Friends from the Other Side / Amigos del Otro Lado facts for kids

Friends from the Other Side / Amigos del Otro Lado is a children's book from 1993. It is written in both Spanish and English. The author is Gloria E. Anzaldúa, a Mexican American scholar. The pictures were drawn by Consuelo Méndez Castillo.

The story is inspired by Anzaldúa's own childhood in South Texas. It is about a young Mexican American girl named Prietita. She lives near the US-Mexican border. Prietita becomes friends with a young boy from Mexico named Joaquín. He has recently moved to the area. Prietita helps him and his family.

About the Story

What Happens in the Book?

The book starts with pictures of a desert yard. There is a small house and laundry hanging outside. Animals roam freely. The first pages also have an introduction from the author, Gloria Anzaldúa. She explains that she grew up near the Rio Grande river. This river is the border between Mexico and the U.S. She saw many people, especially women and children, cross the border to find work. They often had no work in Mexico. This book tells the story of Prietita, a brave Mexican American girl, and her new friend Joaquín. He is a Mexican boy from "the other side" of the river.

The Main Characters

The main character is a young girl named Prietita. One day, she is playing in her yard. A boy named Joaquín walks by. He is selling firewood. They start talking. Prietita notices that Joaquín's Spanish sounds different from hers. She asks if he is from the other side of the river. She also sees that his clothes are dirty and worn. He has sores on his arms.

Prietita thinks about taking Joaquín to the curandera. A curandera is a traditional herbalist who helps heal people. But when Prietita looks at his sores, Joaquín feels shy. He quickly leaves.

Later, Prietita hears a lot of noise. She finds her cousin and his friends yelling at Joaquín. They are calling him mean names. Prietita bravely protects Joaquín from the other boys.

She then goes with Joaquín to his home. There, she meets his mother. Joaquín's mother talks about crossing the border to find work. She explains that they found similar problems on the U.S. side. Prietita offers to help Joaquín's mother find a job.

A Time of Danger

One day, Joaquín is visiting Prietita. A neighbor shouts that the Border Patrol is nearby. Prietita, Joaquín, and his mother quickly run to the curandera for help. Joaquín and his mother hide until the Border Patrol leaves the area.

The curandera then invites Prietita to gather herbs from her garden. She offers to teach Prietita how to prepare these herbs. They can be used to heal Joaquín's sores. The curandera also asks Prietita to become her apprentice. This means Prietita would learn from her.

About the Author

Gloria E. Anzaldúa was born in South Texas. As a young Mexican American girl, she faced discrimination. Her family was poor and Mexican. Living near the Rio Grande river, Anzaldúa saw many women and children crossing the border to find work. These experiences greatly influenced her writing. They inspired her to tell stories about life in the borderlands.

Anzaldúa wanted to use her books to help change the world. She saw her main character, Prietita, as a "bridge." Anzaldúa believed that writing books for children was a very important way to create change. She felt that children could help bring about important cultural and social changes.

Anzaldúa also wrote a famous book called Borderlands/La Frontera: The New Mestiza. In this book, she described how living near the border affected people's lives in many ways. In Friends from the Other Side/ Amigos del Otro Lado, she wanted to share her experiences and ideas with children in a way they could understand.

Gloria Anzaldúa later became a professor at the University of California, Santa Cruz. She was a respected scholar who studied Chicano culture and feminist ideas. She passed away on May 15, 2004.

About the Illustrator

Consuelo Méndez Castillo is an artist from Caracas, Venezuela. She spent much of her early life in South Texas. Later, she moved to San Francisco to study art.

Castillo was one of the first three women in the Bay Area to form a muralist team called Mujeres Muralistas. Muralists are artists who paint large pictures on walls. This team painted many murals that showed parts of Latino life. They also highlighted unfair situations and social issues. Their work was part of an art movement called Mission muralismo.

Consuelo Castillo's art has been shown in many places, especially in Latin America. She has illustrated several children's books. These include Friends from the Other Side/ Amigos del Otro Lado and Atariba and Niguayona: A Story from the Taino People of Puerto Rico. For the illustrations in Friends from the Other Side, she returned to South Texas to do research.