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TOP JOBS

By PATRICK BUTLER
Religion Editor

About 16 hours south by car from Tyler along Mexico Highway 40 is the city of Saltillo, sometimes called “the Athens of Mexico.” The state capital of Coahuica and once the capital of the Mexican territory of Texas, Saltillo is renowned for its heritage and ornate architecture.

The Wall Street Journal once called the area a “mini-Detroit” because so much auto manufacturing and industry were located there.

It’s also home to the “poorest of the poor” according to Tyler resident Virginia Rounds, who visited “squatters and homesteaders” she said, on “the rancheros and barrios on the outskirts of metro Saltillo.” They were people who had been forgotten and overlooked, she supposed, by the government of Mexico.

“There are no paved roads out to where they live,” she said. “Sometimes we (Americans) look at people in poverty and say ‘well, why don’t you just go out and get a job?’ It’s not that easy if you don’t have a car, a road for the car or the right clothes or access to work.”

The journey was her first mission trip outside the United States. Mrs. Rounds, 65, said she was surprised by was the proximity of the forgotten poor to America. She and her husband, Dr. Jack Rounds were part of a 19-member group that went to Saltillo in June, she said, from Tyler’s St. Vincent de Paul Society.

“Saltillo is close, just west of Monterey,” she said Wednesday. “It’s only a 16 hour drive. We saw people who had no roofs on their homes, much less electricity or running water. A typical home has a dirt floor.”

And only the “rich” on the rancheros have access to a well, she said.

“That’s were the paved roads are,” she said. “First they get roads, then electricity and then a well. Most of the people we saw got their water from the skies. They collect rainwater.”

Most of the “raincatchers” are goat herders, she said.

“That’s because goats will eat anything and the people live out in the arid, desert areas.”

Dr. Rounds spent his time assisting Dr. Don Jackman, also a member of Immaculate Conception. The team went from house to house, calling on families who’d never seen a doctor before, said Mrs. Rounds.

“I met people who hadn’t seen a doctor in 70 years,” she said. “And they were so grateful for any little bit of something we could do for them.”

One barrio resident was given an artist’s rendering of Christ, she said.

“They told us they would keep the picture forever just because we came to see them,” she said. “They sang for us, they fed us what little they had. They were generous and had faith they’ve passed down from generation to generation. They don’t have Bibles or story books. They tell the (Bible) stories to their children and pray. Their faith renews your own faith. They have so little.”

And Saltillo has its own immigrant problem, she said.

“There are so many desperate immigrants from Honduras - young men seeking escape from the incredible poverty and dictatorship there - flooding into Mexico,” she said. “We stopped at a place called the “immigration house” a ministry where these young men come to get medical attention, a meal, a drink of water and to pray and talk. Some haven’t had water in days when they get to Saltillo.”

In the brief time she was at the immigration house, she saw 30 men who had just arrived.

“About a 1,000 people a month come to the house,” she said. “They come randomly, staying for a few hours and leave. It’s really like someone coming to the church and asking for mercy, that’s what it is.”

Their plight was troubling, she said.

“It’s a human tragedy,” she said. “The authorities don’t like them. If they find them, they deport them.”

Yet the trip to the underside of Saltillo’s barrios was worth the time, effort and expense, she said.

“It was an incredible step out of my own culture,” she said. “We left the changes of clothes we brought with us, we met people who cried with joy that we had come to them. They had faces like you see in National Geographic; people standing in the sun for a hundred years, faces beautifully carved with wrinkles that we would spend thousands of dollars removing. I’ll always remember the people, sharing what little they have with you and receiving you like family.”