Hey well this is the entry for our fourth week in Comi. I added and album on facebook with some selected photos from our time here. They have captions to kinda explain it all, check em out!
Here is the new blog entry:
Last week marked the end of our stove project, so this week kevin and I began work on updateing and upkeep of the farm we are lving on. The first task we took on was creating a steam shower. I spoke about this a bit last week, but the previous one had tons of leaks. This week we took the whole thing apart and cleaned all the fittings and put it all back together with new pipe glue. This took us the better part of 3 days. Unfortunately tuesday, the water stopped working in our Aldea (aka village) of Los Bujes so we couldnt test for leaks. Last week it was the power this week its the water. In speaking with our host mom this happens from time to time, last year the water stopped working for 3 months! Hopefully it wont be that long. I am worried though, because as I speak the water still is not on. Luckily we are able to use the water from the catchment system we fixed for cooking and washing.
We took most of thursday to walk around and kinda explore more of the area. Maybe it was the culture shock or maybe it was me expecting the bad conditions that caused me almost overlook the poverty here for 3 weeks. The roads here are unpaved and when it rains you end up with huge ruts in the road. Most families (parents, children, and their children) live in two room shacks with dirt floors and leaky tin roofs. Its a luxury to have and outhouse, let alone a hole in the ground. People farm to survive here, and only about 2 % have enough crops to actually sell. This isnt the farming you are used to seeing in the states either, we live in moutainess terrain and most people here farm literally on the side of mountains. Kevin and I are often winded on our walks from town to town, but we seriously get passed by ederly woman with a child on their back not even breaking a sweat.
Perhaps that is also why I don´t notice the poverty here as well. Everyone seems to accept it. They truly love life here. People always great you on the streets with a smile. The kids in our host family don´t complain that they have to share a bedroom with their sister mother and two brothers. They don´t complain that they get to shower once a week to save water. They see cards as the most exciting thing to do during the day. They go to school and then work in the field for 4 more hours, then do homework. And they are so happy every day. Suffering, or what we in america might consider suffering, is a way of life here, its what these people grow up into. They accept bad teeth, parasites from bad water, upper respiratory infections and asthma in 2 year olds from cooking, fleas in their bed, and the struggle to put food on the table every night, as normal life. In meditating on these things I thank God for the many gifts that I never even considered gifts until now. It pains me that I was ignorant to these things for so long. It bothers me that I have complained about not having my own bathroom, having to take out the trash, not getting a car at 16, or not getting to eat what I wanted for dinner.
I am sure I will still complain about these kinds of petty things when I get back, perhaps that is a blessing and curse. I ask those of you who do read this blog, to maybe take the time tonight to be thankful you have clean clothes, food on the table every night, hot runnnig clean water, and the family you have around you. Many others are not so blessed. Don´t feel guilty for these things, but rather just don´t take them for granted.
Ok, sorry for the seriousness of that, but its something I feel I shouldn´t hold back. I have been struggling with the thought of if I am even doing enough here. The defintion of enough here is so vague. We want to help in every way possible, but sometimes aid is so misdirected here (thats a whole new discussion I´ll save you). I know that part of my job here is to observe and spread my knowledge, and I wouldn´t be doing it much justice without my previous words.
On a much lighter note Kevin and I are heading to base camp of Tajumulco tomorrow morning. We will be making the 2 day climb to the summit, which is the highest point in Central America. On a clear morning you can see all both the Pacific and Carribean. Again I want to thank all of you who donated for allowing me to chance to experience these things as well provide fund some of our projects. We also did a Mayan Sauna last night called a Chuh, it was the hottest sauna I have ever been in, it was basically a small conrete box that you heated up with hot coals and fire. Then you poured water on the coals to create steam. You then used aloe leaves for you skin. I felt, well I dont know how I felt, but the kids loved it and it was a good bonding experience for us and the Family.
Next week we will present our new project of either grey water treatment (which will allow people to use their wash water for irrigation), or catchment systems (for collecting rain water for the dry season). AMMID, our NGO, will decide what and where is most needed in the community. Wednesday Kevin and I will leaving Comi to head to Honduras to take a personal trip. We will return the weekend of the 4th for 4 more weeks of work.
Adios and Asta Luego
Friday, June 19, 2009
Saturday, June 13, 2009
Xelaju
Hey ya’ll
Im writing from our hostel in Xela which actually has wifi haha big deal for me! Kevin and I are taking break as we did a lot of work this week. We completed four stoves in two different communities this week, Quexlemu and Ixmolcol. The stoves take two days of six hour work to complete. We were able to complete the ones we started last week and start one new one. We also started work on a prototype for a steam shower using the stoves we are building. We are using the heat generated by the stoves to heat a serpentina (basically a coil of metal pipes) full of water which then runs to shower on the farm. So far we have encountered a lot of leaks, but I think by next week will have it working.
Things are pretty routine in Comintancillo, but we have still had some interesting things happen. From what I have learned Comintancillo is the bolo capital of the word. Bolo’s are drunk Guatemalans, really drunk Guatemalans. I thought I had seen what truly wasted was (especially at Dayton), but they take it to a whole new level. When we walk into to town at seven am to catch a bus we see at least 4 or 5 bolos passed out in the street. It’s worse when they are awake though. Bolos love to harass gringos, they usually can barely walk and point at us and yell in-audible Spanish. It has happened several times but one particular time in Ixmoloco is worth telling. We were walking to pick up wood from a house down the road from where we were working and we here someone yell hey you. A Guatemalan reeking of liquor jumps out and proceeds to hug Kevin, Justin and I. He followed us to the house stumbling and tried to help us carry the wood literally ripping it out of our hands, then he followed us to the site we were working. He knew about 5 things in English, most of them curse words and just kept repeating them. He had followed for at least 30 minutes and he at one time asked what time it was. That’s when it hit me, it was 10 am! I thought to myself, jeez when did u start drinking 6 am?!
While that situation is laughable, it’s also troubling. I have also learned Comintancillo is the poorest municipality in Guatemala (the second poorest Latin American country) with 95 % of its inhabitants below the poverty line. These bolo’s, mostly men, waste away what little money they have on alcohol, while their wifes, who because of machismo don’t usually work, try to make due with 5 kids, no money, and a farm to run. Its honestly scary and pathetic.
On a more positive note we were able to visit the families who had been using their new stoves for a couple weeks. While some are still not using them correctly, the overall consensus from them is that the kitchen air is clearer and they are using less wood. This means that the stoves are doing their job.
We are spending today and tomorrow in Xela. We will most likely work on things on the farm, fixing the steam shower as well as our host family’s stove. We are planning to climb Volcano Tajumulco at the end of the week. The volcano is the highest point in Central America, and on a clear morning you can usually see the Pacific and the Caribbean. It’s a two day hike and the peak elevation 14,500 feet. This is the first large mountain climb I have done, so say some prayers for me!
Also last week I did see the Quetzal, but only the female; the males are the vibrant ones. Still pretty cool experience, I had never been in the heart of a jungle before (I had about 25 mosquito bites though, no malaria yet!)
Thats it for now, I hope everyone is enjoying their summers! Adios.
Im writing from our hostel in Xela which actually has wifi haha big deal for me! Kevin and I are taking break as we did a lot of work this week. We completed four stoves in two different communities this week, Quexlemu and Ixmolcol. The stoves take two days of six hour work to complete. We were able to complete the ones we started last week and start one new one. We also started work on a prototype for a steam shower using the stoves we are building. We are using the heat generated by the stoves to heat a serpentina (basically a coil of metal pipes) full of water which then runs to shower on the farm. So far we have encountered a lot of leaks, but I think by next week will have it working.
Things are pretty routine in Comintancillo, but we have still had some interesting things happen. From what I have learned Comintancillo is the bolo capital of the word. Bolo’s are drunk Guatemalans, really drunk Guatemalans. I thought I had seen what truly wasted was (especially at Dayton), but they take it to a whole new level. When we walk into to town at seven am to catch a bus we see at least 4 or 5 bolos passed out in the street. It’s worse when they are awake though. Bolos love to harass gringos, they usually can barely walk and point at us and yell in-audible Spanish. It has happened several times but one particular time in Ixmoloco is worth telling. We were walking to pick up wood from a house down the road from where we were working and we here someone yell hey you. A Guatemalan reeking of liquor jumps out and proceeds to hug Kevin, Justin and I. He followed us to the house stumbling and tried to help us carry the wood literally ripping it out of our hands, then he followed us to the site we were working. He knew about 5 things in English, most of them curse words and just kept repeating them. He had followed for at least 30 minutes and he at one time asked what time it was. That’s when it hit me, it was 10 am! I thought to myself, jeez when did u start drinking 6 am?!
While that situation is laughable, it’s also troubling. I have also learned Comintancillo is the poorest municipality in Guatemala (the second poorest Latin American country) with 95 % of its inhabitants below the poverty line. These bolo’s, mostly men, waste away what little money they have on alcohol, while their wifes, who because of machismo don’t usually work, try to make due with 5 kids, no money, and a farm to run. Its honestly scary and pathetic.
On a more positive note we were able to visit the families who had been using their new stoves for a couple weeks. While some are still not using them correctly, the overall consensus from them is that the kitchen air is clearer and they are using less wood. This means that the stoves are doing their job.
We are spending today and tomorrow in Xela. We will most likely work on things on the farm, fixing the steam shower as well as our host family’s stove. We are planning to climb Volcano Tajumulco at the end of the week. The volcano is the highest point in Central America, and on a clear morning you can usually see the Pacific and the Caribbean. It’s a two day hike and the peak elevation 14,500 feet. This is the first large mountain climb I have done, so say some prayers for me!
Also last week I did see the Quetzal, but only the female; the males are the vibrant ones. Still pretty cool experience, I had never been in the heart of a jungle before (I had about 25 mosquito bites though, no malaria yet!)
Thats it for now, I hope everyone is enjoying their summers! Adios.
Saturday, June 6, 2009
Workin for the weekend
We got started on work this week. We took the first two days to fix things on the farm. We managed to fix their catchment system and the farm rainwater tank is now filling up. It shouldnt take long, we hardly go a day here without a good 2 hours of rain. The rest of the week we have spent working on stoves. I wanna take a moment to explain the stove project we are working on here.
The cultural norm here is for families to cook on open fires in their households. This makes for a very smokey home and releases harmful amounts of carbon and carcinogens into the air. For most families their consists at best two rooms in their homes. This means that 3 times a day when cooking is done for meals that the whole family, including new born children, are exposed to the harmful affects of the open fires. The leading cause of death in Guatemala is upper respiratory infections, closely followed by dysintary. These open fires are a strongly linked to the upper respiratory infections found in Guatemala. I see these affects first hand in my host family. They cook with an open fire, and I often have trouble breathing when I join them for meals. Little ten year old Georgina already has a signifcant nasty cough.
The NGO we are working with, AMMID, has made a strong effort to reduce the onset of the respiratory infections. The have started a large project that builds rocket stoves in select household across the country. These stoves use a combustion chamber and a chimney to completely eliminate smoke in the household and burn half the wood that normal fires use. This not only improves the health of the families, but reduces their carbon footprint and saves them money each year on wood. AMMID uses volunteers like us as well as donations from several larger NGO´s to fund these projects and deliver the stoves at 20 percent of the cost to the families.
We started work on the 2 stoves this week. They take about 4 weeks to complete. We usually have to walk to the villages, and these two are a good hour hike away. Lets just say with the altitude, hills, and the hikes i´m burning the tortillas and beans right off my belly. The families are very nice and often cook us lunch. The kids just stare at us as they have never seen gringos before. Its nice to see some of the comleted stoves too. The families that use them seem to already be healthier.
Kevin and I have gotten over our fight with the evil ameobas of Guatemalan water and I think we sqeezed out a tight victory, though I think the toilet was a casualty of war. We are heading to San Marcos with several of the peace core volunteers to a nature presever this weekend. We are hoping to see the Quetzale which is the national bird of Guatemala which only about 2% of the people in the world get to see, its super indangered as it was hunted for its beauty. I´m keeping my fingers crossed that we will actually see it!! The peace corp people here are pretty awesome, its nice to have some gringo comfort.
On a sappy note the scenery here is fantastic. Most of the homes are built on the side of the mountains and the views we have all the time are breathtaking. The coolest is right after it rains. The temperature drops and the mountains seem to almost steam. The sun sets with the steam and plays some unbelievable colors. There is so much natural beauty out here!
Thats all for now, I hope I didn´t forget anything. Look for next weeks update, we should be working on more stoves, and maybe I´ll have a picture of the Quetzal! Adios, asta luego.
The cultural norm here is for families to cook on open fires in their households. This makes for a very smokey home and releases harmful amounts of carbon and carcinogens into the air. For most families their consists at best two rooms in their homes. This means that 3 times a day when cooking is done for meals that the whole family, including new born children, are exposed to the harmful affects of the open fires. The leading cause of death in Guatemala is upper respiratory infections, closely followed by dysintary. These open fires are a strongly linked to the upper respiratory infections found in Guatemala. I see these affects first hand in my host family. They cook with an open fire, and I often have trouble breathing when I join them for meals. Little ten year old Georgina already has a signifcant nasty cough.
The NGO we are working with, AMMID, has made a strong effort to reduce the onset of the respiratory infections. The have started a large project that builds rocket stoves in select household across the country. These stoves use a combustion chamber and a chimney to completely eliminate smoke in the household and burn half the wood that normal fires use. This not only improves the health of the families, but reduces their carbon footprint and saves them money each year on wood. AMMID uses volunteers like us as well as donations from several larger NGO´s to fund these projects and deliver the stoves at 20 percent of the cost to the families.
We started work on the 2 stoves this week. They take about 4 weeks to complete. We usually have to walk to the villages, and these two are a good hour hike away. Lets just say with the altitude, hills, and the hikes i´m burning the tortillas and beans right off my belly. The families are very nice and often cook us lunch. The kids just stare at us as they have never seen gringos before. Its nice to see some of the comleted stoves too. The families that use them seem to already be healthier.
Kevin and I have gotten over our fight with the evil ameobas of Guatemalan water and I think we sqeezed out a tight victory, though I think the toilet was a casualty of war. We are heading to San Marcos with several of the peace core volunteers to a nature presever this weekend. We are hoping to see the Quetzale which is the national bird of Guatemala which only about 2% of the people in the world get to see, its super indangered as it was hunted for its beauty. I´m keeping my fingers crossed that we will actually see it!! The peace corp people here are pretty awesome, its nice to have some gringo comfort.
On a sappy note the scenery here is fantastic. Most of the homes are built on the side of the mountains and the views we have all the time are breathtaking. The coolest is right after it rains. The temperature drops and the mountains seem to almost steam. The sun sets with the steam and plays some unbelievable colors. There is so much natural beauty out here!
Thats all for now, I hope I didn´t forget anything. Look for next weeks update, we should be working on more stoves, and maybe I´ll have a picture of the Quetzal! Adios, asta luego.
Monday, June 1, 2009
1st week in Comintancillo
Below is the blog update. A few other things, 1 please please please send me updates about you lives too, 2 i attached some pics or ruben and the kids and the view of comitancillo so check those out, and please foward this on to people I forgot to add so they dont kill me
Hey all, it’s been a while since I posted so there is a lot to tell. For the sake of not writing you a novel, I’ll do my best to keep it short. Last time I left you we were in Antigua and were taking a 4 am bus to Xela. We decided to stay up all night... we thought we would catch some of the night life in Antigua. Mike was the only one who managed to stay up the whole time. Kevin and I grabbed about an hour of sleep. We jumped a micro bus to Guatemala City and then took a bus from there. The bus we took was definitely from the 1970’s paintjob still intact. The ride took about 4 hours with all the traffic. The roads here are... interesting. Anyone can use them, including donkeys and golf carts. We reached Xela and spent the day resting, we also met a friend of mikes for dinner who had been traveling through Central America on a motorcycle (f-ing crazy). That night I also had my wallet stolen, luckily it was my 2 dollar Wal-Mart wallet and there was only cash in it. Xela is normally a pretty safe city but things like that still happen.
We left Xela the next day for San Marcos, the largest city closest to Comintancillo. We grabbed a “chicken bus” which is very true to what they actually are. These buses are old school buses that have worked their way down from the schools of the US to Central America. Most of them are pimped out with crazy paint jobs and Mercedes Benz symbols on them, however there were some that had not yet been pimped and still had the yellow paint jobs with black letters from their old school districts. I actually saw one from South Bend (shout out to Dave and Krystal). You literally had to jump on these buses as there moving and you sit 3 to a seat. Nice thing is though they literally cost nothing; 10 quetzales which is about 1.50 US. The AMMID (the organization we are working with) coordinator, Ruben, picked us up in San Marcos and drove us to Comintancillo. The road to Come is no better than a one lane dirt road, but I still saw freaking Chicken Buses on them.
We arrived in Comintancillo in the evening. Comintancillo is bigger than we thought, it has over 60,000 people (bigger than Archbold... sorry Dan). Most of the inhabitants are subsistence farmers that live in the hills surrounding the city center. We are at about 9,000 feet elevation. We are living in a big concrete box with two windows and a door called La Granja. It has one light bulb and a power outlet which is better than I expected. It is used for the volunteers working with AMMID. It is part of our host family’s farm. Their house is a two room shack were we will eat most of our meals. The host mothers name is Dona Hilda. She is no taller than four feet and speaks very slow deliberate Spanish which is much easier for me to understand. She has 6 children but only 2 live with her, Irvine who is 13, and Georgina who is 10. Irvine is shy, but is usually our guide around the city. Georgina is the complete opposite and is always following us around. They love to play cards and I was able to teach the “ir de pesca” (go fish) and “lucha” (War). They really can’t get enough and are always asking us to play.
We came for one of the best weekends, the annual celebration of the Virgin Mary. It was a three day festival with a huge market, giant parade, fireworks, and soccer tournament. We caught several soccer games which were a joy to watch. They played on a giant dirt field with absolutely no grass, yet it didn’t seem to bother the teams. We watched the parade which consisted of each school with their students doing special dances. The funny thing was is that a lot of the dancing was to American music. I must of heard the theme song from Night at the Roxberry 15 times. Sunday there was supposed to be a huge procession and fireworks, unfortunately I spent the whole day and most of today in bed with dysentery. I’m not going to lie, it really sucks to have and having to use an outhouse is well ... no fun! Hopefully this will only last another day. I think I am seeing light at the end of the tunnel. We start work later today working with rocket stoves in a small community in the mountains. We met the only other person in Come who speaks English, Jason, today. He is the Peace Corp volunteer who we will be working closely with for the next ten weeks. It’s nice to have him, because while my Spanish is getting better, I am still sure I talk like a 5 year old. That’s all for now. I hope everyone is having a fantastic summer. For all you Cleveland fans, I am truly sorry... not!
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