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Not in Kansas Anymore!

Well since it has been a pretty full week with countless changes, I figured it was about time to update you all on the happenings of my Guatemalan life. Perhaps we should take this piecewise…

1.) Travels: After a couple of full days packing, I finally got the heck out of Minnesota! Success #1. All my travels went just swimmingly all the way to my new home for the next 9 months. Jose Luis, from Asosiación Vida (the organization I will be working for this year), was waiting for me right outside the airport when I arrived around 9:30, and it was about 1 hour and 45 minutes to get back to Patzún. We pretty much covered a good amount of the small talk topics during the drive…including, “What sports do you like?” I told him I had been a runner for several years in the US and had done a few marathons in recent years. Big mistake! He got somewhat excited and told me that there was going to be a 10-mile race in Patzún that Sunday and that I should run it. Crap! More on that later… In any case, my host parents, Francisco and Margarita, were waiting for me when I got there. They showed me around their home and then showed me to my room. It´s a great house, very open, and I think I am going to be very comfortable there.
2.) My Host Family: They´re wonderful! In addition to my host parents, I´ve got 5 younger sisters and one younger brother. Zuly is the oldest at 18, and Misael is my 2-year-old little brother. They´re taking great care of me and Margarita is a total rockstar, prepearing special food to help my stomach ease into the Guatemalan diet. Francisco used to work for WorldVision for a number of years. Zuly(18) only lives with us on the weekends and is otherwise studying in Antigua to be a teacher. Karla (16) and Débora(12) are always helping me out around the house. Séfora (8) is constantly smiling. Analis (6) is constantly following me around the house and has told me at lest 4 times so far that she is turning 7 next month. And then Misael (2) runs up to me whenever I get home and gives me a hug. We´re still trying to teach him my name so far, but one thing at a time.
3.) The Race! So, even though my stomach was pretty uneasy the first couple days and I didn´t have much appetite, I decided to do the race. I went with some guys from church to the Municipality to register for the race, and…get this…they had a separate category for foreigners (not sure that´s necessary seeing as how only saw one other American in the 2400-person race). The race started in the next city and I was told that there would be transport over to the starting line. At this point, I´m imagining buses, but the reality was so much better than a bus. All of a sudden, all these guys started chasing after this huge truck that is usually used to transport mass quantities of vegetables to markets. When it finally stopped, a couple of guys scaled this monster of a truck and opened up the grate on the back. We all climbed in and packed in like sardines. Someone finally closed the grate and a whole bunch of other guys jumped on either to ride on top or hang off the side. It was hot and sweaty, people were laughing and cursing at each other left and right, and it was total craziness…but definitely my most memorable ride in a vegetable truck to date. The race itself was great too! I laughed a good amount throughout the race because people would point at me from the side lines and yell one of three things…1. a gringo!, 2.) canche! (which means blond hair), or 3.) any one of the 5 English phrases they know. All in all, it was good times.
4.) My Internship: I´ll be spending the next few weeks figuring out exactly what I will be doing this year, but so far, it´s been a really good experience. Dr. Axel Suquen is the clinic´s director and as soon as I met him I knew I would like him. He is very passionate about the work of the clinic in the community, he loves Patzún and all the people here, and he is full of positive energy. I think I am going to learn a lot from him this year. Yesterday, I went with two other AV workers out to some of the surrounding villages. After yesterday, I am inclined to think that this is going to be the most difficult part of my internship here. One stop on our tour of 5 villages was to Tesoro to visit and bring medicine for a 2-year-old girl who was just released from the hospital last Friday for malnourishment. The house was made of sticks, mud, and a nylon tarp for a roof. When we came up to the house, the girl´s mom came outside and we sat and talked with her for a few minutes waiting for her husband to return from the fields. When the clinic gives out medicine, we try to keep records of who the medicine is going to and get an idea of what their situation is like. For this family, the mom is 20, the dad is 23, and they have a 6-year-old, a 2-year-old, and the mom is going to have another baby next month. Plus, the dad´s parents live with them. They have no bathroom, and our best guess is that the entire family lives on about 8 bucks per week. It´s really no wonder that this little girl had a big belly, skinny little arms and legs with loose skin, and a big forehead. It´s going to take some time for me to know exactly how to respond to these situations when I see them. But, this is why I am here.
5.) Prayer Requests!
a. Pray for people living in the villages. Life is hard there and AV is really undertaking a difficult task trying to fix the structures that keep these people poor.
b. This has been kind of a funky season with inconsistent rain. Farmers need rain for their crops to grow. If their crops fail this year, they don´t eat next year and there will be more suffering. In large part, it really is that simple. Pray for rain.
c. Pray for me as I get used to my new surroundings. Bit by bit, I am getting more used to the diet here, but it will still take some time. Also, readjusting to the language is proving more frustrating than I thought it would be. And last but not least, pray that I would continue to get to know people here and make some good friends.
d. Give thanks for a great start so far!
I´ll try to post some pictures this weekend. ¡Hasta la proxima!
GRACE and PEACE,
Erik

I Guate Get Outta Here!!

¡Hola a todos!

Well, this Friday (9/18) I’ll be traveling to Patzún, Guatemala to spend the next nine months working for Asociación Vida (AV). Just two days prior to my departure, I am learning that no packing list is comprehensive enough for the unexpected. I have been in contact with the clinic’s director these last couple of months, but some of the more nitty-gritty details—such as where I am going to live and whether or not there will be someone at the airport to pick me up this Friday—have yet to be resolved. I suppose we’ll call those my first prayer requests.

AV is a medical, dental, and public health clinic sponsored by an organization called the Luke Society. Though the Luke Society is a global organization headquartered out of Sioux Falls, SD, their clinics are all run by nationals. I have traveled quite a bit throughout Latin America before; but this time, for the first time, I will not be insulated by a group of Americans. In fact, to my knowledge, I’ll be the only American working at AV. I don’t know exactly what my role will be there, but I do feel that this opportunity is one that the Lord has been preparing me for the past few years. At Wheaton, I blended together a biology major with cultural studies to learn about health beliefs and healthcare delivery in different parts of the world. In large part, I decided to pursue this opportunity hoping these next nine months will breathe life into things I have spent so much just reading about.

 I do know that Patzún is a highland community about an hour and a half west of Guatemala City by car. Many residents in the region would identify themselves as “Cakchiquel” (a Mayan ethnicity), and in fact this population forms a considerable chunk of the patient base AV serves. Wheaton’s Human Needs and Global Resources (HNGR) program has sent several interns to this site before, so they are fairly familiar with “Wheaties.” Assuming my internship will follow roughly the same structure as previous internships, I will spend the first 2-4 weeks learning about the focus of the AV, familiarizing myself with Patzún, and comparing my skill set with the needs of the clinic. From there, I will sit down with the clinic director, Dr. Axel Suquen, and we will select an area to begin designing a project.

I hope to be updating this blog on somewhat of a regular basis, but that too remains to be determined. Also, I would love to hear from all of you! I’m told I will have consistent access to email, so keep me up to speed on all the happenings in your neck of the woods. More than any of that however, check up on this blog for my prayer requests. For starters, my prayer as I prepare for this year is that the Lord would teach me more about how I can spend my life serving the Gospel and my fellow man. And with that, we’ll continue this conversation once I get “down south.”

GRACE and PEACE,

Erik