Wilmer Rodriguez’s mother, Lesly Madariaga, spent a sleepless night looking for him on the streets of Nueva Suyapa, a poor neighborhood in the hills surrounding the Honduran capital, Tegucigalpa.
However, she had no luck: Like thousands of other young Hondurans trying to reach the US in search of work, Rodriguez and a friend had stolen away in secret.
It was February last year, but a month later he was back home. Rodriguez, then 17, only got to Mexico before he was picked up by the authorities and returned to Honduras.
Photo: AFP
“I want to go again. I still have the desire and it won’t leave my head until I pull it off,” Rodriguez said. “If they catch me one, two, three, four, five times again, I’ll still keep trying because my dream is to support my family.”
In a country experiencing deep economic woes and rampant violence, and where more than half of the population of 10 million people lives in poverty, thousands expose themselves to the many risks of migration, not least from human traffickers and extortionists.
The trip can be a costly and fruitless exercise.
A report showed that Central American migrants spend about US$2.2 billion per year trying to reach the US, most of which is paid to traffickers.
About 50,000 Honduran migrants have so far this year been sent back home, official figures showed.
Hondurans are to head to the polls on Sunday to elect a successor to President Juan Orlando Hernandez.
After 12 years of the Nationalist Party, some see in former Honduran first lady Xiomara Castro an opportunity for change.
However, not Rodriguez — his dream remains resolute.
“I don’t have much faith in politicians because the truth is, they’re all liars,” the 18-year-old said.
He puts his faith in his ability to become “one of the great” barbers of the world — in the US.
Upon his return to Honduras, Rodriguez trained to cut hair and is now employed at his neighborhood’s La Bendicion salon.
At the salon, the barber capes feature the US stars and stripes — if ever Rodriguez needed more encouragement.
He has not told his mother as much, but she suspects that he still wants to reach the US.
“I wouldn’t want to go through that process again,” she said. “I wouldn’t want him to run that risk.”
She believes “God always provides food,” but knows that today’s dreamers want more.
“The youngsters leave for a better life because there is no work here in Honduras,” she said.
Rodriguez’s house measures no more than 20m2, but a dozen family members are crammed into its two rooms.
In the bedroom, blankets provide makeshift dividing walls. Rodriguez sleeps atop a bunk bed, his mother and sister below. He earns money now, but not enough.
“It’s something, but just for me — not to support 12 people,” he said.
Rodriguez said that young people in the neighborhood are attracted to crime and “easy things,” such as selling drugs, although he has always resisted.
“My goal is to work... My house is my goal too. I know that one day I will build it,” Rodriguez said.
Indonesia was to sign an agreement to repatriate two British nationals, including a grandmother languishing on death row for drug-related crimes, an Indonesian government source said yesterday. “The practical arrangement will be signed today. The transfer will be done immediately after the technical side of the transfer is agreed,” the source said, identifying Lindsay Sandiford and 35-year-old Shahab Shahabadi as the people being transferred. Sandiford, a grandmother, was sentenced to death on the island of Bali in 2013 after she was convicted of trafficking drugs. Customs officers found cocaine worth an estimated US$2.14 million hidden in a false bottom in Sandiford’s suitcase when
CAUSE UNKNOWN: Weather and runway conditions were suitable for flight operations at the time of the accident, and no distress signal was sent, authorities said A cargo aircraft skidded off the runway into the sea at Hong Kong International Airport early yesterday, killing two ground crew in a patrol car, in one of the worst accidents in the airport’s 27-year history. The incident occurred at about 3:50am, when the plane is suspected to have lost control upon landing, veering off the runway and crashing through a fence, the Airport Authority Hong Kong said. The jet hit a security patrol car on the perimeter road outside the runway zone, which then fell into the water, it said in a statement. The four crew members on the plane, which
Japan’s ruling Liberal Democratic Party (LDP) and its junior partner yesterday signed a coalition deal, paving the way for Sanae Takaichi to become the nation’s first female prime minister. The 11th-hour agreement with the Japan Innovation Party (JIP) came just a day before the lower house was due to vote on Takaichi’s appointment as the fifth prime minister in as many years. If she wins, she will take office the same day. “I’m very much looking forward to working with you on efforts to make Japan’s economy stronger, and to reshape Japan as a country that can be responsible for future generations,”
SEVEN-MINUTE HEIST: The masked thieves stole nine pieces of 19th-century jewelry, including a crown, which they dropped and damaged as they made their escape The hunt was on yesterday for the band of thieves who stole eight priceless royal pieces of jewelry from the Louvre Museum in the heart of Paris in broad daylight. Officials said a team of 60 investigators was working on the theory that the raid was planned and executed by an organized crime group. The heist reignited a row over a lack of security in France’s museums, with French Minister of Justice yesterday admitting to security flaws in protecting the Louvre. “What is certain is that we have failed, since people were able to park a furniture hoist in the middle of
RSS