Last night I was speaking to a group of about twenty teens in the rough "Red Light" district of Tijuana. Zona Norte is known to be a dangerous area of the city near the border fence. Even while I'm speaking, there are emergency vehicles streaming back and forth with sirens blasting. Drunks, drug addicts, prostitution, you name it and it's part of the Zone. Colorful, exciting and for some, deadly!
I was telling the boys some adventure stories about the Amazon jungle, and mentioned dangers like tigers, piranha fish, anaconda snakes even insects. They listened intently.
After I had talked a little about my world in the jungle, I asked them what dangers they faced in their world of Zona Norte. I wondered what kind of response I would get.
There was a long silence as the boys sat and thought about the dangers they faced in their world ... no one could come up with a danger.
It seems that the exotic carries quite an impact. The exotic and unknown come wrapped in a package of fear.
The dangers these boys face every day are so common to them that they don't count them as dangers.
Not that unusual is it?
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