When we got back to Chonita's we had breakfast and then met with the Parent's committee from the school Chacaya. There were 4 people present. The parents were very interesting and told us about the school. It is a "Promenade" school which is different from the public school. These schools are run by parent's groups. More like our charter schools in the US.

Parent committee

Currently there are 115 students who attend. They have 4 teachers but the government is only paying for 2 teachers. The other 2 teachers have been volunteering since Jan. When the group from the Luther Center in Vermillion came down in May they chose to pay the teachers' salary as their project. They went out to the school one day and did a field day with the students. This is also the school where Theresa volunteers. The teachers are paid Q1000 per month or $133.00 and end up buying all their supplies and things they need for the school. Right now the school is renting 4 small buildings and sometimes the teachers even pay the rent.

Theresa with students

We left with the parent committee and went out to see the school and the land. The school was busy because a volunteer group from Florida was there putting cement floors in the buildings. They had just dirt floors previously. After seeing the school we went and looked at the land that they wanted to buy. In order for them to have the school built by the government, they need to have land. When people make $2.00 per day it is hard to buy land that costs $5,000.00. Land around Santiago has tripled in price since Hurricane Stan last Oct. We started negotiating with the land owner so hopefully he will get it down to a price we can buy. Land is really a difficult thing to work with in Guatemala. You have to make sure the landowner has legal title to the land and if they have inherited it from their parents they may or may not have the paperwork. Amanda is going to work with a local lawyer and try to sort this out.

School room

View from school land

We went back to Chonita's and met with her about the elder project. Right now we are sponsoring 52 elders per month. We have sponsors for all but 13 of the elders. We do the bags of food for the elders once a month. Chonita says this lasts them about 2 weeks. We had a big discussion on how to handle this.. more food or what. Chonita's dream is to have a senior center. (She visited one in the US when she was with me.) We talked about renting a small house and having a nutritious lunch 3 to 4 times a week. We could also do a " meals on walk" (meals on wheels) to those elders who can't make it. Most of the elders are so old and weak that they need better nutrition. There is no program in Santiago for the elder people. Most programs in Guatemala center on children, education, etc.. I have never seen a program here just for elders. Having a center for the elders would be a good place for us to have volunteers from the US work. We could also have someone monitor their health, have medicine and keep a better eye on them. We looked at several places to rent. Some were very small and really awful. Much worse than my barn at home. I told Chonita and Amanda to look for a place that is cleaner and nicer and maybe if it is big enough we could use part of the space and rent out the rest to Peace Corps workers or someone like that.

We had one elder die two weeks ago. Chonita asked if we could have her husband in the program. He is blind and very poor. Theresa and Sara went and did a few home visits to the elders while I worked with Domingo. We will have some photos of those later. You cannot believe the conditions of the homes that these poor elders live in.

Clemente and Micaela came to visit. They are from the group Mayan Hands. This is another one of our Sister organizations under our NGO here. They have 15 groups, two of which are here in Santiago. Fifteen Mayan Hands families homes were destroyed in Oct. in hurricane Stan. Clemente and Micaela have been working very hard to get work for the women so they can help their families. We do a scholarship program with Mayan Hands. The students who get the scholarships are either children of the weavers or weavers themselves. We have one young women who is 26 and just went back to school in the 6th grade. These scholarships are more expensive than our other ones. They are $500.00 per month. This is because they are mostly older students. Some of which are in college. They also have a lot of transportation costs as they have to travel quite far to school. We currently have 10 scholarships, 9 of which we have sponsors for. They would like to add 8 more as there are so many student who would like to go to school. We added the 8. They gave Sarah the information for these students. This is a good way for the weavers we work with to get some extra help. Most of them are back strap weavers and do not make much money. Clemente and Micaela said the students have been asking if they will be sponsored for next year. The sponsorships pay 75% and the students have to come up with 25%.

We asked Clemente and Michaela to dinner so they left to find a place to stay for the evening. I went out to the Posada (a local restaurant) and met with the owner Susie. She has started a cooperative with some of the Panabaj women that lost their homes in Stan. She has 400 women in the group. We talked about how it was going and some of the training the women are getting. Later Sarah, Theresa, Clemente and Micaela joined us. I introduced Clemente to Susie and they had a nice chat talking about training and cooperatives.

By the time we got back to Chonita's it was almost 10 and we were exhausted. It was really hot that night and I had picked up alot of mosquitoes bites when we were looking at the land so I didn't sleep well.

Lots to do and only one more day in Santiago.

Diane

go to July 4