Taking off from Guatemala

Sitting on the runway at Aurora International Airport in Guatemala City, I have much to reflect on. Looking across the dusty tarmac I see gleaming office buildings and close by their flanks, shacks. As we roll down the runway and lift into the hazy sky, I glimpse open warehouses filled with luxury cars, and just beyond, gray cinderblock dwellings clinging to the sides of steep ravines. The airport has been completely renovated since my last visit more than a decade ago, and the sleek duty-free shops and cafes inside belie the smoggy air and crime that plague this city. As a Safe Passage employee said at our farewell dinner last night in Antigua, as horrific as life can be for the guajeros, there are others in Guatemala City suffering even more dire living conditions in drug-and-gang-ridden areas with no employment opportunities, where working the dump would be an advancement.

I suspect that my reflection process will take some time as I make sense of these past nine days. As one of my companions on this trip mentioned a few hours ago, the challenge will be to avoid sounding self-righteous when speaking of this week with friends and colleagues in the US. My goals in embarking on this journey were to serve those in need, but also to draw attention to the Safe Passage project and the many ways--large and small--that those of us who are fortunate enough to be able to contribute can do so. Serving others, whether in this project or another, does not require international travel or large sums of money. I feel fortunate to be in the position to have gone on this journey, and blessed to have support systems at work and at home.

Friday was our final day at the Safe Passage site in the capital. We visited the adult literacy project (formerly all women but now several men have joined as well). In addition to the empowerment and opportunity that come with learning to read and write, these women--ranging in age from 14 to more than 70--have created a jewelry-making cooperative. Using materials culled from the Zone 3 garbage dump, the women create beautiful jewelry items for sale. In addition to benefiting individually from the sale of their creations, women working in this project learn business skills that will serve them in the future if they move into the formal workplace environment. In the short term, the income from jewelry sales has permitted several of the women to reduce the hours spent working in the dump, and even leave the dump altogether. If handled properly--the cooperative has a board of directors drawn from its membership, and there is discussion of teaching the women financial literacy and money management skills--the jewelry money will likely have a direct and dramatic impact on many families' quality of life.

Yesterday (Saturday) we accompanied twelve of the elementary students to an amusement park/zoo/water park in Guatemala City. On the way we stopped at McDonald's where students ate breakfast and climbed on the indoor play structures. Seeing the bright plastic tubes and bubbles and slides of the playground, one boy shouted, "Look at all these colors!" At the amusement park, students swam, rode a model train and mini-rollercoaster, and ate lunch. I noticed that many students finished only part of their lunch, carefully packing the rest away to take home. During the entire day trip I didn't hear any students complain, even when a boy was not permitted to enter the pool area due to lack of appropriate bathing suit, or when a girl cut her head exiting the rollercoaster. There are many lessons to be learned from these kids' outlooks on life.

Last night we attended our farewell dinner, which included having each service team member present a written note to another member whose name they had drawn from a hat the day before. The comments were thoughtful, comical, and moving, and each of us is returning home to the US with a small but significant reminder of the kind words of friends.