One Glass of Water From an OCEAN

The stove and water filter project is now complete. We installed 180 estufas and 36 aqua filtros.

We have a total of 30 people. 22 from Hearts and Hands Foundation and 8 from Helps International. There was no medical clinic this week.

We were put in teams of 6. 4 of us and 2 from Helps. One of the Helps staff speaks Spanish and English, the other speaks Spanish and one of the Mayan dilects. There needs to be a lot of translation!

My team originally consisted of Stephanie, a Doctor from the USA and Megan from Helps. We were responsible for the water filters. Stephanie twisted her knee on the second day, so I was left on my own as Megan had to drive her to Guatemala City. Megan is a 25 year old who has lived here for 2 years. She coordinates all the Medical Clinics. They have quite a few throughout the year, usually 10 or so Doctors and the line up to see this free clinic for the Mayan people is about 500 to 700 a DAY! The stories she told me were super wild!

John and his team, Yolanda, Linda and Mauricio welcomed me with open arms. Teresa was our Mayan translater. We actually were in a different spot than the others, who were in San Jorge la Laguna, a very poor village more city style. We were in the rural area. The super tall cornfields was our friend when we had to go to the bathroom!

Every day was an adventure! Broken drills, broken rivets, missing stove pieces....you name it, but we worked it all out. I was floating between the outside stove..Nixtalmalera....and the inside stove...Plancha, helping as needed.

This is the rainy season, so every day in the afternoon it rains. Hard sometimes. We were caught in it a few times, were walking in the fields and steep hills was a challenge! I was scared at times, but my team held my hand to safety!

The people in each of the homes were remarkable! It was the women at home, with the kids. Sometimes we would see the odd man, but most of them were working out in the fields. They were all very helpful and most offered us juice or pop with a sweet bun! Every day at lunch time, one of the families would cook us lunch, where all the families had pitched in for the food. It was the same every day. A soup with potatoes, carrots, squash and meat, PLUS tortillas! Those tortillas are awesome. This was a meal they make for special occassions. They serve us and just watch us eat, they did not join us. If there was a man at home, he ate as well, but not at our table.

We had so many special moments, that I would need a lot of time to record them all, here are just a few,

• Yolanda had brought a Dora doll that one of her friends daughter, who is 5 back home in Calgary, gave her to give to a special little girl here in Guatemala. We met up with a 5 year old, Maria, who was our guide one day in bringing us to the next house, so Yolanda got excited and thought, this is the one! Well....when she pulled out the doll, Maria started to cry and was scared of it. We are not sure if it was her hair, or if she had never seen a doll before!
• John customizing the indoor stove with less blocks so it would not be that tall for one of the ladies who was 96 years old! You had to see her walk...barefoot.... she had so much energy! The respect everyone shows for elders and parents, is amazing! Everyone greeted this lady by kissing her hand!
• The very emotional good bye Mercedes had for us. She spoke in her language but we all knew what she was saying while she was crying and we were too. They have nothing, yet they showed us such great hospitality and even gave us a gift from the communtiy, that all the ladies pitched in for. A purse each! We gave her a small gift as well, 100Q and 40Q for her son that helped. Yolanda also gave here some pictures she had developed here. There is an amazing one of Mercedes and her grandson Jose that just speaks volumes about them!

Last night was our beer and pizza night, where we all had a chance to round table some of the moments we had.

WOW! Was this ever emotional.

So many people were crying, especially when Dr Ann spoke about how there was this one lady that just came up to her out of the blue and blessed her. Several days later she saw this lady again, who came up to her and gave her this beaded necklace with a small pouch. Dr Ann knew that this was were she was to keep the locket she always carries of her husbands ashes, who just died one year ago!

Vicki spoke about the one little girl in one of her houses who had a see through mask on due to her burned face and the amazing smile she had.

Barry was a mess when he spoke about this sad little girl watching him leave their house. He said that this look will always stay with him.

I could go on and on.............but I hope these few stories give you an idea of what we are experiencing.

Rebecca from Helps International tried to sum it up by saying that we are helping her people by giving them one glass of water from an ocean full!