We’re famous. From Aljazeera:
In the early 1970s, Richard Wright, a native of El Paso, Texas, began crossing the then porous US-Mexico border into the northern Mexican community of Ciudad Juarez – a place once deeply connected to his home city and yet simultaneously worlds apart.
“I was 15 when I first started coming over,” says Wright, while walking along the elevated Santa Fe international bridge that crosses from El Paso over the Rio Grande – a shallow trickle of water, marking the boundary between the two countries – and into Juarez.
. . .
“We [high school friends] used to come over at night with our Ray-Bans because we knew the sun would be up when we crossed back over,” says the 60-year-old, who spent decades visiting Juarez before passports or security checks were required. Wright has witnessed the city’s evolution.
“Back then, it was like Vegas,” says Wright, standing just across the border at the head of Avenida Juarez. In the 1970s and 1980s, the street was bathed in neon lights from the numerous 24-hour bars, nightclubs, cabarets and restaurants that first arose during 1920s prohibition era and continued to service the throngs of people who came across the border to partake in the vibrant nightlife.
“Juarez had a reputation for being the town where you could do anything and anything could happen,” says Wright, a tall man with a loud, boisterous laugh who wears a big straw hat.
Actually, it’s palma fina.
You can get your little dose of world famous culture and history tours of Juarez via our sister website, JuarezWalkingTour.com.
Read the whole story at aljazeera.com.
I lifted that photo of the Paso del Norte Port of Entry from the Aljazeera story. Credit to Gabriela Campos.