Travels:  ahhh yes,  missives.    Quetzaltenango.  Xela  (Shayla) as it is commonly called.  Guatemala's scond city.  We are here I think, for a couple of days or more.   Shola recouperating:  both of us redirecting the compass.  After a full two weeks in Todos Santos and a couple of days here we are heading for Lago de Atitlan and a relaxing time in the small village of San Pedro.  At least we are told that it is a wonderful village to visit.  We shall see.   

A few brief sketches at the speed of the city.  Wordbites.  The hostel dorm and rooms are crowded with the young and not so young.  Traveling.  Here for weeks, even months.  Volunteering at everything from treeplanting to hospitals.  Canadians abound. The mostly English language newsletter for the volunteer/activist crowd lists a full want ad style page of volunteer opportunities in and around this interesting city. 

A few stories:

Todos Santos: 

It is morning.  About seven o’clock.  I rise in the cold as there is no sense trying to sleep.  Slip on my sandals.  I had slept in my clothes.  Needed them for warmth.   I head out to say hello to the family I am living with.  From my wood plank and tin roofed lean-to against the earth brick wall of the house.  Stretch.  “Buenos Dias” I offer, looking around and rubbing my arms in the cold morning air. I hear “adios” from around the corner.  Rigoberto, aged 9 and Augustino, 14 are set to head off.  For the day.  Into the mountains.  To collect firewood. Augustino with a sharp machete in hand.  Both clad in their traditional village garb, the only addition for the day, a knotted rope mesh strung over their shoulders.  Down the rocky path between houses they head.  Not adventurers, contributors.  Knowing a job has to be done and ready to do it.  They are off to collect firewood, a sense of purpose written all over their open faces.   

By the end of the afternoon they have returned.  Rigoberto points out the place where they have gone: Across the narrow valley and up one of the trails on the other side, past corn growing on impossible slopes into forested terrain.  He  takes me by the hand to show me his pile of firewood, a mound of twigs and branches collected at a distance of several kilometers from home.  Augostino having carried an  appropriately larger load. 

Multiply that scene hundreds of thousands of times, add trucks with men and chain saws to fell big trees, buck  them  up, deliver them to towns and villages and you have a sense of the nature of the need for cooking fuel and the problem it creates.  The land is becoming deforested.  There is no infrastructure in place and no money to speak of to reforest the hillsides. 

When I think of treeplanting in Canada,  its efficiency and the capability and vision of the working culture surrounding it,  I am overcome by the scale of the problem here and the meagre resources to respond to it.  Not to mention the desperate need for the resource, the attendant ecological consequences of the deforestation from the so precious soils eroding, to the evaporation of species seedstock. 

The government is in some ways perhaps better than any since the peace accords were signed ten years ago, and in some ways, things are worse.  The pressure of development is inexorable. The priorities are urban and run by the business elite.   Money is not available for ground level projects, for simple indigenous lives. And the wounds from the brutal civil war fester unattended by the present regime. 

And what do we discover.  Here in Xela, in the hostel we are living in.- a group from Canada. 

They call themselves project Guatemala woodstoves.  A modestly efficient woodburning stove related to the style known traditionally, yet with a draught encouraging  more complete combustion.  No smoke in the houses.  A few hundred built and installed in village homes in one area.  Another batch set  for this year.  Searching for funding to build  more.   Canadians.  Some even from Calgary. It makes me feel proud.   I tremble to think what could happen if a Canadian treeplanting NGO were formed to work the treeplanting and nursery dynamics needed for effective reforestation.  But it could happen. 

Canadian NGO’s everywhere, and the name of the Canadian government everywhere.  One feels good about what we have done with our vision of a co-operative world.  On our way to Xela, Shola needs antibiotics immediately.  We arise for the bone jarring chicken bus ride up from Todos Santos to Huehuetenengo armed with the name of a respected physician.  A morning in the waiting room and Shola is in to see him just after noon. 

“Ahh Canada” he says with a smile.  He supports community clinics free for the poor. For every 1000 quetzals he puts in the Canadian government puts in 1000 dollars. Gratitude and thanks are written all over his face.  Respect earned. 

Then there is the project run by Cause Canada and funded by CIDA in Todos Santos to increase literacy among women.  Since the project started over ten years ago the literacy rate has gone from under five percent to over fifty. 

We were toasted when we first arrived by some men just because we were Canadians. 

Let’s not forget it.  No matter who we are we can contribute to the building of a more humane world. 

 Love to all
David (aka elfnomad)

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