Farewell Parties

Three parties on our last three days in Santiago. First, with the Hospitalito. Then, just the nursing staff. Both were filled with gifts and tearful goodbyes.

Our last day, Betty, her son José Luis, and our friend Rosa Viviana arrive around noon to learn how to cook lasagna, bread, and other goodies from up north. About 30 people are expected for the evening meal.

One guest of honor will be Irma Magdalena, the girl we're sponsoring. After taking her shopping on Sunday, we brought her to the Hospitalito to have her checked out on Monday. Her health is not too bad, though she may have some parasites. She got an ear lavage, which she hated. Her mother Magdalena had to come back a few times after that, and Geneen made sure she knew they were invited for Friday and gave her directions on how to get to Las Milpas.

But I was pretty sure we'd have to go to their house to get them and bring them. The culture often works like that here. Promises are made and abandoned regularly. When at 4:00 Rosa, José Luis and I set off for Chukmuk, I was very surprised to see Mother, daughter and grandmother already heading down the path to see us. And Irma in her new outfit.

It was great fun putting the kids to work cooking. Irma and José Luis were thrilled to mix the carrot-beet-coconut salad, and to squeeze lime juice on it. I had them shape the loaves of bread, and suggested they braid it. Irma is a whiz at braiding.

I chose a quiet moment to give Magdalena Q500, or about $60. She cried and said she's never seen so much money. I asked her to please make it last, that it was to help with corn and firewood.

Cooking for 30 is a lot of work. There are so many ore people I would have liked to invite. I was a little disappointed that the party mostly split itself into two groups, one group in traditional clothing speaking Tz'utujil, and one in modern clothing speaking Spanish and English.



Around 8:00, the guests left. Betty gave Geneen a shawl she wove. It's magnificent to the point that you can feel its aura.

I hugged Irma and told her to write, that we hope to be back next year. She hugged Geneen and burst into tears. We told her we love her.

Centro de Mesa

About a month before we left Santiago, Geneen contracted with a family to have a centro de mesa (table runner) made. Maribel and Ingri work at the hospital, and have been friends of ours since shortly after we arrived. Geneen and Maribel picked out the threads, choosing colors that Geneen felt best represent Santiago.

Their house is like other houses in Santiago, in that you enter the courtyard, and there are several rooms that open into it. María, the mother, sits in the courtyard and weaves much of the time. Her daughter Betty embroiders for a living.

María spends a week weaving our cloth. She weaves the old way, using a ceiling hook or post, and a strap that goes around her back.

The cloth is then sent to a woman who draws the figures that will be embroidered. Geneen has asked for hummingbirds drinking nectar, a design frequently seen on the clothing here.

Betty's part lasts a few weeks. Shortly before we left, we picked up the finished product, and were more than satisfied with the quality.

Shopping Day

This morning we picked up our goddaughter Irma at 9. Her mother, Magdalena, gave us permission to take her to the market to buy her some clothes. Yesterday we had arranged for Rosa Viviana and Ingri to go with us to pick out, and bargain down the prices, for a traditional outfit for her.

Most of the women of Atitlan wear a blouse called a güipil (wee-PEEL), a skirt called a corte (COR-tay), a belt, and usually carry a shawl. Some prefer non-traditional clothing, and many girls don't wear traditional clothing because their families can't afford it. That's Irma's case. Even for Chukmuk her family is poor. Many of her classmates wear güipil and corte, but she's never owned either. She wears paca, or used imported clothing from up north. Many Americans don't know this, but much of the clothing we donate to thrift stores or drop in used clothing bins ends up being sold in the so-called third world. It's a good thing for the poor here because they can often afford a few changes of clothing. And here especially, where the amount of labor required to make even a simple güipil is great, and the price tag of $20 is beyond the means of families such as Irma's.

Sunday is market day, and we can barely squeeze through blocks of vendors and buyers. Rosa and Ingri take us to one stall where they inquire about size and quality and begin to barter even before we're interested. That's good, because it helps us to learn what the vendors will really accept. Had Geneen and I tried to do this alone, we would have been out of our league, and the vendors would have eaten us alive. Not only that, but we learn all sorts of things about which colors are appropriate, where the designs should end, how the neckline should be. We're in the company of experts.

Every time we stop to look or talk with a vendor, we clog traffic, but we're not the only ones doing so. Worse, not only are the passageways small, but there are vendors sitting on the ground with baskets of peaches and other things, and it's hard not to step on them.

After an hour or so, upstairs in the market building, we have found a corte vendor that both women are happy with. Irma has identified a pattern that she likes. I keep having her choose between one and another to make sure she really knows what she wants. She can be pretty quiet so I bombard her with questions. Rosa speaks to the vendor in Tz'utujil as Ingri translates for us. We can understand some of what's being said since so much Spanish is worked in to the native language here. For 300 quetzales, or $37 US, we buy a corte that is big enough to become 2 cortes for someone Irma's size. We have the vendor cut it in two -- one will be for Hilda, Irma's 12 year-old sister.

We buy a güipil, shawl, 2 belts (one again for Hilda), two pairs of shoes and three pairs of socks. Not bad work for three hours, and all for less than $100.

I ask the girls if they want pizza or regular food (comida corriente). Irma says she's like food. She has never heard of pizza. We decide it's time for her to learn about one of the world's most important foods, and head off to Pizza Utz (utz means good in Tz'utujil) where we stuff ourselves. I give Irma a brief lecture on how these two women are good friends, good role models, how she needs to work hard in school and become a teacher, anurse, an accountant or doctor, and that's that why we help her. We don't want to see you get married at twelve or working hard just to survive. there aren't many opportunities in Guatemala, but they do exist.

After lunch, we go to Rosa Viviana's house for Irma to try everything on. She is beaming with happiness. She's beautiful and proud.

Back in Chukmuk, we show her family the purchases. Magdalena is overwhelmed and breaks down crying. She says she can never repay us, and we tell her she does so by taking care of her children, and they they are very deserving children, being so well brought up. Geneen cries. Hilda is very pleased with her faja and corte. We walk home, savoring the day.

There is some chance the family will sell the clothing, but I don't think it's likely. Only if things were to get really desperate. And we'll hope, that with the little help we give, that won't happen.

Rosa Viviana

Rosa has become a good friend these past few months. Last night for the second time a small group of Americans and Europeans went to dine at her family's house.

Rosa at 24 works two jobs. She teaches first grade in the mornings and is a middle school principal in the afternoons. Her father works at the Catholic church. The pile of corn on the cob, the size of a pickup truck bed, in the living room is evidence that the family has a few pieces of land here and there. They don't work it -- they pay someone else to. The complex where they live has six or seven rooms that open to a courtyard filled with loud dogs, stacks of wood for cooking, hundreds of empty Coke bottles, all centered around a pila (sink for washing).

We have brought chicken mole, a salad and two quarts of ice cream. Though the family is well-off by Santiago standards, there is no refrigerator or freezer. The cramped kitchen consists of a small table, a wood stove and a sink. The stove has a chimney, something which is often not found in the Guatemalan Highlands. COPD is rampant as a result.

Rosa, her mother and aunt have made patin, tortillas, potato salad, broccoli, and a hot pineapple beverage. There are two types of patin -- fish and beef, both smothered in tomato sauce and wrapped in a large leaf. The fish are minnows, very salty and pan-fried. The beef has been marinated in lime juice before being cooked. The fish patin is much better than what I've had at the market before. The potato salad contains homemade mayonnaise, and even I'm a bit nervous about eating raw eggs here, but I don't turn anything down.

Rosa's mother shows us the different types of corn they produce -- yellow, white and black. The seeds they plant have been in the family for generations. The grow beans, coffee and avocados as well.

A few years ago, Rosa gave up a government job where she made a lot more money than she does now. She feels she can give more to the community working directly with young people, though she currently earns around half of her former salary of $600 per month.

Her aunt doesn't join us this time, probably because she doesn't speak much Spanish. We leave the rest of the mole and salad when we go, but take the ice cream.

Irma Magdalena

A few weeks back we decided to sponsor a child through Pueblo a Pueblo. They have 3 different types of sponsorships -- individual, school, or pregnant woman. We opted for individual, where our $25 per month will go toward school supplies and medical care for a child in Panabaj.

Panabaj is a poor village about a kilometer south of Santiago, where the Hospital used to be. In 1990 the government massacred several dozen people there, some of whom had not yet reached adolescence, and there's a small peace park erected in their memory. In 2005, a few months after the Hospitalito had reopened after being closed for 20+ years, Tropical Storm Stan caused mudslides that ruined the hospital, the town, and a large percentage of its residents. The area is now condemned, but is not empty. The government has built a new community on the other side of Santiago, called Chukmuk, and little by little is moving the residents of Panabaj there. The first wave bean last year, and the school only opened in February of 2009.

We were shown 3 applications of children that need sponsors. Two from Chukmuk, one from Panabaj. All were girls around age 10. Irma Magdalena's father left right after she was born, and the other two still had fathers, so we chose her.

Monday we met her. We had arranged to meet with the Pueblo a Pueblo representative, Irma's teacher, her mother and her outside the municipal building at 1:00 for lunch. Mother and daughter were the customary 30 minutes late, and the six of us went around the corner into Comedor Kathlyn's.

We had been warned Irma was shy, and were not surprised by it. In the small towns around Santiago most girls are pretty quiet. She never said a word the entire time, but communicates very effectively with her powerful smile, the kind where the face wrinkles a bit as she makes full eye contact with you through squinting eyes. Her Spanish is not strong yet as she's only in first grade.

Her teacher explained that the range of ages in her class is from six to thirteen, as many families don't allow their kids to start school until very late in life. Irma, if she passes each year, will be 15 when she finishes primary school and 18 when she graduates middle school. Middle school for most poor people is not much of an option, though, as it is not free. There isn't one in Chukmuk yet -- the students have to travel a few kilometers into Santiago.

Irma and her mother, Magdalena, both ordered fried chicken, rice, salad, tortillas and lemonade. Both saved the fried chicken for last, then slipped it into a napkin to take home. Magdalena washes other peoples laundry for a living. Her eyes fill with tears when she talks about her husband abandoning her and her four daughters 10 years ago. Two of the daughters are now married and have moved out. Fifteen is a common age for girls to marry here. The twelve year-old is still at home.

Computer Installations; The Youth Team Plays

My life's been very interesting and very busy of late.

Yesterday I biked to Panabaj, a poor town 1 km from Santiago where the Hospitalito used to be, and finished installing software on the computer there, at ANADESA. Then I biked to Chacayá, about 8km away, where I have helped them acquire 4 more computers for their tiny computer room. They now have six. Since I only have one copy of Windows, the installations took some time. The principal, teachers, and kids kept coming in to see what was going on. I started photographing some of the kids; they really seemed to enjoy it. By two in the afternoon I was back in Santiago at Escuela Chuul. They have 12 computers and need my help installing Windows and Office.



The computers won't fit in the school, which is an ex-pronade, and very basic in construction -- it's a few boards with tin. The pronade (pro-NA-day) system no longer exists in Guatemala, but it's effects persist. It used to be that some schools were governments schools, and some, the pronades, were managed by a group of parents, a sort of board of directors. The government gave the board the money to run things, and the system was very open to abuse. Within the last two years someone figured out that the pronade system was less than optimal, and now all public schools are so-called government schools. But the ones that were pronades are way behind in terms of resources.

The computers are in a house 100 meters away from the school, in a room with a bed. 12 computers crammed onto little tables. The expectation is that the students will hold the mouse and keyboard on their laps, two to a computer (and probably 3 or 4 to a chair, because the room is about 12 ft by 10 ft).

Escuela Chuul is 200 meters east of the soccer field (stadium, they call it), but on a dirt road that most outsiders never go on.

My first month here I tried to head that way. There were some really messed up glue-sniffers and drunks, and the road got really bad and narrow and I asked myself if I was prepared to die. My answer was no, and I got out of there with my tail between my legs. Now, many people know me, and I feel welcome there. "That's the gringo that's helping with the computers. He's also the soccer trainer."

In the evening, while dining on pesto that Neus made, the phone rang. The principal from Chacayá was dropping off the computer he's had at his house for a while, that the coffee plantation gave him. It doesn't work. Since my residence, Las Milpas, is not on a road (it's on two footpaths, though), could I meet him at the Hospital? I leave my pesto and head off there, a 5 minute walk.

The computer is at least 15 years old and the formerly beige plastic of the monitor has attained a telltale yellowish hue. The dust is thick. There is no mouse. Not much hope here.

The nice thing is, he gives me a gift, and tells me how much he appreciates what I do. Diego Chávez is well-known and very much admired in community here. It means a lot to me. He wears regular clothing at the school because he doesn't want to show off where everyone is poor, but here, in Santiago, he dresses traditionally -- cowboy hat, western shirt, three-quarter length pants with purple stripes and lots of hand-embroidered flowers, sandals. He's a community leader.

His gift to me, he explains, is something he got in March when he went to a meeting in Quito. It's a bag made of alpaca that says "Ecuador" on one side.

Saturday I awake and check out the computer. The power supply doesn't work. I'm confident that if we replace it we'll find that a lot of things don't work. The question here is, what can we take from it that will help us and how do we dispose of the garbage?

At 11 the youth team has a game. Last week the senior team played, and I gave a silly interview and had no idea what was going on. This time I was better prepared. No screaming. But I managed to avoid the interview until half-time.

We played against San Lucas which is 15 km away, but more civilized than we are. They're in what's called the third division, which is somewhat competitive. With success, they could move up eventually to the professional level. We are nothing, not any level. Santiago had a third division team at one time, but allegedly got thrown out for cheating. That's supposed to be one of our objectives, to put together a team that can handle the third division. Well. I had never seen a third division team until today; now I know.

San Lucas was leading 2-0 after 30 minutes. We weren't playing badly, but they were clearly the dominant team. I was yelling as loud as I could because the speakers were right behind me.

For the first time in two months, I learned their names.

And here's something I learned. Last week's game was televised. Several people I asked throughout the week had said they hadn't seen the game live, but on television. And then I learned the worst -- my interview was shown several times throughout the week. "We're going to WIIINNN!!" Haha, stupid gringo. Win against Xelaju with your chubby little teachers.

Shortly before halftime, we started to play. All of a sudden it was 2-1 and we were in the game. At halftime, we went to the dressing room under the bleachers for our chat. The electricity hasn't been installed yet, and I don't know if there will be a fan when there is, but UUF! it was a bit pungent there. I made several player substitutions, gave a pep talk, and went outside.

The man with the microphone approached. I felt confident and explained that we were making several changes, and the important thing was that everyone played, that every game is a training exercise, that the second half is going to have a very different flavor.

The soccer was up and down in the second half, but we played well. We tied the game ten minutes in and went ahead with ten minutes remaining. Somehow we managed to hold the lead, and won, 3-2. I couldn't believe it! I congratulated the players, told them to get their butts to practice on Monday, that there was still a lot of work to do, and headed off to Escuela Chuul to continue installing Microsoft products on old computers.