The San Diego Padres baseball game was capped by a convoy of cement trucks, oversize cranes, and trucks bearing the first supports of what will be the major infrastructural commitment of the new administration to the United States. The project, expected to cost in the billions of dollars, has many legislators on both sides of the aisle wringing their knuckles at the proposed cost. For Hector Rodriguez and his family, however, who sat in the grandstands observing the game, the sudden appearance of the construction convoy provided a well-deserved dose of comic relief.
“Look at how big that truck is!” Eddie, 12, said. “Such a big truck, and it’s going to the middle of nowhere!”
“Odds are, at least half the trucks run out of gas before they get to the proposed wall site,” Hector, 38, said. “They have no idea how dry it is out there.”
Rodriguez, who crossed the US-Mexico border at age twelve to escape the situation in his home country, recalls his experience in the Sonoran.
“They think it’s suitable to cart this stuff half a thousand miles to build a wall!” Rodriguez said. “The Ubers are gonna be calling in by the thousands just to ferry the workers out.”
Maria, 36, agreed with her husband’s assessment, enjoying a chuckle herself as she watched a gigantic crane take a lumbering right turn and enter the freeway towards Mexico.
“They have the materials for...like...one inch of wall...” she said. “It’s going to take a hundred years to build something that size.”
History buff Julio, 14, gave a touch of criticism as well.
“The Chinese took centuries to build anything this size and they had to top it off by filling it with all the people who died building it,” he said. “If they think they can build something this size in the desert before our president decides to resign or the next administration takes over, they should go to the library and check out a history book.”
