Jerald and Tina in Guatemala

From Guatemala to Nicaragua . . . oops Costa Rica

2008-08-25T14:39:00.000-07:00

So we finished our year in San Miguel Chicaj.

Nothing certain was planned when we left on the 1st of August, apart from travelling to Nicaragua to see what was there. So far we have had a great time visiting the touristy and some very beautiful places in Nicaragua. Also as I had to renew my visa we headed to Costa Rica to visit some friends Jerald worked with right before we met. It just so happened that they were off to repair the roof of a church at Playa Manzanillo (a very beautiful beach) the next day so we took advantage of the free transport and board for a little bit of work and headed off with them.

You can find some photos of our trip here for Nicaragua and Costa Rica.

Anyway as we have shared previously we are wanting to get involved with RescueNet. The YWAM bases here in Costa Rica have also been wanting to start a similar sort of ministry - being available to help following disasters. So we thought we would head back here to help out at least until December. The base we will work with is located in Bambu/BriBri . . .

Bambu, labeled on traditional maps as Bratsi, is reached by following the Suretka River, about 30 minutes into the reservation from the main indigenous community of Bribri. A good deal of the way as you're passing alongside the river, youll see Panama directly on the opposite side of the riverbank.

The Bribri were the original people of the Talamanca region, living in the mountains and Caribbean coastal areas of Costa Rica and northern Panama. They live very simply, the majority without electricity or running water. They subsist primarily on agriculture.

Most Bribri are extremely isolated and have their own language. This has allowed them to maintain a rich indigenous culture relatively untouched by western civilization. However their isolation has also caused them to have poor education and health care, not to mention the lowest income per capita in the country.

YWAM Talamanca has some photos of the community, the base is involved with NIKO wilderness camps, raising up local churches, construction, micro-enterprise, occasional medical outreaches and working in conjunction with the local Red Cross.

At the moment we are visiting Matagalpa, where Jerald grew up and we have caught up with some of his extended family and friends here. Tomorrow we head back to the capital and then on to Costa Rica.

Slideshow of our dental clinics.

2008-07-29T15:19:00.001-07:00

Dental Outreach

2008-07-29T11:53:00.000-07:00

Last week we were joined by Bill and Peggy Pratt, Luke their grandson and a family friend Kelsey all from Washington along with Jacobo and Janet Pineda from here in Guatemala.

Bill is a dentist and Jacobo is a medical doctor so we spent 8 days running clinics in three separate communities. We spent 4 days in Chicholom where we visit weekly already to have medical clinics or visit houses and pray. Plans are now in progress to start a dental monitoring program there with some of the children.

Chacalte is a neighbouring community where we had never visited but often patients come from there to our clinics in Chicholom, we spent 1 and 1/2 days here before travelling back to San Miguel Chicaj (our home town) and finishing off with one day in Javalliel/Bramadero a community were YWAM San Miguel hopes to work in the future as well.

We had so much fun as Janet and Jacobo can hardly say a sentence without making a joke and Jerald was kept busy harassing and being harassed by Luke and Kelsey (both 15).

It was nice to meet Bill and Peggy who travel extensively and use a lot of their time to run dental clinics here in Guatemala as well as in Mongolia and Ecuador among other countries. A highlight of the week was seeing Bill piggyback Peggy (both 71) over the stream which had risen in just two days and covered the stepping stones we usually use. Unfortunately I did not get a photo and the following day we found a new way across.

It is sad that it is the last time we will visit Chicholom - the first time I stayed here for 2 weeks running a health clinic at the beginning of 2005. It was so cold you could see your breath even in the middle of the day. But the past week was the perfect way to finish our time here in San Miguel Chicaj.

This Sunday we will be all packed up and heading out for some time in Nicaragua. I will keep you updated on what happens.

RescueNet

2008-06-09T10:41:00.001-07:00

To Oregon and Back

2008-05-20T13:00:00.000-07:00

RescueNet is a disaster relief training program - With the purpose of teaching you how to meet a crisis with the love of God through; First aid/CPR, Search & Rescue, Fire Suppression, Disaster Counseling, Disaster Child Care, and Refugee Reception. They then take what you have learned and place you in multiple scenarios to see how you will respond with the tools you have been taught. To finish off we had a written test and a final scenario that took us 3.5 hours to finish - finding and removing 12 people from a 3 storey building following an earthquake.

As with finances for healthcare the world over, a large amount is used to benefit a small amount of the population - often in a disaster 10% of the people affected actually receive assistance while 90% are left to fend for themselves. Even more horrifying is that peadophiles were the first people to enter Indonesia following the Tsunami in 2004 and that Aid workers have been known to sexually abuse women and children

RescueNet is currently building up teams to be able to show Gods love in possibly the worst day of a persons life. The founder of RescueNet completed the IPHC here in Guatemala (with our current director as his leader). Rescue Net not only has this training, but also already responds to disasters all over the world including Pakistan (earthquake), Iraq (War) Honduras (Hurricane) among others.

Here are some pictures of our last 3 weeks. The participants

Practice getting about in small spaces, entering under the deck we had to find a 'missing person' and radio in.

Learning about assessing a victim.

We are really glad we had the opportunity to complete this training and are looking for avenues to continue learning more about this area of work. I don't have any photos yet of the scenarios but I will put some up when they get sent.

Our next project

2008-04-17T07:00:00.000-07:00

So we have been thinking about doing some training with RescueNet (another ministry of YWAM) which is taking place in Oregon from May 3-18. Initially we had just applied so Jerald would be able to go but after being apart for the majority of 6 weeks during the healthcare school outreach we thought it might be something we could do together.

Jerald has been visiting the Red Cross in Coban (close to where we were for clinic on outreach) to complete a first aid course as part of the pre-requisites.

Anyway yesterday we found out we had been accepted - we also found out that Jeralds current visa is not specific enough to allow him to enter the US for this training. So the week prior to May 3rd we are planning to travel to Nicaragua to apply for the correct visa - this does not allow too much time to get an appointment at the embassy but we are not able to leave any earlier.

We are really looking foward to taking part in this training, so hopefully everything will fall into place.

WORLD FAMOUS

2008-04-17T06:48:00.000-07:00

The Buzzy Bee, world famous right here in Guatemala!

The real Latino football experience

2008-04-02T15:42:00.000-07:00

This is a small game between two regions in Guatemala - not even on a full size soccer field.

well first of all I had to make Jerald a hat since he doesn't like the sun and he had graciously given me his hat so I wouldn't get burnt.

Just the usual amount of security which apparantly is necessary if the away team wins or if the refs make a bad call which causes the away team to win or if the away team just outplays the home team.

Upset home supporters throwing rocks and threatening the referees

The home team capitan came out after about 30 minutes to placate his supporters - eventually most went away although some stayed to throw rocks at them when the refs eventually made a run for thier exit.

2008-01-15T14:27:00.001-08:00

My most favourite part of my job

2008-01-15T11:40:00.000-08:00

Is getting to find out what happened to patients who have passed through our previous clinics. I wrote during my last post that we had returned to Pacux (we had our first clinic there in 2005) - I put up some photos of one of the families we had seen previously (some twins that were a little delayed in their develpment) the day after the last post we returned to our clinic in Pacux and a little girl - Blanca (about 3 1/2 years old) came through. We had seen her three years ago when she was only a few months old and had recently travelled to the city to undergo surgery to correct a bilateral cleft lip.

However when the time of the surgery arrived they informed the mother surgery could not go ahead as she had a chest infection and this needed to be cleared up. I am unsure why the hospital did not prescribe or provide the antibiotics. Anyway when she passed through we were able to give her some antibiotics and it was so wonderful to be able to find out that she did eventually undergo surgery succesfully.

This clinic (3 years later) she returned with her mother with a foreign object up her nose, but other than that healthy and very well behaved.

FELIZ NAVIDAD Y ANO NUEVO

2008-01-05T07:06:00.000-08:00

Well this year seems to have gone quite rapidly, and to me it feels like we have been back in Guatemala far longer than the almost 4 months since we left NZ. Since I last wrote we have kept ourselves busy. Jerald helped staff an SST which would be similiar to a 2 week long youth camp with 1 week theory and 1 weel practical helping local churches/ministries. With the healthcare school we have completed 2 clinics. Currently (two days last week and 3 days next week) we are running a clinic in Pacux (http://advocacynet.org/resource/854 - has a report on what happened in this area during the early 80's during the civil war) which is where I stayed for 1 month during my school 3 years ago and it has been great recognizing and hearing stories from the people in that community. We had planned just to complete 2 days of clinic there but there has been quite a lot of patients we have had to turn away each day so we are extending our time there.

For Christmas we spent the first few days of our holiday finishing up the wooden chest we started a few months ago. Christmas day we decided to go exploring and found a nearby waterfall, at the cafe there I had a whole turkey leg in Kak'ik (traditional Guatemala soup) and Jerald had a whole grilled fish it was a really good Christmas dinner for about $7 each. Then Boxing day we headed off to Belize because I have to renew my visa. Prior to leaving we had visited the Belizean Embassy in Guatemala City (since it is about a 12 hour trip one way) and they had assured us that Nicaraguans did not need visas. However the immigration officer at the border to Belize decided we needed one and informed us we could buy one for $100 - when I heard that I said 'far out we don't have that much' however she thought I said something else that starts with an f sound and ends with a tch sound so we were taken to her supervisor and I was told off for abusing her staff, which I denied- at this stage I was just thoroughly frustrated because it felt like we were in a Ricki Lake show - 'She said that you said ..... , oh yes you did did mami you called me a ....., why are you lying' so I decided that we were not in fact entering Belize. I had already had my passport stamped - as Jerald was behind me. So I just had to pay my departure fee from Belize and we went on our way back to Guatemala.

The next few months will includes some visiting teachers for the healthcare school mid January the midwife Tammy will be coming for 2 weeks (1 week theory and 1 week of women's cinics at the healthcare post here in San Miguel Chicaj) and we will complete an extended outreach of 6 weeks for the healthcare school (finishing 4th April), Jerald will be organising an outreach for a visiting DTS in the next few weeks and taking more time to improve the communication/updates here at the base to keep people more up to date with what is happening and to be able to plan effectively for teams that come through to visit or work.

Hope you enjoy the photos, Jerald and Tina.

Delayed update de Jeraldcito y Tinita.

2007-11-25T08:56:00.000-08:00

?Como les va?

Well I thought I would send out an update, since I have been particularly slack in that area up until today, my excuses are: firstly there wasn’t anything exciting enough to write home about apart from that we began the school and I was involved with general organization of the 9 students and teaching some classes.

However in the 4th week of the school we came upon dental week which is always very interesting both the theory week where students practice injecting each other and then outreach week where we run a clinic and practice on the locals. We spent 2 days in Chicholom - a very very cold village up in the mountains – we had to wrap blankets around the patients to stop them shivering and we all had multiple layers of clothing on 24 hrs a day, the rest of the week we spent in San Miguel.

Following dental week we had one more week back in the classroom then this week just gone we teamed up with Dr Jacobo from the city to run a medical clinic about 30 min from where we live. So the last few weeks my excuse for not writing is that I have been busy with packing and restocking both the dental and pharmacy supplies and the general extra organization that is required to take 17 people out to a remote village to run a clinic, oh along with the Thanskgiving dinner for 40 guests on Thursday the 23rd.

Two really encouraging things for myself have been, during our dental week we were joined by Milton (the oldest son of a local man we work with here) and Jeremias (a nurse we worked with during the last school outreach) for both the lecture and outreach phase, so now they are able to take those skills and use them for educating people about oral hygiene and perform cleanings in the communities where they live on a more regular basis, it was so encouraging to see Rabinal Achi people in our classroom because that is the aim of the school to educate those in the spanish speaking community for whom the opportunities to learn at a tertiary level is not easily attainable.

Secondly during our medical outreach week with Dr Jacobo a team visited from the States to install a water purification plant – this is exciting for me because 3 years ago when I visited Los Encuentros for my outreach this village had the plan or vision to build a school (the government would not assist as there was a school in the neighbouring village however it was not large enough as the community had since extended) and a pure water source. So over the past 3 years the community has sourced the finances and put in the hard work to build the school and with the professional contacts of Dr Jacobo have now assisted with installing a water purification system (solar powered!!) in thier village. It is very encouraging and humbling as well to see God’s faithfulness. This village is part of the CHE (community health envangelism) programme that we run along with Dr Jacobo.

So the last 3-4 weeks have been particularly busy for myself and the next 2 at least will be really busy for Jerald because tonight up to 15 youth will arrive to start the SST (in English Summer of service and training in Spanish Salvos a tomar accion or ‘Saved to serve and take action’) it is in non ’YWAM’ a two week camp made up of 1 week of lectures on topics such as – The fatherheart of God, Motives of the heart, Idols etc. Followed by 1 week of outreach serving the community and local churches in practical ways and street evangelism through dances and dramas. They are planning to go further north to Coban to complete the outreach so he will be away for 1 week. Along with that I have been keeping Jerald busy with constructing furniture for our room, we already have the block and plank of wood shelves taken from the example of the Bull’s and the Powells, I also have a very solid good looking coffee table that Jerald built with a little of my assistance a few weeks ago and yesterday we started making a chest to go at the end of the bed so I can finally have some storage – it is looking a bit bigger then I expected but I think we will paint it black since that has a slimming effect. Either way I don’t think it will be finished until at least after the SST.

So apart from that Christmas is coming up in the healthcare school we will be running clinics just before and just after the students go on their vacation, I need to leave the country to renew my visa in that time also we will likely either go to Belize (which borders Guatemala - close but a bit more expensive) or Nicaragua (further away - 18hrs - but cheaper to stay).

So I hope you are all well and wish you a spectacular Christmas/New Years period.

Que tengan un buen dia!!

2007-10-03T17:47:00.000-07:00

So we arrived. After a brief stop in L.A and a quick trip to Santa Monica Beach where we met up with one of our friends and went out for dinner.
Last night I realised it has actually been less than a month since we arrived, feels like a lot longer. Here are some pictures to show where we are living.

This is the view down into the neighbours yard. There are a range of types of houses here in San Miguel Chicaj, this is made of dirt brick and has a dirt floor. Some houses are made of block with concrete floors and tin rooves. The house that we rent as the main house where we have classes and eat meals is red brick with tile floors internal bathrooms, at the moment we (Jerald and I)are the only people living at this house so we practically have our own house with a nice bedroom and an ensuite - the shower only works for about 1 hr each day when the town water supply is on, otherwise it is bucket baths - but since it is so hot this is quite refreshing. When teachers or visitors come they will stay in the extra bedroom here.

In our yard is an almond tree, you can eat them straight from the ground, they are a bit slimy inside but have the same taste. 

It was all action the past week in San Miguel as they celebrated the patron Saint, there were parades of people and animals, fireworks at 4.30am, temporary bars set up in all the streets and a ferris wheel in the park. Now I am not so stupid to go on a dismantable ferris wheel in a third world country but my friend did - she actually had bruises from having to hold on so tight due to the speed that it was being run at.

Since we arrived Tina has been preparing for the school (students arrive tomorrow) and Jerald has been super busy fixing the electrcity and lights, bathrooms and other general handyman tasks in the 3 houses that we rent here. He will be returning tomorrow from his trip to Nicaragua, he now has a Nicaraguan license and was able to catch up with friends and family since he had been away for over a year.

Keep you posted, Jerald and Tina.