Fall 2004, number VIII

Country Coordinator turned Board Member once Intern.
By Rebecca Cutter

Rebecca Cutter has been a Board member since 2003. Currently she is finishing her masters degree in Sustainable Development and she worked as an intern in our office in Charlottesville last summer. Here she tells us of her experience as a CASEP member.

Guatemala has been my home since December 1996 when I traveled there in search of an experience that would broaden my horizon and deepen my understanding of the world. I fell in love within the first year and soon married. When our daughter, IxChel, was born, I felt an even deeper connection to the culture and the people of Guatemala. I would describe my relationship with Guatemala as one of love and frustration. The roots of my affection were clear; in the warmth of my community, my family and the richness that comes from things we cannot buy. The frustration came from the process of making sense out of a history of violence and the uncovering of disturbing truths. After a few years, I felt generally ubicada (oriented) and began to engage more directly in community organizing. The signing of the peace accords, on December 26, 1996, ended a 36-year civil war. There was much hope for peace and social and economic development. Working with women seemed like the most obvious place for me to engage in this process. I must admit, however, that my motives were self-serving. It is a challenge to define one’s new identity while living abroad. By working with women, I found solidarity and community.

Together we explored the strengths and the uniqueness of womanhood, and the trials of discrimination. From 2000-2002 I served as the CASEP country coordinator with the solar cooking women of Guatemala. I learned about the daily workings of a non-governmental organization (NGO) and women’s important roles in managing natural resources: providing firewood, water, medicinal plants, food and basic health care for their families.

Upon completion of my two-year commitment to the project, I decided to pursue a graduate degree in Sustainable Development at the School for International Training (SIT) in Vermont. The theoretical training received at SIT has helped me make sense of the practice of sustainable development, and the training has improved my skills as a practitioner. Serving on the board of CASEP has helped me continue my support of the solar cooking women throughout Central America.

This summer, after completing my graduate course work, I did a three-month internship with CASEP where I worked directly with Bill Lankford, board president and founder, and Vinka Craver, the office manager. Working from the main office in Charlottesville, I learned about connecting people to resources, problem solving and making strategic decisions that affect the future of the organization. Bill and I traveled together for three weeks to Honduras, Nicaragua and Costa Rica, reviewing biannual reports and assisting each team with specific needs. In each country, CASEP supports solar cooking and women’s leadership, and in Honduras, a nutrition center.

The desire to bring women together around issues of environment, health and education provide an underlying connection between the four countries, but there are unique interpretations of the project that give each country a different flavor. Each country has specific conditions and needs requiring special attention and providing unique opportunities. There is much to learn by experiencing the different roles of country coordinator, board member and intern. Each opportunity has allowed me the chance to see the project from a different perspective.

Soon I return to Guatemala to rejoin my family and finish my thesis on Women’s Leadership Development. I look forward to the January 2005 Women’s Leadership Conference to be held in Guatemala as a time for rejoining forces and exploring new opportunities for women.

Nicaragua by Amanda Hooker

Amanda Hooker became our new Leadership Coordinator in September. She is currently in Nicaragua improving her Spanish, working with the coordination of the Nicaraguan program, and evaluating the possibility of reviving a formal leadership program in this country. This is the article that she sent us from our Centro Girasoles near Masaya, Nicaragua.

Though at first glance the CASEP center in Nicaragua, El Centro Girasoles, may seem conspicuously lacking its namesake Sunflowers, you only need to pass through the gate of the farm and take a closer look to see an abundance of thriving life—from the ripened plantain harvest, to the litter of kittens in the top drawer of the desk in the office. And though the project here has undergone a rather tumultuous past two years in management changes, I have witnessed the energy and commitment in the current leadership that will sustain this project as it works to realize its potential. Spending time here with Luci, Maritza, and Jamilet, the three joint coordinators, as I begin my own work in the Women’s Leadership Program, has been invaluable.

The three coordinators are currently writing grant proposals to local and foreign NGOs as well as governmental ministries to secure continued funding for the three areas of the project: solar oven construction and promotion, family gardens and natural medicines, and organic agriculture. Each proposal addresses CASEP’s commitment to strengthening community bonds through further oven construction, contributing to the reinstallation of a national family garden (huerta) movement, and organic bean and corn production for surrounding community members.

Last weekend Jamilet, Maritza, Lucia and I traveled to the city of Condega in the deforested, infertile terrain of the mountainous North. The purpose of our visit was to meet with women who had received solar ovens on a trial basis and to evaluate if the weather and social climate would welcome an extension of our project to the area. We were very encouraged after visiting Doña Almalijia Rodrigues, the beneficiary selected by the Red de Mujeres Contra Violencia (a women’s organizing project which works primarily against domestic abuse) to test the practicality of the solar oven use in her home. Not only was Doña Almalijia able to use the oven nearly every day to cook for her family, but had supplemented their normal income with a small bakery business.

Condega is a very poor area, rendered so by the declining sustainability of agriculture on the deforested land plots. The men who have traditionally farmed the land are now scrambling to find other work. Therefore, earning the family’s livelihood falls heavily on the women—especially those families living within the city limits. Doña Almalajia’s husband lost his work on a small production farm in the rural area outside of Condega and was forced to take a low paying wage job as a security guard in the city. It is now up to Doña Almalajia and her nearly grown children to fund their living expenses at college. The second eldest daughter told us that because her family couldn’t afford to send both her and her younger brother to college, she had relinquished her own chance to give her brother the opportunity. However, with the additional money from the bakery sales, Doña Almalijia says there is a much greater chance that all four children, not just the boys, will be able to go to college—and, as Almalijia added, her son and daughter who are currently studying will have the extra money for nourishment above their diet of tortillas and salt. As we continue to make contacts through the Red de Mujeres, our work in Condega can be a powerful example of the way CASEP’s goal of equipping women with the solar oven is not only a method of generating income, but of illuminating the importance of the way a woman’s life and her self worth extends to a stronger family, a stronger community, and societal change.

The potential of expanding into projects in the North gives me great hope in the coordinators who define this program and in the concept of the solar oven--which is to say, it has been exciting to witness how the energy of this project attracts dynamic women who refuse to give up the struggle.

Greetings from Guatemala! by Laura Koch

Dear friends, Here is a brief description of the wonderful work that CASEP is helping to carry out in Central America. The Guatemalan program is a good example of the several projects that our staff in Central America and the respective grass root organization can do with your donations…

SOLAR OVENS: This winter the Guatemalan team is getting ready for two solar oven workshops to take place in early February. We are set to build 26 ovens in Chuachinup and 11 ovens in Chuisantotomas, two communities in the Quiche speaking region of Nahualá in the Department of Sololá. Due to the rainy season, which ends in late October and the coffee harvesting season, which runs through January, we chose to schedule the workshops for February and March, which are some of the best months for solar cooking. One of the biggest challenges in preparing for these workshops is finding quality ½ inch plywood, as hard woods grow increasingly more rare and expensive. We often reflect on this strange irony that the same forces of deforestation that we are fighting against with the promotion of solar ovens are those that make construction of quality ovens increasingly difficult.
Thanks to the help of CASEP, Rotary International and the Agostino Foundation we are able to continue building solar ovens and incorporate more women into our program.

Current team working with projects in Guatemala

PRODUCTIVE PROJECTS: In October, we celebrated the end of the Organic Home Garden and Rainwater Cistern project sponsored by TROCAIRE 2002-2004. In each region the women held a celebration where they prepared a large meal for all the participants, exchanged tamales between communities, danced to traditional music and shared stories about their gardens. For the grand finale, we taught the women how to make their own shampoo using aloe that they had grown in their gardens. The women were excited to receive their diplomas along with the latest booklet of recipes including all the natural salves, tinctures and syrups that they had learned in this year’s garden workshops. Due to the overwhelming success and interest in this project, we hope to expand the number of organic gardens and continue the monthly workshops in 2005.

In October, we inducted 56 ferro-cement rainwater cisterns, which each hold 4000 liters of water. The project was a huge accomplishment for our four female constructors who took on the job of masons, which is traditionally thought of as a man’s work. When asked about her experience Paula Xinico, one of the constructors told this story about one of the husbands who was watching while they were building a tank.

“I never imagined that women could do this. This is work of a man, not of a woman.”
“But we can do it”, we told him.
“Well you are hard working women, you are good for doing this kind of work.”
That’s what he told us and as the ice cream man passed by he invited us to an ice cream.
“This is man’s work but we were able to do it.”
– Paula Xinico Guadelupe, Santo Domingo, Suchitpéquez.

WOMENS LEADERSHIP: Our women’s leadership project continues to grow with the help of Coordinator Magdalena Ajcot and Canadian intern Heather Asbil. Currently there are 23 women participating from 14 communities in monthly workshops on themes of self-esteem, gender, community participation and conflict resolution.

In the case of Guatemala, several of the women who participate in the monthly leadership workshops do not know how to read or write, but it is incredible how they express their opinions and share the experiences that they have lived within their families and their communities. At PROCESO Guatemala, we believe, with the help of popular education techniques, that all women, regardless of their formal education, are important actors in their lives and in the futures of their communities. These women have an inner strength to continue in the workshops and help to encourage other women to change their traditional ways of thinking.

Words of the women leaders in Guatemala

“Participating helps wake up our minds
Our words do have weight
From the struggles we learn
If we, as women do not leave our houses it is because we are still sleeping on top of the ashes.”

WOMEN’S HEALTH: In August, we were fortunate to have the support of Sue Hammerton, a nurse practitioner who specializes in women’s health. Sue accompanied us into all three of our regions and gave workshops on female anatomy, menopause, urinary tract infections, and natural remedies for women’s health. The women loved the workshops and asked for more workshops on women’s health for next year. Due to the overwhelming response, we have decided to look for funds to organize a traveling pap smear clinic in areas where there are few, if any gynecological services.
This semester, with the help of private donors we were able to purchase four sets of materials including pots, pans, tubs, knives, colanders, and various other implements, so that the groups of women in each region can continue making the natural medicines and shampoos that they have learned in the home garden workshops. Their dream is to create small local natural medicine pharmacies operated by the women of Amigas del Sol, our affiliate organization in Guatemala. In 2005, we hope to provide more training to women who have interest in running these pharmacies and can teach others how to cultivate, produce and use natural medicines.

Letter from Bill:
by William Lankford, CASEP president

"We have to be in solidarity with our Guatemalan sisters". This was the response of the Honduran coordinator to the question of whether we should hold our annual coordination meeting as planned in Guatemala early next year. The US State Department had just issued an alarming "announcement" warning of increased violent crime on the highways of Guatemala, apparently with the collaboration and participation of the national police. Rebecca and I looked into it further and found that indeed there is a marked increase in assault and violent robberies of common buses, tourist vans, and private cars.

I polled all the prospective participants in the meeting and after reflection all said that we should have our meeting as planned, taking all the reasonable security precautions possible. These strong women refused to give in to fear. What a lesson for us in this country, where most of us face nothing of the dangers they face daily! Please keep us in your prayers as we continue to do our work.

As a counterpoint to the heavy challenges to life for the majority in Central America, I want to tell you that our newly sponsored young women's kickball team in Nicaragua, the "Chicas Girasoles" reached the final championship series in their league. I got to see four of their amazing playoff games. Our team ended up in second place, a remarkable achievement for a team in its first year of play. Even more exciting was the strength of the players on both teams, and the justified admiration they earned from the increasingly large mixed audience.

With your contributions we can continue to support these extraordinary women who are making this a better world for all of us through their own empowerment and their contributions to their communities. Please join us in this effort. The needs and opportunities we have in Central America have expanded beyond our initial resources. We need your help in responding to these opportunities. Happy holidays to all.