At points, his feet were swollen and sore from walking. Rodriguez said he was robbed and attacked during the journey. The trip began with a hike through the dangerous Darien Gap, a notorious stretch of jungle between Colombia and Panama and ended with him swimming across the Rio Grande. It took him nine months to save around $800 for the long and arduous journey to the United States. Rodriguez made the difficult decision to leave his family. Four years later, life was still difficult, with his family exposed to violence and an unstable economy. In 2018, Rodriguez fled with them to Bogota, Colombia, looking for respite from Venezuela’s socio-economic collapse. He scribbles their addresses on his palm with a well-used Bic pen nearly out of ink. He’s hoping for some extra help from mutual aid groups and charities that he hears about through word-of-mouth. He drinks water from a refilled Coca-Cola bottle to stay hydrated in the August sun. On a recent day, he had just $1.50 in loose change in his pocket. An extra T-shirt, papers from immigration officers at the border, and a tennis ball, so he can practice baseball, a favorite hobby. After the long journey, his possessions don’t even fill his small black backpack.
Rodriguez carries his belongings with him as he goes about the city, but that isn’t difficult. He doesn’t have money to buy food when he’s out job hunting. Since stepping off the 40-hour bus ride to New York, Rodriguez has been spending his nights in the homeless shelter in Brooklyn and his days walking the streets, going door to door looking for a job. He has a place to sleep and meals when he is at the shelter, but not much else.
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