Danilo Munguia, 34, from El Salvador, in the one room house he shares with three other people. Danilo is transgender but had all of his clothing robbed while staying at a shelter in Tapachula. Finding a safe place to sleep is a daily challenge. He is sharing this small house with three other migrants from El Salvador (a mother and son and one other woman), but he often feels unsafe as one of the women has a violent boyfriend who comes to the house for days at a time.
Last June, Mara Salvatrucha 13 (MS13) gang members approached Danilo Munguia, a 34-year-old transgender person, in Usulután, El Salvador, demanding that he deliver drugs for them. “I’m not one of those people,” he said. “Fine,” they replied, “but there will be consequences.” Days later, four members of the gang broke into Danilo’s home, beat him, and took turns raping him. The next day MS13 asked if he was ready to work with them. Again he said no. “Well,” came the reply, “you know what’s coming.” Danilo moved, but they found him and abused him again.
Danielo pleads his case to the shelter manager at the Belen shelter trying to get a bed for the night. He has no other place to stay and his only alternative is sleeping outside the shelter on the ground along with many other migrants.
It was after this that he decided he could no longer stay in El Salvador. An aunt in Tijuana, Mexico, told him to come and live with her. “We don’t have anyone that supports us and when something like this happens, there is nothing you can do,” said Danilo, who is now living in the southern Mexican city of Tapachula, a major hub for refugees crossing into Mexico from Guatemala.
Danielo stands in front of the house where he is staying along with three other El Salvadoran refugees. Danielo would leave this house the next day after this woman's boyfriend showed up, drinking, and started acting violent with her and threatening him.
Danilo identifies as female but often uses male pronouns to refer to himself. Robbed of his female clothes, he has found it impossible to maintain his appearance traveling north. He is among the surprisingly high number of LGBT people fleeing the Northern Triangle to Mexico and the United States. In 2014, officials estimate there was one LGBT person arriving per week to Tapachula. In 2015, that number was closer to one per day.
Prices for various travel options from Tapachula to Tijuana written on a piece of paper. Danilo was hoping to hear if his asylum application had been accepted and was seeing how much a plane or bus ticket would cost him to get to Tijuana. But they're expensive and he doesn't know how he'll be able to afford either of the alternatives.
The streets of Tapachula late at night near the Belén Shelter.
Though Tapachula is more tolerant of LGBT people than the countries they are fleeing, it still holds considerable danger for people like Danilo, who face additional challenges as transgender refugees. Finding a safe place to sleep is a persistent concern. Shelters, their capacity already strained by the enormous numbers of people pouring into the city, have a particularly hard time accommodating transgender refugees in facilities segregated by gender.
Danilo and two other asylum seekers sit and sit outside the offices where they are waiting to hear about the status of their applications. The woman on the left attended cosmetology school and is showing Danilo and his friend, Nildeson Ismael, photos from school. Danilo dreams of attending cosmetology school when he makes it to Tijuana.
One of the homes where Danilo stays is owned by a Central American man who has lived in Tapachula for years. Danilo stays there for free but washes clothes during the day to earn his place. The house is one room and Danilo sleeps on the floor with two other Central American refugees.
Danilo has had to move multiple times out of fear for his safety, as he waits for the government’s decision on his asylum application — a process that can take several months. At night he either sleeps on a concrete floor in a small room with three other refugees, on the sidewalk outside Tapachula’s Belén shelter or, if he’s lucky, on a bed inside.
Danilo and his friend Alexander Jesus in front of the COMAR offices (Comisión Mexicana de Ayuda Refugiados) waiting to hear if their asylum applications had been approved. For weeks he spent everyday there waiting, some days for as long as 7 or 8 hours.
Tapachula is the primary entry point for Central Americans making their way north and shelter space is extremely limited. Here, migrants sleep on benches in the shelter's courtyard.
The danger comes from all sides, too. Jose, a transgender refugee from El Salvador who requested we not use his last name, says he was beaten by guards at a National Migration Institute (INM) detention center in Tapachula, where he spent 104 days waiting for the results of his asylum application. Rosember López Samayoa, the director of Una Mano Amigo, an organization that does HIV outreach to Tapachula’s LGBT community, says these complaints about INM are very common. According to López, the INM lacks adequate accommodations for transgender individuals; violence, rape and demands for sexual favors as the price of better treatment are all commonplace.
Jose (R) and Enrique (L) two transgender refugees from El Salvador both claim to have been sexually assaulted by Mexican migration officials.
As he awaits a decision on his asylum application, Danilo spends his days trying to “forget my life” which, he said, “is like a book that always reads the same.” He dreams of getting to Tijuana and going to cosmetology school. But he confesses that he may end up working for a man he met on Facebook who recruits for adult movies in Tijuana. “Maybe just in the beginning, to make some money,” he said.