Guatemala update February 2010
Message from Greg, Helaine, Gigi, and Bella Walton, San Antonio, Guatemala:
Hello New Day and Blessings from the mountains of Guatemala:
FAMILY
It has been raining continuously here for several days, the road in was very muddy and it remains uncharacteristically cold in the evenings and constantly overcast, providing challenges for the agricultural side of things here. During the last week of our stay at Lake Atitlan, over our restful vacation, we were once again reminded of our Father’s protection over us and the continual need for prayer cover. Bella woke Helaine up at around 2 am needing to use the bathroom which in itself was not normal. After settling Bella, she noticed a strange movement at Gigi’s head, Helaine quickly picked Gigi up, a scorpion scuttled out from under her hair. Needless to say, we had to move quickly to resolve the situation. If the Lord had not awakened us up at that moment, the consequences might have been scary. We were again reminded of the importance of prayer cover – since returning here, it has been noticeably tough spiritually, we are taking this as a good sign of the amazing things to come …..:)
We have received tentative commitments that the new road which is being constructed through the mountains to the south of us is about 4 months away from completion – this access to the village will have radical implications over the long term.
THE SCHOOL
It has been an exceptionally busy start for us, Helaine has been at my side and we have been pushing hard with little rest for a while now. With more students, staff, and levels than we have ever had, our work has been cut out for us. Ironically, for the first time ever other than us we have no volunteers or foreign staff at present - of the 15 teacher staff, 9 are former students – we continue to trust the Lord as he leads us in this crucial area for the future.
As of today, Monday our enrollment in the school is a total of 124. The great news is that a University extension was approved for this year. But, we are scrambling to find and hire college trained instructors for the approved courses. We will be having classes from 6:15 a.m. to 6 p.m., 7 days a week. We still go 22 days a month with the last 8 days of the month off. Although everyone is still stretched with the increased demands placed on them, the spirit is good all around and the first month has gone by quickly.
Our additional challenge right now is to get text books into the hands of all of our students in each of the levels. Despite the deadlock in the budget currently producing a political crisis here, the school has only continued to grow.
We recently did a complete overhaul of our electrical installations, including putting fuse boxes in all the classrooms and rewiring the 110v system - it was a mammoth job but well worth the effort and investment. We also changed out our faulty solar panels after a six month wait for the replacements. We also have installed 12V lights throughout the school, these will be well used especially for the evening classes of the Mariano Galvez University which will begin this Friday.
AGRICULTURE
The chicken project continues to grow. The market demand still exceeds our production levels, so we are incrementally increasing the number egg-laying chickens. We are encouraged by the news of the advancing road which will eventually reduce our transportation costs. We have harvested our first chia seeds and over the next few weeks, we will replant the seeds and distribute the seeds to the students’ families. This year we are planning to grow tomatoes, chili, and produce broiler chickens for the sale of meat, locally. Additionally, we will be producing and selling organic fertilizer produced in our worm farms.
We are in the last phases of the paperwork for the agricultural processing center which will be constructed on the land below the school. It will be run by the village association. But, it has had difficulties with the proposal, due to the size of the project and to the political storm in the country. The project is being promoted by the current presidential administration, but the opposition parties continue to look for ways to stall, which has left us scrambling to put out the fires.
As per usual, this first month has been quite a whirlwind – we continue to hope and pray as we train the teachers to assume greater responsibility and leadership over the long term. For the moment, we do continue under considerable pressure, but we sense and see the Lord’s hand in so many details each day. We did get a visit in late January from Kevin Mangold and Mary Ho for a few days and the time we had to share, was good.
Thank you for your continued prayers.
In Christ,
Greg, Helaine, Gigi and Bella
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