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Old Posted Jul 5, 2020, 8:30 AM
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Pedestrian Pedestrian is offline
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Join Date: Dec 2016
Location: San Francisco
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Quote:
Originally Posted by Buckeye Native 001 View Post
El Paso is Southwest. Never been to San Antonio, can't vouch for the vibe.

What exactly makes New Mexico more southwestern than Arizona?
San Antonio is rather odd. It's nothing like the American Southeast or Gulf Coast as Houston is, but it's quite different from the true Southwest including El Paso as well. It's kind of a blending of the southern plains and the true Southwest. It also, rather oddly, has had a substantial German immigration resulting in surrounding towns with names like New Braunfels. It's quite a melting pot.

What makes New Mexico and Arizona different is recent arrivals from the rest of North America (and I include Canada in that because my Arizona community has lots of Canadians, mostly but not exclusively snowbirds, living there). New Mexico has not been nearly so populated by newcomers and retains more of the "old southwest" flavor that you can also still find in the more remote parts of Arizona (like its southeastern corner) but not in most of the state. Because it lacks major metros (Albuquerque isn't really "major"), it's also not nearly so much of a magnet for migrants from Latin America (including Mexico)--in other words, it's just relatively isolated and subject to less homogenizing change.
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