43 pages • 1 hour read
Javier ZamoraSolito
Nonfiction | Autobiography / Memoir | Adult | Published in 2022A modern alternative to SparkNotes and CliffsNotes, SuperSummary offers high-quality Study Guides with detailed chapter summaries and analysis of major themes, characters, and more.
Chapters 7-8Chapter Summaries & Analyses
Chapter 7 Summary: “La USA”
Paco and Mario take the group to a staging area, where they meet with others who are going to cross. The leader of this group is called Mero Mero. Everyone eats, drinks, and rests before they will cross the border, and Javier is excited to see his parents. Mero Mero goes over the rules, the signals for stopping, and what to do when they spot La Migra. They then walk through the night and cross into the US. Hours later, Marcelo sprains his ankle. The group takes a 30-minute break, and many fall asleep. When Chele wakes up, he finds Marcelo has left and taken all of his gear; Marcelo faked the ankle injury and decided to go alone. Javier struggles to understand why Marcelo would betray them. His grandpa told Marcelo to take care of him, but Chino and Patricia have been taking care of him while Marcelo has done very little.
The group moves off and has to maneuver under many barbed-wire fences. They hide near bushes when a helicopter is heard. They then come to a large road. They cross the road, slide under a fence, and wait in a ditch. They have made it. Now, they will wait for vans that will take them further.
They are awakened by shouts of La Migra. People run, and there is confusion. Chino, Patricia, Carla, and Javier are all caught by border guards. They are taken to Nogales, Arizona, and processed. The guard informs Chino and Patricia that if they are caught crossing the border again, it will be a 10-year jail sentence. Eventually, Patricia, Carla, and Javier are deported back to Mexico. Chino must wait until later. Patricia and the kids wait many hours until Chino comes through the border. When he does, they are happy to be reunited despite the horrid conditions. They then go together to an albergue (hostel) run by nuns for those deported and stranded in Mexico. When they arrive, they are given a few basic bathing supplies, food, and a place to sleep. Chino calls the number that Mario, the pollero, gave them. They get another try and plan to leave later that day.
Chapter 8 Summary: “Second Attempt”
They climb into a truck and are taken to an old shack in the middle of nowhere, where other migrants are already waiting when they arrive. At dusk, a new Mero Mero and a few other polleros arrive. Mero Mero gives the group the rules: which signs to use, when they are to hide, when to stop, and how to make it back to him if they get separated.
They walk for hours. Eventually, they hear a helicopter. First, they hide, then they run. Patricia falls onto a cactus, and Chino does his best to remove as many of the needles as possible. The people regroup and walk some more. Mero Mero, whom Chino has dubbed Coco Liso, sprains his ankle. After Marcelo’s incident, the group isn’t sure whether to believe him. Eventually, Coco Liso says he cannot go further, and the group continues on without him. At this point, Chino alternates between carrying Javier and Carla, who are getting more and more exhausted. Javier falls asleep on Chino’s back, and when he awakens, there are no others around, just Chino, Carla, and Patricia. They make their way toward some houses in the distance. They find a garden hose and drink until dogs begin barking. A white man with a shotgun approaches them, fires into the air, and tells them in broken Spanish not to move or he’ll shoot. He says he has called La Migra.
Shortly thereafter, a white truck shows up and a man in a green uniform gets out. To their surprise, he speaks Spanish quite well. He has Javier and the others get in the back of his truck and gives them water. He asks them questions and gives them hot chocolate and some bread to eat. Finally, he takes out all the needles from Patricia’s face and hands that Chino was unable to remove. He then drives them to a place near the border and tells them it is their lucky day: He tells them where to go and to wait three days until their next border-crossing attempt. They are back in Mexico; he let them go.
Chapters 7-8 Analysis
In Chapter 7, the group is finally near the border and getting ready to cross into the US. Javier is especially happy at the thought that he will soon see his parents. The greatest problem is, of course, that the arduous journey to the border was the easiest part. The most difficult and most dangerous part of their journey is crossing the border without getting caught and deported. Javier’s and the others’ experiences in Chapters 7 and 8 show just how difficult and dangerous crossing the border can be, and it only has partly to do with getting caught by Border Patrol.
The first problem they face is the size of the group. A group of 50 people is easier to spot and moves more slowly than a smaller group. In another apt insect analogy, Javier compares them to a centipede. Ironically, the omens that Javier thinks are good are, in effect, bad omens: They view the full moon as something good, lighting their way to the US. That might be true, but if they can see better at night, it also means that they can be seen better, too. The full moon’s light will make it easier for Border Patrol to spot them and track them across the border, which is most likely what happened, as the group was caught by surprise along the side of the road. It seems that Marcelo was aware of these bad omens and didn’t trust the polleros. His sprained ankle turns out to be a ruse so that he can travel alone and better avoid being caught. It is possible that he had been aware of that contingency for a while, since it would explain his relative aloofness to the rest of the group. Chino, Patricia, and Carla had always been relatively close, but they only grew closer as they traveled longer together. For Marcelo, the group dynamic was never of interest. It should be remembered that Marcelo had already lived in the US before. It’s possible he was prepared to go off alone because he had experienced similar difficulties at the border in the past. Regardless, the juxtaposition of Marcelo and Chino bears witness to two very different types of migrants. There are those who will do whatever is necessary to get to their goal, and those like Chino, who will not leave others even if they risk getting caught.
Javier’s experience in US Border Patrol custody offers a rare glimpse of this process from a child’s point of view. The initial exchanges between the guards and the migrants show that the guards treat them as criminals rather than individuals seeking asylum. Perhaps strangely, none of the guards is fluent in Spanish, despite dealing with an overwhelmingly Spanish-speaking population.
Javier endures being separated from his new family members; even though Patricia, Chino, Carla, and Javier are not biologically related, they have become like a family during their journey. The border guards do not know they aren’t really related, but this matters little, as men and women are kept in separate facilities regardless of their familial connections.
The treatment of migrants as criminals is further reinforced by the fact that they are kept in prison cells, fully equipped with the bars and seatless stainless steel toilets. Javier describes it as being in a zoo. He uses the nature similes and metaphors of which he is fond, and which he has hitherto used in a mostly positive way, to show that they are caged like animals. This echoes the comparison to chickens that the polleros use for the migrants, and in both cases, the animals in the cages are helpless, without agency or recourse. Despite these difficulties, Patricia and Chino are able to maintain their cool, continue with their roles as husband and wife, and most importantly, maintain their cover as Mexicans. This is important because they only want to be deported back to Mexico, not back to El Salvador, so that they can easily reattempt entry.
Unfortunately, despite finding refuge at the albergue, their second attempt at crossing into the US goes worse than their first. Getting lost in the Sonoran desert could mean certain death. Patricia learns how harsh the terrain can be when she falls into a cactus and still has its barbs stuck in her face and hands. Carla and Javier are too exhausted to walk on their own for long, and Chino begins carrying them on his back. This supports Chino’s characterization as a heroic figure in the book; despite is skinny build, he is quite strong and tough, and more importantly, he acts honorably.
The second crossing experience shows the humane side of the US Border Patrol and provides a counterpoint to the horrifying experience of incarceration. Patricia believes that the agent releases them to Mexico because he is one of them, a person of migrant descent. This is a possibility. However, another possibility is that the agent sent them back to Mexico to save on paperwork. He tells them where to find a real coyote, either because he is on the take (is being paid a portion of the money to send people to the coyote, which is not unheard of in the Border Patrol) or because he knows they will continue to attempt to enter the US and he would rather them go with someone competent who won’t leave them to die in the desert. Since Javier is a child and unaware of these political nuances, Zamora lets readers consider these questions, all of which are legitimate possibilities, without burdening the narrative with explanations.
