MEDICAL AND DENTAL CLINICS

We have arranged various medical and dental clinics in San Jorge. Due to the lack of a facility to hold the clinics, some of them had to be done in an open plaza with no easy access to running water.
We need a place to hold these needed clinics in the future.



We organized a Canadian team from Project Gift 2003 to go to San Jorge La Laguna for three days and treat the people of the village.

We organized one of the children diagnosed with Spina Bifida to receive an operation in Guatemala City.

We arranged for “Wings” to go to San Jorge and discuss with them Women’s Health Issues.

We raised funds for a baby in need of a heart operation to receive the operation in Guatemala City.

We have arranged medical help and assistance for many different women and children and supplied wheelchairs, walkers and crutches to those in need.

Dr. Jennifer from Nelson, B.C. Canada set up a clinic in San Jorge to check the weight and height of children under 5yrs of age and especially focusing on babies under 1yrs of age. We are hoping from this that we may be able to head off medical problems and get early treatment.

She found 30% of the children malnourished. She also decided that we need to get funds to be able to do laboratory testing on many of the children complaining of stomach aches. A lot of these are parasites but it needs to be confirmed by a feces test. We need to start finding the parasite medicine to treat these children.

The children are usually very healthy until the mother stops breastfeeding. That is when the malnourishment starts. Some children are lucky and breastfeed until 18 months or older but many of the mothers are pregnant very quickly and so some only get breast milk until 9 months of age.

The women are learning how to fill out the forms and do height/weight checks.

Milk formulas donations are always needed.

SCHOOL AND STUDENT SPONSORSHIP

The rural school in San Jorge la Laguna has 550 children enrolled in 11 classrooms this year. Lots of them suffer from malnutrition and parasites. Very few are exposed to any educational material before starting school and they struggle in crowded classrooms. Spanish is their second language and instruction is given in Spanish with no extra support.

When we first went to this school, there was no running water. We are now pleased to say that they have running water in the toilets and wash basins thanks to generous donations from private donors. We also supplied this school with desks, chairs, paint, school supplies, tin trash cans. In June 2007 we finished paving with cement the space between the classroom. The children now have a safe place to play and the classrooms are kept cleaner.

We have also found sponsors for students from San Jorge.

These girls attend the San Jorge School and they are sponsored by Mayan Family donors. They received new uniforms in April 2007. Please visit our Student Sponsorship blog http://mayanfamiliesstudentsponsorship.blogspot.com/

School is free here but there are many costs attached to it. The inscription fee, the school uniform, the books, the backpack, the school shoes, the tennis shoes and the added extra costs. This puts sending a child to school way out of the range of many families. These costs vary from school to school.

Quite often if there is a choice between which child shall go to school the family will choose the boy to attend school and the girls will stay at home. We sponsor many boys but we like to make sure that girls are getting a chance to go to school as well.
We especially try to sponsor children from single parents as these are the most disadvantaged. We also sponsor two parent families who are suffering hardships.

It costs us $120 a year to send a child to school. This includes school subscription, school uniform and sweater, all school supplies, backpack, two pairs of socks, underwear, school shoes, tennis shoes, shorts and t-shirt for gym. Depending on the school and the grade it may also include a musical instrument, it also usually includes an annual school excursion and help with projects - such as mothers and fathers day crafts etc.

If you would like to sponsor a child, please contact us at mayanfamilies@yahoo.com.

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June 2007.- Mayan Families donated water filters for each of the classrooms and now the kids are able to drink clean water.

Temporary classrooms in center of town:

Classrooms at the permanent school:

This new classroom needs electricity and paint

Volunteers playing with the kindergarten children

This is the cereal snack being cooked at the school in San Jorge la Laguna. It is a cereal called Incaparina which is rich in vitamins and fiber. It is mixed with a little powdered milk and a lot of sugar. The children at this school are lucky. They receive this snack daily. The women are cooking these huge pots over wood stoves. The heat and the smoke in the room is overwhelming.

The school is also in need of more classrooms, desks, chairs, their dream is to be able to have a library and computers for the children.

The needs of this school are:
*URGENT* New classrooms to replace the makeshift ones currently used in the center of town.

Glass for the windows.
Bookshelves.
Desks for the teachers.
Computers.
Typewriters.
A microphone and speakers.
A play area for the children.
Supplies such as paint, markers, paper, pens, pencils etc.
Chairs and Desks for the students.

The boys' lavatory

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October 2007.- This week we were able to install bookshelves in 15 of the 17 classrooms in the San Jorge school. The other two classrooms are temporary classrooms and the shelving will be installed in January when school re-opens.

This was a donation from G.A.F.I. - a wonderful group of parents who have adopted their children from Guatemala and want to give something back to the country and to help the children here.

These classrooms had no shelving previously. The books and equipment had to be stacked on the floor. These shelves are going to be of great use to the teachers and pupils of the San Jorge School. Thank you so much G.A.F.I.!

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January 6, 2008.- Thanks to an anonymous donation from a Mayan Families supporter, 2 bathrooms are being built in San Jorge so the children that go to the temporary school don't have to use the Mayors Office. They are hoping to have them finished by the time school starts.
Now students and the people of San Jorge will have a public place to use the bathrooms and wash their hands. They are going to be the only public restrooms in San Jorge so they will be a busy place.

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January 11, 2008.- New Gas Stoves for San Jorge School.
The school in San Jorge had been using huge wood burning stoves to cook the snack provided each day to the children. This snack is sometimes the only meal that the children have from the moment that they get up until they go home at 12.30pm. Many children do not have breakfast before they come to school. The school provides a cooked oatmeal drink called mosh, or sometimes a meal of noodles and meat.
This has always been cooked over these very large wood burning stoves. The kitchen was laden with smoke, it was so hot for the women working there.

The school had a wish to be able to buy these gas stoves but no money to be able to make that a reality.

Along came a school in the U.S. that wanted to be able to do something for the children of Guatemala. They sent the money to buy these stoves.

This will not only help the health of the women working in the kitchen but it is going to really help the environment. Before each child had to bring wood every week to be able to keep the stoves going. Now the school is charging $1 per child per year to be able to buy the gas.

Now the stoves are being installed in a smaller room that used to be a very crowded classroom. There was barely room to move. The old stoves are being dismantled and the old kitchen which was much bigger than the small classroom is now going to be painted and used as a classroom. This will give the children and the teacher much more room to move.

Today the arrival of the stoves was greeted by loud firecrackers and applause and many speeches of appreciation.
Most of the students and parents gathered to see these stoves and waited in the hot sun to hear the speeches.

Thank you to all the people who made this dream become a reality.

MICRO CREDIT

We received funding to do a micro no- interest loan project with the women in San Jorge.

Our microcredit program is simple: we give a loan, deduct Q10 for paperwork costs, and the women pay back the loan interest-free over 10 months. Our largest loan is Q990 ($132), paid back at Q100 monthly. No-interest loans are controversial in the world of microfinance. Here is our position. These families are extremely poor. The best thing we can do is to give them an opportunity to help themselves by financing businesses that supplement family income. The fact that they can pay back a loan's principal is the first step, and later, if their business grows we can worry about interest.

The money has to be used to either start a small business or enhance an existing one.

Many of the women make jewelry or weave so they have taken that money to invest in their business and to be able to buy their merchandise at wholesale prices.

One woman has started a small goods store. Another has bought two blenders to start a juice stand. Another to invest dry goods into her already existing stall. Another to buy a stove for her tortilla business.

Our survey found that these home-based part-time businesses increase family income by 38 percent on average. The most successful business averages daily sales of Q30 ($4, the exchange rate is about 7.5 Quetzales = $1). What are these women doing with the income from their businesses? They are feeding and clothing their families, sending their children to school, saving to improve their houses, and growing their businesses.

So far we have had a 100% payment return. One of the advantages of this project is that the women have had to learn how to use the banking system. The repayments are made directly into an account at the bank so the women have had to become familiar with filling out deposit slips. For many women this was the first time that they have ever had to enter a bank.

We have many women waiting who want to participate in the micro credit loan.

CHCKEN PROJECT

We have been able to help with funding a “Chicken Project” for the Women's Group.

Each woman received 10 chickens.. The purpose of this was to increase their income. After raising the chickens most of the women sold them, keeping one or two to eat. This enabled them to supplement their income and increase the protein content of their diet.

When they sold them they would buy two extra for every one sold. This way they increased their stock of chickens, they had food to eat and they had some money left over.Some women sold their chickens and invested in thread for their weavings.

All of the women used the money to better their financial situation. Almost three quarters of the group still has chickens that they are continuing to sell.

ENERGY EFFICIENT STOVE

These women also need to have simple stoves built in their houses. They cook over open fires and the smoke is very bad for the whole family’s health. We need to be able to put in stoves that are wood efficient and with pipes-chimney's that can take the smoke outside.

Onil stoves are an excellent solution to this problem. They reduce smoke emission's from within the dwelling by 99%, they increase the cooking surface height - eliminating burns and/or uncontrolled fires, and they create a 60-70% savings in fuel consumption - allowing for a reduction in deforestation and freeing the women and children from having to gather and carry large quantities of wood for cooking.
Mayan families has secured donations for 120 Onil stoves in San Jorge. We held classes to teach the women how to install them. We are very proud of this project and we hope to continue providing this life changing stove to more families.

The women learning to make the energy efficient stoves. We need a facility to hold meetings and classes for this and other projects.

January 25, 2007. Yesterday 120 energy efficient stoves were delivered to San Jorge la Laguna. They were laid out in the main square while all the pieces were put together. This was a long awaited day for these 120 families. Now the work of installing them begins!

HOUSE REBUILDING

Many of the houses in San Jorge are in need of urgent repairs. Lots of these house are made with all kinds of improvised materials, like tin sheets, pieces of wood, plastic, mud bricks, etc. Hurricane Stan destroyed and damaged many more and the people living in them will suffer even more now that the rainy season has started.

Mayan Families has secured donations and volunteers to build and rebuild houses for the most needy families. The families that receive the house must contribute with work during the construction and they are very happy to do it, even the small children.

Lukas and his family pose in front of the house that was built for him thank to a generous donation. Lukas suffered an accident and became a paraplegic. His wife and children make beaded jewelry to help support the family but it is a very low paying job and they do not make enough to support the family.

Some other projects that we have done in San Jorge are:

Constructed three more houses

Supplied new roofing to a widow.
Built a retaining wall to stop a house falling into the river.
Constructed two bathrooms.
Built a ramp for a child in a wheelchair to make her house more accessible.

We have many women in this group in San Jorge who after the Hurricane Stan are in need of new tin for their roofs and at least three people in need of rebuilt-new houses. One elderly couple’s house was completely destroyed in the storm and they are in need of a new house.