Here is our team! (left to right: Darbi, Anthony, Jess, Nick, Carolyn, Andrea, Erin, Ann, and Sarah). There was another girl from Kentucky who met us in Guatemala. She flew out before this group shot was taken.

Basically, our trip was packed full of visiting orphanages and areas of Guatemala to love kids. Hannah’s Hope is the orphanage where we stayed. It is also the orphanage of the organization we were connected to. They have 4 houses…2 of the houses have 20 babies in each, 1 house with toddlers, school aged kids, a few babies, and a few mentally and physically handicapped kids, and the other house where we stayed. It was great to be so close to the kids. We felt very welcomed and free to help out with the kids whenever we wanted. It was great to see how well the kids are cared for. Here are some kids from Hannah’s Hope:

Mama Carmen’s house was the next “orphanage” we visited. This woman is loco and amazing. She takes in any child that is left at her door. Right now she has over 100 kids with an age range from baby to 18 years old. She feeds them, sends them to school, and loves them. The crazy part is that she doesn’t allow adoptions because she feels all of the kids that come to her house are God’s gift to her. She loves all of them and prays for more. We brought a bunch of donations to them, including jump ropes, books, bubbles, beads and string to make necklaces, and some Spanish songs we learned. Jessica had raised a ton of extra money for the trip which allowed us to go to the grocery store to buy food and other supplies Mama Carmen requested. We filled 4 shopping carts full of stuff! It was awesome. Here are some of the calmer moments at Mama Carmen’s casa:

Next up was the Catholic boys school and orphanage. When we arrived, the nuns were feeding the street kids while their mothers waited outside. We handed out ice cream to the kids. Afterwards, we had some ice cream left over so we gave some out to the mom’s with little kids. It was a strange to see them fight over ice cream and lie about whether their child received one.

We met the head nun of the place. She was delighted to see all of our donations. We split up into groups of about three to go into different classrooms and share our activities with the kids. I was luckily with the two elementary teachers, Erin and Darbi, in the 5th grade class. Our activities were painting, coloring, and reading books that Laura Pitman helped donate! I was in charge of the painting station. The boys seemed to really enjoy all the activities, especially the books. Some of them even stayed inside during recess to continue to read. After activity time we headed outside for recess where we taught them to play four square, kicked around soccer balls, and wrote with sidewalk chalk.

La Limonada is one of the ghettos in Guatemala City. Ashley told us some intense stories of things that have happened there that put us all a little on edge. Some opted out of going on the trip to the ghetto, which made me even more fearful. But I have to say, this was the most powerful day and part of the whole trip. We went there to help haul some building material across part of the town (since the streets are too narrow for a car to drive through) to this guy’s house. The houses are made out of sheet metal, mud, and concrete blocks if you are lucky. One of the walls in this guys house was eroding because of all the rain. We carried 100 lbs bags of sand, rocks, and concrete on our backs up this steep alley to his small home at the top of some treacherous stairs. Good thing Erin and I are so tough! In the process of working our butts off, we were able to witness an amazing community. We could really tell that Ashley, who lives in the ghetto, truly loves her neighbors and would do anything to help them. The local gang members helped Erin and I carry some of the bags up the alley which we found out later was a pretty big deal. The gangster (14-22 year olds) don’t normally do much helping out in the community. We were able to joke around with them and thank them repeatedly for their help.

After our manual labor, we went out to buy food for a couple needy families and some shoes for a little boy. When we came back to the ghetto, I had a refreshing feeling. It was good to be back. We gave the food to the families, the shoes to the little boy, and toys we had brought to the kids in the street. The little kid’s faces said it all…when we handed them the toys, they would instantly run back inside to show their moms in delight. I would definitely like to go back to the ghetto.

We then traveled about 3 hours to Panahachel. It was absolutely beautiful with a large lake, volcanoes, and waterfalls. We visited two depressing orphanages around this area. The first was run by Americans which would make you think that they were taking good care of the kids. They had a ton of really nice stuff and a gorgeous location with a view of the lake, but the kids were completely zoned out. When we walked in, they were all glued to the tv watching some terrible American 80′s Christian kids singing songs. They barely smiled, and you could tell the workers view this as a job and not as these kids’ only interaction or love. It was really depressing. Another orphanage was the complete opposite. The kids looked loved and happy but the facilities were pretty gross. The top kids are from the ritzy orphanage and the bottom kids are from the rough one:

Our last planned trip was to take some mud slide victims out to lunch. In order to get to their town/village, we had to take a boat across the lake. The mud slides happened in 2005 and the people are still living in temporary housing due to lack of government funding. Most of the people are Mayan and don’t even speak Spanish. Once the mothers were convinced that we (the gringos) weren’t baby steelers, they allowed their children to hop in the back of a pick-up truck to drive to lunch. The kids were so excited about the soda they were given, the play-doh we brought, and the coloring books we had for them. It was also good to have something to do with them that didn’t involved a lot of conversation. The plates of food were massive and the all took a lot of the extra back to their family.

We also got to go zip-lining. It was amazing!!

The trip was amazing. It changed my perspective on a lot of things and caused me to really evaluate my life and priorities. I would definitely go back! Thanks for reading

i got my typhoid vaccination on friday. i think i’m all set for my vaccinations. thank goodness…no more shots. look at my awesome garfield bandaid! i went to the delaware county health dept which was pretty fast and easy. the office is on the third floor past all the photos of wanted criminals. there were a few that had FOUND written across them. but the rest of the fairly large wall were still at large. i scanned it to see if i recognized anyone, a little fearful of who might pictured.

We heard from one of the staff of Global Orphan project with our schedule. She wrote this email which made me more energized and encouraged about our trip. It’s nice to hear more details to make it feel more real. Here is the email…

“The orphans of Guatemala are facing a crisis. The government has ceased all new adoptions while they renovate their adoption laws and process. While it shows promise of improving and reopening in the future, the children wait. As the mom of five adopted children, I remember praying that God would play with my children and comfort them while they were in the orphanage. I wanted them to have a heritage of nurturance and care. I wish teams would have visited my children but, unfortunately, there were no such ventures at the time. For the children that remain, you will be those moments and memories of care and childhood fun. Our prayer is that you approach your journey with joy. There will be glitches but, they will be far surpassed by the smiles.”