San Pedro Housing Project

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At the end of 2016, San Pedro community members blessed three new houses that had been constructed with the help of their sister community in Cayuga, New York. However, these buildings weren’t the only fruits of the nearly seven month long project. Based on a collective learning-building methodology, the effort to plan and build these houses facilitated an educational exchange between participating families and the rest of the community.

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The San Pedro community collectively chose three families based on need and availability of land. These families committed to prepare local materials and assist with the construction of all three homes.

Further meetings offered community members an opportunity to learn more about the Modern Bahareque construction method which was used to build the homes. Modern Bahareque makes use of local materials such as clay, sand, grasses, wood, rock, and lime. It is a sustainable method to provide dignified housing to people who have not had access to permanent homes.

Upon completion of the project, local catechist Don Carmen blessed the new homes. It our hope that with the support of sister communities, this new knowledge will empower the community to continue construction.

To help us continue the Dignified Housing Project, please consider making a contribution through FACES, a nonprofit in the U.S. that supports our work in El Salvador. For more information about this project, see the report on our Facebook page.

Tour Report

Massachusetts Bay!

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Well, folks, the tour is over. We started at the Pacific Ocean in Los Angeles on September 23, and on November 1, we touched the Altantic in Boston! We have met so many wonderful people and communities along the way, and we are grateful for a safe trip, new and strengthened friendships, and lots of reflection and joy around the sister community relationships. Many new ideas grew out of conversations along the road, around tables, or on walks with our friends in Palm Desert, Phoenix, San Jose, Portland, Raleigh, Durham, St. Louis, Champaign, Chicago, Grand Rapids, Detroit, Columbus, Cincinnati, Akron, Cauyga, New Haven, and Boston. THANK YOU, once more, to everyone!

To briefly document our last two weeks, we went to Hoban High School on the morning of October 24. Hoban is a high school in Akron, Ohio that came to visit El Salvador and the community of Guachipilín for the first time in February. We spoke to some combined Spanish classes and met with the faculty involved in organizing the trip before heading out for upstate New York. Along the way, Larry had a surprise… NIAGRA FALLS!

 

José and Laura Buffam modeling the bags from the women’s group in San Pedro

We spent a really lovely long weekend in Cayuga, New York with San Pedro’s sister community and getting to know the folks at Wells College! We visited some dairy farms around the county with Pablo, meeting the cows and the farmworkers, learning about their situations, and we went to a kid’s Halloween festival, fundraising for UNICEF. We went to Quaker worship Sunday morning with the community, and spoke at Wells that afternoon, to a group of students, faculty and community members. On Monday, we spoke to a couple classes at the local high school, as well as Spanish classes at Wells. It was great to reconnect with folks who have visited El Salvador over the past decade or so and talk about hopes for the future of the sister community relationship.

Laurel, José, Dan, Mike Bozza, and daughter on campus at Boston College!

Our last trip with Larry, who has earned the title of “U.S. Edgardo” (Edgardo is FUNDAHMER’s stellar driver), was over to New Haven, Connecticut to speak at Yale Divinity School and the University’s Catholic Center. A group from the Catholic Center is traveling to El Salvador this March, so we shared about the country’s history and current reality.

Finally, we rolled into Boston, Massachusetts for our final stops. We had the great pleasure of being with Dan Ponsetto at Boston College, talking in our friend Steve Pope’s class and speaking to students that evening. We also had a lunch with about 25 or 30 administrators from different departments at BC to share a bit about how we receive students visit every year and to field questions. The next day, we went to Boston College High School, who first visited El Salvador in 2012 to meet administrators and speak in classes. Go Eagles!

A bulletin board prepared by the folks at Good Shepherd about their scholarship students!

The next day, we spoke with the folks at the Church of the Good Shepherd, longtime friends who have been visiting El Salvador and the community of El Ocotillo for many years. We shared dinner and then spoke about the community, especially the now nine (!) scholarship students that the church is working with Boston College to support. The next morning, we headed over to Littleton UCC, the church of current volunteer Amelia Wiggins, to speak about FUNDAHMER with her church community. We met her mom and grandmother, and are headed back to El Salvador with many hugs for Amelia!

Halloween with the Bozzas (Note the José costume on the right!)

Throughout our time in Connecticut and Boston, the Bozza family was a great help and support. The Bozza’s come to El Salvador every year to do a dental delegation, and we were so happy to see Ralph and Mary Lou, at their home in Farmington, CT as well as seeing Mike, Zana, their daughter Salam, and FUNDAHMER volunteer Mary Lou in Boston. They shared their homes, time, care and vehicles with us, and we even met up with a group of lawyers with Mike in Boston to talk about issues that undocumented immigrants face.

The tour may be over, but its fruits have just begun to ripen. We’ve got some new strategies for the scholarship program, moments of witness to solidarity from this side of the border, and lots of new friends we hope to see in El Salvador for the International Sister Community Retreat in March! We have also received gracious and generous donations, all of which will go directly toward the three projects we spoke about during our visits: grain purchase to mitigate effects of the drought in Morazán, the continuation of Campesino School, and support for the women’s groups in Sacacoyo, Las Mesas, and Morazán. We started an online crowdsourcing fundraiser for the duration of the tour as well, via Indiegogo, and we are still able to receive online donations for these specific projects here:

(FUNDAHMER’s online fundraising page)

Please consider contributing a small donation – every little bit really does go a long way – or sharing the opportunity to give with your family or community.

José got to a point by the end of the tour of saying “THANK YOU, THANK YOU VERY MUCH” whenever there was silence or as we were leaving a visit, and as far as sentiments to express out of the blue go, gratitude isn’t a bad one. We are very grateful for the openness, hospitality, and care we received along this journey, and look forward to continued collaboration with each and every person and group we met.

Historic Memories in San Pedro

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In February, the interview team from Cayuga, New York returned to continue their memory and history project! The Cayuga community is sistered with San Pedro, in Cacaopera, Morazán, and began last year to record interviews with members of the community about their own stories, at the request of one of the community elders, Eligia. This project has not only allowed both communities to grow closer together in knowledge and care for each other, but has also strengthened the mutual accompaniment, which is the goal of the sister relationships, as well as provided a space for empowerment and emotional healing within San Pedro.

The interview below is with Ana, a member of the congregation of mothers, about her experience as a Salvadoran, a woman and a mother during the war.

High School Graduations in Morazán

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The Salvadoran school year ends in November, which means, as you’ve surely seen here on the blog, many graduation celebrations, from preschool all the way through high school, and hopefully some university students in the coming years! Last weekend were graduation celebrations for high school (“bachillerato”) students out in Morazán in the municipalities of Cacaopera and Corinto. We are so proud of all of the graduates and their families for choosing education as a priority. Most of these students are the first high school graduates in their families and one of a minority in their communities.

Graduations for high schoolers are obviously a time to celebrate the accomplishments of these students and to admire the sacrifices and dedication of each student and his or her family. However, for some students in many grade levels, graduations and the end of the school year mark the end of their educational career. The national university gets more competitive each and every year, and many families decide to send their young people to work in the town or in the fields closer to home instead of continuing on to university, high school, or even seventh grade. It’s easy to get swept up in the victory of graduation day, but we would like to take a moment to invite the extended FUNDAHMER family to hold in our hearts especially those young men and women who will not be continuing their studies next year, for whatever reason.

The graduations in Cacaopera were on Friday, November 30, at the “United Nations” Education Center, where students from Agua Blanca, San Pedro, La Hacienda, Junquillo, Yancolo, and sometimes Calavera go for high school. As always, we were grateful for the accompaniment of representatives from Prince of Peace parish in San Antonio, Texas, including Glenn, Tom, and Monsignor Patrick Cronin, who concelebrated the graduation Mass and helped award diplomas during the ceremony. The day started off with Mass in the church in Cacaopera followed by the graduation ceremony at the school. Afterwards, all of the graduates’ families invite friends and family for lunch and possibly dancing!

Graduations in Corinto were held the next day, December 1, in the Community Center in Corinto. Santos Aurelia, from Jimilile, earned the top spot in her graduation class!

To see photos of this year’s graduating high schoolers, click here. For pictures of the ceremonies and celebrations, see the slideshow below!

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Interviews in San Pedro

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Last weekend, Dee Nance and Phoebe Chestna from the sister community of Cayuga, New York came to visit and to begin an exciting new effort with their sister community of San Pedro in Cacaopera, Morazán.

Dee shared some of her preschool songs with the children of San Pedro during her visit in 2010.

On the last day of the Cayuga group’s visit to San Pedro last April, Doña Eligia, one of the community’s leaders, expressed hope that the story of her life, especially during the war, could be written for the memory of her community and for future generations. The group was touched by this idea, and began to imagine how to respond to Eligia’s dream. Dee made contact with Phoebe, a recent graduate of Wells College in Aurora, NY, and they came down last weekend for what we all hope will be the first of many visits. The community was enthusiastic about the project, and we had time to begin interviews with nine individuals. The plan is to transcribe these interviews into English and Spanish, so that both San Pedro and Cayuga have access to the memories of these very full lives.

Here is a very small part of what Luciano had to share: