top of the moving train, these individuals had to evade Mexican migration agencies that were attempting to remove them from the train, according to Daiverson Munoz, a 20-year-old from Venezuela.
“And we’re stuck in the middle of the desert. But it’s nothing, we’re here and we feel super happy because we’re about to realize our dream. It’s been hard but not impossible.
“The hardest part was seeing how many people were injured” during the journey, said Munoz, a law student in his home country.
Jeffri Gomez, a 24-year-old Venezuelan woman who was traveling with her husband and their one-year-old child, was relieved to have reached the end of a perilous journey.
The train had originated about 1,800km (1,120 miles) to the south in the State of Mexico, and many of the train surfers had sustained injuries along the way.
The final 370km (230 miles) of the trip took 17 hours due to numerous stops, Munoz explained.
This risky journey has become virtually the only option for those hoping to reach the US border in pursuit of a safer, better life, as it is nearly impossible to purchase passenger tickets.
In mid-September, Mexico’s main rail operator reduced its traffic by 30 percent as the government implemented stricter security measures to prevent people from boarding the trains.
Upon their arrival, the travelers encountered an official from the Mexican National Institute of Migration and a barbed-wire wall from the Texas National Guard on the banks of the Rio Bravo, a natural border with the US.
Source from www.aljazeera.com