Returning to Guatemala in a cardboard box after a migrant life in the United States

"At 11:10 p.m. on an unusually freezing night in late January, the last commercial flight from Houston, Texas, landed at La Aurora Airport in Guatemala City. Passengers and their luggage were immediately unloaded. Just when it seemed everyone had left, the cargo hold door opened and airline staff pulled out two white cardboard boxes. Inside, two coffins. Julio Gonzalez, 59, import supervisor at Combex-IM, the airport's customs warehouse, oversaw his team's respectful transfer of the remains in a small forklift to a chapel illuminated by a cross."

"In 2025, 2,443 people who had died overseas arrived by air at Combex-IM, almost all from the U.S., according to data from the customs warehouse. Just today, 10 coffins arrived, says Gonzalez, who has worked there for 33 years. In Guatemala, migration is constant. Just as many people leave, many return. Sometimes in a coffin, he adds. More than one million people born in Guatemala live in the United States, according to the most recent data from the Guatemalan Ministry of Foreign Affairs."

"Under the current deportation policy of the Trump administration, 4,941 Guatemalans were deported in January alone, an average of 159 per day. At 2:30 a.m., after completing the administrative procedures, Luis Felipe Alvarez Oviedo and Roberto Herrera from the Landivar funeral home loaded Miguel's heavy coffin into a minibus. As they left the Combex-IM bus terminal, Herrera crossed himself before driving off, out of respect for the passen"

A late-night flight from Houston arrived at La Aurora Airport in Guatemala City carrying two coffins among its cargo. Airport customs personnel transferred the remains by forklift to a chapel and identified one occupant as Miguel Raymundo Raymundo, 36, who died in the United States on January 14, 2026. In 2025, 2,443 people who died overseas arrived by air at Combex-IM, almost all from the U.S. More than one million people born in Guatemala live in the United States. Under current U.S. deportation policy, 4,941 Guatemalans were deported in January.

Read at english.elpais.com