Wanna hear the Macarena? Wanna hear it for 24 hours straight! - Life on the border

Mexican culture continues to be alive and vibrant in San Diego. Just 18 miles south of San Diego is Baja California, a thousand miles of beaches, desert and hills. Most of California was taken by the US in the Guadalupe-Hidalgo treaty, so we could consider San Diego and the area around it "Alta California," what Mexico called it.

The San Diego-Tijuana border is the most heavily crossed in the country, if not the world. The dollar is as common as the peso, and residents of "SD" and "TJ" go back and forth regularly to work, shop, dine, and visit family. Language has reflected this fluidity: Spanish and English have changed into a version of Spanglish that most everyone understands. Even the radio stations are one and the same: Q106.5, a local rock station, converted to a Spanish language station playing pop favorites. They announced the change from English to Spanish language by playing "Macarena" for 24 hours straight!

-Monica

Related Dispatches: 
Monica: Life on the border
Sylvia: What can we do to help street children.
Shawn: Tijuana - Lots of colors, lots of poverty, and lots of vegetarian food (NOT!)

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