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ready to raceddgarza's McAllen, Page
my marriage in-laws live on the texas/mexico border city of mcallen, texas. mcallen is a small city, but really growing fast. in most recent years mcallen has been rated as the 2ND FASTest growing city in the usa behind only las vegas.
i'm from corpus christi, texas, about 150 miles north of mcallen, and along the texas coast. but i can still feel the difference in the climates. corpus christi is much more humid than mcallen, but mcallen is still hotter, much hotter.
so, if you don't like warm climates, DON'T come to south texas, because it's warm/hot here almost every day of the year. fall and winter combined only last about 3-4 weeks. and it doesn't rain much either. maybe that's why we have so many "winter texans" around here ? ("winter texans" are folks from up north and canada that come here to escape freezing winters).
otherwise, mcallen seems like a nice small city (to live). especially for central & south americans that can afford to have an extra home in the USA.
they often choose this city, because, i would estimate, that about 80% of mcallen citizens speak both spanish & english. and because it is usually also the closest USA city in relation to their south-american home countries.
since mcallen is along the border with mexico, there are lots of factories just on the mexican side where mcallen "managers and trainers" go to work everyday to take advantage of economically cheaper and more abundant labor. (also more relaxed labor/legal environment in mexico). and these factories are quite huge.
reynosa is the mexican city right across the border from mcallen. it's a nice place to shop and to eat. but reynosa is really crowded and has alot of traffic.
so, if you go a few towns over, there's another nice mexican border town called progresso, very nice shopping, especially on the duty free stuff like cigarettes, liqour, and perfumes. also, huge crowds go to patronize the many pharmacies that sell generic-type and brand name drugs for prices that are a fraction of what you have to pay here is the usa.
[ HISTORIC MOMENT: the best history teacher in south texas once told me that the area between the rio grande river and the nueces river was dubbed "the desert of the dead" by 19th century mexicans who had tried to make the trek northward during the summer, and rarely or barely made it. ]
hope i was able to help...
logo borrowed from... ( http://www.medc.org/home.html , a website that has some good demographic and other info about mcallen, and the surrounding areas. )
