Celebration in Las Cuevas on March 23

At the beginning of March we received a call from Santos Lares from a small ABC community called las Cuevas.  Santos was calling because he was excited about an opportunity that was presented to the church, he just had no idea how to go forward.  The community leaders had approached him asking his church to lead the community in a thanksgiving service for 23 years of incorporation as a community, for the school, for having the first year classes of middle school and for the project of potable water for each individual house. 

In Guatemala, this is a huge opportunity and requires various participants of which they do not have many in this small congregation.  So he called asking for assistance to lead this service for the community.  We had the privilege of helping him organize this service and many churches and individuals came forward to donate their time for this endeavor.  We had to work out not having electricity, getting a sound system, finding speakers and song leaders for leading a thanksgiving worship to the Lord.  That can be difficult when you do not normally worship with a band and most others who get invited for these types of events do.  As you can imagine, it would be a little strange for someone to be up front doing a solo with others who do not know the songs. 

Thanks to Gaspar, Manuel, and Tomas were able to schedule 3 speakers - Jacinto from Mactzul II, Anastacia from Pacaja Xesic and Martin from Choacaman and also the singing groups of Voces Acapella and the men's singing group from Mactzul V to travel out to the small town of Las Cuevas.  Some for a couple of nights and some for just the long day. 

The community and the governing leaders expressed their gratitude for the spirit of volunteerism that exists in the church.  Hopefully, as a church body, we were able to demonstrate how we can honor God in all that we do and share in the thanksgiving of the Las Cuevas community.

Here are some pictures:

Santos giving the welcome 

 Jacinto

 Local Mayor

 Local Community leader

 Voces Acapella and Mactzul V singing group in front - with Josue, previous health promoter and scholarship student came to participate.

Anastascio

Leading worship

Men's group from Mactzul V

 The Cave that Las Cuevas gets its name from!

   Men's group from Mactzul V

We are sorry we missed out on the fun, but thought it  best not to draw attention to the gringos.

Dental Program

This last year we were blessed by the addition of our newest dentist, Dr. Sandra Aldana and her assistant Maria Chan to our previously two-man team of Dr. Marcos Lux and Martina Sente.  With this expansion we have been able to take monthly mobile dental teams to almost all of our communities.  Not only that, we have had the blessing to add mobile equipment to do fillings as well. 


Dr. Marcos Lux and Martina Sente in Chimente

Dra. Sandra Aldana and Maria Chan in Mactzul V

This is a great benefit for the rural population who prefer to pull a tooth rather than pay a third of a day's wage just to get to our central clinic and still have to pay for the filling.  The numbers of patients requesting fillings has really increased since we started.

Cesar Quino our ABC Coordinator holding a mirror up for Jose to see where he missed in brushing.

 Now our goal is to use our great dental team and their top-notch assistants to get all of our ABC kids evaluated on dental hygeine/brushing technique.  They are able to examine and give an objective score on the percentage of surfaces not adequately brushed. 

Tomas Sente one of the volunteers in Mactzul I teaching a family about dental hygiene.

 

Nicolas also showing the kids and moms how to properly brush.

 

This is crucial data as it allow us to triage our kids and prioritize those with good scores for restorative care, and continue encouaging those with bad scores to improve.  We have seen so many kids over the years, that after a couple of years after a filling already have new cavities (sometimes severe) in the same tooth.

Deisy brushing mom's teeth

We have talked over and over with kids and moms and dads and churches as a whole about the need for good dental hygeine and now we are putting our money where our mouth is! 



Mom brushing Elias' teeth in Mactzul II

Since January, with the help of visiting dentists and teams, we have gone out to the communities and seen 80% of the 356  kids  in the program, spending time with each individual family to show them what bad oral hygiene and good brushing look like. The parents also have to particate in the food dye activity if they still had teeth. Then everyone practices brushing their own teeth and each others'. 



Nelson brushing Mom's teeth in Mactzul II

I want to thank Kemmel for his tireless focus on the kids' dental hygiene.   He has a vision for them and their families to have good dental health and to be able to teach their own kids the same one day.   I know he feels like a broken record sometimes, but we are starting to see progress!  And thanks to our dental team of Dr. Marcos Lux, Martina Sente, Dra. Sandra Aldana and Maria Chan and all the volunteers who have helped this year--you guys are making a difference.



Happy Holy Week

It's Holy Week in Guatemala, which means time for reflection, processions (see Sheri's blog on Antigua's festivities), worship, travel and relaxation.  Kemmel and I are taking an administrative retreat--working on plans for the coming months, hashing out new ideas, catching up on research and reading all in the beautiful comfort and solitude of Santa Cruz La Laguna.  We have a favorite casita that we like to visit and were in luck this week that someone backed out of their reservation at the last minute!  Yesterday we got settled in after driving to Panajachel and parking the Suzuki and hauling our goods to the boat dock.  We joined 30 other passengers plus the captain and his assistant in the tiny vessel headed to various towns around the lake.  Thankfully we made it without capsizing.  We spent the rest of the afternoon hiking around town (mostly lakeside casitas and huge European mansions), then enjoyed a plate of humus and some smoothies.  The evening was rounded off with light dinner and catching up on American Idol and The Bible series.  This morning Kemmel enjoyed a swim in the lake, which according to him is "not cold at all!"  I'm doubtful.  Today we will work on some projects we have cooking and then head out for a hike to another favorite hotel/restaurant Lomas de Tzununa for a late lunch.  Tranquilo!

Driving to Panajachel

Panajachel has come alive--lots of people, food, drink, festivity!

The Suzuki tucked in at the Parqueo for the week.

Man, this boat was FULL!  I was making mental note of where the 4 life vests were...

Our getaway for the week--oh so nice!

View of the Lake from our covered patio.

That Lochness Monster-like blip out there is Kemmel doing his laps in the 75 degree water.

Farewell Dr. Romano!

 Today was the last day for our Dr. Ruben Romano.  He has served with us for two years as a Bates Scholarship recipient.  And now he and his wife Sandra will be returning to Nicaragua to start their residency training in orthopedics and anesthesiolgy, respectively.  It was a sad and exciting day for us to see him go and start this new chapter in his life.  Thanks Dr. Ruben for you hard work and service to the people here in the cold Altiplano!  And may God guide you through the coming years.

Enrique,  Dr. Ruben and Tomas



One last pic together.  Until we meet again!

On Mission With Harding University

 

Our week has been shared with a great team from the Harding Univeristy PA school, Pharmacy School and some pre-med students. They jumped right in from the start as we tackled our well-child check-ups for the ABC kiddos. We were also pretty ambitious this year and tried spreading out the team over several more communities, and for the most part it worked great! We covered 14 different clinics in 4 days! The students have been doing vital signs, nutrition assessment, physical exams and basic labs and pharmacy. They also took on the very important task of one-on-one hand washing and teeth brushing demonstrations with their patients. We had some very long days, but thanks to this team and their supervising providers, Gary Hill, P.A., Eric Dahl, M.D. and Dannie Middleton, M.D., we covered 8 of our 11 ABC communities and more than 250 kids! Great job! In addition to working with our wonderful staff and visiting team, we were joined by Dra. Josefina Lux, donating her time as well this week. She is a blessing to this ministry still and loved by her patients.

 

Dr. Middleton with Jaime

 

Say "Ahhhh"

Gary Hill with Lauren and Joe translating.

Drew getting vitals on Erica

Hyejin and Alyssa selling drugs!

Me and Josefina in Xepocol

Happy International Women's Day

Around the world Today is recognized as International Women's Day.  I'm not sure I take time often enough to be thankful for the liberties I have enjoyed as an American women from a Christian family married to a faithful Christian man.  But today in clinic I sat with a patient who always brings her kids for sick visits and even well-checks.  She is not a Christian, but told me today how much appreciated the clinic and the church for opening its doors, and has often wanted to come to worship services.  However, her in-laws (who are tradtional Mayan worshipers) made it clear that she could pack her bags and leave (without her children) if she dared to do so.  I felt so sad for her as we prayed together.  She said she prays to God every day and knows that he hears her. I told her I would pray for her and her family, that one day she would feel free to follow Christ. 
So today I am thankful to God for my life and for permitting me to enjoy freedom to learn, worship, marry whom I pleased and speak my mind.  And I pray that I don't take it for granted especially when working with women that don't enjoy these freedoms.

Some of the wonderful ladies we get to work with (L-R Sheri, Maria, Cecibel, Me, Maury)

Culinary Adventures--Cacao

This country has a lot to offer in the culinary arena. There is an abundance of fresh fruit and vegetables at very reasonable prices. 


Broccoli about $0.50 a head, potatoes $0.25 a pound, avocados $0.12 each, tomatoes $0.25 a pound, cabbage as big as your head for $0.35, bell peppers at $0.25 ea.). 

Due to lack of refrigeration, most people are accustomed to making things from scratch--time consuming but healthier. I try my best to use fresh ingredients because the packaged stuff is expensive and not as good.  But, as a normal American, I get the craving for good desserts and buy a lot of my baking ingredients in the Capital where you can find import products and finer local products (like brown sugar, corn syrup, chocolate chips, baking chocolate, flavoring extracts, nuts). 

But this year, I decided to make a chocolate pudding cake for Kemmel's birthday. Unfortunately it requires cocoa powder. I looked everywhere and could not get my hands on it, so I decided to venture out into the raw cacao world. Guatemala is a major producer of cacao and prepared chocolate for hot drinks, but does not produce unsweetend baking chocolate or cocoa powder. 

Fresh cacao with the seeds still in the pulp

So I bought some raw cacao beans $2.50/lb, toasted them on the stove top till they quit popping, cooled them, peeled the shells off and ground them in my coffee grinder. I soon learned that they gunk up your grinder if not very cold. So I dumped the whole bowl of beans (nibs) and chunks coarse meal into the freezer for an hour and re-ground them. I ended up with a medium-fine powder, like ground coffee and used that in my recipe (measure for measure). 

Dried raw cacao toasting.



Toasted peeled cacao (nibs)

Papershells after peeling

Ground cacao

The chocolate pudding cake recipe turned out great (according to Kemmel and Sheri--I don't like chocolate!) and was not crunchy or gritty.  Apparently this type of product is pretty high dollar in the States, so I was proud.  The nibs as they are called can also be coarsely broken up and used as chocolate chips if you like the bitter flavor or used in other recipes.  I think I will be packaging some of my product for Christmas presents this year!  Especially since coffee prices are on the way up--that's a post for another time.

Missionary Journeys

We spend a lot of our time working with 22 communities (most within a 1-hr. radius from our home), offering medical and dental services through the local churches. This opens doors for future prayer and counseling and home visitation and evangelism. But sometimes we get to take part in new outreach clinics and visitation/encouragement in new areas. This last week we added two new clinics to our schedule and had good turnout and reception from the community. We also joined forces with a group of leaders from local churches who are evangelizing an area in the Department of Baja Verapaz about 4 hours from here. There are several new Christians in the area and these leaders are working to help them organize their worship services and teach Bible. This is an area that we hope to expand to in the future, so they may be clinic ministry partners one day. These same church leaders will be heading out to Las Cuevas this month to help out with a community-wide worship service that the town council asked the church there to host, to give thanks to God for many blessings they have had this year in their town.  It's great to be co-missionaries with these faithful brothers!  Here are some pictures of the trip to Baja Verapaz and Joyabaj areas they visited.

Meeting and praying with the church in Cubulco, Baja Verapaz

New church building in Cubulco



"The Church of Christ Meets Here"  Xepepen, Joyabaj, El Quiche

Xepepen members at the Bible class



How beautiful the feet...

Fellowship time in Xepepen