The returning Spring 2009 Guatemala Cross-cultural group shared reflections and adventures from their experiences in Central America in chapel on April 20.  Listen to it on the EMU Podcast.

The coffee industry has had a major impact on the lives of most of Central America´s rural communities. In many cases, it has further impoverished families, creating land tenure problems and trapping small growers in a cycle of low selling prices and high production costs. However, some small coffee growers have found that by forming cooperatives, they are able to earn fairer wages for the coffee they produce.

CECOCAFEN is one of these cooperatives, representing 2,637 small coffee growers. Santiago Dolmus, one of CECOCAFEN´s agronomists, referred to the cooperative as a “democratic” business that is tightly linked to the individual producers. Apparently, marketing and finding a fair price for coffee are the biggest struggles for coffee growers. As a large cooperative, CECOCAFEN can find markets for the coffee that Hill bring fairer wages to the farmers.

Dolmus gave four reasons for the existence of the cooperative: to sell coffee, to provide financing to farmers, to provide technical training to farmers, and to provide special programs for the cooperative´s members. In addition to finding fairer prices for its members, CECOCAFEN runs a women´s microfinancing program, a program to develop a market for high-quality coffee in Nicaragua, a tourism program in rural communities, and a youth education program.

On April 1, we visited Martin Vicente Padilla´s farm near Matagalpa, Nicaragua. Padilla is a member of the CECOCAFEN coffee cooperative and serves on the board of directors. His own coffee finca consists of about 9 acres of land that he tends using only organic farming methods. While organic coffee is his main source of income, he also grows a wide variety of fruits, precious woods, medicinal plants, and staple crops such as corn and beans. He raises chickens for eggs and meat, pigs for meat and extra income, and a cow to provide milk for his family.

While every member of the family works on the finca, they all take education very seriously. Through CECOCAFEN´s youth education program they were able to complete high school.  Padilla is determined that all of his children will become professionals in some field of study, and two of them are well on their way, one studying to be a lawyer and another currently studying medicine in Venezuela.

Visiting the Padilla family´s finca reminded me again of how little I know about the origins of common products, in this case, coffee. Our visit also made me rethink my attitude toward coffee drinking. I don´t drink coffee, so I had always thought of it as a waste of resources, kind of like candy that doesn´t exactly hurt one´s body, but doesn´t really do any good, either. I never realized how many hundreds of thousands of people depend on the coffee industry to provide their daily rice and beans. Our visit also drove home the importance of buying fairly traded products. Before this trip, I viewed fair-trade products as things that were great to buy, as long as they were convinient to find and not too expensive. Now I realize that there´s a reason that most commercial coffee is cheaper: the small growers are paying the difference through low wages.

– Christina Harman

Group: Peyton Erb, Cassie Leatherman, Rebecca Copeland, Yvonne Stauffer

I think we are all equally exhausted tonight. We went on a white water rafting trip today in the Pico Bonito forest just outside of La Ceiba, Honduras. First our guide had all of us stand together and say a prayer before our trip. Then they gave us tips on how to stay afloat if we were to fall off the raft. For three of us, it was the first time rafting. The guide told us all to jump off this 10-foot high rock into these swirling rapids. This was supposed to get rid of our fear of water and learn how to float. We just decided that the guide knew what he was doing and to trust him. We all jumped off one at a time. After many different feats like this one we got on the raft and started down the river. All of this lasted about 3 hours. We then rode back to La Ceiba in a big, green, army looking truck.

-Yvonne Stauffer

“LAS BANANITAS” (Hannah Kraybill, Monika Burkholder, Jenny Blosser and Charity Strayer)

It’s called Free Travel, and travel free we did. In eight days, Jenny, Monika, Charity and I passed through three countries, wheeled and dealed in four different currencies, pushed, shoved and bartered our way into ten buses, seven taxies, four boats, two kayaks and rested our weary bodies in five different hotel beds.

From La Ceiba, Honduras, to the Rio Dulce in Guatemala and finally down to Managua, Nicaragua to reunite with out Cross Cultural “family,” whirlwind adventure may sound like a more accurate description. But, in the midst of sun baked bus rides, shady characters, a few seedy hotels, various creepy crawlies, miscommunication, misdirection and misunderstanding, each night as we gathered for our “debriefing,” although physically exhausted, we felt spiritually energized by the adventures of our day.

Whether it was white water rafting, zip lining, a spontaneous conversation with a stranger or fellow traveler, a peaceful kayak trip, a chance encounter with a previous acquaintance, simple yet delicious food, fishing without a rod or late night talks, we molded our week, moment by moment into a priceless life lesson. Starting with flexibility, good humor and a few grin-and-bear-it moments, the result is a week abundant in laughter, beauty of all varieties and a good dose of high quality adventure.

-Hannah Kraybill

The Unsniffible (Hitch) Hikers
Ingrid Johnson, Allison Glick, Elisa Troyer, and Christina Harman

Our group name comes from our stench after hours of hiking and riding over dusty bumpy roads in the back of a pickup truck. We ended our first day of free travel with a starlight hitch-hike ride on the way to a little town called Gracias, in the mountains of western Honduras.  We spent three days and two long nights hiking and camping in Celaque National Park, home to a very lovely cloud forest.  We actually hiked for a total of about 13 hours, five of which resulted from a wrong turn on the infamous Sendero El Gallo.  Looking back, we are glad for our mistake, as it allowed us to see a wider variety of flora and fauna.

After a good night’s rest in Gracias after we got back from our hiking adventure, we continued in the back of a truck to a little town called La Esperanza where we caught a bus to Tegucigalpa.  We spent one night there in a pretty shady part of town after discovering that the two hostels that we had considered were either full or closed.  The next day, we continued to the Honduran-Nicaraguan border, where we lost about $40 each to bad exchange rates and crooked taxi drivers.  We spent that night at a hostel in Leon, and explored the city the following day, contributing to the local economy through our licuado (milkshake/smoothie drink) consumption.  We stayed there for one more night, and the next morning took a bus to Managua, the capital of Nicaragua where we met up with the rest of the group in the lovely Quinta Shalom Guesthouse.

We had a lot of fun and met many interesting and very helpful people along the way.  According to Ann, after this experience, we can now travel anywhere in the world!

Group: Giles Eanes, Andrew Derstine, Lindsey Grosh, Amy Histand, & Aaron Yutzy

While traveling, sometimes the most random encounters, the ones that you don’t and can’t plan, end up being the most interesting bits of the journey. Our group crossed paths with a colorful host of characters throughout our travels from the Honduran island of Utila to La Ceiba, to Tegucigalpa, and finally to Managua, Nicaragua. If having uncannily good timing with buses is a sign of sharp traveling instincts, I also believe that being available and open to the people along the road, among the pigeons in the park, and in the bus seat next to you, is a mark of traveling well.

We had one such encounter during an afternoon exploration of Utila. We followed some sign for bike rentals off the street and into someone’s yard, because on Utila you’re always walking into someone’s yard to inquire about food or a place to stay or laundry service, and rented mountain bikes that had seen better days. I had to go back to the shed twice for new bikes, as the first two did not successfully make it more than a hundred meters down the road. Third time was indeed the charm, and I managed to coax the geezer of a bike down the rather uncomfortable road to Pumpkin Hill, the formerly active volcano of Utila.

While the five of us rested at the side of the road, an elderly couple crossed our path.  In his thick island lilt, the gentleman told us that it was no good, that we were too young to be tired. We proceeded to talk with him about his thirty-five years on the seas as a boat hand, which included docking in Norfolk, VA many times. And then we continued on our way and they on theirs, hauling sacks of wood shavings to their farm. It felt exactly like the sort of encounter one should have on a little island. We went on our way; the bikes survived the trip back to their shed; nothing earth shattering had happened. But the chance encounters we had during the week enriched our experience and added dimension to our journey.

-Amy Histand

The Meanderers: Jenae Leatherman, Anna Rodgers, Michael Showalter

The River

Shadowed by the mountain,

Cutting through the trees.

The river roars its victory chant,

Beneath the water, life is gone.

The rain feeds its constant thirst,

The sand plows a deeper tract.

Rocks worn smooth by the river’s wrath,

Cast into shadow by the setting sun.

Whirlpools dance, spinning away,

Ripples pass, a fleeting glance.

Solid yet moving stone,

Liquid in a set path.

The river never rests,

The river always wins.

–Kiwi

As we reflected on our week, our overall trip reminded us of white water rafting the first day on Rio Cangrejal.  Even though we knew our final destination and the approximate path we would take, there were always times where plans changed.  There were decisions and obstacles that we encountered along the way that were unexpected, but by working together as a group we accomplished what we set out to do and had a fun, interesting experience along the way.

Our visit to ASONOG in Santa Rosa de Copan was very fascinating.  I thought that it was very cool that we could make that connection from our speaker in the first week of orientation, Francisco Machado, to the organization that he worked with in Honduras and actually see the work they’re doing that is so dangerous to some people’s interests that he had to flee to the United States.  I was appalled to hear of the pollution being produced by the mining companies, especially the cyanide pollution.  Cyanide is an extremely deadly poison that they use to extract gold from the rock they mine.  After the process is over they either leave the soil, but the cyanide makes is unusable, or they dump it into rivers that serve as water sources for nearby communities.  It kind of upsets me.  Aren’t there safer ways to extract gold than exposing so many people to such a poisonous substance?  Have they no regard for human life at all?  I was very glad to hear about the Civic Alliance for Democracy, a civilian organization researching the effects of cyanide on the local health and organizing local communities in protests.  The Catholic Church has also gotten involved in ensuring the welfare of its people.

The original mining law that allowed mining companies to evict people from their homes (the new law isn’t much better) reminded me of how in the States, the road building companies used to be able to forcefully take over people’s land to build roads and expand the infrastructure.  I’m not really sure how much that goes on anymore, but I’m sure whatever does happen is much different from the new mining law in which there is so much pressure to sell that you’re almost basically forced to.

Along with their work in mining, ASONOG is doing some work with community development, such as risk management and capacity building, which I was very impressed with. They even have regional boards, and they have national conferences to discuss current issues regularly. I was thinking a bit about how these municipalities only receive around 1% profit from the industry that is destroying their land and the health of the people, and it reminded me of discussions we’ve had in class about this idea of center and peripheral countries.  The peripheral countries produce raw materials like food and metals, and these are sold to the center countries at a pretty cheap price.  These are then processed into refined goods, and sold back to the peripheral countries for a profit. Because the peripheral countries do not provide their own refined goods, and what they can produce is of less monetary value, this creates a great inequality in the wealth of nations.  Yes, it’s wonderful that Honduras can produce this raw precious metal, but when it is only sold, or extracted by the center countries, the peripheral countries are taken advantage of, and this is a prime example.  The municipalities receive 1% of the profit from the industry that is polluting their soil and drinking water, displacing hundreds of people from their homes, and stripping their land of the natural resources that belong to the people.  The Honduran needs to seriously reconsider the concessions it gives to these mining companies. One has to wonder if these communities would actually make more money extracting, working, and selling the gold themselves as artisans.

-Ingrid Johnson

Friday, Feb. 27 was the end of language school.  That day we had a Clausura in which each Spanish class did a presentation highlighting their progress from the past 8 weeks. There were a variety of presentations, all showing tremendous improvement in the students’ capabilities.  That same afternoon we boarded a small plane for Flores, an island in Lake Petén Itza and stayed the night in a small hotel on the shore of the lake.  Saturday morning we traveled to Tikal and enjoyed a tour and significant free time to explore the ancient pyramids in the jungle.

Sunday the group split up.  Jared and Addie Leaman, Peyton Erb, Yvonne Stauffer, and Rachel and Ann Hershberger returned to Guatemala City. Jared and Addie were heading back to the States on Monday and the other 4 were headed to San Marcos, Guatemala, bordering Mexico for their week of community learning. The rest of us 18 students and Jim took a boat ride on the lake to visit a zoo and some water slides in the morning before heading to Semesche in Alta Vera Paz province for our community learning.

The group in San Marcos spent their week visiting a number of MCC projects there in a food security program as part of the local catholic dioceses. They were working with MCCer, Nate Howard and his local partners, Juan Pablo and Osmar. They visited two different villages, at altitudes between 8 and 9,000 feet! The first community was Nuevas Maravillas where they attended a meeting to discuss the mushroom project the community is starting. They also have flower projects. These are an attempt to increase income and food supply for the people to avoid the necessity to migrate. The produce from their projects is sold in Mexico, several KMs away.

The next morning the group was in the school interacting with the children and Peyton was able to teach the preschool class for an hour while the teacher was not there! That same day they caught a bus back to the central town, Sibinal. There they were able to walk around the market in the morning and attend a meeting of the project treasurers from 4 communities. The second village they visited was La Vega, a community working with trout farming projects. The group attended more meetings and was able to relax by playing some soccer with the locals. After another cold night sleeping on hard boards, they woke up Friday to ice on the ground. Friday was the day of a large community celebration as well as the inauguration of about 25 houses in 5 communities built after Hurricane Stan. The group was able to share in these exciting community events and projects and learn more about what MCC and the local communities are doing in the region of San Marcos.

-Lindsey Grosh

This past week in Alta Vera Paz was one of joys, struggles, and most of all growth for me. We first traveled to Semesche by cattle truck on Monday. That was interesting because it was raining and I´m not sure you could call the path we drove on a ¨road¨ at least in comparison to what we´re used to back in the states. So there was lots of jerking and bouncing, kind of like a country rollercoaster. Then we finally arrived and were welcomed with warm smiles, giggles, and stares from the community. We were divided up into our families and left to settle.

The first half of our week was spent living with our host families and enjoying communication that consisted of ¨oos¨ (good), ¨bantiox¨(thank you) and of course lots of smiles when we didn´t understand. During the day we also spent time planting trees at different houses in order to help the people of this community gain rights to their land. It was very rewarding to be filling bags with dirt while wearing 24 feet of fabric around my waist, strung up by a string into the native dress they wear  called a corte. We often walked home with dirty hands and nails waiting for the fire to start up in the evening for warmth. Those moments around the fire were some of the most meaningful to me because it was there that I felt the overwhelming feeling of being welcomed into my host family. Although it was present throughout the community, it was here that I saw the beautiful spirit of these people.

On Thursday we set out for a three hour hike to our second community, Sesalche. I don´t know that I have ever had to push myself so hard before. Some of our paths seemed to go up forever and there were certainly times when I wanted just stop. But when we would arrive at the top to see the view,  it was more than worth it. I have never seen anything like it. The endless mountains with the clouds draped across them… I felt like this was God´s way of giving me encouragement to keep going, and after some time we finally arrived.

Once we had finished our first meal at Sesalche, we all headed to the church that was to be our home for the next couple nights. We immediately began pushing the benches together to create our beds and then headed off to the school for an art camp with the kids. Again this was a fun experience because most of us only knew about two words to use to communicate with the kids, but we found that we could learn a lot of new words just by drawing pictures and then pointing as the kids told us the names in K´kchi, their native language. After the art camp we discovered that the kids were not going to let us just walk back to the church. They wanted to play. So we spent the next bit of time playing ¨you´re it!¨ in K´kchi.

The next couple of days were probably some of our hardest. I felt pretty drained from the hike, lack of sleep due to hard wooden boards for beds, and I stopped eating a lot because I wasn´t feeling very good. But despite some of these conditions that we were all experiencing, we were still able to help some of the families with building cages for rabbits and also composting bens. These were a part of the Heffer Project that had been taking place in different communities. In this project families are given different things like animals with the notion that when their animals reproduce, they will then pass the gift on to five more families, and those families to others until everyone that wants to participate is included. It´s a really neat concept and helps the people of these communities take ownership of these movements rather than it being an outsider´s project. So I think we all appreciated being a part of that.

On Saturday we set out for our three hour hike back to Semesche and even planted some trees on the way when we stopped for lunch. When we returned, we were glad to be able to sit and rest for a little bit, even if it was wooden benches that we were sitting on.

The next morning we all went up to the church to attend a wedding that we were invited to. It was definitely a time to see cultural differences. For one, within this culture the men and women are separate which meant that the bride and groom did not know each other before the wedding. This probably would explain why we did not see them smile at each other. The wedding was also the church service and a baby dedication all in one. So we were there for about three hours. But it was definitely a gift to be able to be a part of this sacred tradition, and another example of how welcoming this community was to invite us to this event. After the ceremony we gathered our things and got back on the cattle truck to start our bumpy journey back to Guatemala City.

As I said before, this week of service was one of great growth for me. I got to experience a way of life that was very foreign to me. I was able to learn some new words and repeat some others more times than I would like…Bantiox. I even arrived at a point where Spanish had the comfort of a native language to me! Though it was hard and possibly the farthest from my comfort zone I have ever been, it was an experience that I, and I´m sure the rest of our group would agree, would not change for the world.

-Rebecca Copeland