New play tells story of youth care workers, migrant girls sheltered in San Diego Convention Center

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It's time for KPBS Midday Edition. On today's show, the arts and culture shaping San Diego. I'm Jade Hindman with conversations that keep you informed, inspired, and make you think. From a theater play that tells the story of unaccompanied migrant children to an elusive bird, hear about the productions taking stage this weekend. Then, hear what's on Julia's arts calendar. That's ahead on KPBS Midday Edition. In spring of 2021, hundreds of unaccompanied minors who were seeking asylum were sheltered in the San Diego Convention Center, where they waited to be reunited with their sponsors and families. That period is captured in a new play called Our Lady of San Diego Convention Center. Local company Tuyo Theatre is putting on the play, and they're taking it to 12 different venues across San Diego starting tomorrow. I'm joined now by Mario Vega. He's the playwright behind Our Lady of the San Diego Convention Center. Also with us is Tuyo Theatre's artistic director, Patrice Amon. She's directing the play. Mario, Patrice, welcome to the show. Hi, Jade. It's so nice to be here.

Hey, Jade. It's great to be here.

It's great to have you both here in studio with me. Mario, before we get into this play, I want to talk about the specifics of this story. Under what circumstances did the children end up at the convention center during this time, and did they cross the border by themselves, or were they separated from their families at some point? What's the situation there?

Yes. So the children who are at the convention center were overflow from the detention centers in Texas. They were unaccompanied when they arrived at the border and they came to seek asylum. So as they moved from the border to detention centers in Texas, they were all bused to the San Diego Convention Center, which is being used as a shelter for them as they waited to get reunified with the family they had here in the United States. And were they all reunited? Yes, as far as I know, every child that was there was reunited with a family member they had here in the United States.

Okay, good. You were a youth care worker during that time. How was the play born from that experience?

Yeah, so I just got in my double vaccination. It was the first job I had. out of college. And I was hired there in March of 2021. And I was like a semi-decent Spanish speaker. And then every kid there spoke Spanish. I was like, oh no. So it was just taking care of kids, helping them eat, helping them process the kind of big emotions that they would have while being away from their families. And yeah, I worked there for a few months. And at some point I was like, oh man, I'm kind of forgetting how it was and the kids that were there. So I wanted to write it to kind of keep the memory alive.

And I mean, what made this story a good fit for Tuyo and your mission as a theater director?

Yeah, we were really excited to hear that Mario was approaching telling the story.