March 2004-04-06
Dear Friends,
It is already 6 weeks since my last newsletter. Thank you to many of you for your kind and supportive replies. I felt surrounded by your friendship and that is great.
Thank you again for those who are helping me with the water Filter project. I still need some donations in order to reach the amount of money sufficient to give a filter to 500 families. Do not hesitate to contact me if you wish to help!
February has been extremely intense. I was working in the streets 3 or 4 times a week, keeping the Wenesday and Friday afternoon, which are the days of Spiritual activities, with the kids of level II.
As usual, some good and some bad news. Benjamin, who has an amazing memory for geography, passed to level III, and studies very seriously at school. But Daniel, who is nearly blind, and has been with Casa Alianza for several years, left without any explanation. Again, a very frustating experience, as I had spent a lot of time talking and teaching him. He lost his parents and has only two brothers, who are not able to help him. It took me a month to find out where he was, and I will be trying next week, to see him and find what may be done to help him. But the toughest is that they all are very proud and often refuse to be helped!
For St. Valentine’s day, Casa Alianza organised “the Friendship’s race”, with all the boys and girls, including the educators and volunteers. A very friendly moment, with different categories based on age. For the first time in my life, I found myself in the Senior group (35 to 50). Tough reality of life...I am not so young anymore. I nevertheless managed to win the silver (fake) medal!
We had another 15 year old birthday party for Heidi, which was similar to the one I described in my first email. It has the importance of a “debutante” ball in Guatemala. Starting with a Mass, followed by Speeches, lunch, cake and a lot of dancing. It was great fun.
On the “Street” side, we worked a lot on the Zona 6 and 1 (around the market, the bus terminal and some prostitution areas). In one of the abandoned gas stations, we met a young 16 year old mother with a 2 year old baby, in a condition of extremely poor hygiene, on the point of being expelled by a private militia. We interfered and negotiated for her to stay one more day. When we went to pick her up the day after, she was gone! Instead, the place was occupied by 3 kids (around 12 years old) who , after a lot of talking, came with us. Two days after, 2 of them were already back to the street!
One morning, I received an urgent call from Oscar ( Street’s educator) who told me that 4 girls from the program had not come back the night before. One of them, was the lovely Marie Sol, 11 years old, usually very quiet and nice. We had only one day to find them, in order to be able to reintegrate them in the program. We went around the whole city, asking other homeless, and after 5 hours, we found them in the Parque Central. It then took 2 hours to convince them to come back with us. They are ultra sensitive, and a simple argument or disagreement could make them leave Casa Alianza, preferring to be in the street!
It surprises me sometimes how “ prima dona” these kids can be, when they have nothing else, and receive a lot from us. But it takes a lot of patience and understanding to realise that they never received attention or love, and that they often react on first impression.
We also help another group of educators, with the “mobile school”, which consists of a nice minivan containing all pedagogical possibilities and large boards, in order to teach kids in the streets. We went with them several times to the most dangerous Zone of Guatemala City (zona 18), in the colonia (district) Lemon. These are some of my best and brightest memories of all.
When we arrived in the central square of the colonia, between 50 to 70 kids, from 2 to 14 years old, joined us from everywhere, with huge smiles and laughing eyes. We separated them into groups, and each of us started teaching alphabetisation, mathematics, ect... After 45 minutes, we played with them, then we set up the puppet theater, in order to performe a small play about hygiene or an education program. We usualy finished with a distribution of juices and cookies.
The amount of joy and smiles make you feel that all this work is worthwhile. I miss them already.
I could continue for a long time telling you about my experiences with the children of Guatemala, but I will keep some stories for each of you, when I next see you face to face.
I miss them also, because, as I mentioned in my previous email, I decided to stop my volunteer job with the kids. After 7 months, I realized that I was completly occupied, with no time for myself. I will therefore devote more time to the water filter project, in order to finish it before the end of May, and keep some time for myself to think about my future.
I will be looking for a job in the Art world, of course, in the USA or Europe, but also will look into posibilities of professional fund raising or management positions in International N.G.O.s or private foundations.
I am spending a little bit of time to discover this amazing and beautiful country. Last week, I was in Rio Dulce, which is the carabean part of Guatemala. Completly different from the rest, with wild forests of Mangrove trees, rivers and swamps and beautiful white sand beaches. The population is an interesting mixt of maya culture and black creole. Not far from there, next to lake Izabal, I swan in the most enchanting hot water waterfall, surrounded by lush vegetation. The way I imagine the Garden of Eden!
I will try to travel a little bit more and will keep you posted by end of May for where I will be going next.
Once again, an amazing experience, which opened my heart and my mind about the reality of the world. Wonderfully nice and warm people, extremely diverse culture and civilisation. I fell in love with Guatemala, which will stay for ever in my heart, and I hope that I will be able to visit it regurlarly.
Thank you again all, for your moral and financial support. You have made my time in Guatemala helping the kids possible!!!
I am looking forward to hearing from you.
Sincerely Yours,
Ghislain
