No more dogs!

There is lots to like about Guatemala but also a few things not to. Let’s not talk trash today, but about something else that bothers me.

Street dogs.

On my short walk through town yesterday I saw no less than seven dogs in different spots and different degrees of shabbiness. Some might have owners but they were nonetheless wandering around town in search of food or a short-lived love affair, resulting in even more unwanted puppies. Each of the coffee farms near the place I’m staying at has its own pack of dogs. Many of them are injured from fights with their peers, traffic accidents or from purposely being hurt by people with machetes. And needless to say, the packs keep growing and growing. These dogs sometimes assault people who’re walking their pet, chase motorcycles and rip open garbage bags. They’re definitely a pain in the butt. But it isn’t their fault.

One of 6 puppies we've so far been unable to catch, in its "home" at one of the coffee plantations

Being born poor in Guatemala as a human usually means a tough life ahead. Being born an unwanted puppy is basically having no future at all. Even “proper” pets are often not well taken care of. People take on pets without a thought (and to be honest, in many cases the same counts for kids), not realising it is a serious and long-term commitment. Despite the fact that hardly anyone is ever forced to have a pet (unfortunately the same can’t be said about unwanted babies in Guatemala with its skyrocketing number of cases of sexual abuse), few people seem to think of what a dog’s life involves. I’m not talking about puppy day-care, designer booties or pricey wet food from a tin with a sprig of parsley on top. Just basic stuff, like actually having enough food to spare. A dry, safe space to live. Medical care when needed. Care in old age instead of being dumped on the street. And preferably, playtime, exercise and socializing.

Although I think that in many “developed” countries the way people treat their pets is sometimes way over the top, around here even basic, fair treatment is not a matter of course. But it doesn’t mean people don’t love their animals. I think it’s mostly a matter of education.

Luca, Monster, Saudi and me, Honduras

When I lived in a small town in Honduras, I was appalled to see that people’s first reaction to seeing a dog on the street is to kick it. I even saw toddlers barely able to stand, swing a leg at a passing dog. Dogs were obviously considered dirty and a pest. But not MY dogs! Everybody loved MY dogs! Cars would stop on the street and let us pass when Monster would drag his four feet long stick back home from our walk. The kids I used to teach were always more excited to see my Luca than me! They’d spend hours playing with her, teaching her tricks and would even share their lunch with her. (No wonder she was fat.) But none of these kids would ever consider doing the same with their own dog, which they all have in the rural areas. And when I would ask why not, they answered their dogs don’t play. Because they were never taught to.

But the times are a-changing. More and more upper-class Guatemalans who previously would only be interested in overpriced full bred pedigree puppies are now considering adopting. Even in rural areas, small changes are visible. My friend and patron saint of dogs in San Martín Jilotepeque, Cristy Velasco, mentioned how dogs are mostly used as doorbells, but more and more often she sees people walking their dogs or putting food outside for the strays. More people are willing to spay and neuter too.

Tessa and Gerson with cats in recovery

When Linda Green made her dogs rescue efforts official in 2010 with the NGO Unidos para los Animales, she quickly realised that picking up abandoned puppies off the streets and shipping them off for adoption to the US was just a drop in the ocean (although not for the puppies, obviously). Stronger measures were needed in order to prevent puppies on the streets altogether. But when Linda started her first spay and neuter campaigns, she almost had to beg people to have their pet sterilised. It wasn’t a common thing and especially castration of male dogs was not considered “natural” in this macho culture. But how times have changed! The main focus of Unidos para los Animales is now on sterilization campaigns with a target number of at least 2.000 dogs and cats a year, in communities in and around Antigua Guatemala. And these days people are begging for a spot on the waiting list! Considering the fact that each pregnant cat or dog can easily be responsible for a thousand puppies or kittens (because her babies will eventually have babies too), this has a huge impact on the canine and feline community.

Linda and her paharmacy

Due to Covid-19 the target of 2.000 animals wasn’t reached in 2020, but this year we’re off to a good start. The first week of January, veterinarian Jim Bader (from Mapleview Animal Hospital, Holland, MI, USA) and his daughter Karina came down for a full week of surgeries. Dr. Jim did a total of 161 surgeries, including some complicated cases other than sterilisations. Today another 82 cats and dogs were spayed/neutered in Jocotenango.

The logistics for today’s clinic were in the capable hands of the Dirección de la Mujer (Women’s Office) of the Municipality of Jocotenango. We did a clinic there last December, but the demand was so overwhelming that a new one was scheduled so soon after. As usual, the ladies of this office were fantastic. They did a pre-sign-up last week and in no time the 100 slots were filled. They closed shop with no less than 132 people on the waiting list! And today everything went as smooth as can be. Volunteering for the clinics in Jocotenango is borderline boring, because everything is so well organised and so many people are helping out. From the traffic police out on the street to the ladies at the entrance disinfecting everybody; the ones at the inscription table; the strongman who carried the dogs and cats from the operating room to recovery; the cleaners afterwards… The three Guatemalan vets and their techs did an awesome job and were done operating around lunch time.  And 82* happy humans went home with slightly groggy cats or dogs.

Our strongman of the day

Today was actually a little weird because we got a lot more attention than usual. We got no less than four visits by politicians and the press and were live streamed on several social media. Turns out we are great (although unwilling) propaganda and were reported to have done 150 surgeries with more to come in the following days. (Not.) All that with “international support” and no mention of Unidos para los Animales. Not that the dogs or cats don’t care, but we humans do.

People and patients waiting for their turn

See, these clinic cost money. Each pet owner pays a small contribution (50 Quetzales or USD 6.50) whereas the cost per animal is four times as much (surgery and vaccines). If people can’t afford the required contribution, they can “pay” with whatever they can. A bag of rice, some avocados or a few pounds of sugar will do. The clinics are organised and run by volunteers. And although they are officially offered by Unidos para los Animales, it is in close collaboration with Tessa and Gerson of WOOF Guatemala and Francesca of Patitas.

Volunteers Jimmy and Bobbie

It is great to see how animal welfare is slowly going tin the right direction. Sterilisation is becoming the norm, as is clear from the number of inscriptions. New too is the increasing number of male dogs and cats. It would be great to walk the streets of Antigua one day and not encounter a single stray.

If you’d like to contribute towards the sterilisation program, please visit the following websites. Thank you!

USA, Canada, Guatemala, Europe: Unidos para los Animales

Holland: WOOF Guatemala

 

*The number of surgeries is usually a bit lower than planned because some animals are rejected because of medical history, not having fasted or nor being healthy enough.

 

 

 

A Christmassy Thing for Dogs

 

‘Twas a few days before Christmas and it wasn’t snow but a light traffic that covered the roads to San Martin Jilotepeque, a town in mountainous Guatemala. After many twists and turns in between steep walls of soothing green, the town of San Martin Jilotepeque is surprisingly buzzling and urban. A cacophony of sounds and colours hits you in the face with motorcycles whooshing by with women in their indigenous dress apparently comfortable sideways on the backseat. Chicken busses honk, rev and roar on the narrow streets covered in bright signs, posters and banners. If you don’t have a specific reason to go there, you probably won’t. But we were on a mission.

See, San Martin Jilotepeque is the town where Cristy Velasco lives and works. Cristy is the patron saint of street dogs in that part of the world and cares for over a hundred dogs in her shelter, not counting the twenty or so she has at home, the dozen that stay at her restaurant or the never-ending number of strays that she feeds. So, after an eventless journey, we went by Cristy’s restaurant to pick her up to direct us to the shelter, only a ten-minute drive away.

Well, not today. The asphalt of the road near the shelter was being renewed and we got stuck in a humongous traffic jam. After sitting put for about 45 minutes (entertained by a puppy that Cristy had just rescued off the street), we decided to park the car at a carwash across the road, walk to the shelter and then return to the restaurant to drop off our donations. And that turned out to be a very good idea, because on our way back, the line had barely moved an inch.

Up until last week, Cristy kept her dogs at an abandoned construction site of what was once supposed to become a maternity clinic. The place consisted mainly of walls and a roof, but it was spacious and offered dry places for the dogs to sleep and enough areas for play. Recently the town council decided to resume building the clinic. Not a bad idea by itself, but what to do with over a hundred dogs? The mayor offered to build a new place. And he did. Which was a very nice thing to do, but unfortunately the new place is very small and there is no space at all for the dogs to play. 

On our way to "the end of the world..."

The shelter is located on the outskirts of town, right there where you think you’ve reached the end of the world. It consists of two wooden / aluminium sheets structures with kennels divided by chain-link fences. The kennels are clean but bare, with just one wooden pallet for the dogs to sleep on.

Cristy at the shelter

This is not a shelter as you know them up North or in Europe. This is a place where, with all efforts and good intentions, the dogs are dry, safe and fed, but not much else. All because Cristy does this basically singlehandedly, on a shoestring budget. Just the cost of feeding al those dogs is staggering, not to mention medical costs. So Cristy can use all the help she can get and that’s why we went up there with a few bags of food, dog beds, used collars and leashes, cleaning supplies, some cash and a bag of bulky sweaters that can be used for beds.

Cristy had to stop on the way back to buy some food for some street dogs we encountered.

After a delicious lunch at Cristy’s restaurant it was time to head back. During our ride home I already received pictures from Cristy of the donated bed and collar being put to good use. She had even made puppy sweaters out of the sleeves of the cardigans we had left. Darn cute!

Puppy Sweater, design by Cristy Velasco!

Dog bed and red collar approved!!!

It was a wonderful day and I couldn’t believe to be back in San martin Jilotepeque this soon. It was only a few weeks ago we were there to paint a doggie mural. You can read all about that project and more about Cristy by clicking here: MuralArt Guate.

The idea to go to San Martin Jilotepeque to drop off donations was a fantastic one, and all credits go to Catherine Corry, who not only offered to drive, but also supplied much of the donations. Many thanks too to Ana Maria Ackermans, Irene Saletan, Ellen Cristenson, Linda Green, Unidos para los Animales, Alice Lai, Cat Langley and Catherine’s friend whose name I forgot.

Today's donations.

A few bags of dog food will help, but won’t last. So in the future we hope to continue supporting Cristy taking care of the dogs of san Martin Jilotepeque. If you’re in Guatemala and would like to donate, please contact me at carinsteen at yahoo.com. You can also donate directly through Paypal using the following link: https://www.paypal.com/paypalme/sanmartindogs?fbclid=IwAR3xy3CqLuRQkBsbSxWEL9NlLfi2zP7h__szn4J74E6ci3X_qBJ0-VW9XwI

 

Donations pup approved!

One very tired but lucky puppy....

Thank you so much!

Wooof!!!

 

 

A NeverEnding Disaster

Worldwide people heaved a sigh of relief when the American elections were over, but for a lot of people in Central America it’s the last thing on their minds. The sun’s out, the storms reduced to a gentle breeze, but more than a week after Eta ravaged Nicaragua, Honduras and Guatemala (and a short but not too bad comeback last night), the disaster is far from over.  

Although Category 5 hurricane Eta was quickly downsized to a tropical storm when it made land, the damage done is tremendous. Large areas are flooded, mudslides caused many deaths, roads are destroyed and crops are ruined.

You’ve heard it all before.

And you’ll hear it again. 

The vicious cycle of poverty, corruption and corporate greed amplify whatever nature throws at us. Time and again it magnifies deep-rooted problems in these countries, only soon to be forgotten again. Poor people will rebuild their houses with cheap materials in risky areas, simply because they have no choice. Roads and bridges will be rebuilt, often with materials of a quality inferior to what they were budgeted for, with the difference disappearing in someone’s pockets.  Massive deforestation will be business as usual, causing ever more catastrophic mudslides and flooding.

It’s tempting to close my eyes and Netflix the day away. It’s easy to ignore the search for cadavers and the sense of hopelessness these people must feel at this exact moment while I sip my morning coffee in the sun. For a little bit. Because I can imagine what is going on. It’s been 22 years already, but I will never forget Hurricane Mitch and its aftermath. The surge of adrenaline while evacuating people, the all surrounding brown muddy water. The pain in people’s eyes seeing all their possessions gone, just like that. The feeling of hopelessness, despair, loss. It clung around people for days, weeks, months.

But there were also moments of heart-warming solidarity, as there are now. Of tremendous physical efforts to rescue and evacuate. The sheer hard physical labour of cleaning up tons of mud in the days after. And then the process of healing and rebuilding.

The amount of international help Honduras received after hurricane Mitch was staggering. At the time I was naïve enough to think that something good might come from this disaster, that a better Honduras might re-emerge, with improved infrastructure, safer communities, job opportunities, hope for the future. Of course, I was terribly wrong.

Copán Valley 2020

It hurts to see places I’ve been, worked or lived in, being so devastated. Copán Ruinas in western Honduras, my hometown for 17 years, looks very similar to when Mitch turned the valley into a lake Thankfully no lives were lost this time, but about 80% of the roads in and around Copán have been destroyed. 74 Families lost their houses and the coffee production this year, if still salvable, won’t be able to be cut or sold. And this just after the town was severely hit by Covid. Many of my friends in Copán are working hard, in collaboration with the municipality, to help those in need.

Copán Ruinas, entrance to Hacienda San Lucas

Copán Ruinas, 2020

Up north in Honduras, closer to the Caribbean coast, the damage is even worse. In El Progreso, the children’s home of ProNiño, where I painted a series of murals a couple of years ago, is now under water. Children and staff were evacuated on time, but it will take a while before they can go back to start the process of cleaning up.

ProNiño , El Progreso, Honduras in 2015

ProNiño now

In Guatemala, the search for survivors, or more likely, cadavers, continues. Entire communities were buried under tons of mud. The victim count will go up in days to come. The disaster is not over yet.

Among thousands of pictures that show up in my newsfeed, I found this one from Guatemala that speaks more than a thousand words. The three so far unidentified bodies are of two children and one woman, in the catholic church of the hamlet of Quejá in Alta Verapaz. (For more pictures click the link in the caption).

Photo by Yeimi Alonzo, Plaza Pública. (At noon today it was announced that rescue efforts have stopped, due to the improbability to find any survivors and the dangers of more mudslides. 88 People are still missing in the village of Quejá, San Cristobal Verapaz.)

In the meantime, I’m unexpectedly taking care of the tiniest of Eta victims: a little hummingbird fledgling, upheaved by the strong winds, flew against my window last Friday. Too small to fly, I’m taking care of her until she’s ready to be released.

Funny, how in the midst of all this bad news and this abominable turd of a year, this tiny, feisty little bird has become my symbol of hope and perseverance. And I’ determined to keep it alive!

So yes, you’ve heard it before and you’ll hear it again: the people in Central America need your help. They really do.

If you can, please consider donating to one of many organizations active right now. Below a few NGOs that I know very well and can vouch for.

 

Thank you very much.

Be well.

 

Honduras:

Special Missions (Please specify if you want your donation to go to Copán Ruinas)

GoFundMe action for relief in Copán Ruinas, organized by two ex-students of mine

 Guatemala

CasaSito, emergency relief for their scholarship students in Alta Verapaz

GoFundme by my friend Alce Lai

For people in Holland who want to help:

Voor noodhulp in Guatemala: Stichting Uno Más, o.v.v. Noodhulp


Kindertehuis ProNiño in El Progreso, Honduras:

IBAN: NL11TRIO 0212487167 t.n.v. Homeless Child te Vlagtwedde

Mission Accomplished!

Argi, Teresa and me

A week ago we were on our way to the doctor in Guatemala without a clue about what could possibly await us after that split-second decision to leave Teresa (a 56-year old woman from a small village in Copán with a terrible infection in her face) behind for emergency surgery.

This whole week has been about Teresa. Each morning started with excited yells back and forward as my roommate Argi  and I happily exchanged how many more donations we received overnight in our Paypal accounts. The next thing would be a call to Teresa to see how she was doing and how many times she went to the bathroom. Yes, life turns surreal when your first thought on a Sunday morning is: I hope Teresa peed well! Not that the danger was anything surreal, because the medication is very hard on the kidneys and at the first sign of kidney failure, we were to take her of those specific antibiotics. Which could lead to yet another problem, since Teresa already turned out to be resistant to the first antibiotics prescribed. But all well, she had a blood analysis yesterday and there’re no problems on the kidney front.

Next I’d start writing people thank you notes, update the blog, inform people how to donate and so on while Argi would call the doctor in Guate for a daily update and make sure the right medications were taken on the right time. It was not so much time consuming as attention absorbing. And besides Teresa’s health, it was also the uncertainty whether we would be able to raise enough money that was quite stressfull.

Yesterday we went to visit Teresa who’s staying at her colleague’s house, just outside Copán. Logistically it’s much easier to stay there, with of all the nurses’ and doctors’ visits, but also because Helda’s home is, though tiny, well built, meticulously clean and much easier to maintain that way than Teresa’s own house where it’s a coming and going of neighbours, kids, dogs, cats and chickens. I think she’s secretly also happy to be away from the family and village hubbub for a bit. After all, a lot of people in her village, including some family members, believe that the maggots that were crawling out of her face were a result of witchcraft, which doesn’t do much good for relationships within the community.

Anyway, Teresa was doing great when we saw her, talkative and joking around. I think she only half understands the effort it has been on behalf of so many people to get her were she is now, which is fine, because she’s the last person to worry about that. She told us how friendly the people in the hospital had been and that it wasn’t half as bad as she had expected (Little does she know that she stayed in a private hospital, because the surgery was anything but regular, and yes, that’s why she didn’t have to share the bed with two other patients!) and how great people have been in general. She is very grateful for all help received. And it’s just about the money, it’s knowing she was not alone when she most needed help. 

On Thursday she’s going back to the clinic for a check-up and from there probably back to her mountain. Unless there are some major changes or complications, I guess this will be my last post on Teresa. Weird. Sad somehow too. Of course we’ll continue to visit and monitor Teresa in the following weeks, but all the excitement of last week will leave a strange hole behind.

On behalf of Teresa, her family, Argi and me, there are really no words that can thank you enough, all those wonderful people who stepped up and generously donated to help out a poor women many of you have never met. It has been an amazing experience, starting in great anguish, ending in a jubilant success, making Teresa’s health a small victory, if not for entire mankind, then at least for Teresa and for all of us involved, learning yet again that there are so many people full of compassion and generosity among us, and that makes all the difference.

Well, that leaves us here. Mission accomplished! We have raised more than enough money, a whooping total of $3,611! Please don’t send us any more money (but if you do, we’ll make sure it gets to Teresa anyway).

Thanks so much to the following people:

Agueda Interiano, Al Steele, Alejandro Ferraro, Alice Dearden, Alice Wilbur, Amanda Mopeth, Anna Smith, Annemie van Nieuwenhove & Geert van Vaeck, Argi Diez, Beatriz & Aura Martínez, Bill Corba, Bill Sain, Café San Rafael, Carlos Alvarado, Cesar Borregón, Darlene Carlton & Gary, Diana Pineda, Elisa Orsburn, Elizabeth Butler, Elsa Rubin & Lizzette Soto, Fito Alvarado, Flavia Cueva, Frida Larios, Hacienda San Lucas, Heather Butler, Helena Ihamuotila, Hilda Santos, Jennifer Casolo &; Pedro, Jessica Fashun, Jody Patterson & Paul Willcocks, John & Marianne Bodrug, Josue, Karen Leiva & Bill Hare, Katie Miller & Marc Wolf, Kristin Landau, Mark Zipperer, Michelle Fitz, Michelle Vandepas, Miguel Raymundo, Missy Kluth, Nina du Mée & Ingrid Schreuder, Open Edge, Paola Carías, Personnel Hacienda San Lucas, Oneida Rivera, Radiant Health Institute, Rina Peña, Robyn & Geoff Affleck, Ronald Speer, Señor X, Shannon Kring, Suzette Cardona, Wendy Russell and Yvonne Santiago. 

Teresa in the hospital with one of her sons

Operation: Teresa

Teresa is back home! (If you have no idea what I’m talking about, see my previous post first.)

Amazing how the healthcare of one person in a remote village in a far corner of Honduras can mobilize so many people from all over the world. We have received donations from as far as Chile! But beside our friends; friends of our friends; and friends of friends of friends who have so generously donated to this cause, there are many others involved.

Counting the cash we received and adding up the donations through Paypal and bank deposits was a lot of fun and a huge relief, although a bit complicated because of the various accounts we used and donations in no les than five different currencies (American dollars, Canadian dollars, Euros, Lempiras and Quetzales). A friend who’s in the in & export business offered us to use her bank account to deposit the Lempiras and take it out straight away in dollars (or was it the other way around?), just to save a few bucks there. She also set us up with a trusted money exchanger at the border who gave us a good deal. When all the cash was changed into Guatemalan quetzales, Teresa’s coworkers Bea and Pilo left for Chiquimula to pick up her up and buy her medication, at least for a few days, because we planned to buy the rest in Honduras at a lower price. That turned out to be a bit more complicated than expected and required in the end visits to several pharmacies, but they managed to get a supply for three days of super duper and very expensive antibiotics.

Teresa was happy to go home, although the doctor would have preferred to keep her a few more days. But we simply can’t afford it. At least we made sure she’ll receive all the care she needs in Copán, including some new rules on hygiene that will have to be applied in her home. Bea paid off the hospital bills and left around $300 for the surgery, which was still $1000 short (we had some more money in our accounts, but Paypal transfers last 1-3 days) but the doctor was so nice to give is a few more days to pay. By the way, I want to give this doctor (Dr. Jorge Mario Mendez Paiz) maybe the biggest THANK YOU of all, because without hesitation he operated on Teresa, knowing very well that none of us had any money and all of us being foreigners too!

Anyway, Teresa came home in the early evening. Happy. For us, the shock was that we learned that the antibiotics she needed were much more expensive than we expected: at least $800!!!! She was supposed to get her first intravenous antibiotic treatment at home right then and there (through a catheter in her hand she had gotten in the hospital) but the medication they brought back from Guatemala was in powder form, and didn’t come with the IV fluid. It was too let to find any. Oops! More phone calls to doctors which ended with the decision to give her an injection of other antibiotics in her behind, administered by a friend of us, a nurse, who was so nice to go all the way to Teresa’s house in the middle of nowhere at 9pm… It turned out that Teresa needs three injections a day and as nice as our friend is, he’s not that nice… (Actually, he is, he just has other things to do too.) But another solution presented itself: Hellda, a co-worker of Teresa offered to take her in for a few days. She lives in a village much closer to town and in a concrete house, much easier to maintain clean than Teresa's humble house made of mud and sticks. Helda’s neighbour is a nurse, so the injections are no longer a problem…

In the meantime yet other friends were in San Pedro Sula buying the antibiotics we needed. Teresa was brought to town for a visit to the clinic and then to Helda’s home when we received the results of the exams from the doctor in Guatemala: it turned out that Teresa is resistant against the main antibiotic that she needs. This is a mayor problem for Teresa (for now, but also in the future) but something that happens all too often in Honduras due to the fact that here you get antibiotics for the slightest sneeze. And also because people stop taking the pills as soon as the symptoms of their illness disappear. Anyway, we were just in time to call our friend in San Pedro Sula NOT to buy the antibiotics. Unfortunately we already bought 3 doses in Guatemala, but maybe we’ll be able to resell those through doctor and pharmacist friends.

Argi spent much of the morning in doctors’ clinics to discuss Teresa’s antibiotics treatment and as far as I understand, they worked something out. So far, all goes well. Teresa is doing okay, although the bones of her face have been affected too, we’ll need to monitor her kidney closely. and she’s in a lot of pain, so the road to full recovery will take a while.

As for Argi and me, we are very happy that more donations have kept coming in and we hope they continue to do so. We were very excited when we reached the amount of $2,500, thinking we were almost there (the hospital bill and surgery were $2,600 together), but the medication and after care is going to be more expensive than we hoped for. But we can’t complain: so far we have $2,887.72, which is more than I could ever hope for when we sent out our cry for help less than three days ago.

This is what we raised/spent so far:

Money raised                                    $ 2,887.72

Millennium Hospital                           $ 1,366.00

Surgery                                             $ 1,293.00

Medication (bought in Guate)           $    130.00

Medication (bought in Copán)          $      49.00

Food & necessities for Teresa          $      50.00

                                    Total:                   $  2,888.00

           

Still needed for medication and follow-up care: About $ 500. 

If you want to make a donation, you can do so using Paypal (connected to my email address carinsteen at yahoo.com) or write me for other options (bank deposit, Western Union etc.)

Thanks so much to the following people who have donated and/or helped otherwise: 

Agueda Interiano, Al Steele, Alejandro Ferraro, Alice Dearden, Alice Wilbur, Anna Smith, Annemie van Nieuwenhove & Geert van Vaeck, Argi Diez, Beatriz & Aura Martínez, Bill Corba, Café San Rafael, Carlos Alvarado, Cesar Borregón, Diana Pineda, Elisa Orsburn, Elizabeth Butler, Fito Alvarado, Flavia Cueva, Frida Larios, Hacienda San Lucas, Heather Butler, Helena Ihamuotila, Hilda Santos, Jennifer Casolo Pedro, Jody Patterson & Paul Willcocks, Josue, Katie Miller & Marc Wolf, Mark Zipperer, Michelle Fitz, Michelle Vandepas, Miguel Raymundo, Missy Kluth, Open Edge, Paola Carías, Personnel Hacienda San Lucas, Oneida Rivera, Radiant Health Institute, Rina Peña, Robyn & Geoff Affleck, Ronald Speer, Shannon Kring, Wendy Russell and Yvonne Santiago.

The Difference 24 Hours Can Make…

Doña Teresa in better times (artwork/photo by Frida Larios and Tyler Orsburn)

Only two days ago around this hour I had just come back from a trip to Chiquimula, Guatemala, to the vet. It was only sort of a coincidence that we took Doña Teresa, a lady from a small village near Copán with us to see an orthodontic surgeon because of the nasty infection a pulled tooth had left her. Little did we know that the situation was so grave that there was no option left: we had to leave Teresa behind for emergency surgery, if not she would surely die soon…

That left me and my friend Argi baffled and overwhelmed, to say the least, but also very preoccupied. The whole treatment was calculated to cost about $4,000 and where the hell would we get that kind of money from?

But since it was either taking Teresa back with us and let her die a painful death or leave her behind and have her have her surgery… As I said, there was no choice…

So there we went, back to Copán, in the back of the pick-up truck with our rather subdued dogs on our laps. The conversation went something like this:

“Did we do the right thing?”

“Of course we did, we had no choice.”

“But how are we going to pay for the operation???”

“No idea, but we’ll find a way.”

“Are you sure???”

“No, but we’ll find a way.”

“Okay, we’ll find a way. Any ideas?”

“No, not yet.”

Neither of us slept very well that night ($4,000 hospital bills kept popping up in my dreams) but probably not half as bad as Doña Teresa whom we had left without even a pair of clean underwear. But as dawn arrived, we continued our quest. Argi went to work early in the morning and learned that Teresa’s son and daughter-in-law had already left for Chiquimula. That was a good thing, at least she wouldn’t be alone when she’d wake up after her surgery. Argi spent the rest of the morning talking to doctors to find out ways to cut down costs, for example by bringing Teresa back to Copán, even though the specialist in Chiquimula would like to keep her there for at least ten days. But at $50 a day, plus medication and no money, well… how??? The local doctors as well as the surgeon agreed finally that we could bring her home after three nights in the hospital and that we could give her intravenous antibiotics here in Copán, which turns out to much cheaper in Honduras anyway. So far, all well. Teresa was doing reasonably well, although in a lot of pain and with a face swollen up about three times the size it was before she went into surgery.

I spent my morning writing my blog post and writing emails. Argi and I agreed to get together in the afternoon to synchronize our posts and start asking for money wherever we could, because so far the operation had gone well, but it was on our shoulders to somehow pay for it all. We were both on the edge and extremely nervous but especially Argi was hit very hard. She sounded awfully depressed when I talked to her several times on the phone, so I offered, the least I could do, to make her a nice dinner.

When we got together yesterday afternoon we were still $4,000 in the red, but had our petitions ready. We both posted them on Facebook and through emails and sat down for dinner.

Now, let me tell you, I don’t believe in witchcraft and I am a 100% sure that Teresa’s horrible worms are the result of a nasty fly and an infection, not of any sort of black magic. But still, I can’t stop believe in miracles.

We had just sat down for dinner (nice steamed tilapia and pasta with mustard leaves) taking our first bite when: Pling!

My computer. Facebook message. A pledge for a $50 donation!

Pling! Argi’s laptop. A $100 donation in Paypal!

Pling! Mine again. Another donation!

Pling!

Pling!

Pling!

It went on and on. Friends started sharing our links and the whole thing went viral. When I went to bed around 10pm we had already raised about $700. That was 700 times more than with what we had started the day…

Sometimes these things take a spurt and then die a quick death. But oh, no, not Teresa’s case. Today I spent the whole day answering emails to people I’ve never met in my life but who were willing to help Teresa out. I went to the bank to pick up donations through Western Union and from friends in town and did one Paypal tranfser after the other. I just met Argi this afternoon and we were besides ourselves, piling up cash. So far we have raised about $2,000!!!! After talking to the doctor, we have now narrowed down the bills to $2,600, not including the medications Teresa will need, plus the after care. But in the end, we think around $3,000 will do, which is at least a $1,000 less than we originally thought.

We’re still not there yet, but already soooo much further than we ever imagined being only 24 hours ago. Tomorrow we’ll bring Teresa back home. Her family is already preparing the house, cleaning it and making it as adequate as possible for a recovering patient.

This adventure isn’t over yet, but we’re getting there. I can’t thank people enough for their generosity, trust and faith.

To be continued…

(Donations can be made through Paypal connected to my email adress: carinsteen at yahoo.com )

A Series of Strokes of the Worst Luck Possible

Teresa

Being poor and living in the Honduran countryside is hard as it is, but some families have some extra blows to deal with.

This is about a family that I’ve known for years, living in a small village near Copán Ruinas. The oldest kids were some of the first students I ever taught and the rest of the brothers and sisters steadily followed over the years, participating in our photo, mapping, art and video projects.

I remember all too well how we celebrated the end of a video project about five years ago when we noticed that one of the participants, the thirteen year old daughter of this particular family, looked a bit chubby. I remember thinking that she might be pregnant but discarded the idea. I mean, I’m all too aware about teenage pregnancies, but this one was only thirteen and still such a girl!

What a shock to get a phone call only a day after that the girl, let’s call her Doris, was rushed to the hospital in Santa Rosa de Copán were she had given birth to a premature but otherwise healthy baby boy. Her mother, Doña Teresa was there with her, without money or clothes, so with some friends we put some things together and sent it to the hospital.

The baby boy turned out to be the cutest thing ever and is going to school this year. His mother Doris is also back in school while her mother watches her son. So far, so good.

A real tragedy struck when not long after the birth of yet another mouth to feed, Teresa’s sister Leticia, mother of a six year old daughter, was diagnosed with cancer, a nasty tumor right behind her eye.

Going to doctors isn’t easy if you are not used to it since birth, let alone if you don’t have the money to pay for it. But luckily, Leticia was not alone. Argi, the manager of a local B&B where both Teresa was working, dragged her along to a doctor in town and from there from one specialist to another. She contacted a medical brigade (the Rice Foundation) that comes to Honduras to do surgery once a year and Leticia had surgery twice in the following years plus fellow-up chemotherapy treatment. That was quite an ordeal too, because she had to travel to San Pedro or Tegucigalpa, scary as hell for a country girl that had never traveled further than the central park of Copán Ruinas. Leticia was doing much better every day and learned to smile and enjoy life again. Alas, not for very long. Despite the operations and treatment, Leticia passed away last year. Her daughter is being raised by her sister Teresa and her grandmother. Leticia was only 33 years old.

Teresa doesn’t only look after her children and grandchildren all by herself, she also takes care of her elderly mother Doña Munda. This old lady isn’t too fond of the modern ways of life, such as using a latrine, so she does it the way she always did. One day, about two years ago, she was just doing her business in the bushes on the edge of the village when a friend of mine walked by with his dogs and a tourist he was guiding around. Doña Munda all of a sudden appeared from the bushes, startling everyone, especially one of my friend’s dogs, who thought she was a fiendish enemy, and bit her in the leg. Although not life threatening, it was a nasty wound, so my friend did what needed to be done and took her to the nearest clinic. This was easier said than done, because they were way up in the mountains. Luckily, the tourist that accompanied him was a big fellow, so he scooped the tiny Doña Munda up in his arms and carried her all the way down to where the car was parked. From there they drove her to the clinic, gave her money for treatment and a taxi back home and then continued their hike. There wasn’t much they could do for Doña Munda at the moment: she was in good hands (her daughter Leticia was there too), and the tourist had paid for his now much deserved hike after all. So far so good. Except that ten minutes later the clinic was robbed by some armed guys and the doctor and patients were all robbed of their valuables.

Despite everything, Doña Munda was doing okay, she just needed daily shots of antibiotics for a week or so, so the same friend (who happens to be a nurse) went up to the village every day for the next week to give her the injection.

This year, bad luck yet again. Six months ago, Doña Teresa went to the health centre in town to have a molar pulled and the wound got infected. The same friend who had helped her sister, Argi, dragged her from doctor to dentist to yet another doctor. Teresa received various antibiotic treatments but the swelling wouldn’t go down and over the months she got sicker and sicker. Last week, the family was in the middle of a praying session when all of a sudden worms crawled out of Teresa’s eye and cheek. Shock and panic all over and the conclusion was, of course: witchcraft.

Argi intervened yet again and after consulting some local doctors, she made an appointment with an orthodontic surgeon in Chiquimula, a town in Guatemala at about an hour and a half drive, for us in Copán the nearest medical facility. She was going there anyway because Argi’s employers dog needed chemotherapy treatment. My dog was sick as well, so I went along for the ride.

While I took the dogs to the vet, Argi went with Teresa and her daughter in law María to the lab for an x-ray and from there on to the surgeon. The news was bad. The infection had spread beneath the skin of her whole face and larvae were eating away the rotten flesh. The larvae are from a fly that usually infects only horses, but isn’t too picky on which kind of infected skin it lays its eggs. Apparently, Teresa had had some teeth pulled previously (or they had fallen out, that’s unclear), but the roots were never removed. They are now also infected and feasted upon by the larvae. The main problem however, was that the infection is still spreading and can get her brain infected anytime, which will most likely result in death. So the surgeon suggested to operate her as soon as possible, but wanted to consult wit a colleague, an internist, first.

So we waited for another few hours and for more bad news: the internist agreed and insisted on emergency surgery. So from there we went straight to the hospital were yet another doctor came to the same conclusion: an operation as soon as possible, or else…

The problem was… A surgery costs an enormous amount of money, at least for people here. A quick calculation by the doctor came up to $4000. Daughter in law Eva went pale when she heard that amount and said that she hoped that the doctor was talking about 4,000 Lempiras and not 4,000 Quetzales. Unfortunately I had to tell her he was talking about dollars, which comes up to about 80,000 Lempiras.

So what to do? Argi explained the doctor that Teresa has no money whatsoever, but since it really was a matter of life or death, he promised to do the operation anyway.

So at 5.30pm we left Chiquimula to go back to Honduras, one person short. It was awful to leave poor Teresa behind, without toiletries or anything, but at least she was well taken care of while getting ready for the operation this morning.  

The latest news is that the operation went well but they want to keep her in the hospital for another ten days. This costs a considerable amount of money (about $50 per day), but Argi has been going around doctors in town and has been in contact with the surgeon in Guatemala and they all agree that Teresa can get the intravenous antibiotic treatment here in Copán at a lower price, which will lower the overall costs considerably. But still, assuming there will be no complications, we’re looking at a huge amount of hospital bills…

As for how to pay for it all? That still remains the big question… Argi and I are writing letters to any person or institution that might help. So far we have $500 pledged. This family has been lucky enough in all their tragedy to receive help when needed and we hope that once more they will. So if you want to help out, any donation is more than welcome! We need money and we need it NOW!!!

(For privacy reasons I have changed some of the names and omitted last names as well as the name of the village the family is from. If you’re interested in helping Doña Teresa, I can give you specified details on the treatment and other details. Please write me at: carinsteen at yahoo.com.)