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Kadir van Lohuizen / NOOR
Carmen Elena Rosales, 26, Irving Ernesto Rosales, 23, Nancy Jasmin Rosales, 15, and their father Ernesto Rosales Guillen, 47, at home in the community of Iberia in El Salvador's capital San Salvador.
Photojournalist Kadir van Lohuizen traveled from the southern tip of South America to the far reaches of Alaska on the North American continent to explore migration in the Americas. What he found both supported and defied stereotypes, which he reported on a website and an app for iPad called Via Panam.
El Salvador has been called the most Americanized country in Latin America. An estimated one quarter of its citizens live in the U.S. -- often illegally. A significant part of El Salvador's national income is made up of the money that these migrants send back, and American mores and customs penetrate the small Central American country.
Kadir van Lohuizen / NOOR
Sonia Vanegas Munoz is a domestic worker in Beverly Hills. She earns $10 per hour. Vanegas Munoz hasn't seen her husband and children in six years.
Kadir van Lohuizen / NOOR
Ernesto Rosales Guillen and Sonia Vanegas Munoz appear in a wedding picture that hangs in the couple's home in El Salvador.
The mass migration of Salvadorans to the United States began during the country's civil war in the 1980s and continues to this day, fueled by overpopulation and poverty. After the fighting there ended in 1992 many of the refugees were sent back to El Salvador, taking American culture with them. Many of the Salvadorans who remained in the U.S., whether legally or illegally, have also never broken ties with their homeland.
An estimated 2 million Salvadorans live in the United States. Many share housing in large cities like Los Angeles and Washington, D.C. In contrast to the Mexican or Cuban communities, Salvadorans are not conspicuously politically active, although in recent years the Salvadoran government has tried to get successful immigrants to invest and help build the country's economy.
'No papers, no fear': Undocumented immigrants declare themselves on bus tour
Los Angeles and its suburbs are home to an estimated 1 million Salvadorans, the largest community from the Central American country in the United States. The migrants, many without residence permits, often work as unskilled laborers, cleaners or nannies for American families. Because the migration had its origins in hospitable U.S. immigration policies in the 1980s during the Salvadoran civil war, the group has played a major role in the discussion over whether the United States bears some responsibility for the world's refugee problems.
Kadir van Lohuizen / NOOR
The gate of the home where Munoz works in Beverly Hills. She left El Salvador in 2005 because her family wasn't making ends meet.
K. van Lohuizen / NOOR
From Colombians fleeing war to North Americans retirees moving to Nicaragua, a photographer's journey from Chile to Alaska explores both the expected and unexpected patterns of migration in the Americas
Experience the entire journey, from Chile to Alaska, by exploring the slideshow at right, the Via Panam website or by downloading the app for iPad.
More Photoblogs from the Migration in the Americas series:
US retirees flock to Nicaragua
On the run from water in Panama
Bolivia hopes for windfall from producing lithium
Leave a Comment:
The family who employs this woman should be arrested. They are wealthy but refuse to pay decent enough wages and provide benefits to an American or legal resident.
We could solve the illegal immigration problem in this country very easily by heavily fining and jailing those who hire illegal immigrants. The amount of the fines should be linked to the wealth of the employer so that it really hits the pocketbook, and if the employer is not a wage earner him/herself, s/he should be put in jail for six months.
The person who took the picture of the home knew that the people who lived there were employing an illegal immigrant, but he did not report this violation of the law. He should also be fined.
The United States is not an ATM machine. Agree with everything the person said above, fine the employer and or put them in jail. It is not like immigrants before where people came here to build a life, it is make money and send it to their "home". What an obvious agenda you people have, just goes on and on, for a change how about a few stories about the latin gangs, the violence, the teenage pregnancy, the COST of illegal immigration and only stupid parasite fools say they pay more than they take. Crap, they are not paying payroll taxes and if they do they with their fake documents get the EIC and get it all back. I am a CPA, in school I did volunteer work preparing taxes for the poor. The media and the parasites of society keep pushing this against the majority will of the people and that i s why we get these extreme groups and angry people. A president who is in the pockets of the Drug Cartels, must be has prosecuted more medical marijuana facilities than any other, but can choose to not enforce immigration laws, the only person that helps are the cartels
Definitely time to increase immigration quotas. A ten fold increase would be a good start. Make them all legal in the land of opportunity. Let them bring their entire families here, legally. Most Latin Americans are hardcore Christians, and I’m sure they’ll be welcomed with open arms in the white, conservative Christian communities. Give everyone vouchers to get an education, and vouchers for healthcare. Do that Ryan plan, and make sure that our new, legal immigrants get it too. Grant amnesty to all now; make them legal. Bring over all that have been waiting for years to get in. Let’s do this, and let’s do this in the name of Jesus. God bless the last beacon of freedom in the world. God bless America.
Everyone stop for a second and realize something: You were fortunate as hell to be born in this country, first off. Second, think what it would be like if the only way you could afford to take care of your family was to move to China and work so that you could send money home. I will submit to you that you probably shouldnt have had a family that you couldnt afford to take care of, but damn. That has to suck.
make more babies and over populate your own country...hell yeah make them babies...freedom babies...
USA pay out in aid to the country and then the family here sent money to the family living in the other country. We can not support the whole world and remain a country in power, thank to Obama we are trillion of dollar in debt. We need to keep, we need to circulate money within the USA, that is make within USA not out side USA. Help save America stop illegals. deport all illegals and the sending of money to foreign soil.
I dont Know but nowhere in the article does it say if she is illegal or legal. thou they make sound it like she is illegal but story deserves a benefit of the doubt. And she is paid well above the minimum wage and looks like she is given accomodation too. In other words she is an stay in maid. Does the family she works for declare her as such is not mentioned. Just a confusing story.