Analysis Of Francisco Cantú's Essay 'Bajadas'

In the essay “Bajadas” (2016), Francisco Cantú argues that experience teaches us who we are and the values we hold. He supports his argument with narrative, symbolism, and examples. His purpose is to persuade us that we won’t be comfortable betraying our personal value system. His audience is the general public.

The author narrates the story of Santiago, a physically unfitted agent, who quits the academy. This let’s the reader portray Cantú as an inspirational man who believed and encouraged others, attitude that continues as he works as an agent. This narrative foreshadows his decision of abandoning the border patrol because he felt alienated from his coworker’s ideals; he believed in the migrant’s capability of achieving their dreams.

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conversation that the author had with his mother; envisage an adventurous man who wanted to understand the border reality and not restrict his perspective to the pages of a book. This section shows that he had a limited conception of migrants suffering and the dangers entailed in that job, this attitude evolves as he starts questioning if that job is for him.
Cantú’s encounter with a girl who desired to cross the border to become a singer breaks the stereotype he had and shows the reader an emphatic man capable of seeing through the migrant’s eyes.

The way he treats her while on the patrol exposes a man who understands that they were people seeking a dream and treating them as criminals wasn’t right.

Cantú first shift alone, gives him time to reflect on what he has done as a border agent. This section describes him as a principled man experiencing side effects by trying to do a job that betrayed his value system. The weather illustrates how he felt tormented by the way the border agent dehumanized migrants and portraits three important causes of this: the migrants, his values and the other agents.

Cantú keeping himself as an observer rather than an actor when Cole lights a cactus on fire suggest that he is a conscientious man, who categorizes the agent’s methods as unnecessary destruction. This attitude implies that he is capable of understanding that for the migrants, their belongings were treasures and destroying them wasn’t a needed

procedure.
The clash Cantú’s ideals have with the agent’s vision, creates a moral dilemma emphasized by rhetorical questioning what is a good agent. He attempts to justify the agent’s behavior, but he is incapable. This concedes with Cantú description, as man with strong principles who doesn’t feel comfortable doing something that goes against them and keeping up his job will only increase his nightmares.
The way each agent responds to a group of migrants that had been six days in the desert, gives the opportunity to contrast Cantú’s empathetic behavior with the agent’s aggressiveness.

Actions such as giving food and his own clothes to the migrants expose the idea that he goes against the dehumanizing methods of his coworkers.

The symbolism of his encounter with a snake suggest a man that feels morally comfortable as a mentor as he escorts the snake back where she came from, instead of displaying a violent behavior. These actions are parallel to the way Cantú treats the migrants, as he believes that taking them to the station means guiding them back home because otherwise they would have died in the desert.

Several encounters shape how the author sees migrants and increase his disagreement with the ideals he learned in the academy. As he tries to help a mother looking for his son, the idea of a humanized man evokes. He understands that people care for the migrants and he feels identified with the woman’s attitude, as he has seen it in his

mother.
After working as an agent, Cantú’s attitude changes, no longer coinciding with the border agent’s code of ethics. Cantú driving close to lava flow exemplifies how he felt like a volcano, symbolizing his frustration. This emphasizes the idea of a moralistic man as doing a job against his beliefs made him feel as a volcano ready to explode.
Both his encounters with migrants and the situation that one of his closest friends experience influence Cantú’s decision of quitting his job. Visiting Morales at the hospital as he had a motorcycle accident make him aware that no warranty of how long we will live exist. This demonstrates him that his job involves dealing with a different set of values and putting his own life at risk.
Several narrative devices support the idea that different episodes in our life shape our background and play and important role in constructing our personal value system.