I have no doubt that not that long ago some people would have been embarrassed saying they were from Tijuana, but that has changed and every day we are prouder of what we have to offer. Everything happening with the culinary and music scenes and now with the Xolos, our professional soccer team, generates a sense of unity and belonging that for a while did not exist in most Tijuanenses.

In the professional field I am starting Bustamante Realty Group's corporate responsibility program called Responsabilidad Social BRG. This project has two main goals: one is supporting charitable organizations in Tijuana with our time and hard work to help them achieve their goals. A couple of recent examples were going with my wife and kids, co-workers and their families to plant trees in the Third Stage of the Río area and working with shovel and pick at La Esperanza school to prepare it for a subsequent tree planting by removing garbage and debris. Another goal of this activity was to raise awareness about the benefits of taking care of the environment among teachers, students and parents.

These activities were performed jointly with Asociación Gilberto and the Tijuana Metropolitan Pro-Afforesting Committee. The second and most important goal is inspiring love and commitment for our city in my family and friends that will be multiplied as they share it with their social circles. This love and commitment is based on actions and not words.

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I want you to let you know that Tijuana's boom has a way to go. The burgeoning art scene in Downtown will have people talking for a while. People like Josué Castro and his "La Tentación" photography studio in Gómez Passage, where he arranges conferences and exhibitions with well-known international artists.

Tijuanense René Peralta, Director of the Master of Science in Architecture : Landscape (and) Urbanism at Woodbury University, is opening an extension of this school to exchange ideas with Tijuana's students and architects; in music, the artists of the Ruidosón movement are sparking national and international interest through websites like MTV Iggy; in the food scene we have great new talents thanks to the Culinary Art School like Tacos Kokopelli's chefs who have already been taken part at events in Los Angeles and San Francisco celebrating street food; Derrik Chinn's Turista Libre brings curious people from the United States to enjoy the real Tijuana every week; in the field of craft beer Tijuana is the Mexican city with the highest number of breweries, some of which have won national and international awards. All of these movements are happening at a grass roots level and are strongly driven by what has always set us apart: Our location in the busiest border area of the world and the exchange of knowledge and ideas between both sides of that border.

Today we are proud of being Tijuanenses. We like that our city is touted by global media outlets, that people come from all around to experience all these movements in a city that just a few years ago was considered one of the most dangerous of the world.

This, for me, is a huge testament to the people of Tijuana who, in such a short time frame turned our situation around and are coming out of it better than ever. The Tijuana everybody ran away from and the one nobody visited, the Tijuana of nobody does no longer exist. Welcome to the Tijuana of us all!

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Genaro Valladolid/Mujer Actual

Traducción: Karen.balderas@sandiegored.com