parque central

Here are a few snaps of the Central Park in the Historic District, 1, in Guatemala City on a typically blue skied day.

breakdance

HELLO 2009

Hey, All of the interns are back in Guatemala City beginning work after the holiday vacation. We all did different things for the holidays. Christina went to Vancouver. Tasa went to Minnesota, and Alana went to El Salvador and Belize. It was refreshing for me to reconnect with loved ones and I feel refreshed to start my internship, speak Spanish, and get to work on the last leg of our journey here. In five short weeks we will be done our internship in Guatemala. Everyone at the CONAVIGUA and MOJOMAYAS office is still trickling in from the holidays and the city is a lot more empty and tranquil. We live near a busy street where there it is constantly cars honking and the smell of pollution; however, it’s nice to be back in the city. It’s a hot 25 degrees Celsius out which is very different from the cold negative 2 snowy weather of Vancouver. It will certainly be good to be back on the Westcoast when all the flowers are starting to bloom on the cherry trees.

view from the window in my apt.

This week I went to the office to say hello to the Mojomayas who are starting to come back into the city. We saw Efrain and Letty on the first day and Alfonso and Juana on the second day. Juana came back for CONAVIGUA’s Junta Directiva meeting, which began today and ends tomorrow. On Friday the MOJOMAYAS have their team meeting where we will be discussing the events and issues of the month. We want to discuss our work plan including: giving the Mojomayas a workshop about Aboriginal History and Relationships with the Canadian Government, a community visit with one of the Mojomayas, and an English lesson. We have five weeks left in our internship and we want to make the last five count! We also plan to do some good traveling on the weekends before we leave because we have only traveled to Monterrico, Puerto Barrios, and Antigua on our own. It’ll be good to see the beautiful landscape that Guatemala has to offer. I want to go to: Semuc Champey, Tikal, Lago de Atitlan, Lago de Izabal, Rabinal, Rio Dulce, and Coban. Probably won’t be able to see all those places but a girl can dream… and try!

december post

we're still alive and well. in good health. etc etc.

this past weekend we participated in our first "reflection weekend" with the break the silence network interns with jackie and caren facilitating. we talked a lot about how our internship was going, set some more goals for the future, and a tentative date for the last reflection weekend that we would be taking part in in january because we will be gone by the middle of february. our reflection weekend took part in a beautiful house in antigua with five cats, a garden, television, hot showers, and the most gorgeous kitchen i've seen in guatemala. antigua is a city full of dust, older historical architecture, petty crime, and tourism. it was the first time that many of the interns visited antigua but it was a good glimpse of the point of reference that many people see guatemala as being as a reality. we rarely get to take part in tourist activities because are busy with work but i enjoyed the time away from reality in antigua. we also got to see what the break the silence interns are doing around guatemala: a brief coles notes version is that one is into permiculture working in the lago de atitlan, another dude is working for the international human rights court of the americas in rabinal, another woman is working to set-up a nurses-assistance program in rabinal, and the last is working to develop healthy communities using programming like teaching hair-cutting courses as a way to increase self-esteem.

on monday morning we came together with all of the CIDA interns albeit one intern. all together there are about 15 of us working around the country. we were served breakfast and listened to a workshop about gender. afterwards there was some time to meet with the other interns over coffee to learn more about their programs. the areas that they are working on are: education, human rights working in conjunction with the united nations, and the above mentioned.

yesterday on december 2nd we participated in the second day of the "evaluacion semestral de conavigua" (year end evaluation) where all of the programs came together to give a powerpoint presentation. it would have been great to participate in both days but we were unable to because of time constraints. one really interesting presentation that i liked was about the "dignificacion y atencion psicosocial a victimas" where they discussed the 4 cases that are being brought forward to the supreme court in spain resulting from the massacres and mass-graves of bodies, workshops, and 126 processes of exhumations, and 1204 exhumations in total that they are working on and or have worked on, as well as the 20 cases pending with them. i have often wondered what exactly is going on with the exhumations and I would still like to know more about the involvement of CONAVIGUA in this process.

the year end evaluation was also a great way to come together with the MOJOs and CONAVIGUA workers and to network and meet new people. we ended the day with a ceremony discussing the energy of the day and a marimba dance where rosalina tuyux took the lead in shaking it. good way to end a long day for sure.

photos

We recently went to Upstanpan in the Quiche region for the celebration of the Dia de los Muertos (Day of the Dead) on November 1st. We were invited by Magdalana (who is part of Conavigua and the former ED of the Mojomayas) to celebrate her father's life, as it is the 22nd aniversary of her father's murder. It was an honour to be invited to her community and to stay with her for the few days that we visited Ustanpan. We saw another side of life in Guatemala that warms my heart to see: like seeing inter-generational relatives interact witheachother, coming together to make and share food, and participating in activities together. The coolest part of the trip for me was listening to the young women talk to eachother in Quiche before going to bed like I used to when I had sleep overs at 10. All of the children were kind and made us feel welcomed into their home.

As for the trip: It took over 5 hours to travel there by bus and mini-bus because it's in the very north and remote region but we got there and home in one piece, even though, I wondered if we would. Here are some photos from this experience, sorry that there isn't more, but flickr would only allow 32mb to be uploaded.

Click here for photos.

November Update

Hey,

We've been really busy over the past month, honestly, time is passing by quickly because of all of the activities that we have participated in. I am sharing with you a part of my reflection report from the past month to update you guys on what we have been up to. ~Christina Gray

The Encuentro de Juventud Indigina de Abya Yala was held from October 3^rd to 6^th with over one hundred youth from Honduras, Ecuador, Guatemala, and Canada came together to discuss issues concerning Indigenous youth’s health, alternative modes of communication, the importance of maintaining culture, economic systems, employment, defense of our land and territory, education, repression, Indigenous governance, space of expression and recreation, Indigenous cosmovisions, power of female youth, and globalization. Resulting from the Encuentro was The Agreements of the Committee following the First Indigenous Youth and Children Encounter of Abya Yala 2008. The declarations were read at a press conference held at Conavigua on the last day of the Youth Encounter. Alana spoke at the initial press conference as well as at the final press conference where the Prensa Libre, the main national newspaper, interviewed her.

The following day participated in the Third Social Forum of the Americas in Guatemala City, which was from October 7^th to 12th. The forum began with a Mayan ceremony at the University of San Carlos and afterwards there were many different bands including the descendents of Africans that live in Guatemala, the Garifunas, a children’s marimba band, and rock bands. I participated in a lot of different workshops for the Foro Social including: local agricultural development, international human rights court (criminal court), children of the street (Movimiento de Jovones de la Calle), and an Ecuadorian led workshop for children.

It's been awesome working alongside other youth that have similar visions of healthy communities; although, the youth that come from South and Central America struggle with different issues and are profoundly affected by international trade agreements (Central American Free Trade Agreement). Similar to Indigenous people in Canada they are struggling in their communities to retain their languages, culture, and foundations for economy because they are being forced to struggle against corporations, racism, and their government.

More recently I participated in Conavigua’s Taller “Incidencia Politica de las Mujeres” for regional women leaders on October 20^th and 21^st. During the workshop we focused our attention on contemporary issues like the effects of poverty, machismo, mining, multinational corporations, safety, and security. This workshop was interesting to take part in because they used dynamic ways of sharing experiences through drawing our communities on pieces of paper and cutting out newspaper clippings to paste on to a paper about Guatemala’s negative contemporary situation, which we later shared with the group and discussed. The facilitator tried to discuss solutions that these women could implement in their communities but not many solutions were given because it was at the end of the day.

The following day after Conavigua's workshop we went with Santiago Domingo Perez, the representative for the Maam speaking region, to Huehuetenango, where we participated in three workshops in three different communities, Ixta, San Sebastian, and Acal, about Globalization. Alana, Tasa, and I gave presentations about our own background, the partnership with the BCAAFC and the Mojomayas, Indigenous peoples history, culture, and contemporary situation. I shared with the youth in Ixta some cultural dances of the Tsimshian of Lax Kw’alaams and their significance. In the future, I want to bring my drum and share some songs that belong to my community with permission of my dance group leader.

For the month of November the activities that we plan to participate in are: take part in a workshop given by Conavigua in Ustampan, travel with Efrain to Ustanpan, workshops with the Board of Directors of Conavigua, Clausura del Diplomodo del Fando Centroamericano de Mujeres, Enma return from Canada with Paul Lacerte, and Rosa Amanda’s return from Japan (she returned on Saturday), Workshop with Young Men, and the reflection weekend in Antigua the last weekend of November.

we're in guatemala city!

We arrived in Guatemeala City nearly three weeks ago after spending two weeks in Quetzeltenango for two weeks and one week at the Mountain School. A lot has happened here since coming to Guatemala. In Quetzeltenango we celebrated the independence day, where there was a lot of celebrations in the streets, including marching bands, musical bands, dancing, and a lot of good food.

This past weekend we participated in an Encuentro de Juventud for four days of intensive workshops, where we discussed issues that are important to youth here and that effect us. The various issues that were discussed were about: health, repression, communication, globalization, Indigenous cosmovision (worldview), preservation of culture, language, and customs. Resulting from the discussions were a Declaration of the Encuentro de Juventud, which was discussed at a press conference this past Monday.

Today we participated in an Encuentro Pre Cumbre to discuss issues that were important to Indigenous women that came to participate in the Social Forum. After the Cumbre we went to the University of San Andres where there were a lot of bands playing, speeches, and dancing. The best part of the night was meeting-up with our friends that we met at the Encuentro de Juventud and seeing a Garifuna band and dancers on stage.

We are having a lot of fun in the city right now with all of the excitement of the Social Forum and Encuentros.