El Sol

EL SOL

Are

American Muslims

EL SOL

Editor-in-Chief Alberto Calderon Assistant Editors Luz Aurora Aramburo Cesar Hirsch Art Director Alejandro Durán Director of Photography David Hodges Copy Editor Brian del Carmen

Letter from the editor

Journalism has suffered in this click-scan-swipe left culture.

Storytelling has been diluted and matters of substance have lost their primacy. News and entertainment blur.

Writers Luz Aurora Aramburo Alberto Calderon Alejandro Durán Priscilla Gallardo Cristofer Garcia Victoria Gonzalez Aubrey King Chariti Niccole Samantha Ojeda Alyssa Pajarillo Bianca Quilantan Netzai Sanchez Jeanette Sandoval Katy Stegall Stefanie Tellez Mary York

Below the choppy surface of our roiling mass media seas survive deep reservoirs of compelling human stories waiting to be well told. Standing tall over the squirming mass of Twitterati, gossip sites and click bait are good journalists still doing good work in service of their readers. Forget the mythology about the Death of Print and the Decline of Journalism.

Not a single major American city has lost its daily newspaper since 2000 and in that time more than 15,000 new American magazines have been born. Community newspapers consider this era a golden age.

Photographers Luz Aurora Aramburo Andrew Dyer Sergio Esparza Cristofer Garcia Bianca Quilantan Stefanie Tellez Mary York

It is not that America does not have great journalism from honorable publications. Our problem is there is too much detritus masquerading as journalism. This issue of El Sol Magazine is old school in that it is a rich collection of meaningful information and storytelling that aims to inform, inspire and provoke. It is also a youthful, millennial-led publication that peels back the conventional wisdom to explore issues meaningful to college students.

Designers Luz Aurora Aramburo Alberto Calderon Mirella Lopez Jaime Pronoble Anna Pryor Bianca Quilantan

Please give us eight seconds and look at our table of contents. If you like what you see, take us home and test your genius.

Production Staff Bo Chen-Samuel Andrew Dyer Joshua Navarro Martin Loftin Kenslow Smith

Albert Einstein was once asked how he became such a genius. “Genius is concentration,” he replied.

If that is the case, humanity is in trouble. A Microsoft Corporation study concluded that the average human attention span is now only eight seconds. For goldfish it is seven. Social media and the internet were blamed, as were music videos with one-second edits and Snapchat-style apps which fade quickly like our over-stimulated brains.

Alberto Calderon Editor-in-Chief

Advisor Dr. Max Branscomb

EL SOL

Table of Contents

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Bernie Sanders shows how to lose an election and still win big Darling of millenials and champion of liberal causes, the fiery Vermont senator has inspired legions of students

By Alberto Calderon

7 20

PC or not PC? Political correctness drives us batty Liberals and conservatives claim to hate political correctness, but conflagrations explode across America with increased regularity

By Alejandro Durán

10

Pixel Perfect Instagram has accidentally become the world’s busiest art gallery and sales forum

By Samantha Ojeda

13

Football’s major headache

37

Junior Seau’s suicide forced the NFL and local athletes to face the serious long-term dangers of football

By Alberto Calderon

17

Starving for control A teenager’s eating disorder nearly became a slow-motion, low-calorie suicide

By Aubrey King

20

Let’s Makeup Darlings of the internet share their secrets to online stardom

By Stefanie Tellez and Alberto Calderon

25

Life lessons without college (or student debt) Many young adults are seeking skills not taught in American higher education

By Cody Rae Quigg

27

Faceless no more Courageous women who have suffered sexual assault speak up Priscilla Gallardo.......30 Alyssa Pajarillo..........31 Netzai Sanchez............33 Chariti Niccole............35

27 37

So long to the two-year college Nearly 40% of Southwestern College transfers or certificate earners need six years

By Luz Aurora Aramburo

43

Is it safe to be Muslim in America?

ASO President Mona Dibas and her sister Nada are among the many young Muslims who love the U.S.A., but feel the sting of Islamophobia

By Cristofer Garcia

49

Is the Uber economy nascent freedom or emerging slavery?

Uber drivers and other work-formyself denizens of the sharing economy experience exhalt and agony

By Mary York

43 52

71

Tacos de mi barrio......53

In a rare gesture of international cooperation and humanitarianism, the U.S. Border Patrol opens the gate at Friendship Park and allows love to cross the border

Food

MJ’s Fusion Deli..........57 Juice Adventure...........60

By Victoria Gonzalez and Jeanette Sandoval

61

No work, no rights, no country

Migrant day laborers are a forgotten workforce who too often face abuse

By Bianca Quilantan

65

Tearing down borders, building up hope

Architect and activist Teddy Cruz rethinks the role of architecture in revolutionizing the Tijuana/ San Diego border region

By Alejandro Durán

Love has no borders

61

By Cristofer Garcia and Mary York

74

Activists remember the forgotten dead in America's saddest cemetery

By Bianca Quilantan

76

Oh, the money you’ll owe!

Many students face a mountain of college loan debt

By Victoria Gonzalez

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And the winner is...

Bernie Sanders Darling of the millenials and champion of liberal change, the fiery Vermont senator has inspired legions of students Story Alberto Calderon

Photo Luz Aurora Aramburo

A

s 12,000 people filed into the San Diego Convention Center with their “Bernilution” signs and pins that read “Huuuge change,” a gigantic screen blaring MSNBC was announcing Hillary Clinton’s Arizona primary victory.

Supporters who waited four hours in a line that snaked a mile long outside the convention center began to chant in unison, “Turn it off, turn it off, turn it off!”

That Bernie Sanders was trailing Hillary Clinton in delegates 1,712 - 1,011 at that moment, and had been given only a 10 percent chance of winning the primary by prognostication wizards like Nate Silver had little effect on the euphoric crowd eager to hear the idealistic Vermont senator whose populist message is shaking up American politics.

Joaquin Gonzalez, an SWC English major, said the experience was worth the wait.

“This is my first rally ever,” he said. “I didn’t know what to expect. My voice is gone. I was cheering my head off. I waited for nine hours, but honestly I don’t care. It was worth it to me, it was so inspiring to be able to see him in front of me.”

After actress Rosario Dawson introduced Sanders, 1

2

Bernie Sanders fires up a crowd of 8,000 in National City’s Kimball Park. Sanders has been well-received among younger voters inspired by his positions on education, Wall Street reform, universal healthcare and social justice.

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“When you have someone like Bernie Sanders, millenials are more likely to take a euphoria crescendoed as the crowd exploded in cheers reminiscent of a rock concert.

On stage, Sanders the grey-haired rock star, played the hits. He recited his campaign themes of Wall Street corruption, Medicare expansion, campaign financing reform, affordable higher-education and prison reform. Weeks later Sanders drew a crowd of 8,000 on very short notice to National City’s venerable Kimball Park. He stayed on message.

SWC biology major Natalia Rico, 21, said Sanders’ issues set him apart from other candidates.

“I feel like he speaks about real problems and he’s just so blunt about it,” she said.

“I feel like it’s never been addressed so specifically, like what’s wrong with the government and how skewed it is towards to keeping the rich rich. Bernie is the first political candidate that has gotten me interested in politics, despite the fact that I hate politics.”

Sanders’ first visit to California comes a full two months before the June 7 state primary. California’s 475 delegates (including 71 super delegates) are vital to Sanders’ remote chances of overtaking Clinton.

Undeterred by the math and energized by the message, dozens of people took to the streets of downtown San Diego hours before the speech to express their support for the fiery Vermont senator.

“There are 11 million undocumented people in this country,” Sanders declared,

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big leap, because their future has so much economic ambiguity” his voice hoarse from the campaign trail.

“Many of them are living in the shadows, living in fear, and they are being exploited every day. That needs to end. I am the proud son of immigrant parents and I know a little about that.”

SWC sound engineering major Eric Favela, 24, said he was pleased to hear Sanders address the immigration issue.

“Because of where we are, I thought that what he had to say about immigration was the most important part,” he said. “I’ve never been stripped from my parents, but I know of people who been. That really got me.”

Sanders barely finished his immigration remarks when the crowd erupted into a boisterous chant of “¡Si, se puede!”

Enthusiasm has been a hallmark of the candidate’s campaign and its supporters.

Consistently drawing standing-roomonly crowds in every city he visits despite trailing in delegates, Sanders has often said large voter turnouts are his best chance for

a primary victory. In the last 16 years, only 60 percent of eligible voters cast ballots in the general election and even fewer in the primaries.

Jeanette Russo 22, an SWC studio arts major, said Sanders’ campaign has stoked her political engagement.

“This is the first time I felt inspired to vote and it’s because of Bernie Sanders,” she said. “He is in the election for the people.

Unlike the others, he has been consistent with his record and hasn’t sold himself to all the corporations.”

Sanders’ campaign has had success appealing to the millennial generation. A report by the Harvard Institute of Politics found that in the last six months, Sanders has gone from polling at 1 percent with millennials to 40 percent. In the first two primaries that took place in Iowa and New Hampshire, Sanders won more than 80 percent of the youth vote.

SWC psychology major Stephen Gonzalez said he thinks young people love Sanders because of his progressive policies.

“A soon as I heard he was coming, I called in sick to work,” he said. “To me, Bernie’s campaign is about changing the way we think. He has made issues young people care about, like student loan debt and the 1 percent, a really important part of this election.”

Millennials, which now comprise America’s largest voting block, are unlike any electoral demographic. About 40 percent report no party allegiances and are professed political independents,

Sanders was introduced by George Lopez and Shalene Woodley in heavily Latino National City. Most of the crowd of 8,000 was less than 35 years old.

according to the Harvard study. Personalitybased criteria (integrity, level-headedness and authenticity), are what millennials value most in a candidate. Political and business experience were further down the list.

SWC philosophy professor Alejandro Orozco said he has observed a marked difference in the characteristics of his students over the years.

“My generation believed that people would get married, have kids and own a home,” he said. “I don’t think millenials buy into that.

I think that makes millenials greater risk-

takers, in a good way. So when you have someone like Bernie Sanders, they’re more likely to take a big leap like that, because their future has so much economic ambiguity.”

On the night of his first San Diego speech at the Convention Center, Sanders won primaries in Hawaii, Washington and Alaska, but lost to Clinton in Arizona. In the past two weeks Sanders has won eight of the last nine primaries and claims to be gaining momentum, although it may be too little too late.

Gonzalez, one of the last to leave the

Photos Andrew Dyer

Convention Center after being one of the first to arrive, said Sanders’ candidacy is more important than just winning or losing this election.

“All my friends that I’ve turned onto Bernie have become way more politically involved,” he said. “This is the first time I can remember where I don’t feel like we are just picking between the lesser of two evils.

It’s a movement as much as anything. I’ve been with him since day one and I plan on being with him until the end no matter what happens. The man is just inspirational.”

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PC or not PC? That is the question

Political correctness irritates Americans on the left and the right Story Alejandro Durán Contributions Bo Chen-Samuel

Just before Halloween, Dr. Nicholas Christakis, a respected physician, professor and residential master at Yale University, found himself on the receiving end of a torrent of anger.

His crime?

Defending his wife after she suggested the Ivy League campus should not “exercise implied control over college students” by discouraging “culturally insensitive” Halloween costumes.

“It is not about creating an intellectual space! It is not!” yelled one student.

“Do you understand that? It is about creating a home here!”

Nicholas and Erika Christakis resigned as heads of Yale’s Sillman College (though not their teaching positions). Chalk up another casualty of the PC police.

Political correctness seems to be even less popular in America than taxes, death and Justin Bieber. Liberals and conservatives who cannot concur on the time of day, walk arm in arm when it comes to deriding the dread PC. Bill Maher and William F. Buckley, Jr. have found common ground. George Carlin and George Will are on the same page.

It is most everyone else who cannot agree or agree to disagree, though Southwestern College has done better than most. A two-year, nonresidential institution quietly tucked away in the Chula Vista suburbs, SWC is slowly beginning to embrace the types of issues that form the national discussion about safety, inclusion and political correctness. Unlike a lot of other campuses in the United States, however, many students and staff here seem to be coming to terms with both sides of the issue and steering clear of the PC swamp.

Southwestern College recently launched “safe zones,” an initiative

meant to create spaces of openness and safety for LGBT students. Erik Moberly, a veterans’ counselor, is coordinator of the program. Part of his role is to work directly with the Gay Alliance, a national LGBT advocacy group, to train faculty and students to become safe zone facilitators on campus. Moberly said he “hates political correctness,” but insisted the goals of creating a space of comfort and an intellectually-rigorous space are not mutually exclusive.

“I think they go hand in hand,” he said. “I don’t think you can be intellectually challenged when you’re scared straight. When you don’t feel safe you feel stressed out. I think people learn best when they’re free to explore, to be creative, to make mistakes, to voice their opinion.”

Moberly is not alone in feeling this way. In 1992, long before Donald Trump and Ted Cruz began railing that political correctness is destroying America, Mari J. Matsuda, a legal scholar and former professor of law at Georgetown University, wrote a book exploring the implications of assaultive language on college students’ psychological well-being.

In “Words that Wound” Matsuda argues that if words can aggrieve, and by extension inhibit a student’s capacity to learn, then the academy should provide a unique space that is free of physical and verbal threats.

“Universities are special places, charged with pedagogy and duty bound to a constituency with special vulnerabilities,” she wrote. “Many of the new adults who come to live and study at the major universities are away from home for the first time and at a vulnerable stage of psychological development.”

Matsuda set off a line of questioning

that challenges the sacrosanctity of the First Amendment. If threatening violence against someone is illegal, then should limitations also exist on the types of expression that inflict more subtle, imperceptible types of harm?

Phil Saenz, professor of political science at SWC, said the First Amendment is not absolute.

“There are forms of expression that are clearly not worthy of protection,” he said. “How can anyone defend defamation, sexual harassment or expression that incites lawlessness or unnecessarily causes panic or harm?”

At UCSD, posters plastered on walls suggest more benign alternatives for potentially harmful words. Saying “That’s so ghetto” stigmatizes people from low-income communities.

Instead, the posters suggest, try describing something as “lame” or “bogus” to get your point across.

But what students and safe-zone coordinators at Southwestern are undertaking is a somewhat novel, more balanced approach to creating a safe campus environment. Where most people take entrenched stances, SWC students and coordinators have managed to find common ground and enact an agenda that earnestly attempts to reconcile both sides of the political correctness argument.

Dan Cordero, a member of the transsexual community, is a safe zone trainer at Southwestern. His role is to enable others on campus to become safe zone facilitators. He said his own personal history as a transgender man is part of the motivation behind his work.

Cordero said safe zone training is not about policing language or acting reproachfully towards people who might use certain words or express

8

certain ideas.

“It is s o e asy to underst and why arguments about political correctness come up when we start off conversations by saying ‘don’t do this, don’t do that, don’t you dare say that!” he said. “You are already coming off attacking with your guns blazing and you’re not giving the other person the opportunity to be engaged or to have a positive and proactive involvement in that conversation.”

Cordero said a shift in attitude is needed to avoid divisive confrontations like what occurred at Yale between Christakis and his students.

“I think one of the things we need is to be selective of our intent when we do have those conversations,” he said.

“So instead of all the ‘don’t’ language and negative language, encourage the other to participate.”

S om e r Me a d e, a p s ych ol o g y instructor at SWC, said that punitively policing language may, when taken too far, inhibit learning.

“Political correctness can be a cause of stress in interactions,” she said.

“When we become preoccupied with managing the impression we are giving and trying not to offend someone, we can see stress levels increase.”

But it is important to note that for people of the LGBT community and other underrepresented communities, incidents of offensive language and harmful episodes are not isolated, rare occurrences. They are subtle, recurring motives in life that shape perceptions of self and of one’s relation to his or her broader community.

Erika Christakis paid a steep price for her Yale email last fall, but her message contained more than just an oblique criticism of political correctness. In it, she expressed a genuine concern for the viewpoints of underrepresented communities and cultural groups.

“I don’t wish to trivialize genuine concerns about cultural and personal representation, and other challenges to our lived experience in a plural

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community,” she wrote.

C hr ist a k is, more t han most, would understand the impact of the challenges presented to one’s personal development by cultural and identity issues. She was a lecturer of psychology and early child development at Yale.

Why then, were reactions to her email so strong, so emotional and impassioned?

Cordero said that for many members of underrepresented communities, incidents like these represent a gradual withering of one’s own identity.

There is a drawn-out process of dehumanization that most people are unaware of when arguments about political correctness begin.

“I get why people get angry about that,” said Cordero. “It comes down to lived realities for certain people.

Incidents like that reinforce the entirety of what you’ve been told your entire life. People get angry at Mexican jokes, for example. And it’s easy to brush off in the moment. People say ‘We’ve been hearing Mexican jokes forever. I don’t know why you’re so offended, it comes with the territory.’

But I think the issue with that is that when you don’t call attention to it, we end up with people like Donald Trump.”

Cordero said language ties directly into people’s perceptions of a community.

“Trump says a lot of things that are bullshit, but some people take a certain amount of it to be true,” he said. “It’s about exploring that impact on a larger scale. It comes down to recognizing the weight and impact that language has.”

Over time, certain types of language, words or expressions have gone out of use. It is uncouth to refer to an African-American as a “Negro” or to refer to a gay person as a “homo.” But this process has been largely passive up until recent years, when an increased sensitivity towards language has begun to percolate through the minds of

young millenials. The process has become more active, bordering on vengeful at times. Why has this shift occurred?

Dr. Guadalupe Corona, director of Southwestern College’s Office of Equity, Diversity and Inclusion, recently found herself at the center of a wild controversy that many campus leaders called a “racial crisis.”

A quick, unintentional slip of the tongue is all it took to spark a raciallycharged episode that likely damaged people’s careers. Even in her position as an authority on diversity and inclusion, Corona found herself on the wrong end of a language-induced confrontation. She chalks up shifting attitudes toward language to the rapid changes in the way millenials devour information.

“Technology has provided millenials with a wider spectrum of ideas and perspectives,” she said. “You don’t have to wait for one news source to give you a perspective. You can make your own decisions because you have multiple outlets on which to base what your ideas and values are. I think that’s one of the biggest incentives of knowledge that this generation has that a lot of us didn’t have growing up.”

Google Trends shows that terms like “safe space” and “political correctness” have seen an uptick in the past few years. The word “microaggresion” has had a steady rise in mentions since year 2007, one year after Facebook was opened to anyone over the age of 13 with an email address.

Powered by social media, PC police officers are growing in number and getting younger, much to the chagrin of members of the old guard like Bill Maher.

“Unfortunately, political correctness is making a comeback,” he told his TV audience. “Now it is easier than ever.

In the ’90s, you at least had to get off your ass… you needed signs, you needed petitions. Back then, getting worked up was a lot of work.”

Pixel Perfect Story Samantha Ojeda

Illustration Alejandro Duran

Instagram has accidentally become the world’s busiest art gallery and sales forum

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“Collecting art is an addiction and Instagram is the dealer and the pusher that enables it.”

Art Collector Karen Robinovitz

When Instagram launched in 2010 it was perceived as a place where people could instantly share photos of themselves drinking mai tais in Maui to the envy of all their friends.

It has unwittingly (and undoubtedly) become the biggest and most visited art gallery in the world. Collectors are taking notice.

More than 70 million photos are shared each day through Instagram and the app is shaking up an art world that is often viewed as elitist and cloistered.

Artists around the globe are seizing on its democratizing power. Instagram is a virtual museum wall that allows artists 11

to circumvent the cliquey world of brick and mortar galleries.

Los Angeles artist Petra Cortright is a fan.

“Instagram is more important than the openings now,” she said. “I think an artist’s work speaks for itself, whether it’s seen in a gallery or an iPhone. If it’s good, it’s good.”

Collectors apparently agree. More than half of the art collectors surveyed

by Artsy.net, an online platform that promotes and sells art, said they purchased works from artists discovered on Instagram.

A survey by Artsy.net, an online

platform that promotes and sells art, revealed that 51 percent of art collectors surveyed purchased works from artists they originally discovered on Instagram.

Ashley Longshore, an artist and gallery owner, said she frequently sells her art for upwards of $30,000 on Instagram.

“I can post a painting and it can sell before the paint is dry,” she said. “My collectors will text me and e-mail me their credit card details, they mail checks. It is literally a frenzy.”

Blake Tomczak, 20, a Southwestern College fine arts major, said he takes advantage of the platform.

“Initially I didn’t consider Instagram

something that I could post my art on,” he said. “Over time, the people that spent more time on it separated into different groups and eventually it gave birth to an art community.”

Tomczak, who specializes in portraiture employing a unique Chicano-cubist style, said his Inst ag ram p osts resu lte d in commissions for freelance work.

“I actually was commissioned to draw three portraits for a photographer for an LA-based magazine who found me through Instagram,” he said.

Karen Robinovitz, art collector and former editor of Elle magazine, said the app bridges the gap between supply and demand.

“Collecting art is an addiction and Instagram is the dealer and the pusher that enables it,” she said.

Instagram helps up-and-coming artists to showcase their creations while creating a digital portfolio that can be shared with virtually anyone.

Aaron Pretty, 22, a SWC dental hygiene major and artist, said he saw other artists find success so he gave Instagram a shot.

“I was always scared to post my art because I didn’t want people to think ‘oh this guy thinks he’s so cool posting his art,’” he said. “Then one day I saw someone I used to watch on YouTube, Craig Gleason, and he would try getting his drawings out. His popularity grew and it really put it into perspective for me.

Success starts somewhere. If you keep it bottled up no one is going to see it.”

Gleason now has 43,000 Instagram followers and has had pieces displayed in the prestigious Gallery1988 in Los

Angeles.

Pretty said fear was the biggest obstacle he faced.

“If you’re always scared of being called pretentious you’re never going to go anywhere with it,” he said. “It’s all this fear of getting your drawings bashed, people not liking them or being thought of as too cool.”

Pretty said his goal is to be discovered on Instagram so he can achieve a career in art.

“I don’t want to make it out to be rich,” he said. “I just want to draw for a living. Right now I’m having a hard time between school and reality. That’s why I try harder on Instagram.”

About 80 percent of college students change their majors before committing to a career. Pretty said he is facing a career tug-of-war.

“If I do the dental hygiene program in two years, I could have money and not be living at home,” Pretty said.

“But that scares the hell out of me because that’s a demon fighting with the one that wants to draw all the time. So if I come off as desperate on Instagram, it’s because I’m trying really hard to get noticed.”

Tomczak admitted that he changed his major four times before choosing art.

“It took me a while to come to the point where I decided that art was something I really wanted to pursue and that it would be the main focus of my life,” he said.

Photography major Alan Joseph has been hired through Instagram for small portrait gigs after posting his portfolio on Instagram.

“I started finding people that were into creating very artistic expressions of themselves and I was so intrigued,” he said. “I thought, ‘why am I not pursuing myself that way?’”

Many of his subjects have come from Instagram, he said.

Instagram is projected to have 400 million users in 2016 compared to 8.8 million visitors a year for the Louvre and 6.8 million for the British Museum.

Unlike the classical repositories of great art, Instagram requires no travel, entry fees or waiting in line. It is the world’s first hand-held gallery and art brokerage.

It even works in Maui.

“I don’t want to make it out to be rich. I just want to draw for a living. Right now I’m having a hard time between school and reality. That’s why I try harder on Instagram.”

Aaron Pretty 12

F O OT BA L L’ S NEVER-ENDING H E A DAC H E

Story Alberto Calderon Illustration Luz Aurora Aramburo

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Three years after retiring, star linebacker Junior Seau shot himself in the heart. Seau was apparently convinced that his unending depression was linked to playing football and wanted to leave his brain intact to be studied.

It was the third time an ex-NFL player had committed suicide in such a fashion.

Seau’s death raised the volume of the concussion conversation from a persistent whisper to a fever pitch.

Just 28 days before Seau’s suicide, the New England Patriots played the New York Giants in Super Bowl XLVI, the highestrated telecast of all-time. Football’s popularity was reaching an ever-escalating zenith just as health and medical leaders expressed concern over the viability of a sport whose veterans were killing themselves or suffering unimaginable brain deterioration.

Across the country over-enthused, under-informed young athletes eagerly lace up their cleats and strap on their helmets.

On Sundays, Americans visit the mega church that is the NFL, but Fridays and Saturdays are reserved for local youth football. Communities congregate in their local stadium cathedrals under bright lights that pierce through the night sky, scarfing down dollar hot dogs and taking in halftime festivities. They have gathered to watch high school and college athletes try their hand at America’s favorite game.

Often tragedy ensues. Southwest High School junior tackle Kevin Montes suffered a concussion on what appeared to be a routine collision in the third quarter of a 34-6 game his team trailed. He lay motionless on the field for nine horrifying minutes. An ambulance ground its way past the cheerleaders and dirt track before carrying the still-motionless Montes out of the stadium. Players from both schools began to approach the line of scrimmage and prepare for the next play before the ambulance had cleared the field. Referees put the ball

in play and the game resumed within 45 seconds after the 18-minute injury stoppage. Next man up.

“I remember being in the back of the ambulance with my helmet and pads still on,” Montes said. “I was dizzy and my hand started to get real numb. Since I have epilepsy I was afraid it was going to trigger a seizure. It was pretty scary.”

Montes did not have a seizure, but he did suffer from concussive side effects.

“In the first week I had a lot of migraines,” he said. “I would wake up with one, then it would go away, then at night I would get another one. I couldn’t focus that much, a little bit of memory loss. If I was talking to you I might forget what I just said.”

Montes sat out for four weeks with concussion-related symptoms, but now that his migraines have subsided Montes said he is intent on returning to the field.

“I know it’s a danger, but I just like the game too much,” he said. “I was scared at the moment, but I knew I was going to get better and come back to play. If I get hit during the game and it’s just a little migraine well, you know, I’ll just keep playing.”

Southwestern College athletic trainer Dennis Petrucci said combatting youthful naiveté is one of his main challenges as a trainer.

“A lot of these kids have never been injured before, they are young enough to still have that Superman invincibility,” he said. “We tell these kids there’s certain things we don’t mess

14

around with. We don’t mess around with the brain, heart or spinal cord. It’s not like a knee or an ankle where you can go have surgery and we’ll rehab it and get you back.”

Petrucci said treating brain injuries carries an element of uncertainty.

“There are a lot of symptoms, that’s the problem,” he said. “We are talking about your brain, your brain controls everything. If someone has a concussion there is not much you can do, you just wait for the symptoms to be gone.”

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ootball’s sometimes unsettling level of violence is nothing new. In 1905 Teddy Roosevelt, no shrinking violet, threatened to ban the sport entirely. That year 18 players died. In response to this a rules committee was established to make the game safer.

What has markedly changed, however, is the medical information surrounding head injuries and the sports’ ubiquity within American culture. Imagining the ludicrousness of President Obama attempting a similar maneuver speaks to the game’s meteoric ascension.

In September, Frontline aired a report that said 87 of the 91 former NFL players whose brains were studied, tested positive for chronic traumatic encephalopathy (CTE), the brain disease at the heart of the concussion debate in football. Even more troubling, the lab found CTE in the brain tissue in 131 out of 165 individuals who, before their deaths, played football at any level.

Yet NFL profits continue to soar. Last year, the league’s teams had a total revenue

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“Ever since the injury, school has been difficult.

Not to the point that I can’t do it, but I get random headaches.” of $9.17 billion and NFL games accounted for 23 of the 25 most-watched telecasts last fall. Both issues, though inextricably linked, seem to have completely no effect on each other. Normally, when an industry has a wide-ranging health concern, support for the industry wanes.

It is a legitimate phenomenon.

This dichotomy is creating some ambivalence among football fans. SWC head football coach Ed Carberry said his views on the issue have evolved.

“I’ve done a complete 180 degrees on this issue,” he said. “Back then people would get hit, everything would go black for a second and it was fine. In the

early years when I coached high school football, I was the coach and the team doctor. If you came back to the sidelines and gave me an audible sound, you were going back in. That’s how it was 30 years ago. Now at the college level we have a trained staff and whatever they say goes.

There’s never an argument.”

Carberry said he believes football will remain unfettered.

“I think football will continue to maintain the level that it has attained,” he said. “My wife and I were in Texas recently visiting a high school, they have two freshman teams and two junior varsity teams with 80 to 100 players a piece coming out for them.”

Just nine miles from where Kevin Montes sustained his concussion, Chula Vista High School senior linebacker Yusuke Titmus suffered a similar hit in the fourth quarter of a game between two winless teams. The game was paused as he lay on the field. After four excruciating minutes of minimal movement, the training staff helped him to his feet and attempted to walk the clearly shaky linebacker to the sidelines. He collapsed again halfway to the bench. As the staff attempted to gather him again, the announcer informed the fans that they could use this break in the game to purchase $1 hot dogs that were almost sold out.

After being inspected by the training staff on the sidelines as the game went on behind him, Yusuke said he was unsure of his future.

“The plan is to keep checking on me every 30 minutes,” he said. “If my headache gets worse we’ll go to the hospital to make sure my skull isn’t

fractured. If everything is fine we’ll go to the clinic tomorrow.”

Yusuke said this was not his first time going through this procedure.

“I’ve already had two concussions,” he said. “It’s depressing to think that my career might already be over. After three concussions you can’t play anymore. I’m hoping it’s not a full-on concussion so I can still play football.”

His parents anxiously sat behind him, vacating the bleachers and taking up residence on the sideline bench next to his teammates.

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is parents, Matthew and Josephine Titmus, said they were not pleased with how his injury was handled by school staff and game officials.

“I think they should have evaluated him more, it was not good the way he was walking, especially with spinal and neck injuries,” said Mr. Titmus. “That was messed up.”

Mrs. Titmus agreed.

“Yes, I did not like that,” she said. “I saw it, I really saw it. My son could not walk.

I was shocked.”

Mrs. Titmus said watching games is not fun.

“I’m really scared the whole time until the game is completely finished,” she said.

“I have no peace of mind, I’m so nervous.

Is this a part of the game? Some of this is not normal play. Some of this is crazy.

They have to make this safer.”

Her husband interjected.

“Yes, it’s a part of the game.”

Petrucci said that as a sports trainer he has always been aware of the dangers of concussions, but was surprised by how many people are affected by some of their more harmful side effects.

“We were aware of the possibilities, but I don’t think we realized to the degree that it was happening,” he said. “I think

we knew (prolonged depression) was possible, but I thought it was rarer. Once I saw all these ex-NFL players file suit and say they had all these issues, that’s when I tapped the brakes a bit.”

Petrucci said as a lifelong fan of the sport he is conflicted.

“I was dizzy and my hand started to get real numb. Since I have epilepsy I was afraid it was going to trigger a seizure.

It was pretty scary.”

“There was this YouTube sensation, she was this little girl,” he said. “She was running guys over, she was amazing. And I thought, this is the coolest thing I’ve ever seen. But then you realize how many hits she’s taking and how young she is and you realize, that can’t be good. I have two daughters, 6 and 4.

I told my wife, I’m glad we don’t have a son so we don’t have to make that decision.”

Three weeks after Yusuke’s concussion, his life still had not returned to normal.

“Ever since the injury, school has been sort of difficult,” he said. “Not to the point that I can’t do it, but I get random

headaches from time to time, like if read something or work on a worksheet.”

Yusuke said his symptoms had been improving until a recent setback.

“Just a couple days ago I had a major migraine out of nowhere,” he said. “I had been stable, nothing too crazy. It was during class. I had to leave to go the nurse’s office.

She gave me Tylenol, I normally don’t take it because it doesn’t work. But I was desperate so I took some. It didn’t help.”

Persistent, intense headaches have caused Yusuke to reconsider his intention to return to the game.

“I was set on returning to play, but as the days went on, I would keep getting these headaches and I hated them, they bothered me so much. I was limited on doing things, like watching TV. So I’m done playing football. What if I played and I got another concussion? It could happen again. I’d never know.”

His father said he and his wife were happy his son’s football days are behind him.

“It’s been hard watching him, he gets pretty bad headaches,” he said. “You can see other effects too like tiredness and being forgetful. Since he’s an intelligent kid, people around him have been telling him not ruin his brain over something like this because life is more important than high school football.”

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Starving forcontrol Perspective Aubrey King

Illustration Luz Aurora Aramburo

I hated being looked at.

I hated looking at myself.

I showered with lights off.

I avoided windows and mirrors. I tried to hide every part of my skin.

I hid myself away as much as I could. I did not want to be touched in any way. I was disgusted with myself and thought everyone else was disgusted with me, too. I cried in dressing rooms, into plates of food and after every fraction of a pound I gained.

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When I chose this disorder (and at first, it was a decision) I made sure to do my research.

I wanted to know all aspects of the disease. I looked into all known side effects: depression, tooth decay and amenorrhea (absence of a period due to extreme weight loss, exercise or stress).

I have an EDNOS (Eating Disorder Not Otherwise Specified) which means that I do not fit into any one box that encapsulates a specific type of disorder. This means that I can manifest the symptoms and behaviors of anorexia, bulimia or binge eating disorder at the same time.

At 13 I was overweight. I concealed my size with baggy clothes and hid in my room with piles of food and dove into the pantry at night after everyone had gone to sleep. I ate all day or I ate massive amounts of food in one sitting — or both. I was a binge eater triggered by stress, anxiety and boredom.

Then I dropped 20 pounds in a month. It was then that an obsession and the “high” of losing weight kicked in. After my weight loss plateaued I had to find a way to keep it going.

I was going to push myself as far as I could go.

It was voluntary prolonged suicide.

After a few months, food no longer looked like food. Food looked like numbers and grams and percentages. I could not look at something without seeing the amount of fat, sugar, sodium and calories. I can look at a plate of food and see exactly how many calories are on it. I came to be really good at math.

On top of that, I exercised incessantly.

I began to measure my self worth in how many bones protruded from my body and the space between my thighs. I counted how many ribs I could see on my side, how many vertebrates on my back stuck out, and how big of a shadow my collarbones cast on my chest.

I spent hours in front of a mirror stretching my skin and calling it fat. I looked for ways to hate myself more and punished myself by eating even less.

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ooking at pictures of myself during those times still bring me a sense of pride, joy and accomplishment.

As horrific as it may sound, I took pride in knowing that what I was doing to myself was working — that I was slowly dying. The worse I got, the more symptoms I exhibited, and the more pain I was in, the better I felt.

I was so certain of what I was doing. I thought I would be able to control it. I thought I would be able to stop whenever I wanted. If I had known that it would end up controlling me, maybe I would not have pursued it. At my worst, I threw up 12 times a day while still

consuming less than 700 calories. Anything that went in came right back out.

At my lowest weight I could not stand in the shower, I could not lift a case of water and I would not eat more than 100 calories at any one time. A layer of “fur” known as lanugo, which occurs in extreme states of malnutrition, began to develop on my body.

I began to hallucinate. I would sometimes throw up involuntarily, and I was in a constant state of pain and fatigue. I lost so much hair it was hard to ignore.

Yet I felt so proud of myself, my self-control and my will. I had gone lower than I ever had

I smelled it, I knew that something inside of me was dying.

I was a recluse. My thoughts were my thoughts and my secrets were my secrets.

Even my closest friends were unaware. The only relief from my conscience at the time was my disorder and writing.

When I grew fearful enough, I wrote a letter to my mother that I was not sure I would ever actually give her. I did not have to make that choice. My mother found the letter in the drawer of my bedside table. She pulled me out of school during my break and took me out to eat without telling my why.

I knew that she knew. Maybe it was the way she was watching me scarf down sushi, but in that moment, sitting across from her with nothing but an empty plate between us and my stomach begging me to be emptied, I knew that I did not want my disorder to end.

I was afraid of what life would be like without my disorder. Despite all the pain it caused me and the irreversible damage to my body, my disorder was what I turned to for comfort. I was afraid to eat normally, to gain weight and to exercise with restraint. I didn’t know how to deal with my life without hurting myself in the process.

My disorder was discovered six months after I turned 14. I went to therapy for my depression and anxiety. I talked to three therapists — all skinnier than I — and was pumped with medication they hoped would help me deal with life without causing me to gain weight.

My parents and I never talked about it.

None of us knew how to approach the subject.

They hardly asked how I was doing or even attempted to talk about it with me. They probably meant well, but at the time I felt like they did not want to deal with me.

Although I hated them asking (they were never gentle about touching the subject and there was never a right time), I also hated that they didn’t. I was so angry for so long. I felt so alone when I didn’t have to be.

About a year ago, during an argument, my boyfriend told me that I looked like I was dying. As much as I had wanted someone to say something and as much as I needed to hear that, I felt like he was lying to me and I hated being lied to. I was livid. I did not think I was emaciated. I would not believe I was frail and falling apart, because I was far from my weight goal. In my eyes, I was still overweight.

“After my weight plateaued I had to

find a way to keep it going. I was going to push myself as far as I could go. It was voluntary prolonged suicide .” before. My sense of accomplishment could be compared to crossing the finish line after running a marathon.

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he only thing that provided me happiness in life was the one thing tearing it apart. here was no out for me. Even as I got sicker, I never thought treatment was necessary or that I was deserving. I was blinded by my disorder and my dysmorphia. I always saw myself as fatter than or healthier than my reality.

My friends recently told me I was “dangerously thin,” a phrase that used to leave me jubilant.

In the process of losing weight, I lost myself. I had no regard for my life and for my future. My disorder forced me deeper into a life of isolation. My anxiety developed into agoraphobia. I couldn’t walk down the street or attend classes. I was forced to withdrawal from high school and enter a charter school I only had to attend once a week. This pushed me farther into my disorder and away from others.

The hardest part about this all — even with all the pain I went through and the muscle loss, memory loss and hair loss — was eating.

I had just turned 14 and the first time I was really able to gauge how sick I was. There was an acidic bitterness in my mouth, pain in my gums. I felt as if my teeth were loosening every day, my hair and nails were thin and brittle, and my body had been in a state of severe starvation for more than a week. I don’t know how I knew what it was, but the second

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Young people with eating disorders come in all sizes from every corner of society.

These are a few symptoms and warning signs to watch out for: Extreme vigorous workouts — Patients may show a severe fear of gaining weight, causing their workout routine may change and exceed beyond a healthy level.

Social isolation — Friendships and other personal relationships may begin to dwindle due to sufferers wanting to keep their illness a secret.

Irregular sleep cycle — Inconsistent or abnormal sleep hours will become more prevalent. Insomnia may form.

Preoccupation with food — Counting calories, hunger denial or extreme binging may manifest.

To assist people with eating disorders remember the following: Avoid food topics — Find activities or discussions that do not revolve around food.

Distracting the patient during and after meals can also reduce anxiety.

Focus on inner beauty — Instead of complimenting patients on their outer appearance, focus on their positive personality traits or contributions to the world.

Do not ignore the issue or be too forceful — Patients can feel resistant to aggressive persistence, in spite of the good intentions. Helping to find a therapist or scheduling doctor’s appointments can reduce their anxiety as well as encourage treatment.

Be patient — Recovery can be a long journey with bumps. It takes time. Relapse and resistance are to be expected, but do not give up.

Hotlines (410) 427-3886 (EDNOS specific) (800) 931-2237 (National Eating Disorders Association) 19

Katy Stegall

All the people who were supposed to help me cope gave me nothing but a deeper sense of emptiness. I stopped going to treatment about three months in. I was impatient with my medication and nothing seemed to be working. I was looking for a quick fix I was not going to find.

I was stubborn about my feelings, my treatment and my disorder. I mostly felt like I was forced to be there, which only made me want to refuse treatment even more. I stopped taking my medication about a month in. I was lying to everyone. I told them I was feeling better, when in reality, I was incapable of feeling anything.

I did not realize that going to therapy actually helped me until I started taking my recovery seriously. Being able to talk about how I felt and being able to see myself and my choices in a different perspective allowed me to address the root of the situation. I was looking for control in my life, therapy helped me find it.

I was told to write and keep a journal about how I felt, how I reacted to certain things and how I felt at certain times during the day.

Doing this helped me to understand what happened throughout my day that could possible cause my to engage in disordered behaviors.

I could speak freely in therapy. I felt safe talking about how I felt and what I was going through even if I thought that they didn’t understand at times. It was hard to talk about it with anyone else, especially friends and family, so having someone that was just there to listen helped me more than I thought it would.

For years, I was at war with myself. By 17, I had failed to recover three times. I reached the point in my life where I had to ask myself: “Do I want to live or do I want to die?” I could either turn my life around or give myself over to my disorder. I chose to live. It was one of the hardest choices I’ve had to make in my life.

I started slow. I increased my caloric intake week by week. I began paying close attention to nutritional value rather than caloric amount. I started to eat healthier, to run and lift weights. I adjusted my perception of how I looked and what I ate. I learned to forgive myself for any weight I gained.

I forced myself not to label food as “safe” or “dangerous.” I had to convince myself that food was necessary. I had to tell myself that eating was normal, gaining weight was normal and that numbers on scales fluctuated.

Everything I was afraid of was “normal.” In order for me to survive I had to restructure my mind.

This time around, recovery was easier.

Ironically, what made recovery easier was the fact that I had so many restrictions to my diet. Being a vegan meant that most of the food I was afraid of, or the food I would run to during an episode of bingeing, was off the table. I did not have to worry much about what was going into my body. I rarely had anything processed, any junk food or anything high in calories or fat.

I was able to stop worrying about what was on my plate. Fruit, vegetables, legumes and whole grains were not anything to be afraid of. For the first time in years I was able to focus on something other than food. I was even able to exercise without having to worry about burning off all the calories in a protein shake. Eating became easy and living became even easier.

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t 19, I am finally at the point where I can call myself pretty. I have good days when I can look in the mirror and feel love for my body instead of hate, and when I do not have to change five times before stepping outside. Good days now outnumber bad ones.

Finding veganism and learning how to balance my diet and my life has brought me to a point where I have learned to accept my body. I now know that if I want to make a change, I do not have to kill myself in the process.

I still struggle. I have to fight the thoughts and the compulsions to binge or purge or restrict, but it has gotten easier. I do not consider myself active in my disorder anymore. No matter how much I may miss it or how much I feel like I need it, I’m able to ignore it.

The hardest thing about recovery and getting healthier is watching my body change.

The gap between my thighs has lessened, my chest filled out to where people cannot see the spaces between my ribs anymore, my hips feel more like a soft edge than the corner of a table.

I still pick at my curves sometimes. I do not like that my clothes press into my skin. I hate that my arms do not look like sticks. But I hated myself for my disorder more. I was more ashamed for what I put myself through than eating itself. I cried myself to sleep many times. I cried constantly — for the food I ate and for the food I did not eat.

I am now more dedicated to my recovery than I ever was to my disorder. I’ve only thrown up once since I turned 19 and I’ve learned to ignore the encouragements of my disorder. I’m alive and no longer living with the intention of dying. I refuse to lose myself again, to lose my control and to think that being skinny means being successful.

Ready for my closeup Story Stefanie Tellez and Alberto Calderon Photos David Hodges

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YouTube has given young beauty gurus a platform and a chance at cyber stardom

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L’oréal bronzer, Sephora lipstick, Clinique eye shadow and Revlon blush are arrayed over t he v an it y t abl e of Harmony Jones, along with 20 other makeup items. Drawers full of other glamour accessories loom nearby out of sight.

“It may not seem like, it but I use it all,” said the 21-year-old SWC cheerleader and Internet star. “I’ve been growing my collection for a little over two years.

I probably have at least $5,000 worth of makeup and equipment. I think of it as an investment.”

Jones is among the growing number of people who post their own makeup tutorials on YouTube, a genre that has taken root as one the most popular in cyberspace. The mother of a 2-year-old daughter said she was an avid fan of makeup tutorials before she jumped to the other side of the camera.

“Whe n I w as pre g nant I wou l d watch YouTube videos all the time,” she said. “It was pretty much all I did because I couldn’t do anything else.”

Jones posted her first YouTube video in 2015 and now has since an audience of 3,000 subscribers. Her most popular video has nearly 90,000 views. Google’s video uploading website has become a mecca for DIY (do it yourself) videos, where people can be found instructing viewers on topics from how to open a wine bottle without a decorker to changing a tire.

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YouTube celebrity can be short lived, however. Most enjoy 15 minutes of fame with a one-off viral video that was forgotten as fast as you can say “refresh the page.” A generation of telegenic twenty-somethings have seized upon the DIY movement in search of fame and a following by creating thematic YouTube channels that provide useful information and foster a sense of community.

A search for “make-up tutorial” on YouTube retrieves more than 20 million results, which begs the question, how does one stand out?

Jones said you have to make a connection.

“It’s about being authentic and having personality,” she said. “Viewers can tell when you are faking it.”

Jones said that the goal for her and the majority of beauty channels is to eventually recap her investment in

makeup. Popular YouTubers collaborate with brands and create products. They also receive new collections to test out and feature on their channel. Some profit from YouTube by promoting ads.

Some beauty gurus are now cyber celebrities. Beyoncé is no longer the face of Maybelline or L’Oréal because brands have incorporated popular YouTubers to represent their companies.

SWC student Jacqueline Flores, 18, who was inspired by Jones to start her own make-up channel, said she will be attending Fashion Institute of Design and Merchandising in downtown San Diego next semester to major in beauty industry and merchandising marketing.

Since middle school Flores has enjoyed watching YouTubers paint their faces and transform themselves using makeup, she said, but was hesitant to start her own

“It’s about being authentic and having personality.

Viewers can tell when you are faking it.”

Harmony Jones

Jacqueline Flores is a cyber DIY star and makeup aficionado.

channel.

“I didn’t want to start a channel because I was scared that people weren’t going to like my makeup or whatever look I was creating,” she said. “I thought that I wasn’t going to be able to handle the hate.”

After less than a year on YouTube, Flores has gained nearly 400 subscribers and recently filmed a video in the Ipsy Open Studio’s in Santa Monica. Michelle Phan, a young YouTuber with more than 3 million subscribers, created a video studio that is completely free to her cyber makeup brothers and sisters. It is designated for smaller YouTube channels which need a studio area and equipment to create quality videos. It includes high-definition cameras, a camera operator, state-of-the-art microphones, sophisticated lighting and backdrops.

Flores’ mother, Patricia, accompanied her

to the Ipsy Open Studios.

“My husband and her sister went and they said they loved it,” she said. “The studio is very professional. It’s an opportunity that doesn’t come up very often, so you have to take it.”

YouTube is a new frontier for Flores, but Instagram is where she is master of her domain. After she wore Adidas in some of her popular Instagram posts, the shoe giant reached out to her. Adidas sent Flores new products so she could post photos in her new kicks for her followers to see.

Flores said she hopes to form a partnership with of a top makeup company like Tarte or Laura Mercier. Eventually, she said, she would like to create her own makeup brand. Getting noticed by a top

Harmony Jones applies a recent internet makeup lesson.

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“I feel like if I don’t upload every week my subscribers are going to forget about me.”

Jacqueline Flores

editing a video that I uploaded today. It’s dedication.

If you really care about your channel, you will make sure you have at least one video a week.”

After knocking out at 3 a.m., Flores woke at 5 a.m. to study for an exam that morning.

She said the sleepless nights are worth it.

“It’s honestly so I don’t leave my viewers without a video,” she said. “I feel like if I don’t upload every week, my subscribers are going to forget about me.”

Flores said her number one tip was to be c ons iste nt w it h t he rel e as e of v i d e o s .

“I just have to make sure that it is my number one priority,” she said. “You can’t become successful unless you give it your all. There are so many people trying to do the same thing as me I have to separate myself somehow.”

And look good doing it.

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LIFE LESSONS LIFE LESSONS WITHOUT COLLEGE WITHOUT COLLEGE Many young adults are seeking Many not young adults are seeking skills taught in American skillshigher not taught in American education higher education Story Cody Rae Quigg Photos Sergio Esparza Story Cody Rae Quigg

Polonius would have hated student loans more than Hamlet hated ghosts.

“Neither borrower nor a lender be,” he warned, “for loan dulls the edge of husbandry.”

Rising college costs in the United States are making many students look like they have seen ghosts. More and more are deciding to avoid college to avoid debt.

It is a legitimate fear. In the 1980s tuition for a public university averaged about $9,000. Today it is $19,000.

Millenials are pushing back by pushing away. From 1970 to 2010 college enrollment increased steadily, but in the past four years enrollments have waned.

College is still a good investment for most. In 2013, the income differential between millenials with a college degree and a high school diploma was $17,500.

The median net worth for households owned by 25 to 32 year olds was $26,058 for those with Bachelor’s degrees, $5,681for two-year degrees and $3,137 for high school graduates. Americans with Master’s degrees and doctorates generally earn even more.

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Millennials, however, are finding ways to make money without degrees. Many correctly argue that a college diploma is not always necessary. Jobs such as web developer, online advertising manager or dental hygienist can pay $60,000 to $80,000. There are also new jobs evolving such as Uber driver, Viner or dog food tester. There are even people paid to cuddle other people.

Well-paying trade jobs are re-emerging.

Some require schooling, but others are learned from mentors. Trades like tattooing are learned in the field, just like carpentry, plumbing and welding.

Lauren Skinker, 25, said she wanted to be a tattoo artist since she was a child.

Her earliest attempts at body art were not appreciated.

“I got in trouble for it by a teacher,” she said. “She pulled me outside because I was drawing dragons and flames on my arms, and she told me I was going to get into drugs and become pregnant when I was 15 and all other kinds of crazy things. That’s when I first learned that not everybody is cool with tattoos.”

Four years after high school Skinker saw friends graduating from universities.

“At first I was kind of bummed out right after the first wave of people graduated,” she said. “I thought that could have been me if I had just stuck to it. As time went by I saw that they were working restaurant jobs, too.

I’m just in less debt than they are.”

Debt can is major factor when deciding to attend college or not. Student loan debt is at $1.2 trillion nationally and rising at a rate of $3,000 per second. Two decades ago a student in debt $20,000 would be shocking. Today it is the norm. Student loan debt has increased 500 percent since 1999, according to Huffington Post, and more than 40 million young Americans are awash in red ink.

Skinker’s only red ink is among her tattooing supplies. Now she is working to monetize a lifetime love.

“I’ve been drawing my whole life, but I first thought about tattooing in middle school,” she said. “I would draw on myself or my friends.”

Skinker said she had every intention to attend a university.

Lauren Skinker is serving an apprenticeship as a tattoo artist rather than pursuing a university degree.

“That was the plan,” she said. “My parents had me set up for success. We did the whole college crawl up the coast, visiting different campuses.”

She attended SWC for four years before realizing she was only there to play water polo with her friends and “just fizzled out and stopped going.”

A university would be a waste of money for her, she said, because she is apprenticing in a tattoo shop. Even so, she may go back to college some day.

“I think maybe eventually I will. A lot of tattoo artists go back to school after they’re established.”

Skinker said she understands the benefits of college, but she does not think a degree is always necessary.

“At least not for everything. Obviously for things like medicine and law or other (professions) you have to study up on, but now it seems like everyone has a degree but not everyone can get a job, so it’s kind of pointless.”

Sam Agape Konsoulas, 25, attended Valencia College in Orlando for two years before moving to Los Angeles to

pursue her dream to be a professional singer. When she arrived in California “making money and paying bills” became her priority. She is now the manager of a LA restaurant with plans to open her

“At first I was bummed when high school friends were graduating college. But they are working restaurant jobs, too, and I’m in less debt than them.” own food truck specializing in creative croissants.

“I do think that I should have at least gotten an AA just because I would know a little more about the profession I have

chosen,” she said. “But it also might have just been a waste of money. Everything that I know now I learned through the job that I work in. My boss even asked why I would want to go back to college because people are going to college for the position I have right now.”

Another option for millennials is the Armed Forces, though a Harvard Institute of Politics survey found that only 15 percent showed a desire to enlist. SWC drop out Marcos Espinosa, 21, is one. He said he plans to join the Air Force and is happy he did not attend a university right away.

“Why be in debt when I could end up at a low-paying job, not even being able to pay off my loans?” he said.

Like Konsoulas, he said he would like to return to college someday.

“I do think in today’s society it is important to have a degree for two reasons. One for self-accomplishment because it’s not an easy thing to do and two because if more people have a degree, it’s a more educated society. But not everyone who is successful has a degree.”

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Survivors of sexual assault speak up and put a face on a shameful national pandemic Photos David Hodges

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exual assault is pandemic at American colleges and universities, including Southwestern College. Our administrators and campus police have either ignored or downplayed serious assaults and rape. Worse, they have often blamed and traumatized victims.

A small but growing group of brave young women are speaking up. This spring the Southwestern College Sun newspaper ran a 16page special edition that featured 13 first-person accounts by students who had experiences with sexual assault and violence. They urged other victims and people who care about campus safety to speak up and tell their stories, no matter how painful.

Without speakers there is no voice, without witnesses there is no case. Vice President Joe Biden called campus sexual assault “a sick cultural norm.� We must all help to change the norm.

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“I refuse to see myself as a victim. I never want anyone to hear my story and feel pity for me.

I am not a victim. I am a fighter.”

Testimony Priscilla Gallardo

T

he first man to touch me did not have my consent. I was seven. I barely knew where babies came from when I found out what rape was. He was my uncle, someone who was supposed to protect me, someone I was supposed to trust. The experience shifted my idea of family, especially male figures.

I was always shown special attention being the baby of the house, and I was socialized to believe it was normal. Everything changed when my grandparents became ill. My parents decided the best thing would be to move them in with us, along with their youngest son, my uncle.

He quickly noticed the attention I received and took full advantage. He started telling me “secrets” to see if I would tell anyone. I didn’t. One day I thought I was home with just my grandma. I walked into the garage to grab a toy and found him with a needle in his arm, shooting heroin. He showed me a gun and said, “If you tell anyone, I’ll kill you.”

I was seven when I was raped. I ran upstairs,

my face still burning hot with copious tears streaming down my cheeks onto my Hello Kitty pjs. I threw my blood-stained clothing in the trash. I spent the rest of the day hiding in a corner of my closet, dreading every footstep I heard outside my door.

This went on for more than a year. My innocent body became accustomed to disassociating myself and I already knew to discard any article of clothing stained with blood and guilt. I threw away all my favorite clothes that year.

Once the situation was exposed, my abuser confronted me one final time, threatened me at knifepoint, told me to be a “good girl” and to “stay quiet if you know what’s good for you.” He fled to Mexico like the cowardly son of a bitch he is. I never got my justice.

It took four years of weekly therapy and the remains of my childhood for me to bare my soul to a child psychologist whose counseling saved my life.

I did not fully comprehend the severity of the situation at the time, and at my age I did not understand everything being said around me. Police officers referred to me as

“the victim.” The psychologist who spent two hours talking to me in a small, austere room said I was “another victim,” but that it would all be OK in due time. The trauma specialist on the other side of the mirror called me a “typical victim.”

Members of my own family treated me like a helpless puppy.

One day I overheard my mom telling a close family friend what happened and she referred to me as a victim. I became enraged.

I stormed into the room and began yelling, “Victim! Victim! Is that all I am to everybody?

A victim!”

I hated being labeled a victim. Victim of sexual assault, victim of violence, victim of whatever circumstances, but why are we victims? To me a victim means being weak, helpless, someone who has nothing left. I refuse to see myself as a victim. I never want anyone to hear my story and feel pity for me.

I am not a victim. I am a fighter, I have had negative things happen to me, but I am more than a statistic. I have a name and a story, and I also happen to be a survivor of sexual assault.

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When Alyssa Pajarillo was 13, she was raped by her boyfriend on the way home from school.

Her life changed.

Testimony Alyssa Pajarillo

I

was 13.

He wasn’t some stranger in a dark alley. He was my boyfriend of three months.

It was early December. I had gone to meet him at the park one evening after school to hang out and walk around the neighborhood like we always had done. We walked down into a neighborhood trail, we talked and he smoked his cigarettes.

It was dark now, but it was okay, I lived in a nice neighborhood. I was with my boyfriend who would protect me. I was safe.

We came to a street where the hedge bushes were high and thick. There was a clearing for an electrical transformer. He took me behind it. He kissed down my neck. It wasn’t anything new. We had made out before.

Then he turned me around and pushed me against the transformer. This wasn’t right. I asked what he was doing. He assured me it would be okay, that no one could see us. He unbuttoned my jeans and pulled them down to my knees. This was wrong, I told him we shouldn’t be doing this, it was a bad idea.

“It’s okay, it’ll be quick,” I remember him saying as he aligned his hips with mine and pushed into me.

It was a burning pain and I immediately pulled away and out from behind the transformer. I fixed my jeans and began walking home as quickly I could.

He followed soon after. He began to walk with me, saying it wasn’t a big deal, how it was just the tip.

I wanted to go home as quickly as I could, but I was sore.

After a few streets of him reassuring me that it was okay, I told him I needed to sit down because I needed to wait for the pain to stop. He said he would wait with me,

after all I shouldn’t be walking home alone at night.

We found a grass hill to sit on a few feet off the sidewalk. He told me it was normal for things to hurt, that it was just something I had to get over. I told him I didn’t want to talk about it. He leaned over and kissed my cheek, attempting to be sweet. I said nothing.

He kissed my cheek again, then my ear, telling me that I was so tight and that it was going to hurt, but that it was okay. I told him I didn’t care, that I didn’t want to try it again. His kissing crept down my neck again. I stood still. I held my breath as he unbuttoned his pants and took himself out.

He pulled down my jeans, not bothering with my button or zipper. He again assured me it would be okay as he pulled me onto him, forcing his entire length into me.

The pain was worse this time, my eyes watered and my stomach twist. I didn’t want this, it was wrong.

I stood up, pulling my pants back up and felt warmth in between my legs. I reached my fingers into underwear and pulled them out to see red. I was bleeding. My head was spinning.

Before he could get up himself, I was already down the street.

I was walking as fast as I could. The warmth began to fill my underwear. He tried to catch up with me, but I kept a good pace ahead of him. He would try to yell after me, but I refused to talk to him.

I could feel the blood leaking, I remember touching the outside of my jeans, and once again my fingers being bloodied. My heart was racing as I tried to hurry home, ignoring the pain I felt. Hoping that the blood wasn’t as much as it was appearing to be.

I walked past houses with Christmas lights, as I was panicking about what had

just happened. What had happened? It was wrong. I didn’t want it. Was it rape? But he was my boyfriend, he wouldn’t do anything to hurt me, would he? I could hardly keep my thoughts together as the warmth spread to my thighs.

Once I was home, I went immediately upstairs into my room. I didn’t even check if my parents were home. I just wanted to go upstairs and clean myself up.

I stood in the bathtub and took off my pants. Blood had soaked through my jeans and my underwear. I felt light headed, I hadn’t seen so much blood before. As I changed my clothing, blood dripped into as small puddle into the tub. I had heard that it was normal to bleed when you lost your virginity, but no one told me it would be this much. I was in shock, I couldn’t process anything that was happening to me. I just went through motions as my brain struggled to grasp what was going on. I felt dirty, not only because I was soiled in my blood, but because I had just had sex – wait was it sex? Was this how it was supposed to be? It couldn’t be, this was wrong. I cleaned myself up in the tub and put in an overnight pad. I went through two overnight pads that night.

My parents couldn’t find out. Would they be mad at me for what happened? Maybe this is how it is supposed to be and I would be in trouble. I had to hide the evidence. I took my jeans and threw them in the wash and buried the ruined underwear at the bottom of the trash.

I wish I could say I had a revelation and told my parents and reported the incident.

But I didn’t and haven’t to this day. I just went to bed, not understanding what had just happened to me, and if the amount of blood was normal, but knowing it felt wrong.

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Netzai Sanchez and her parents were forced to watch children they loved and cared for returned to sadistic biological parents.

Testimony Netzai Sanchez

W

hile ser ving as a foster sister for more than 10 years, I bore witness to many cases of child abuse. Now that I am an adult and understand the concept of consent and abuse, I tear up remembering the little faces of my sweet little foster siblings.

One case that still haunts me is that of a four-year-old girl my family picked up from the Polinsky Children’s Center along with her six-month-old baby brother. He had multiple fractures, including broken ribs, a broken leg and skull fractures. The girl did not have any visible injuries. Hers were internal and emotional. She had been raped by her abusive father.

Something I still cannot understand is that for many months these children were forced to visit their parents every week. It was their parents’ right, we were told. How can that be? An abused animal is immediately removed from the dangerous place and the aggressor is taken into custody. Abused children, however, face more danger from abusive parents. Americans value the ideal that we are innocent until proven guilty, but why do these innocent children have to be repeatedly exposed to monsters? Worse, they are often forced by the County of San Diego to testify in court in front of a judge against their abusive parent.

A parent accused of rape should not have

33

the same rights as a parent who has a child taken away for other reasons. These children should not have too see these people if they are now “safe.” Even if the parent does not abuse the child anymore, his (or her) presence alone puts the child put under extreme distress and mental torment.

I can still remember the nights my little foster sister would wake up with what doctors call “nocturnal terror” due to trauma. I remember how every time entering McDonald’s where she would normally see her parents for visitations, she would complain of abdominal pain and sometimes even pee her little pants.

Where the social workers fighting for these children? No. Social workers fought for more visitation hours for the parents.

Why were no social workers fighting for these kids?

At times I would overhear my dad tell my mom how angry he felt every time he had to supervise these visits. Children, he complained, were not treated fairly.

We did our best to handle these situations.

It was tough hearing a delusional mother trying to brainwash an abused child into thinking her father loved her and that he was innocent of any wrongdoing.

My foster sister knew what her father had done to her. When she was six years old she went to court. She was asked to point with her little finger to the man that had abused her. She pointed to her father. Somehow this little girl found love and forgiveness.

When she was told of her father’s 15-year prison sentence and her mother’s 12-year sentence, she cried.

Most grown-ups try to be good people and create a good world for the little ones.

Most of us try to teach them to be good people and we try to set an example. But it is the children who teach us. No matter what they might go through or how they are taken for granted, their innocence prevails.

They are little white canvases that adults need to paint with care and love. They are still children and although they might have had their virginity taken away, their dignity is intact.

It was tough hearing a delusional mother trying to brainwash an abused child into thinking her father loved her.

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35

Chariti was only 3 years old when her cousin raped her the first time.

Testimony Chariti Niccole

I

was so excited. I was finally a big girl and was allowed to take a bath by myself. No mom, no dad, just me having fun in the tub. As a three-year-old there was nothing cooler than that.

After my bath, I grabbed my towel, wrapped up and went to my room. I was always an independent child.

I walked into my room and started to put my pajamas on that my parents left for me on the bed.

I heard the door open and I assumed it was my mom coming to help, but I was wrong. It was my cousin John who we were living with. He picked me up and laid me on the bed. Confusion consumed me, but I remember being told not to say anything. As his hand touched me as he touched himself, thoughts ran through my mind.

“Where is my mom, my dad? Where is my aunt to stop her son?”

No one was there, just me and him.

This horrific chain of events happened more than once and sometimes John’s older brother, Michael, would join. Fortunately, my mind has only allowed me to vividly remember the first time.

I am not sure how my parents found out, but once they did we moved out of that house and my aunt moved herself and her three sons across the country shortly after. It turned into a huge family issue that was quickly covered up and partial blame was placed on me by my grandparents.

Somehow they believed a three-year-old was able to seduce a teenage boy.

At age five, my parents sent me to child therapy.

“Do you remember being touched? How did that make you feel?” the therapist would ask me. “I don’t want to talk about that,” I

He picked me up and laid me on the bed.

Confusion consumed me, but I remember being told not to say anything. said. “Can we just play the game?”

That was my response every time. I convinced myself at a very young age that I was going to be OK and that what happened was not going to affect me.

Nightmares about being kidnapped in the night and scary men sneaking in my room to kill me began around second grade.

I found myself clinging to my parents, sleeping in their room until I was 11 years old. When I did sleep alone, every light was on and the door was open. Nothing or no one was going to surprise me.

More than 15 years passed. I was living in Washington state again and John was in the process of moving back as well. I wondered how I was going to react once I saw him.

Would I cuss him out, slap him or maybe even stab him. Emotions I never felt before consumed my being and I felt weakened as these thoughts overwhelmed me.

I walked into my Aunt’s house to find John sitting on the couch. He looked right at me.

“Wow!” he said. “You’re grown now.”

The look in his eyes made my blood boil.

Even with all the hatred and anger running through my veins, for some reason I smiled and gave him a hug, welcoming him back to Washington.

Occasionally the older cousins would enjoy a night on the town, bar hopping or hitting up clubs in downtown Seattle. All the family that was over 21 would go out, him included. I would catch him staring at me or looking at my butt. “He has daughters himself, has he not changed at all?” I would think to myself.

As cordial as I was, I knew I could not be around him any longer. Less than a month after John arrived I decided to move back to San Diego to save myself from the constant memory of what he did, but to also save him.

In 2013 I was in my first real relationship.

I believed he was the one and no one could tell me any different. As our relationship grew I began to wonder, “When can I tell him about what happened to me? Should I even tell him?” Guilt began to fill my conscious every day. I tried to bring it up, but was cut off by my own emotions. It was then I realized that what happened to me back when I was three years old is still affecting me today.

I began to look for a local therapist that specialized in people who were sexually abused as children, and because of my faith, I wanted my therapist to be a Christian.

Today the search continues for someone that I can truly open up to so that my healing process can begin.

Although I have forgiven my cousins, their mom, my grandparents who tried to cover this up and my parents, the pain lives on.

Every day I pray that no other little girl has to go through what I went through. I pray that no other family is torn apart.

In the end I know I will be ok. I know that somehow what happened to me has made me stronger and my testimony will help women of all ages. Maybe the time is now.

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BIDDING SO LONG TO THE ‘TWO YEAR’ DEGREE Story Luz Aurora Aramburo Photo David Hodges

At Southwestern College six is the new two.

Only 40 percent of first-time students graduate with a degree or reach transfer level within a six-year period at SWC, according to state figures. That means at least 60 percent of them do not even reach transfer level. The state average is 47 percent.

Research shows that California community college students can get seriously bogged down. A “two-year degree” has largely become mythology.

California graduates 39 percent of its bachelor degree students within four years, slightly lower than the national average of 39.8 percent.

Many variables go into student success (or failure) and experts argue about which of them is powering this national phenomenon. Many students blame math.

Elijah Hawley, 21, a mechanical engineering major, is in his third year at SWC, one more year than he had originally planned. Hawley said he took five AP classes in high school and had a 3.24 weighted GPA. “But since I hadn’t been in a math class for over an entire year, I was a little bit rusty (for the placement

37

Fewer seats for California students at UC and CSU campuses is just one of many factors that has greatly slowed community college transfer times test),” he said.

Hawley is one of the 79 percent of students who do not pass the placement test when entering SWC and have to take remedial courses before they can take transferable credits in math or English.

Dr. Michael Odu, dean of the School of Mathematics, Science and Engineering, said he was concerned with the rate of students held back by math.

“If you come here and test into remedial, you need to take like four different (math) courses before you can to get to transfer level courses,” he said. “If everything goes well, that is two years before (reaching) college level. How many of us have the resilience to want to hang around?”

According to the California Community Colleges Chancellor’s Office Student Success Scorecard, 32.9 percent of SWC students placed into remedial math, 50 percent are placed in remedial English. Only 35 percent of students placed in a remedial class graduates or transfers within six years.

Hawley took algebra his freshman year of high school, and algebra II and math analysis before

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(Especially for California students who are not rich)

University of California, est. 1868

503

San Diego County students Foreign and out-of-state students 248

California State University, est. 1857

534

477

Promised admission to SDSU

180

Admitted to SDSU

297

477 SWC Students deferred to other CSUs

Source: UCSD Personnel Information Office, Southwestern College Public Information Office

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“Every time you go from one class to the next sequential class, there is a hole in the bucket and you lose students. Even if they are successful in the previous class, when they go to the next class, not all of them register.”

Kathy Tyner Vice President of Academic Affairs

graduating. Hawley is in elementary algebra, his second SWC math class. He needs two more before he can transfer.

“Everything that was presented to me, I already knew,” he said. “It felt like a waste of time, a waste of money and I could have been doing something better.

I show up like half the time for my math class, but I’m still one of the highest in the class.”

Apart from a warning to the whole class

himself since he graduated high school.

He works part-time and balances 11 units. He said the ideal number of units he would take is 15, the amount required to graduate on time.

Dr. Jonathan King, dean of Counseling and Student Support Programs, said some community college students do not have the luxury of focusing solely on their studies because they have families to take care of, jobs or other distractions.

you need to know is there.’”

Odu agreed.

“We have this assumption that technology is everything,” he said. “It’s not everything. I’m sorry. When you put a student in front of technology they just ‘click, click.’ When you give them someone — a person — they know you care about them, their future. Have them come up with a plan so they know what is ahead. A lot of times students

1,700 about being dropped for being absent, he said his instructor has never talked to him about his absences. He has missed class twice since the warning.

Vice President of Academic Affairs Kathy Tyner told the governing board that SWC needs to decrease the number of steps to transfer.

“Every time you go from one class to the next sequential class, there is a hole in the bucket and you lose students,” she said. “Even if they are successful in the previous class, when they go to the next class, not all of them register.”

This fall SWC will merge two of the remedial math courses and offer an alternative to algebra for students who are not science, technology, engineering or math (STEM) majors. Four sections of Math 57 will be offered, the first of two statistics courses known as gateway classes. The changes are meant to shorten the time it takes students to transfer and to triple the success rate. The second course will be offered in Spring 2017.

Other states have been adapting to this model for some years now, said Odu, but the UC system was a late adopter.

Hawley said he has been supporting

“Our students have a hard time, not only transferring, but trying to stay in college and even get to the point of transferring,” said King.

Hawley said he did not have any financial aid his first semester and paid for classes out of his own pocket. By the second semester he had heard about the Board of Governors Fee Waiver and used his money for other expenses. He now works part-time and takes more classes than he did at the beginning.

At SWC the average student attempts an average of 8.4 units per semester, but only completes an average of 6.3, according to the SWC Fact Book. Hawley said admissions and counseling at SWC have not been helpful.

“My first semester was kind of hectic, just trying to figure it out all on your own and over time, through multiple people, instead of being directed the right way by the first person,” he said. “I feel like most of the staff should be better prepared to help students who don’t know what they are doing when they first get here.

(They need) to be more helpful and lead students down the right path instead of saying, ‘Just go to Webadvisor, everything

don’t have that opportunity. They make the assumption they know what do and they’re stuck here and they do not know what to do.”

Hawley took several courses in the past three years, but said he later realized that some of them were not necessary to transfer. Even though an associate degree requires 60 units, the average associate degree graduate in the U.S. accumulates 81 credits in community college. Bachelor’s degree graduates, who require a standard of 120 credits, accumulate an average of 133 credits.

King said many of these students are the first of their family to go to college and do not understand the process.

“Some come from households that don’t know what you need to know to navigate to stay in college, so they are up against a lot of different circumstances,” he said. “The most important thing for these kids is mentoring and more hands on with the counseling and faculty. That link with the counselors and the faculty is very important.”

With three semesters under his belt, Hawley made an appointment with a counselor. For personal reasons he had to

40

cancel his appointment, he said, and never rescheduled. He said the counseling office did not reach out to him, so he bought the college catalog, went through it and found the courses he needed to take.

“I don’t need to talk to anyone anymore,” said Hawley. “I’ve helped myself more than they’ve helped me. I believe I am doing it the right way and if it ends up not being the right way, I can’t blame anyone but myself since there was no help there in the beginning. After I figured it out, it has just been me and myself the remainder of the time.”

Once he passes all the courses he needs for transferring, other challenges await.

Odu said local universities prioritize the admission of higher-paying out-of-state and international students to generate revenue.

“There’s the business component of it we don’t want to address,” he said.

“Colleges are now hiring businessminded vice presidents for their VPs, and their presidents are now often from the corporate world, not from education world. They run the schools as a business.

The dynamic is changing. When you start hiring these business experts, you are telling us that this is a business model now.”

A critical state audit on the UC system was released in March that accused the system of violating its mission statement to serve the state by educating Californians.

UC President Janet Napolitano defended the increase in higher-paying out-of-state students and foreign students.

“UC took bold action to control costs, remain affordable to California residents and protect quality during the biggest financial crisis since the Great Depression,” she said.

In the last 10 years, foreign student enrollment at UCSD has increased 1,307 percent, while local student enrollment has increased 26 percent. Foreign and outof-state students outnumber San Diegans three to one. Some UC campuses are nearly 40 percent non-Californians.

Odu said the strategy is destructive.

“If you need money, you have foundations and you have the state, but what they are saying I really don’t buy that,” said Odu. “It doesn’t make any sense. What happens to those students? It discourages the students from even moving on, because they are stuck here they have nowhere to go and they are funding the (universities with their taxes). There is no justification for 41

“If you test into remedial math, you need to take four different math courses before transfer level courses. If everything goes well that is two years before reaching college level. How many of us have the resilience to hang around?”

Dr. Michael Odu Dean of Mathematics, Science and Engineering

that. They can come up with whatever excuse they like, but there really is no justification for that.”

In an effort to help local students, the California State University system began a campaign called “A Degree with a Guarantee” promising students who applied with an Associate Degree for Transfer (ADT) would be guaranteed a spot in the CSU system. California increased the amount of ADTs from 735 to 6,901 within three years. SWC had the largest increase at 138 percent during 2014-15. Southwestern’s efforts will be recognized by the Campaign for College Opportunity in Sacramento on June 2.

In fall 2015, 180 ADT applicants were accepted into SDSU, but the remaining 297 that applied were redirected to other less-crowded CSU campuses across the state, most of which accept fewer out-ofstate students.

Nicholas Nguyen, the SWC Transfer Center Coordinator, said he is concerned that four-year universities are not admitting students from their service areas even if the students fulfill the requirements.

“If you apply with a 3.9 GPA and are not accepted, it’s not your fault, you’ve done everything you can as a student and (SWC) as a school,” he said. “ I think what happens is that when their students take longer to graduate and it created a trickle effect on transfer students because if they were able to graduate their students quickly, they would be able to accept more transfer students. Our students tend to be a lot more prepared, they have completed more classes. They are doing well, but as long as the university does not open up more spaces, the number of students will not improve drastically.”

Odu said four-year universities have a big advantage. “(Universities) are doing a better job, let’s be honest,” he said. “But the fouryear colleges only admit the best because it is a competition. If you have the best, I expect you to be doing more.”

USD has the highest percentage of four-year graduates in San Diego at 67 percent, followed by PLNU at 59 percent, UCSD at 57 percent, the Art Institute of SD at 47 percent and SDSU at 29 percent.

The science of crashing Story Luz Aurora Aramburo Photo Mary York

M

y first week of college I crashed 13 classes. I was not planning on attending community college and finally decided two days before classes started. I was told that if I wanted to register I would have to crash my classes, so I did. Swarming into class with other students, some of them fellow crashers, and fighting for a seat, I felt dumb for thinking it could have worked. Little did I know I had begun a ritual.

Crashing as many classes as I could gave me flexibility and control over my education. Even though I now register for classes on time, I have never stuck with my original schedule.

RateMyProfessor and first lectures can be deceiving.

I always take double the amount of classes I want to take on the first two weeks to make sure I have a backup for each. Sitting in class for three-hour lectures is no easy task. This is why I tend to pick classes based on the professor’s personality.

If I like listening to my professor, attending classes is no longer a taskW but a pastime, which makes me a better student.

The first two weeks, however, are a complete nightmare. Over time I have learned a few tricks that make it much smoother, but it still takes a lot dedication. Sometimes I can tell within the first minutes of a class that it’s not me. My first semester I sat through them, not

wanting to be rude, but wishing I had crashed the other class that overlapped.

I learned to either sit or stand by the door to make a swift exit when necessary.

This way I covered more ground. Being late to a class was the worst thing I could do. I got dunked to the bottom of the crashers’ list and could only enroll if everyone before me (this includes waitlisters) and/or some of those enrolled, dropped the class.

I arrived to classes 15 minutes early to make sure I was first on the list.

The second week of crashing is arguably more important than the first. This is when many fellow crashers have been discouraged and the competition narrows. Persistence is hard, it includes doing all the work professors demand. This means I barely slept on those first two weeks.

It is not so much that I wanted to make sure I received a good grade in the class, but that I wanted to convince professors I was serious about crashing.

This sometimes gave me priority over other crashers.

It is easy to get discouraged, especially when professors begin the class by stating the unlikelihood of enrolling for crashers.

Sometimes they are right, but sometimes it’s necessary to be a little stubborn.

When I tried to enroll in an English 116 class (English 115 and 116 classes are most competitive) I was crashing three of them at

the same time. The professor I preferred had a 7 a.m. class. The class, as usual, overflowed with students. After my first week crashing that class, the professor said I was wasting my time, I responded that with all due respect, I would like to linger on another week, just in case. His response discouraged me and I did not attend the next class. A classmate told me several students dropped, I talked to the professor again and he gave me an add code.

I learned that was the easiest way to crash.

At first, students tend to convince themselves they can wake up early and go to class.

Many realize they are not the early bird type and drop within the second or third week.

Crashing classes has its pros and its cons.

It brings a lot of uncertainty and at first, forced me to take classes I did not want out of sheer desperation. My schedule never made sense because I prioritized the quality of my professors over the timeslots they had on my day.

One semester I began my classes at 7 a.m. and finished at 9 p.m. I had long gaps in between, but it was a long day. Still, it was easier to have long days listening to people I enjoyed than to loathe every minute of a short day.

It worked that way because I sacrificed my schedule for professors I liked. Crashing let me pick what was best for me. Even though it was exhausting at first, it was worth it.

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Southwestern College ASO President Mona Dibas

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Story Cristofer Garcia

Photos David Hodges

Donald Trump’s call to ban Muslims from the United States and an increase in Islamophobic hate crimes has made it scary to be an American Muslim.

Mona Dibas, all-American woman, was born in San Diego, drives an SUV with a “Bernie 2016” sticker on the bumper and sings along to her friend’s “Hamilton” CD. She was just elected President of the Southwestern College Associated Student Organization and is hard at work planning to take charge in June.

Even though she is popular and clearly on a roll, Dibas said she must always be vigilant. So it goes for Muslim-Americans.

“It used to be because I was a woman I needed to protect myself,” Dibas said. “But at this time, it’s not even about that. It’s about the fact that I wear a hijab.”

Dibas’ decision to wear an Islamic head scarf sometimes draws negative attention.

“I remember recently I parked my car a little too close to this truck and I had my little sister with me,” she said. “(The driver) got so mad and he started to curse and (say), ‘you can’t effin drive because of that towel on your head.’

My sister was very scared. I just drove away and he also pulled out and started driving behind me and I remember feeling so afraid.

They could have a gun, they could ram into

my car. I remember feeling completely angry and I cried. I was thinking we’re in 2015, we’re such an advanced world, yet we can’t get over the fact that I wear a hijab and you don’t.”

Such incidents flare after terrorist attacks, she said. Violence against the Muslim-American community has nearly tripled following the November stadium bombing in France. A man in Michigan called a store clerk a “terrorist” and shot him in the face. A Pennsylvania taxi driver was shot by one of his passengers after the passenger asked him about ISIS. Violence has also spilled on to school grounds. A San Diego State University student was recently attacked and verbally assaulted for wearing a hijab on campus, spurring a march of hundreds of diverse students showing solidarity.

Dibas and her younger sister, Nada, are among the estimated 3.3 million Muslims residing in the U.S., less than one percent of the population. They are native San Diegans who live typically American lives in Chula Vista. Typical to a point.

Recent events like the San Bernardino shootings have escalated anti-Muslim rhetoric, including controversial statements

by Republican presidential candidates Donald Trump and Ted Cruz. Trump’s “Muslim ban” calls for “a total and complete shutdown of Muslims entering the United States until our country representatives can figure out what is going on.”

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Worshippers pray at a San Diego area mosque.

Trump has actively worked to stir antiMuslim resentment in the U.S. “A poll from the Center for Security Policy released data showing 25 percent of (Muslims) polled agreed violence against Americans in the United States is justified as part of the global jihad,” said Trump at a rally in South Carolina last December.

“They want to change your religion.”

The same poll, which surveyed 600 Muslims, also found that 61 percent define “jihad” as a “peaceful, personal struggle to be more religious” or a “non-violent action.”

Cruz upped the ante after the Brussels attacks by calling on law enforcement to “patrol and secure” Muslim neighborhoods in the U.S. Sadly, Mona Dibas said, national polls showed support for Trump and Cruz grew following their anti-Muslim statements.

“I’m not surprised that the polls went up,” she said. “Islamophobia, especially after 9/11, has been in people’s hearts, but no one has given them that push to

45

take that feeling out to make it visible to everyone. Growing up I’m sure there were people who were hesitant or a little afraid being around me, but they never physically showed me that. A lot of Trump supporters you hear them say, ‘He’s just saying what’s on everybody’s mind.’”

Dibas said she and Nada try to educate people about Islam while developing their own identities. It was a yearning for selfidentity that Mona Dibas said she decided in the fourth grade to begin wearing a hijab, the headscarves worn by Muslim women in many parts of the world.“I had a friend who wore (one) and I would ask her why,” she said. “Her response was beautiful. She said ‘Look at our classroom, no one is wearing it but me. It gives me this power in my heart to know that I’m different than everyone else and I don’t have to follow society.’”

Mona’s decision was even questioned by her parents.

“My parents never forced me to wear the hijab,” she said. “My mother was like ‘Are

you sure? You’re young, you don’t have to.’

She didn’t want me to wear it because she was worried that I was being pressured. I told her ‘No. This is me.’”

As she grew older, she said she realized that the hijab was also empowering.

“Society is all about twerking and crop tops. I don’t define beauty as that,” she said.

“Beauty is being humble. Beauty is being kind and that’s what the hijab taught me.

As I grew up I started to realize this is the strength that comes with it.”

Ahmed Binsanad is a 15-year-old volunteer at Mona Dibas’s mosque who sometimes gives tours to visitors. He said he is interested in studying business and would like to work with cars.

He has only been in the U.S. for two years, but has already been forced out of his high school by bullies.

“At school they kept bullying me because I’m Muslim,” he said. “Every time I walked (by they said) ‘terrorist.’ They make fun of me. It’s common.”

Binsanad said he now believes that he

“I was 12 the first does not belong in public school.

“I used to go to public (high school), but after what happened I went to Muslim school to be with normal people who I belong with,” he said. “I think I don’t fit in with (public school students) because of the bullying and stuff like that.”

A report from the Council on AmericanIslamic Relations (CAIR) found that more than half of California Muslim students are bullied for their beliefs.

Turki Alharbi, 21, who studies finance at Southwestern College, is one.“I came to (America) when I was 18 by myself,” he said. “I was fascinated with America because of the movies and the songs.”

An ugly incident at a grocery store made him realize he would have to deal with people that do not like Muslims.

“I was walking to Ralphs with my cousin and picking Arabic food there,” he said.

“There was an old lady walking by us.

She screamed, ‘If you (always) speak your fucking language, then go back to your fucking country.’”

Mona Dibas said the problem was common.

“I was 12 the first time I had someone​ come up to me and tell me, ‘You’re a terrorist. Go back to where you came from,” she said. “I couldn’t tell you a number of times that it’s happened to me or it’s happened to my sister or online.”

Mona Dibas said it is this type of hostility that renders her unable to mourn

time I had someone come up to me and tell me ‘You’re a terrorist. Go back to where you came from.’”

with the rest of the nation during national tragedies because she feels she must go on the defense.

“We don’t get a chance to be human,” she said. “You don’t get a chance to mourn with everyone else, to feel bad with everyone else. We have to protect ourselves from these Islamophobia comments. After shootings like (San Bernardino), Muslims are afraid to go walk alone. If I’m alone in the nighttime, I don’t go anywhere. I have to have someone with me.”

Nada Dibas said American Muslims must always keep their emotions in check.

“It’s really important to not get angry,” she said. “That’s what they want. They

want you to prove to them that you are an angry Muslim. You react calmly, you just smile. At the end of the day, as a Muslim, you think ‘what would the prophet do?’”

She said the best way to overcome prejudice is by correcting misinformation.

“You educate them and let them know how it is that you work and sometimes that works. A lot of times you’ll have people that are understanding.”

Mona Dibas said educating Americans will erase misconceptions and bring people closer.

“We are just regular people,” she said.

“We want our children to go to school and have a good education. We want to be able to work in a proper job, retire, have food on the table for our family.”

Alharbi said he is trying to create a club at SWC to reshape the way society thinks.

“People think about the Middle East in a religious way only, which is really wrong,” he said. “Yes I’m Muslim, but people judge me on my religion. If they see my culture and think about it, they will have a different perspective about it. I’m trying to provide my culture to American society so that they can understand it and look at it in a different way.”

Mona and Nada Dibas see themselves as ambassadors for their culture, even though their forays into the public arena worry their parents who live in Abu Dhabi. Nada said her mother was rattled when she saw Mona’s face on the front

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"Beauty is being humble. Beauty is being kind and that’s what the hijab taught me. As I grew up I began to realize the strength that comes with it."

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page of the Southwestern College Sun newspaper following her election as ASO President.

“She’s a mother, in her head something can go wrong,” she said. “(My parents are) just worried in general, but this whole anti-Muslim rhetoric out there gives them a whole bunch of other things to worry about. They’re just worried that we’re putting ourselves out there and it’ll make us more prone as a target.”

Nada Dibas said most Muslims are not radicalized just as most Christians do not belong to the Ku Klux Klan.

“Some Muslims become radicalized but it’s not very common,” she said. “It’s not common at all, it’s just that the media amplifies it. So for us, we have this anger towards radical Muslims because they’re ruining it for the rest of us.”

Muslims are far more often the victims of violence in the U.S. than the perpetrators, Nada Dibas said. Many assaults and hate crimes are downplayed or ignored, she insisted, including the murders of three North Carolina State University Muslim honor students last fall.

“It makes me a little angry to see that,” she said.

“A lot of these crimes aren’t even reported as hate crimes, so it’s actually rare that you do see in the media it quoted as a hate crime. I don’t know if you heard about a shooter in North Carolina, three Muslims died. They called them ‘three winners’ (because they were highly regarded in the community). Over a parking spot. That’s what they said, it was over a parking space, (so law enforcement officials said) it wasn’t a hate crime.”

Both sisters said they are optimist that Muslims in America will eventually earn the trust and respect of their countrymen. They want to be role models for other young Muslim-Americans as well as contributing members of the community, especially at Southwestern College. It will, they agreed, require gumption and patience.

Nada said she and Mona are entrenched Americans and in this for the long haul.

“For Muslims that have only known America for their entire lives, it’s like yeah this (hostility) sucks, but this is my country.”

When Mona and Nada Dibas cannot find a quiet place to pray on campus, they retreat to their car.

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Is the Uber economy nascent freedom or emerging slavery?

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ust after 11 p.m. Luis Reyes picked up three Southwestern College students from Manhattan Bar on Broadway in Chula Vista. He smiled as the crew piled into his car, shaking hands and exchanging names. Friendly chatter drowned out the soft voice of the GPS issuing directions.

It was not until they had pulled into a vacant lot in National City that anyone realized they had driven to the wrong destination.

Reyes apologized and readjusted the directions on his phone.

“Sorry, I just got the app,” he said. “You guys are my second ride ever.”

Reyes, 42, is one of 50,000 drivers to join Uber this month. He is part of a growing clutch of drivers who work with the app, which took off in 2014. Operating in 70 countries and 400 cities around the world, the ride sharing phone app averages 1 million rides a day and is an $18.2 billion business.

Reyes said he got started with Uber because he could no longer stand his office job.

“I’m going to test it out and see where it takes me,” he said. “I’ve heard that if you put in the hours and put in the time, it works out.”

Reyes hopes to work in real estate, he said, so Uber is not the endgame though it is helping him make ends meet.

“I’m excited because of the money that’s in it and from where I was before to where I see this going,” he said. “This bridge will allow me to get back into real estate.”

Reyes is not alone in his enthusiasm.

An entire generation is cultivating a Illustrations Alejandro Durán

“share culture” through outlets like Uber, AirBnB and Couchsurfing. So new are developments in the ride-share industry that baseline statistics are hard to come by. California has been proclaimed a great case study for the implementation and expansion of Uber as it moves from large cities to smaller ones. Researchers are curious to see how smaller towns will cultivate demand for ride sharing, but with little more than 18 months of substantial numbers, Uber’s development is still in its infancy.

A recent study by Uber Newsroom said 85 percent of Uber drivers chose the app because of the freedom it gives them to manage other aspects of life. Unlike jobs with regular hours or shift positions, Uber drivers can manage their own hours around school, family and alternate work schedules.

Uber CEO Travis Kalanick said at least 50 percent of drivers work less than 10 hours a week, a statistic he uses to prove

that drivers appreciate the individual management Uber provides its contractors.

“The world that Uber is in is an ondemand economy,” he said. “That flexibility in work is the real breakthrough in the on-demand economy because you literally have control of your time. That’s a true breakthrough when you can do it at scale.

Millions of people can now work on their own time when they choose and not when they don’t.”

Southwestern College nursing student Ray Reyes, 24, said Uber has helped him balance being a father and a student.

“I’m really glad Uber is out there,” he said.

“I have a little girl, she’s 4 years old, and I have to work. I get to choose my own hours and I decide to just work on the weekends.”

Weekends are especially profitable, he said. Demand is typically higher during weekday mornings or when bars have last call on weekends. Uber rates rise during times of high demand, sometimes a fouror five-time increase. Uber executives call

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it “surge-hour pricing.”

“Just working on the weekends I make what I’d normally make in a minimum wage job,” said Reyes. “I can bring in a good $600 if I work Friday, Saturday, Sunday.”

A recent study by the Benenson Strategy Group concluded that Uber drivers make more money per hour and work fewer hours than regular taxi drivers. Drivers in more populated cities like New York and Los Angeles average between $25-30 an hour.

Ray Reyes said several of his friends who quit their day jobs to drive full-time make $4,500-5,000 a month.

“I’d highly recommend it for the student of today,” he said. “The people are nice.

Plus I get to make my own hours.”

Ups and downs have been a part of the driver-app relationship. Decisions made at the top affect workers like any other business. In January Uber sliced rates of rides from $1.10 to 90 cents. Enraged, San Diego drivers protested.

Juliet Cass, who is finishing her first full year driving with the app, participated in the protest with her husband, who is also an Uber driver.

“They dropped the rates 30 percent on us,” she said. “A lot of people quit and refused to come back because they were making less than minimum wage.

Me and my husband are retired so it didn’t affect us the way it did others.”

Kalanick said the Uber experience will continue to improve for both drivers

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and passengers with the evolution of technology. As the company streamlines the driving experience, drivers can expect to get more work, while passengers receive more affordable rates.

“Four years ago the driver was making about $19 an hour all the way up to, now, $32 an hour because things have gotten more efficient,” he said. “The driver is making more dollars per hour as prices go down.”

Uber has also found its way into headlines in the ongoing s afet y deb ate over ride sharing. Los Angeles, Sacramento and San Francisco are all pressuring Uber to increase its background checks on driving applicants.

It is a highly polarized discussion, which The Los Angeles Times quoted Uber advocates referring to as driven more by politics than safety. In a report released

by Uber in March, only 170 cases of sexual assault have been filed with Uber since 2012 (one in every 3.3 million passengers).

Cass said she has never felt uncomfortable with any of t he p ass engers she has picked up. After working in manufacturing for most of her career, she said she could not manage the physical strains of her the job, but said she is too young to retire. Uber, she said, has given her a new life.

“Standing up on concrete floors for 18 years blew out my knees,” she said. “My doctor said I needed to retire or find a sit-down job.

With Uber, I can sit down as much as I like.”

A young person’s game

Percentage of drivers over the age of 50

Percentage of drivers under the age of 30

30% of Uber drivers work a full-time job, 31% work a part-time job. of Uber drivers have dependents living at home

BORDERING ON GREATNESS New Orleans changed music when European and African musicians combined their aesthetics to create something unique. In our San DiegoTijuana borderlands inventive chefs from Mexico, the U.S., Asia and the Pacific Islands are combining ancient gastronomic treasures into fusion food innovations that are bold, brilliant and delicious.

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TACOS DE MI BARRIO Story Victoria Gonzales and Jeanette Sandoval Photos David Hodges

With the Chipotlitization of Mexican food becoming so prevalent, Chula Vista’s El Ranchero taco truck keeps an essential street food authentic

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I

n the beginning, there were cold trucks – pickup trucks with coolers stocked with burritos.

They were okay for hungry workers during the Reagan Administration. When the Berlin Wall fell, the hot truck rose like a fast-food phoenix, warming the hearts and stomachs of San Diego County’s citizens on the move.

Before that, however, there was Jose Godinez, the Godfather of taco trucks.

Since 1974, Godinez and his family have been serving up tacos under the name El Ranchero (the rancher).

Their flagship taco truck is usually parked on Telegraph Canyon Road near Interstate 805. The Godinez family also owns three taco shops in San Diego County.

Originally from Atotonilco de Alto, Jalisco, Mexico, Godinez developed his devotion for food at an early age in his parents’ restaurants.

“They always dedicated themselves to food,” he said.

Godinez said he taught himself to cook his family’s classics like carnitas, chicharrones and birria when he was 12.

In most traditional Mexican cooking, nothing is wasted, especially when it comes to pork.

Greasy carnitas, essentially whole hog, is cooked in lard until tender yet crisp. To make chicharrones, the skin of the pork is fried until it is crunchy and golden brown.

Birria is a goat stew, braised until the meat falls apart.

Godinez said he has a deep love for the traditional foods of his youth, but he is a businessman at his core.

With a trio of taco shops and a truck to run, he is diligent but unorthodox.

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“If a business is slow, you have to open another one that will give you a bit more money so you can keep open the other place,” he said. “If not, then you become bankrupt.”

This double-down approach seems to be working for Godinez, who has combined his passion for quality with an athlete’s love for competition.

Most food sold at Godinez’s truck is prepped off-site in one of his taco shops under his watchful eye. His adobada, the spiced pork meat stacked on a large spit in hot-air balloon shape with thick pineapple slices at the ends, gets the home treatment before traveling in the truck. Same with his tripe and soft lengua tacos. He also cooks carne asada over coals.

HOW TO: ADOBADA TACOS Marinated tacos migrated from southern Mexico to the state of New Mexico, then west to SoCal and northern Baja California.

Adobada is generally pork marinated in red chili sauce, vinegar and oregano. Taqueros most often serve it on soft tortillas de maize with cheese and sauteed vegetables.

El Ranchero and other food trucks and taco shops keep the authentic culinary art of adobada alive in the borderlands.

He is hyper-vigilant with his line cooks, his talented taqueros.

A skilled taquero has mastered the traditional techniques of taco making.

They work with efficiency, speed and skill to construct tacos with an enviable obliviousness to the sizzling hot food in their seasoned hands.

“This way it is easier and you always maintain the same line,” Godinez said.

“That’s important in a business.”

Mexicans call the gift sazón, an intuitive cooking skill. Even if a decent cook is taught exactly how to make something and follows directions explicitly, the finished product may not be as good as the original, he said. Sazón creates magia every time. This is especially true for Godinez’s classic barbacoa, which he

fig. 6: Salsa (sahl-suh)

fig. 5: Guacamole

(wa-ca-mow-leh)

fig. 4: Cilantro

(see-lahn-tro)

fig. 3: Cebolla

(se-boy-ah)

fig. 2: Adobada

(ahh-do-ba-duh)

fig. 1: Tortilla

(torr-tee-yuh)

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“If you have a business and you start to lose money, you just have to open another one.”

Tacos are prepped in the El Ranchero food truck at 495 Telegraph Canyon Road.

takes great pride in.

Dedication to quality has paid off. His tacos are tiny packets of Mexican flavors, bursting out of their tortillas with salsa, tradition and tantalizing taste.

Almost right next to El Ranchero is Mariscos Rolex, a food truck that sells seafood. This might rattle other restaurateurs, but it is a welcome sight for Godinez. He loves competition, he said.

He likes customers to compare, fueling his drive to find ways to do things better.

Although his sons own the taco truck now, Godinez said his zeal for this business makes it impossible to stay away. He still wakes before dawn and is busy checking in on his taco empire until after dark because, he said, that’s just the way it is with restaurants.

A Shakespearian bard de birria would have said, “The food’s the thing.” Godinez would agree.

“What people care about is to eat, right?”

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E T I H T URR B OC D

O T S R O T C

M

J’s Yogurt Time and Deli defies categorization. Stashed in an ordinary strip mall is an extraordinary culinary adventure born to an exotic borderland lapped by the Pacific Rim. Created by a pair of friendly young men dubbed MJ and Chef Kevin, the Asian/Mexican/ Islander fusion restaurant is a cauldron of creativity, a studio for its multiracial culinary artists. MJ’s is the birthplace of a South County staple called longanisa fries. It is a layered dish of Cajun or plain fries, covered in fried longanisa sausage, a type of pork sausage common in Latin America and the Philippines.

“We are not a traditional taco shop or a hamburger place,” explained MJ. “People don’t know this type of food, so you gotta prepare yourself because even our sign out there says ‘yogurt’ so you never really know we have food. The only way you’ll know about our food is if someone told you or if you saw us in a magazine.”

MJ’s Yogurt Time and Deli opened nine years ago and has earned rave reviews from the San Diego Union-Tribune, San Diego Magazine and Los Angeles County food publications.

MJ’s is Yelp’s second highest rated restaurant in Chula Vista, behind venerable Tacos El Gordo.

“San Diego County is so multicultural that this is how we eat at a party.”

MJ’s signature longanisa is cooked on a flat top griddle that is Chef Kevin’s cooking canvas, along with the all-important fryer. Sliced longanisa and fries are accompanied by any of an array of meats chosen by the customer, chopped into pieces like carne asada. Chef Kevin is standing by with marinated pork, apple-pear glazed beef, Alaskan pollock or herb chicken. Fried eggs are the finishing touch. His master work is garnished with aioli, a sweet salad of cabbage and carrots, sesame seeds and cheese, with a side of Chef Kevin’s mild or spicy “red dragon.”

MJ said the restaurant and its exotic Pacific Rim foods bubbled up from his multicultural upbringing.

“We didn’t really come up with it,” he said. “It’s just how we grew up.”

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MJ said the restaurant feels like a potluck with a group of diverse friends.

“San Diego County is so multicultural that this is how we eat at a party,” he said.

“You don’t know it until you have our food, when you put your plate together, you may have like a pizza or a carne asada, you may have some Filipino food on there. So really you had a fusion plate but didn’t know it.”

A three-way marriage of Pacific cuisines raised in America produced mixed-taste offspring like the pallet of fries and some very original burritos. Tasting the food begs the question, why had they not been combined sooner?

MJ’s also sells frozen yogurt in a variety of flavors, but it is not limited to a cup.

One popular way to get it is as a filling for their very popular Wow Macarons.

With flavors like green tea, Reese’s Peanut Butter Cup and purple taro with Fruity Pebbles, the colorful cookies go perfectly with the wacky compendium that is MJ’s cuisine. They also sell out quickly.

Social media is an important selling tool for MJ’s. Chef Kevin and MJ post pictures of their food on Instagram and invite customers to post pictures of their 59

orders along with specific hashtags as a way to promote business. MJ said this strategy works particularly well with the macarons.

“It’s crazy with macarons,” he said. “We sell them on social media. Once they get posted, people rush over to get them.”

MJ’s yogurt smoothies are refreshing and unique, melding flavors like horchata and white chocolate with Thai tea.

MJ’s menu is as flexible as a yoga instructor. It is infinitely customizable.

An array of meats can be added to sliders, salads, tacos, fries or plump, Californiastyle burritos. One of MJ’s favorite creations is the 805 South burrito. It is a carbohydrate bomb that weighs about as much as a laptop and is filled with lumpia, fries, eggs, meat and cheese.

After almost a decade of business, MJ and Chef Kevin still express surprise at the legion of longanisa loyalists. MJ, the peppy yet zen front man, said the deli will roll with the tide.

“We didn’t expect it to be where it is at and it is not where we would like to be at, but we’re moving (forward) and it’s nice because people are actually enjoying our food.”

MJ and his compadre Chef Kevin run what may be the San Diego/Tijuana region’s most creative place to eat.

Brazilian superfood is a local superstar Juice Adventure’s green drinks, purple desserts keep diners pink with health.

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mid a sea of college-area fastfood restaurants and grease pits, Juice Adventure is a healthy sanctuary. Located on East H Street, across the street from the main campus, it has been a mecca for fruits, vegetables and vitamins for almost 20 years.

Juice Adventure was opened in 1997 by Larry McCrorey, a former Bonita Vista High School track star who thought his hometown needed a healthier option.

It has become a refuge for Southwestern College students and staff fleeing fried burgers and lardy burritos.

After being in business in Hollywood and Long Beach, McCrorey said he came back to Chula Vista because he was raised here.

“I went to Bonita Vista High School,” he said. “I went to Southwestern, then to Santa Barbara.”

McCrorey studied at the prestigious Brooks Institute of Photography in Santa Barbara, then set out with his camera gear to make a name for himself.

During much of 1980s he traveled to Hollywood gyms to take pictures of aspiring actresses. In one of the gyms there was a small shop that sold workout gear and smoothies, he said. The business was failing so McCrorey said he bought a share of the store and business picked up. Inspired by his success, McCrorey opened a smoothie shop in Long Beach.

He was not formally educated in nutrition, but during his off hours he studied.

“I converted myself,” he said.

A smoothie craze was just beginning and McCrorey paddled into the wave.

He recalled the day he decided to blend into the smoothie business. A customer asked him if he had any more locations.

When McCrorey replied that he only had another inside a gym, the customer was startled.

“You should have one on every corner,” she said.

McCrorey said that happened prior to the popularity of Jamba Juice when smoothies were only sold in gyms.

“Back then we didn’t think it would work outside of a gym,” he said.

In 1997 McCrorey moved his operation to Chula Vista. He said the story behind the store’s name is slightly embarrassing.

“I was looking around the room and Peewee’s Big Adventure, the movie, was on. My kids were watching,” he said. “And I said, Adventure. Juice Adventure. Perfect!”

Besides selling smoothies and juices with familiar combinations of fruits like strawberries and bananas, McCrorey sells notable vegetable smoothies, like the Carrot Sunrise, as well as more hardcore health foods such as açaí bowls and wheatgrass shots. He said he does not follow every trendy health food craze that pops up.

“It’s just too much,” he said.

Açaí was another story. Juice Adventure was a Southern California pioneer of the tangy Brazilian berry with cancer-fighting antioxidants. Better still, açaí actually tastes good.

Açaí has joined the pantheon of things considered to be superfoods. It is a small, dark berry that looks like a meatier blueberry with a large seed. It grows on açaí palm trees in South American rainforests. At Juice

Adventure it is sold cold, in pureed form, topped with sliced bananas, strawberries or granola.

Less tasty, but powerfully healthy, is wheatgrass juice. Wrung out of McCrorey’s organic wheat sprouts, it yields a small amount (a shot) of shockingly verdant green juice that smells like the ground after it rains.

It does not taste like dirt, though. It is sweet and fresh like concentrated spinach.

Juice Adventure also offers a trio of marvelous sandwiches − avocado, tuna and turkey − that can be customized with nearly 20 vegetables and condiments.

Customers may also have them toasted or grilled.

McCrorey said about 30 percent of his business comes from SWC. Juice Adventure has developed quite a following in the community as the only healthy restaurant within walking distance of the campus.

Surrounding businesses in the aged 7/11 strip mall have turned over like house hunting hermit crabs over the past two decades, but the adventure continues.

“Most things come and go,” McCrorey said, “but certain stuff never goes away.

We have customers of all ages who want to eat healthy. We’re here for them.”

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Story and Photos Bianca Quilantan

Ghosts haunt the canyons of eastern Chula Vista. At dawn they rise from the fragrant sage and drift toward the rim, in plain sight but invisible. Fantasmas of weathered flesh and sturdy blood amble past the carloads of harried people who seem to see them, but look right through. It is time to find work—any work.

“Jorge,” a 67-year-old migrant worker, rarely smiles because he has no teeth and rarely finds work because he is considered too old.

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Rough, callused hands worn from a thousand lawns, ten thousand nails and one hundred thousand gallons of sweat wave at drivers pulling into the Home Depot. Few slow down, most do not look. These tired, frail faces wait hopefully under the relentless San Diego sun in front of Home Depots across the county, including Chula Vista, barely two miles from Southwestern College.

Sometimes a car door opens and a hasty negotiation takes place. A day laborer hops in. He has work.

Day laborers are Latino migrants who do yard work, construction, moving, demolition and countless other forms of heavy lifting for modest wages, no benefits, and little or no respect.

Sometimes they work for days without being paid—or worse. They are strong armed but powerless, free roaming but often treated like slaves.

Border Angels, a human rights organization led by Enrique Morones, visits the laborers and provides sack lunches and clean shirts. Morones said he worries about the men because they are vulnerable and sometimes mistreated.

“We check in on them to make sure they are alright and to let them know there are people who care about them,” he said. “Sometimes they work all day and are not paid. Sometimes they are not adequately fed or given enough to drink.”

Morones periodically has help from distant lands. He was joined recently by teachers and students from Jefferson County Open School in Colorado. Teachers Connie Kowal and Jordan Hopkins flew with a group of their students to the borderlands to see firsthand the realities of immigration.

“We want to take kids to places to see what’s happening, not just read about it,” Kowal said.

“There’s nothing in the curriculum about Mexico in terms of refugees and immigrants. It’s as if this issue does not exist.”

Morones said he wants to raise awareness about the workers and tell their stories. Some of the stories are disturbing, like the abuse suffered by “Carlos” (a pseudonym) whose wife recently gave birth to twins in Tijuana. His job in Mexico did not pay enough to feed them, he said. Neither did a recent job in the U.S. “I worked four days straight for a man that offered me $40 a day to work in his yard, fix appliances inside his house and other jobs,” Carlos said. “As soon as I finished everything he needed,

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he dropped me off, didn’t pay me and there was nothing I could do.”

Even though they are virtually homeless and live in encampments in the canyons near the Home Depots, the labors work hard to keep a clean look so as to not scare away potential customers.

“I cannot smile because I do not have teeth!” said “Jorge” from Jalisco, who is saving money to reunite with his family in Utah. “But just because I do not have any teeth does not mean I cannot keep a sharp appearance. I take pride in myself to always look good when going to work and the shirts Mr. Morones has given us are great to work in.”

Some laborers are economic refugees, others are fleeing the vicious drug cartel wars in Mexico.

“It has been difficult to support my family with the recent kidnapping and mutilation of my sonin-law,” said Juan from Juarez. “They kidnapped my son-in law, who at the time was working with drug dealers because money had been tight.

Something went wrong and they sent us his severed hand to us in a box.”

Juan lives with his family in the canyon, a lessthan-ideal situation, he said, but safe from cartel hit men.

When work opportunities are slow the laborers pass time in good spirits by playing cards, sharing meals and telling stories about their families.

“What I make here in the States in one day is what I would make in (Mexico in) two weeks,” said Jorge, 67, who as an older man has trouble attracting jobs.

Day laborers have a code that requires them to look out for one another, a tradition from their homeland. Work is distributed evenly and younger men help older ones.

“Whenever I go seek out laborers to cut my lawn or do heavier yard work, I have noticed that they have paired the older men with the younger ones and have created a type of packaged deal in order to make sure he gets work,” said Edalia Gomez, an Eastlake resident who has hired many of these men to do yard work.

As the sun slips from the sky and the afternoon dissipates into evening, the lucky ones are dropped off near the Home Depot and rejoin their compadres. After a full day of clearing brush, painting fences and repairing retaining walls, the workers are once again as ghosts, visible but not, shuffling slowly back into the canyons to sleep.

With tomorrow’s sun there will be work to do – if they are lucky.

“What I make here in the States in one day is what I would make in Mexico in two weeks.�

Day laborers wait patiently for work outside a Home Depot store. Younger migrant workers look after older men by asking to include them on work crews and taking the heavy jobs for them.

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Story Alejandro Durรกn Photos David Hodges,

Estudio Teddy Cruz + Forman

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Five years ago a team of artists, politicians and scholars entered a small drainage tunnel under the concrete barrier separating Mexico and the United States. As they negotiated their way through the damp corridor, they were met by a distressing sight: waves of trash washing off the slopes of Los Laureles, a Tijuana shantytown. The trash cascaded across the border, polluting the Tijuana River Estuary on the other side.

This was not an illegal crossing.

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hen they emerged from the tunnel, Mexican officials were there to meet them and stamp their passports.

Their journey was the centerpiece of Political Equator 3, an event that exposed the environmental degradation occurring along the Tijuana River Estuary as a result of the border wall.

Political Equator is just one of the ways in which architect Teddy Cruz is raising awareness of the social, environmental, economic and political problems that exist along the U.S.-Mexico border.

Cruz is one of the most provocative voices in architecture today. He has spent the better part of his career focusing on border issues and developing an architectural approach for addressing them. His work has been extensively published and was recently featured by

New York’s Museum of Modern Art. Cruz, a native of Guatemala, was born during an era of intense political strife, a fact that he said has informed his interests as an architect.

“I began to become aware that the border between San Diego and Tijuana is an incredible laboratory for rethinking the role of an architect by engaging very similar issues to the ones that I grew up witnessing,” he said.

Cruz began studying architecture in Guatemala. In 1982, after he finished three years of study, Efraín Ríos Montt seized power of Guatemala in a military coup.

This political turmoil led Cruz to finish his studies at California Polytechnic State University, San Luis Obispo. Cruz’s studies culminated at the prestigious Harvard Graduate School of Design where he earned a Master’s degree in design studies and history.

During the mid-1990s Cruz began teaching at the Southern California Institute of Architecture, a school known for being at the forefront of the architectural avant-garde.

“I began an experimental studio called ‘Latin America: Los Angeles,’” he said. “That was the beginning of my inquiry on issues of immigration, the impact of immigrants in transforming the city and also the kinds of relations that exist across borders between Tijuana, San Diego and Los Angeles.”

Architecture is more than an act of design, Cruz said, it is a political act with the potential to transform communities and reshape the way people think about a region.

We forget that as architects we also need to take positions,” he said. “By that I mean political stances, social engagement stances, where maybe the first layers towards a building might not be the building itself, but the processes that engage social, economic and political domains.”

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ruz said his own brand of architectural activism begins at the San DiegoTijuana border, a meeting point along what he calls the “Political Equator.”

This is an invisible boundary located between the 30th and 35th parallels where, according to Cruz, the developed world and the developing world crash against one another.

Hidden away in a small studio teeming with architectural models, loud diagrams and colorful maps at UCSD, Cruz and his partner, political theorist Fonna Forman, engage with the issues of culture, community, economy and ultimately architecture that emerge form the clash between north and south.

“I grew up in a country that was defined in the ’70s and ’80s by huge political and socioeconomic injustice,” Cruz said.

“There you witnessed and faced every day the kinds of class struggles that occur in environments like that, hugely militarized with dictatorships pretty much defining the terms.”

That environment defined Cruz’s agenda from an early age, he said.

“There is a saying in Latin America that growing up here, in many of these countries, you are a kind of Marxist by default. Meaning that you are confronting inequality and social injustice and you definitely get pissed off.”

Today Cruz’s focus is primarily in two small, marginalized communities on both sides of the border, San Ysidro in San Diego and Los Laureles Canyon in Tijuana. This work led him to his current position at UCSD. “They were seeking an artist dedicated to issues of public culture and the city,” he said. “Even though I’m an architect, I was given the position.”

Cruz founded the UCSD Cross-Border Initiative with Forman.

“In the last four or five years we have begun to engage in many projects that address inequality, citizenship and immigration,” he said. “So all of the issues that I began to perceive and work with in Guatemala have become really tangible elements in the rethinking of our practice and our teaching.”

So far, Cruz and Forman have conducted groundbreaking research in cross-border relationships between Tijuana and San

Diego.

Cruz, an architect at heart and by training, has yet to build a single building.

“My primary interest (so far) has been to expand notions of design,” he said.

“Some of us might want to be engaged in the design of pedagogy, or in the design of collaboration or the design of new political and economic frameworks within which architecture might be more inclusive, more democratic, more socially engaged.”

Cruz is working with community nonprofit Casa Familiar toward making that vision a built reality.

On a site near the border in San Ysidro, Cruz and Casa Familiar are planning to build what they are calling “Living Rooms at the Border,” an affordable housing project designed to integrate community services, public space and intergenerational housing.

David Flores, design and development director at Casa Familiar, is helping to spearhead the effort.

“The thing that amazes me about Teddy is how quickly he can see space and be able to identify really good solutions for the use of that space,” Flores said. “It is rare when architecture impacts a community because of design.”

“Living Rooms at the Border” democratizes design by incorporating art spaces, open spaces and intergenerational affordable housing around a historic church that will be restored and repurposed as a community center.

A video of the plan on Cruz’s website shows large, empty concrete frames that will be used as incubators for uses like a weekly farmers market, an impromptu art exhibit and communal kitchens, or simply as the backdrop for chance encounters between neighbors.

A later phase of the plan builds sleek, impeccably modern apartments above the concrete frames and intergenerational housing on the other side of the church.

A combination of uses like these is unconventional and bold.

In this scheme, extended families could work and live together as part of an integrated community. Casa Familiar would also be present onsite to help residents. David Flores said this was one of the design’s key components.

“The whole intent of our project with

Teddy is to make sure that we design great living spaces for people, while making sure that Casa can provide support services onsite,” he said.

Projects as revolutionary as Cruz’s living rooms face many challenges.

“Our projects are not typical projects where a client gives us a brief and we design something in response to that brief,” said Cruz. “We are, in fact, the builders of that brief.”

Therein lies the challenge.

“We have to build the money, partnerships and finances to make these projects happen,” he said. “It is a very large effort to connect all these different dots and put together all these broken pieces.”

Flores said that requirements for traditional development projects would prohibit a project like Living Rooms at the Border from being built. This is where Cruz’s political activism came into play.

Andrea Skorepa, CEO of Casa Familiar, was a firsthand witness to his transformation into a full-blown activist.

“When he started, Teddy didn’t know a thing about politics,” she said. “It is because of our work together that he has seen you need to change policies.”

Flores said that this is the most important aspect of Cruz’s work.

“The design is a visual thing and its impactful, but when you can affect the policy so that you can move projects forward and not have them just be a once in a lifetime thing, but rather ideas that can continue to be replicated, then that’s the impact.”

A few miles west of the Casa Familiar site is Los Laureles Canyon, a marginalized Tijuana shantytown that hugs the border wall and the Tijuana River Estuary. It was here Cruz staged Political Equator 3, the latest in a series of binational happenings designed to visualize the problems that arise along the border. This is one of the lynchpins of Cruz’s work as an activist.

“Political Equator is an event that happens every two or three years, we are currently planning our fourth one,” said Cruz. “They are a series of meetings that happen in these environments which bring the conversation away from the institutions and into these environments.”

Political Equator is not just an event, Cruz said. It also refers to a line separating what he has dubbed “The Global North” and “The Global South.”

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Architect Teddy Cruz’s ‘Political Equator’: A line between the 30th and 35th parallels divides what Teddy Cruz calls “The Global North” and “The Global South.” Three significant borderlands sit along this line, the U.S.-Mexico border at Tijuana and San Diego, the border between Europe and Africa at Melilla and Ceuta, another immigration hotspot, and the Israeli-Palestinian border.

All are emblematic of the divide that exists between the developed world and the developing world. Cruz finds inspiration for his work in studying the dynamics that emerge from these conflicted regions.

“(Los) Laureles Canyon and San Ysidro are on the same line that connects the San DiegoTijuana border with at least two of the most intensive border checkpoints in the world,” he said. “One of them is the border between Ceuta and Melilla, the main border between North Africa and Europe, a zone which immigrants are crossing over at this moment.

The other is the Israel-Palestine border, which is the most iconic geography of conflict in the Middle East. All of these checkpoints are between the 30th and 35th parallels, so I ended up calling this the political equator.”

It is along this equator that Cruz finds inspiration for his work as an architect.

“Part of our practice has been to locate ourselves where ecologies collide and explore the issues that made that collision possible,” said Cruz. “We expose them and use them as material for design.”

Cruz said Political Equator 3 highlighted the destructive results of the wall lining the border.

“The premise was to visualize this problem,” he said. “While Homeland Security has built a wall for the sake of national security, the wall itself undermines our own environmental security and potentially produces socioeconomic insecurity in the future.

“After 9/11, Homeland Security claimed a

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“Ceuta and Melilla form the main border between North Africa and Europe. (It is) a zone that immigrants are crossing over at this moment.”

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The San Diego/Tijuana border region serves as the principle backdrop for Teddy Cruz’s activism and experiments in socially-conscious design.

150 foot jurisdiction from the border to start destroying all the canyons in order to construct a highway of surveillance.”

Cruz said this practice is destroying the environment.

“Basically they have built this infrastructure along the wall that ignores a lot of existing environmental policies,” he said. “This undermines the functionality of the binational watershed system.”

For Political Equator 3 Cruz and an entourage of artists, activists, politicians and scholars from both countries met at the base of the border wall to debate the issue.

“We got permission to set up a tent very close to the wall where they built a drain, beyond which is (Los) Laureles Canyon,” Cruz said. “Not many people here know that 85,000 people live beyond that wall.

The people who live in that settlement also do not know that on this side of the wall

there is a precious environmental zone that needs to be protected.”

After debating and discussing in the impromptu forum, Cruz and his guests did something unprecedented and walked right through the border wall.

“We requested an unprecedented permit from Homeland Security that enabled us to transform the newly built drain under the wall into an official port of entry from the Tijuana River Estuary into (Los) Laureles Canyon,” he said. “We made it into an official, 24-hour port of entry.”

Behind this exercise was a desire to expose what Cruz argues is a binational problem, one that needs to be addressed through a binational agenda that unites stakeholders from both countries.

“People finally realized that there is an environmental system that is shared by these two cities,” he said. “The informal settlement and the estuary on opposite

“The Israeli-Palestinian border is the most emblematic geography of conflict in the Middle East.”

sides of the border must be looked at as two environments that are interdependent, not separate.”

This is the groundwork needed for a new type of architecture and regional thinking to take shape, said Cruz.

“This is the point of departure for architecture. It is a negotiation across institutions that can become a point of entry into a new idea of public space and binational relations,” he said. The political partnerships and ground-level activism that Cruz is fostering are huge movements that involve massive political players. One would not imagine that change can begin at a place like Southwestern College.

Cruz disagrees.

“Community colleges like Southwestern are places where we find the demographics, the truer composition of the neighborhoods that surround it on the border,” he said.

Short of issuing a call to action for

Southwestern students, Cruz said the college can serve as a seed for the type of movements that can revolutionize the San Diego-Tijuana region.

“Many people who are at Southwestern live in Tijuana or come from these communities that flank the border,” Cruz said. “They could become an important platform to produce new, cross-border, cross-institutional collaborations between universities and colleges in Tijuana, and serve as facilitators of new experiments in education and in the research of new, cross-border city planning agendas.”

Studying places like Southwestern College, Los Laureles Cayon and San Ysidro for new ideas about community and architecture holds immense promise, he said.

“From these marginzalized neighborhoods on either side of the border, we can begin to reimagine the world.”

“From these marginalized neighborhoods on either side of the border we can begin to reimagine the world.”

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LOVEHAS NO BORDERS Story and Photos Mary York and Cristofer Garcia

Nine years and one very large wall have separated Jannet Castaño from her mother.

Then, for three magical minutes, the wall opened.

Un d e r t h e w a t c h f u l e y e s o f U.S. B order Patrol and a scrum international media, they melted into a tearful embrace.

Exactly 180 seconds later they kissed each other goodbye. Castaño does not know when they will meet again.

For just the third time in history, the rusty, dusty gate at Border Field State Park cracked open, barely a sliver. Six families had the opportunity millions of undocumented immigrants in the United States dream of.

Organized by Border Angels, a nonprofit organization for immigration reform and human rights, “Opening the Door of Hope” was a binational celebration of Dia del Niño, providing the opportunity to unite children with their families still living south of la frontera and proof that love does not have borders.

Droves of news media flocked in from two vast nations to witness sma l l p e ople wa l k t hroug h t he ominous metallic monolith that seals off the two neighbors. Each party was granted three minutes to embrace before being escorted back across the

patch of no-man’s land.

There were few dry eyes. Even stoic Border Patrol agents brushed away tears as they stood erect several yards away.

Castaño was one of the lucky ones to win what was a virtual lottery pick.

“When (Border Angels) told me I was going to be one of the families that was going to get to hug their family for three minutes, I started crying with emotion,” said Castaño, who was there with her daughter, Yvette. “I can imagine it wasn’t just six families, it must be thousands of families who wanted to do this and I was one in six families that could.”

Dulce Aguirre, 22, a child development major at Southwestern College and Programs Manager for Border Angels, said opening the doors was a huge moment for those families.

“I wish we could do more, but I know those three minutes really affected a lot of people who haven’t seen their families and could actually hug,” she said. “Through the fence you can barely touch fingers. But with the door you can see them without just the shadows and the lights.”

Aguirre is one of the leading forces behind the local action of the Border 72

Enrique Morones and Southwestern College student Dulce Aguirre led the effort to convince the U.S. Border Patrol to open the border gate so that divided families could have three minutes together.

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Angels, working alongside founder Enrique Morones. She said she was able to be the coordinating voice between the families and the Border Patrol.

“Enrique did the Friendship Park, but I contacted the families, got their information and sent it to the Border Patrol,” she said.

One of those families was the Martinez’s.

After traveling from Los Angeles, Salvador Martinez and his son Diego approached the half-open door, allowing rays of sunshine and glimpses of faces to show through from the other side. Waiting for them were his parents and three sisters from Zacatecas, Mexico.

“They looked different,” said Martinez.

“Sometime you see them in pictures or such, but being present there you can see the difference. You can see what they’re like in all ways, be it physical or personality. It’s very different. It’s not the same as photos.”

Martinez came to the US when he was 14, he said. His parents had work visas, which were later cancelled. When they returned to Mexico, he stayed in the U.S, Martinez said. He has been working in landscaping for 14 years.

“I don’t have permission to travel to Mexico at the moment,” he said. “I only have the permit to be here in the United States. My kids are able to travel there, but there is no one to take them there right now.”

Martinez said it had been six years since saw his parents, and 12 since he saw his sisters.

“I felt very happy that I got the opportunity to hug my parents, even if it was for a short time,” he said. “After six years, three minutes doesn’t feel like much, but it was something very significant to me, something very important. One could say it was an accomplishment for someone like me, a victory.”

SWC psychology student Myrna Hernandez, 24, said witnessing the reunion was stirring.

“It was precious and I felt very appreciative for w h at we d o have,” she s ai d. “It’s unfortunate for the families who cannot see their families day-to-day and I see that many of us take that for granted.”

Hernandez said the time was too short.

“Once a year? Three minutes? That’s insane,” she said. “That’s like being confined in a prison cell. You can say that love has no borders, but there’s this wall here. Something needs to be done.”

Aguirre agreed.

“There are never enough minutes we could do,” she said. “Even if we did 30 or an hour, it’s still going to feel short. The ideal would be that they would be able to live together.”

Activists remember the forgotten dead in America's saddest cemetery

Enrique Morones leads a pilgramage of college students through the Terrace Park Cemetery in Holtville, Calif. towards the hidden largest mass grave in the Americas, El Panteón de Los No Olivados .

Story and Photos Bianca Quilantan

HOLTVILLE, CA – Dreams come to die and are forever buried in a dusty patch of the scalding Imperial Valley desert.

Dreamers, too.

Nestled behind the Terrace Park Cemetery in Holtville lies El Panteón de los No Olvidados, the cemetery of the ‘Not forgotten,’ a resting place for broken dreams. At least 500 migrants lie in final rest in unmarked graves in the desiccated patch of ground, a hardscrabble farming outpost too far from the I-8 East for drivers to ever see and so far from the minds of Californians, it might as well be in Arizona. It is North America’s largest mass grave and the most massive non-military burial ground of unidentified dead in the United States.

Most of humanity has long forgotten los descamisados of Holtville, but not everyone. Los Angeles de la Frontera – Border Angels – watch over los muertos to let their spirits know they are not alone or forgotten. Most of those who are buried in the pauper’s graves do not have names other than John Doe or Jane Doe marked on their bricks for headstones as they were advised by their smugglers not to bring an I.D., in case they were caught by the border patrol.

Border Angels founder Enrique Morones leads the Border Angels two hours east of San Diego on pilgrimages to pay homage to the not forgotten when they get permission to do so every 5 or 6

weeks. They pray, reflect and sometimes host mass there, leaving stones, flowers and crosses, comforting the dead and unknown bodies of not just male adult migrants, but also women and children who dared to take on the perilous journey under the 110 degree desert sun.

“None of these people expected to die when they crossed the border to find work,” said Morones.

“They thought they would make it. There have been women in dresses, who thought that in a few hours they would be safe and sound, found dead in the mountains frozen to death or dead from thirst in the Imperial Valley.”

Morones said the number one cause of death along the U.S.-Mexican border is dehydration. One such victim was 5-year-old Marco Antonio Villaseñor who crossed with his father and 18 other people.

“Marco Antonio Villaseñor a 5-year-old little boy, crossed for the number one reason, because his father wanted to find work and wanted to feed his family,” Morones said. “As he crosses he becomes very thirsty and asks his dad for some water and his father won’t give him any water. So he asked the next man, and the next man, and the next man. He asked 18 men for water and none of the 18 men would give the little boy water. Why not? They were already dead and the little boy also died.”

El Pantheon can shock even hardened folks who think they have seen it all. Men and women from

all walks of life routinely begin to sob or break into tears when they begin to soak in the enormity of what lies in the ground below their feet.

“A lot of people do not realize the impact of all of these people dying, so when they see this they are very moved and there’s something comforting about seeing flowers or crosses or stones on the graves,” Morones said. “There was a time when we had them on all of the graves, but the graves are so fragile that if you walk (over the older graves), they’ll collapse.”

Hundreds of more recent dead migrants would have been buried in Holtville were it not for the fact that the U.S. government decreed that migrant bodies be cremated rather than buried.

Besides making it more difficult for human rights organizations to keep track of the dead, said Morones, cremation is disrespectful to the migrants, who are overwhelmingly Catholic.

Cremation also prevents future DNA testing that could help to identify the victims, Morones said.

“We really need to find who’s buried here,” he said.

“If we could match even one person, that would be the world to that one family because they will know my husband didn’t leave me, he didn’t remarry or get detained, he died.”

Morones said virtually no effort has been made, however, to identify the souls out back behind the Terrace Park Cemetery “Even in death they are marginalized,” he said.

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“You don’t see grass or headstones or their names.

You don’t see anyone trying to find out who they are and I’ve brought government officials here from different countries to see if they could do some DNA studies and they say, ‘well they might not be from our country,’ and I say yes, but they are all human beings.”

Morones said the hidden cemetery was placed in Holtville because of the large amount of migrant deaths in the Imperial Valley after the border wall was built.

“The majority of the deaths after Operation Gatekeeper 1994 were in Imperial valley and the reason they chose this place is because they had all of this land, never anticipating having all of these numbers here,” Morones said.

Morones said that the new border wall built after the implantation of operation Gatekeeper in 1994 was like the Berlin Wall of the Americas.

“The wall does not keep people out, what I like to say is that it keeps them in,” he said. “When the men cross to find work, they cannot come back to their homeland freely which leads to them asking their wives and children to cross the border to join them.”

John Hernandez, a longtime resident of the Imperial Valley, said people cross the border in order to work in the agricultural business there. They live in Mexico and cross the border because it is more affordable to live there, but coming across the border has become more difficult since September 11, 2001.

“We have two borders, so anyone between the lot of the labor force is basically considered legal but this area is very militarized,” Hernandez said. “Since September 11, the satellites, sensors, cameras and drones have changed everything. Before that, there were a lot of people that could come back and forth with minimal problems. We all looked a like so we could cross with somebody else’s birth certificate.”

Militarization of the border has been a boon to one set of entrepreneurs, the much-despised coyotes or polleros, human traffickers who charge exorbitant fees to migrants to smuggle them into the United States. Morones said American policy fuels coyotes because of its strict restrictions on legal work visas for Mexicans and Central Americans who are not considered economic or political refugees.

“There are 250 million undocumented people in the world,” he said. “The U.S. only has 11 million, so most aren’t coming here. Of that 11 million easily 35 percent did get a visa, they have a work. But for today’s migrants there’s no legal way to come.

So when they say they should get in line, I say they would love to, but there is no line. They don’t qualify

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for a visa and people don’t realize that.”

Morones recounted the tragic story of migrant Lucrecia Dominguez, who wanted to cross to reunite with her family. She spent her life savings to hire a smuggler. On average, hiring a smuggler could cost $5,000 to $8,000 without the guarantee of safe arrival in the United States.

“She wanted to cross to be with her family,” he said.

“She contacted a smuggler. The smuggler said I’m crossing a group tomorrow, but don’t bring those two little kids with you, Jesus, her 15-year-old son, and Nora, a 7-year-old girl. If you bring them they are going to slow us down and the Border Patrol might catch us.

“But her whole purpose is family reunification, so of course she brought them. And as they’re crossing, the smuggler gets mad and he abandons them. So Lucrecia is by herself with her two children in the middle of the desert wilderness. Lucrecia Dominguez literally died in the arms of Jesus, her 15-year-old son Jesus. This is happening every day because of the border wall.”

Hugo Castro is a border activist who works with Deported Mothers in Action, Veterans without Borders and Border Angels. He helped start the Dreamer Moms shelter in Tijuana, Mexico in 2014 and helps at the Deported Mothers in Action shelter.

He said many mothers are deported because they encounter emotional and physical abuse from their husbands. Once they become separated, it is difficult for them to acquire a visa and the lawyers that they can barely afford usually are not successful in advocating for them to get a visa to keep them with their families in the U.S. Most of the deported mothers, he said, do not even know they have the right to apply for a visa.

Deported Mothers in Action has started to implement different programs in order to help the mothers, including training to find jobs once they get back to the United States.

“We are going to start a special course for women that want to study how to make acrylic nails so they can have a job,” he said. “Two months ago 20 women graduated from a special course for hairstyling. They received not only a diploma from the government, but they received kits to cut hair, the machines and scissors. It costs around $3,000 in equipment free of charge to each of the graduates so now they can have an extra income. The average price is 50 pesos which is like $3 to cut hair.”

Castro said the women also cut hair in the shelter for free. They mainly cut the hair of migrants and

the homeless and every Friday.

Castro said the women also cut hair in the shelter for free. They mainly cut the hair of migrants and the homeless and every Friday from 11 a.m. to 2 p.m. they serve around 20 people.

Deported Mothers in Action also provides comfort to many women who are experiencing psychological trauma from the separation from their families.

Castro said the shelter will be hiring a psychologist to continue helping the mothers heal, but the strong support system among the mothers has been lifesaving.

“Claudia Selaya is a migrant from El Salvador that lost her 17-year-old son,” Castro said. “He was killed in Tijuana 2 months ago. Imagine, she was really depressed and she said that the only reason she felt a reason to be living is because she felt the empathy of the whole group, now she’s taking therapy for it.

He was killed by a special cartel that was involved in sex trafficking.”

Castro said that Selaya has had a difficult time getting an investigation going for why her son was killed. He said the migrants in Tijuana have trouble having any rights.

“She is doing her own investigations because the government is not doing anything, especially because she’s not Mexican, she’s a migrant,” he said. “There is a double standard. Many of the government officials say that they welcome the migrants but in the case of Tijuana-Mexicali you can see the pressures to deport Central Americans that don’t have a permit.”

Castro said a few mothers have gone back to the U.S., but not through legal means.

“We have three of them who have crossed the border, but illegally. We would like it to be in the legal way, but there is no other way,” he said Morones said he believes in borders but having them in a humane manner.

“While some people want to build more walls, I say we should have humane policies, we should open doors and build bridges so we don’t have this type of situation,” he said.

Trump and his supporters have it all wrong about immigration, Morones said, and they are scapegoating innocent and honorable people.

“It’s just the wrong message,” he said. “In the 1980s President Reagan, ‘Mr. Gorbachev, tear down this wall.’ In the 1990’s the United States built a wall and that wall has lead to what we estimate to be 11,000 people that have died. Whether its 11,000 people or one these people should don’t be dying simply because they want a better life.”

OH,

THE MONEY YOU’LL

OWE Story Victoria Gonzalez Graphs Mirella Lopez

S

tudent loan debt is a national scourge that is easy to accumulate and difficult to pay off. It is rarely forgiven and is immune from bankruptcy.

It can, however, pay for an education that will lead to well-paying careers and can be a good investment by students in themselves.

Median student loan debt in the U.S. is about $13,000, according to a survey by Pew Research Center. Jonathan Lewis, 23, is already over that.

He is enrolled in the culinary arts program at The Art Institute of California-San Diego for his associate degree and is $15,000 in debt. He has no scholarships because his grades were less than stellar in high school, he said.

Lewis said earning a degree is a necessity, because in the culinary profession it is easy to gain experience and move up. If you stay in the same restaurant, that is.

“If you move to another place with no degree, you’re just a line cook with lots of experience,” he said.

Lewis said his $15,000 student loan debt feels less like a kitchen knife and more like the Sword of Damocles.

“Debt is in my mind kind of like a prison,” he said. “It is always stalking. It’s+a shadow over your head.”

Lewis works during the

day and goes to school from 6 p.m. until midnight. He said his grueling schedule is taking a toll.

“I’m already burned out,” he said.

Even though Lewis has 10 years from the time he graduates to pay off his debt, he said, it weighs heavily on his mind. He is considering dropping out of the Art Institute to take classes at SWC. “I’m starting to think it’s not worth the money,” he said.

Lewis’ decision to go to a for-profit college was planted in his mind in high school on a class visit to the Art Institute. He said he now regrets the decision. “(For-profit colleges are) not necessarily bad, but consider your school options because that was a mistake I made,” he said. “I probably could have gone (to Southwestern) and got the same thing a lot cheaper.”

Daniel Zavala, 23, previously a four-year university student, said SWC is a viable option to save money for the same quality of education. He said he was not sure what to do after high school, so he worked as a mechanic for two years, but spent everything he earned.

He studied psychology at SDSU, while still working as a mechanic.

Graduating class of 2015 most indebted (so far)

80 70 60

Total education debt of students and parent per graduating class (in billions)

50 40 30 20 10 0

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“I was out of my parents’ house and I wasn’t about to ask them to help me pay for school,” he said.

When Zavala started taking upper division classes he said juggling college and work became too difficult, so he quit his job and got a student loan. He soon realized psychology was not a good fit, but he still finished an Associate degree.

He decided to move on to the real estate program at SWC. “I dropped out (of SDSU) because I didn’t see the point in taking it at a university and wasting more money when I would get the same education at a community college and pay a lot less,” he said.

He got another job to pay off the debt from SDSU, he said, but the process was slow going.

Zavala said students should avoid loans, if possible.

“I would definitely recommend that they don’t do it unless it is a last resort and they really have no other way to pay for it,” he said. “I owe money for a degree that I’m not even gonna use.”

Some students are able to pay debt off quickly or avoid it entirely.

Southwestern College Professor of Anthropology Dr. Erin Browder managed to avoid large student loan debt while earning her doctorate at UC Berkley. She said she is wary of for-profit institutions like the Art Institute. They are called “forprofit” for a reason, she said.

“I am personally surprised at the amount that some people will pay for-profit organizations,” she said.

Browder said when she was a student at UC Berkeley in the early 1980s she racked up $6,000 in student loan debt which, adjusted for inflation, would be about $15,000 today, similar to Lewis’ debt load.

She said she was able to pay it off in about five years.

1.23 Trillion total U.S. student loan debt At that point in her life she was completely independent of her parents.

“I was legally emancipated so they didn’t really give my anything,” she said.

Browder said paying off her debt required commitment.

“I never borrowed any student loan money for living expenses,” she said. “I was super frugal to the point of actually being homeless. I didn’t borrow money to eat or pay any other kind of bills. I was as poor as the state thought I was.”

Saving money became habitual, she said.

“Money was for staying alive, not getting stuff,” she said. “It was not embarrassing to be super poor.”

Browder’s frugal lifestyle allowed her to earn a doctorate before she owned a TV or a car with power windows and air conditioning. After graduating she worked a series of part-time teaching and research jobs. She was able to do that because she worked all throughout college, she said.

Many of today’s students have poor spending habits, she said. Students who cry poverty often have cell phones, cars and trendy clothes.

“They obviously feel a tremendous pressure right now for cosmetics and fashions and electronics and being seen at the right places,” she said.

Browder said that sometimes getting a degree that comes with debt is the best way to land higher paying jobs and solid careers.

“It’s the only money you can borrow that is going to allow you to make money,” she said.

Average starting salary for SDSU graduate

Weighing

down life

Loan forgiveness is not really forgiving

Average Cost of Living in San Diego

(without insurance, retirment, savings)

Average student loan debt SDSU

Bogus radio commercials promising loan forgiveness notwithstanding, it is very difficult to qualify for student loan reduction or forgiveness. Following are four options: Income-Based Repayment Plan (IBR) After taxes and paying for living essentials like food and shelter, the U.S Department of Education will look at your discretionary income and take 15 percent. Its flexibility is great for students following graduation because if their leftover funds put them below the poverty line, then their monthly payments can fall to as low as $0 a month.

A forgiveness amount will be determined after 20-25 years, and will vary based on the original loan and current income.

Pay As You Earn (PAYE) Similar to IBR, PAYE will determine the monthly bill from your discretionary funds with a 10 percent cut instead of 15 percent like IBR, although PAYE is more difficult to qualify for. A forgiveness amount will be determined after 20-25 years, and will vary based on the original loan and current income.

Teaching After five consecutive years of teaching in an elementary or secondary school, debt can be forgiven for up to $17,500 if the teacher is highly qualified in math, science or special education. Should the graduate’s chosen major not qualify, however, the general forgiveness amount is around $5,000. To be considered a highly qualified teacher one must be legitimately certified as an educator and hold at least a bachelor’s degree.

Public Service Loan Forgiveness (PSLF) Working for the government or a nonprofit can provide loan forgiveness if the student has paid at least 120 months (10 years) worth of their direct loan payments.

AmeriCorps or Peace Corps also qualifies under the PSLF program. Recipients are not automatically qualified after reaching the 120 payment requirement and must apply while they are working at the permitted establishment.

$46,100

$32,400

$15,598

Katy Stegall

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