Passion Blog

Welcome to El Paso

When I was younger, my family never traveled beyond the state of Pennsylvania. My parent’s reason concluded that my siblings and I were simply too young to appreciate extravagant vacations. I soon envied my friends who had the opportunity to travel to the beach, or to Disneyland, or internationally. I thought that I would never get to experience what the world had to offer. However, my wish finally came true my freshman year of high school. I finally began to travel across the country and even internationally. I am creating my passion blog about my traveling experiences throughout these past four years. Although some destinations will be more interesting than others, they have all made a cultural impact on me.  

I have decided to go in chronological order, starting with my trip to El Paso, Texas. El Paso is located on the western tip of Texas boarder. It boarders Ciudad Juarez, the most populated city in the Mexican state of Chihuahua, with the Rio Grande in between them. El Paso sits upon the Chihuahuan Desert with a mountain range that separates the eastern desert from the western mountainous range. Now you are probably thinking, “Who would vacation to El Paso?” Well, my best friend moved down there at the end of middle school, so, to me, it sounded like a wonderful vacation. 

My first impression of El Paso was not great. My observation from the airplane window, it looked completely bare. You could see miles of sand with scattered cacti and great mountains behind the city. In my opinion, it looked quite boring. As I walked past the restaurants and stores in the airport, I soon realized that the Mexican culture was everywhereI appeared to be the minority in the city.   

The Chihuahuan Desert 

On the drive to my friend’s house, I noticed the contrasting scenery around meThe houses appeared nothing like mine, instead of grass they had sand, and they had no basements. I was amazed by the vast differences between my home in Pennsylvania and El Paso. I even noticed the different road signs throughout the city. Instead of caution deer crossing, they had caution armadillo, snake, or rodent crossing. Along with the diverse scenery, I tried an abundance of different Mexican foods. I had the best quesadillas, guacamole, tamales, burritos, and even mole. I was definitely proud of myself for opening up and trying various foods to enhance my cultural perspective.

Armadillo crossing road signs

On my last day, we went to the University of Texas at El Paso for a football game. Their stadium, the Sun Bowl Stadium, overlooked Mexico. From our seats, we could see the Rio Grande and the highway that divided the Mexican and American border. As the sun began to set at the football game, you could see the mighty star on the side of the mountain top. The “Star on the Mountain” became a sensation after being recognized as the largest illuminated star in the world.
At 459 feet in length and 276 feet in width, this star truly illuminates the city of El Paso every night. My experience in El Paso was astonishing. It became an eye-opening experience for me to be a part of such diverse cultures and ethnicities. I had the opportunity to try

Picture by UTEP Athletics

different Mexican foods and experience the rich Spanish history. This trip made me step out of my comfort zone and truly understand the lives of people who live near the border. After my trip, I gained a passion for traveling to new places to help further my knowledge of different cultures and the history of those cultures as well. For my next blog post, I will be talking about my travels to Aruba, my first time out of the country. 

 

 

 

 

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1 Comment

  1. lkp5256 August 30, 2019

    Hey, this works.

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