Ana Fernanda and Ana Luisa Bernal are 16-year-old twins and juniors in high school. Since kindergarten, they’ve crossed an international border every single day to go to school.
The girls live in Mexicali, Mexico, with their mother but, being born in the US, they’re able to cross to get an education in English in Calexico, California.
Like many other transborder (or “transfronterizo” in Spanish) children studying in a different country, the twins embark on their daily journey very early in the morning.
This film is part of the BBC’s Crossing Divides season.
California, a western U.S. state, stretches from the Mexican border along the Pacific for nearly 900 miles. Its terrain includes cliff-lined beaches, redwood forest, the Sierra Nevada Mountains, Central Valley farmland and the Mojave Desert. The city of Los Angeles is the seat of the Hollywood entertainment industry. Hilly San Francisco is known for the Golden Gate Bridge, Alcatraz Island and cable cars.
Love Island is a reality TV show in the United Kingdom in which contestants are sent away to an island, and participate in a series of tasks. During the show, they keep swapping partners until they find “the love of their life” with the winner being decided by a public vote. The show is broadcast in the UK by ITV on ITV1 and ITV2.
Mexico is a country in the southern portion of North America. It is the most populous Spanish-speaking nation. Mexico City is its capital city and largest metropolis.
Mexico became an independent nation state after the successful Mexican War of Independence against Spain in 1821.
Mexico is a developing country, but has the world’s 15th-largest economy by nominal GDP and the 11th-largest by PPP, with the United States being its largest economic partner. Since 2006, a conflict between the government and drug trafficking syndicates has led to over 120,000 deaths.
Mexico receives a significant number of tourists every year; in 2018, it was the 6th most-visited country in the world, with 39 million international arrivals.
