♪
There's not a huge sense here amongst these migrants,
who've invested nearly three weeks already,
that they're going to quit.
♪ ♪
My name's Susan Ormiston,
and my job is called senior correspondent,
and Ari, that's just a fancy word for a reporter
who's been doing it a long time.
Ari: I heard you were recently following a big story.
This was about the caravan.
Can you tell us about that experience?
Yeah. You may have seen some of the pictures of these people,
thousands of them, who left their home over a month ago
with almost nothing, and they started walking.
And they walked through --
they're in their third country now,
and they're trying to get to a fourth country
which is the United States.
So they started in Honduras, which is in Central America,
so at the bottom of Mexico.
They left there, many of them told me,
because it was so unsafe.
There's a lot of gangs, and a lot of drugs in Honduras.
And the gang members threatened them,
and threatened their families, and they decided,
you know, a really tough decision, they decided,
"Look, we don't have any future here for our kids
like your age, and younger.
So we think maybe we could get to the United States
where it might be a better future."
[whistling]
Ari: Why do people, like, including President Trump,
why do they fear people coming in to their own country?
Well, that's a good question.
The U.S. president, you know, was facing an election recently,
at least his party was,
the mid-term elections in the United States,
and he believed that there were a lot of his supporters
who were really afraid
about the people coming over their borders.
And he decided that it was important
to reassure those people that they shouldn't be afraid.
What's happened on that border between the United States
and Mexico is tens of thousands of people try
to get across that border frequently,
and some of them go in illegally.
So they will actually run across the border
trying to hide from immigration officials
to try to get in the United States.
Many others go in and say,
"You know what, I have a terrible home.
I'm facing violence, and people are after me,
and I need a safe place to live."
And that's called asylum.
Do you think it's fair to be cautious
that since migrants from a very dangerous country,
like, there might be thugs that could easily slip in
to this whole caravan?
Susan: Yeah, I think that's a fair question.
So there's a lot of people in that caravan
who have nothing to do with crime.
Yes, there could be some who are using that caravan
as a way to get away with something.
Hopefully at the border,
they're going to be asked those tough questions.
Ari: And while you were on this caravan,
what did you encounter?
What did it feel like?
What did it look like?
They started walking really early in the morning,
because it's so hot.
So they would start walking
between 4:00 and 5:00 in the morning.
And they would pack up whatever they had,
only what you could carry.
So if you were in the caravan,
you could only take your backpack,
maybe some food for the day,
and they would head out on the road.
So you had in the darkness, you'd see these massive groups
of people walking along,
and I have a picture in one of my stories about a little girl
who was waiting for the caravan to begin.
It was 4:00 in the morning, in the dark,
and she was looking through a colouring book.
And I thought, "Oh my goodness.
This is no way for children to live."
Ari: What do you think will happen next?
So what will happen next?
Well, they'll probably get to the border.
They'll probably apply for asylum.
Some of them.
And then they'll be stuck for a long time
trying to figure out whether they'll be able
to start their life again.
And some of them, Ari, will, as I described,
run across that border because that's what they want to do.
It's illegal, and they will try to test that.
Well, it was a pleasure meeting you, Susan,
and hopefully we'll be able to see each other again.
I'm Ari Resnick for CBC Kids News.