S1: This is KPBS Midday Edition. I'm Maureen Cavanaugh. Now , food gives us an entryway into another culture. And , of course , borders do , too. KPBS Radio's popular podcast , Port of Entry , combines cuisine and borders as it unveils its fourth season. The series , which explores cross cultural experiences in the San Diego Tijuana border , is using this season to focus on food and migration and to make port of entry truly binational. This season , the podcast will also be available in Spanish Port of Entry. Hosts Alan Lilienthal and Natalie Gonzales are here to tell us about it. And Alan and Natalie , welcome to the show.
S2: Hey , thank you for having us.
S3: Thank you so much and.
S1: Congratulations on the fourth season.
S4: Yeah , it's been it's been a pretty wild ride.
S1: You think it's because it fills a gap , like a glaring gap in the fact that , you know , this is a thriving border community and we just really don't hear a lot about it.
S4: Yeah , I think that definitely has a lot to do with it. Like before I was brought on to host this show , um , I was really as a border person who crosses the border all the time for , for life , for music , for all kinds of things. I was hungry for this kind of these kind of stories and content because all you really hear about the border is usually not from people who have the lived experience , the personal experience of actually , you know , experiencing what it's like to live , to have a border kind of run through your life. So in those days , five , six years ago , I was very hungry for stories like this. And I think just from my own personal experience , it really forget that I'm the host of it. You know , just as a listener and as someone who loves these , who loves learning about the place that I live , it filled that gap for me. So I can only imagine that's doing that for for a lot of people like me , there's really there's millions of us.
S1: Natalie Okay. Say that I'm just hearing about port of entry for the first time.
S3: Then Port of Entry is your podcast because we are telling the real stories that connect us between two places that are San Diego and Tijuana. Beautiful.
S1: Beautiful.
S4: You know , food is since the beginning of human history , is the great uniter eating , breaking bread with people you love. And I think food is a great metaphor for how how borderless our world truly is. We tend to delineate between different cultures and such , but so many of our foods that we think of as staples of a certain place say , like tacos , our pastor in Mexico , like the the , the rotating Toronto actually , I'm not sure how you say it in English , but like the , the thing that spins with meat on it that you put into tacos , you think of that we think of that as like super , super duper Mexican , right ? Like it's like , oh , that's like a classic Mexican thing. But really , it came from a Lebanese immigrant who moved to Mexico and brought like , like gyros , you know , doner kebab that came from there. But now we see it as a super Mexican thing. And there's these stories all across the globe where food has traversed borders and really made its home across nations. And I think food is just a great metaphor for for for migration and for how much more delicious things are when you don't divide them and you just kind of mix flavors.
S1: Now , Alan , we have a nice big excerpt from the first episode of this port of entry season.
S4: We touch on the first big wave of Haitian migration that came to Tijuana , and we started really seeing it in around 2016 , which was a couple of years after the big earthquake. And then right after that , we you get to hear us going to Elena's restaurant in downtown Tijuana , her delicious Haitian food. And hopefully you hear us enjoying all the things you made us.
S3: Which was delicious.
S4: Elena's restaurant opened for the first time on December 14th of 2021.
S3: That's right. Right in the middle of the pandemic.
S4: She's part of a.
S5: Sizable population of Haitian immigrants who have settled in the border city in the last decade. In January 2010 , an earthquake of 7.3 on the Richter scale hit Haiti , devastating a country that was already facing an economic and political crisis.
S6: The Caribbean island nation of Haiti has been rocked by its biggest earthquake in more than 200 years.
S7: These people were the lucky ones. They got on the last flight to Miami out of Haiti just after the earthquake hit Habitantes.
S8: This morning , I want to extend to the people of Haiti the deep condolences and unwavering support of the American people following yesterday's terrible earthquake.
S5: The nation was left in chaos and disarray and many people had no means to provide for their families.
S3: The Haitian exodus began by the tens of thousands. Haitians left their homes to look for work in other countries , countries like Brazil , who needed the extra labor to get ready for the 2014 World Cup. Brazil relaxed their bizarre requirements and for a time welcomed them. Haitians left their country and went there with the hope that eventually things would improve back in Haiti , and one day they could go back home to pick up where they left off.
S5: Unfortunately , that time never came , and Brazil's need for workers eventually subsided. Faced with uncertainty about their future in the middle of the last decade , many Haitian migrants set their sights on the US.
S3: In hope that their situation might improve.
S5: In 2016 , the first wave of the Haitian migrants made its way to border cities like Tijuana , where they sought asylum in the United States. And since then , more and more Haitians have arrived in Mexico and especially Tijuana relatives.
S9: Thousands of Haitians are waiting to get into the US and thousands more are on their way through Latin America.
S10: The surge of Haitians started in May. US customs officials couldn't process them fast enough and a backlog formed in Tijuana.
S5: The Mexican Commission of Refugee Assistance.
S3: In Spanish.
S5: Reported in December of last year that over the past three years , more than 70,000 Haitian refugees have requested asylum in Mexico , But the majority of the refugees were actually trying their luck to make it to the US.
S3: But there are so many obstacles in the way for Haitians who are applying for asylum in the US. Very , very few have been granted asylum here. And over the years , as the majority of Haitians were denied , thousands have settled in Mexico , especially in border cities such as Tijuana.
S5: Adding some Caribbean threads to the multicolored fabric that is the vibrant , breathing , ever changing city of Tijuana.
S3: Or , in L.A. case , a new flavor profile.
S11: ES la vida la vida como como una casa de la vida. Example Mr. Casa.
S5: She says that life is like a house. You start building it little by little and you keep climbing higher. Slowly but surely. And this is how she sees her restaurant. They received loans from friends to be able to open the restaurant. Poquito a poquito.
S3: And even though it has been difficult , Elena and her husband are happy to own their business.
UU: My goodness. Oh , sorry. What if. What ? Well.
S5: Elena said she asked God for a business so she could help people by giving them food or work. She likes to give work to other Haitians stranded in Tijuana below Despacito. She used to have up to eight workers , but some of them have now left for other cities or countries.
S3: Now , though , her delicious food and hard work has made her popular around downtown , and she has many Mexican customers who love to eat there as well.
S12: Rica , Comi Pero , Frito Arroz con recalls.
S3: We spoke with one of her customers and she told us she ate some delicious fried chicken and that she could taste the love in L.A. cooking. And we can attest to what this piscina said , because.
S5: We ate there , too.
S13: I know. I think it's so good.
S3: Elena's cooking is Caribbean soul food. It made me feel at home. Like if I was at my grandma's for a birthday , the main dishes were a succulent dance between spicy acid and rich flavors. Like Mexican cuisine. Haitian food revolves around beans , rice , and a protein like Rico , be it chicken , fish or pork. But instead of tortillas , they use plantains as their main source of starch. And we had her famous fried chicken accompanied by this rich and spicy mash of steamed vegetables.
S5:
S3:
S5: I felt zero guilt. I just felt very euphoric eating this delicious meal. So many colors and little dishes that you could mix. It was almost like the Caribbean version of Indian.
S4: Food , where.
S5: You have so many options to mix and play with. And it was just delicious. Delicious.
S14: Delicious.
S1: You just heard part of the first episode of the KPBS podcast , Port of Entry Season four with hosts Alan Lilienthal and Natalie Gonzales. Now , before I let you go , tell me a little about the launch of the Spanish language version of the show. Natalie.
S3: So I. I am way more comfortable in Spanish. And I remember when I saw the job posting for this , I thought this should be in Spanish. But I never said anything out , out loud. And I know Alan has said many times that they thought about this a long time ago. But with our new producer , Julio , he was just on board with this. As soon as he got hired , he he got this new idea of having the episodes in Spanish , like a Spanish version. And he's a great producer , so he just went for it. And now we launched it in Spanish. And I think it's very important because , for example , for me , my parents , they don't speak English and I want them to to hear the episodes. I want them to understand what I'm saying. So now they're able to listen to the episodes and now they're like , Oh , now we understand your job. Like we know what you're doing. Now.
S1:
S15:
S3: Same as the English version. You just go to wherever you listen to your podcast. It could be Spotify or Amazon music , so you just click on the link of port of entry and you're going to you're going to have access to the episode in Spanish. We're just going to post it next to the English version.
S4: I would love to add just up what Natalie said , that this is a podcast really for people , the people of our region , to really honor the stories of people who cross borders and who have this life experience. And it just makes so much sense to to tell those stories in the mother tongues of this region. And doing it in English is really only telling it to half the people because this region is both right. So it just makes sense to really if we're going to tell the stories of our region , it's got to be in the language of the region.
S1: Well said. I've been speaking with Alan Lowenthal and Natalie Gonzales. They are co-hosts of the KPBS podcast Port of Entry and Port of Entry , as you heard , is available wherever you get your podcasts. Alan and Natalie , thank you so much. Congratulations.
S2: Thank you.
S4: Thank you so much for having us.
