Another day, another community from one of the rings of the Inferno

After breakfast, we set out to see the other two communities the Foundation is working with. The condition in which we find these people is completely unimaginable. I suppose that the slums of Rio or Calcutta or Cairo can rival what we see today, but only in size. Your imagination really can't fill it what we see today. No, it really can't. The first group we meet is compsed of indigenous people and drug addicts (we don't see the addicts). They are unwanted by the neighboring communities and under the constant threat of being bulldozed. (Frankly, I'm still trying to figure out if this would be as bad as it sounds, except that the people would be driven into the street, plus the injustice of the act.) No one wants them. Their ground is extremely polluted because they started digging latrines next to holes for wells, not realizing the problem with this. Now,scattered through the whole community over a number of years, the whole area is unfit for clean water wells. They then tried to go up the hill to get water, but the neighboring communities started dumping garbage up the hill to prevent this (not to mention the dead bodies that seem to collect up the hill - 7 were found up there earlier this week.) Now, their only choice is to steal water from a cistern for a nearby slaughter house. They haven't given up on digging a well nearby for a cistern system that would come into the community, but they have no money for this.

Adjacent to this community is another that while it looks as bad is at least accepted by the surrounding communities and has access to clean water. Clean water is one of the essential foundations for a better life for these people. Clean water is the key to better sanitation and better health. Dirty water leads to a long list of health maladies, from assorted parasites, bloated digestion tracts, all sorts of disease, disfiguring skin diseases and so forth, not to mention head lice and general stink.

After we leave, we have a chance for lunch and then we leave Santo Domingo. We get to ride back up the hills (mountains) we came down. It's not quite as exciting being on the mountain-side of the road as it is being on the drop-off side. We were all glad to see Quito. The Refugio is downright civilized compared to where we have been!

Peace to all of you from the intrepid pilgrims.

Another Community

After bidding farewell to our friends at La Isla, we set out to visit one of the other communities the Foundation is working with. This one is much larger, maybe around 5,000 people. They are situated on a garbage dump that contains medical waste. The ground is so contaminated that they cannot build a well like the one at La Isla. The smell of sewage coming off of the adjacent river is almost overpowering. The community leaders met us and walked around the community to tell us of their challenges and their hopes. They are an extremely happy, laughing group of people. They told us all they have is their laughs and their faith in God. They are VERY religious. In all of these places, you would simply not believe the sort of things people call a home. Two inches below your feet are several feet of piled up medical garbage. Here, a girl is usually pregnant by 14 (and 11 is not uncommon) and with another man by 16. Violent crime is a normal occurrence with several people killed every day (we are assured that we are safe, since we are with the community leaders).

Getting clean water into this community is more complicated. A piece of vacant land outside of the community needs to be purchased where a well can be dug and cisterns set up. The water then needs piped into the community. Even if they were to dig 2,000 feet, they would not find clean water anywhere in their community. Interestingly, they have not given up hope of this becoming a reality some day.

After we were given some bananas we headed to the hotel for the evening. It was a day filled with great emotional swings.

Our Well

After a bit of lunch we set out for the community of La Isla to see our well. First, a bit of background. La Isla is one of several communities in and around Santo Domingo occupied by what are essentially squatters, migrants and migrant drug dealers who had arrived in hope of finding work. Most of them ended up trying to live in the only places made available to them, essentially the vacant land on top of garbage dumps. The local politicians would essentially cover the dumps with a couple of inches of dirt and then "give" the land to the community in exchange for votes. After the election, no one did anything to help these people in what is essentially an unlivable situation. One of the primary problems in all of these communities is the lack of clean water.

The Foundation has been working with four of these communities for the past few years. Their goals are maternal health, anti-violence education, community organization and sanitation. La Isla, where our well is located, is one of these communities. When you come into La Isla, you can't miss the well. Not only is it the tallest structure in the community, it is also wrapped in a banner saying "Thanks to the People of St. Mark!" Being three stories, there is a classroom on the first floor, a "town hall" on the second and a "lookout" on the third with the cistern above this. Essentially, water is pumped out of a well and into a holding tank where it is chlorinated. It is then pumped into the cistern where it then flows by gravity into two smaller cisterns in the community (maybe 700 people).

Words really can't express the feelings of these people toward the people of St. Mark. It took the community president a while before he really could talk about the experience with us. He first told us about how everyone had given up on them and how no one would help them except the people of St. Mark. It was us who gave them hope for a better tomorrow by our gift to them. They were quick to tell us how everyone had to help, but the women did the most work, hauling the concrete (several showed us their biceps to prove their strength!). Everyone in the community pays $3 each month to use the well and to help with its maintenance. They then laid out a meal for us which included the best food these people probably saw in any number of months. As we got ready to leave, it is again impossible to write of the extreme emotions that these people expressed for the people of St. Mak. It is impossible to exaggerate these people's feelings for us and the outpouring of gratitude for what we helped them achieve.

Setting Out for Santo Domingo

Well, Tuesday morning arrived a bit earlier than we probably would have hoped. We met up with our pal Washington, had a bit of breakfast and went to see our friends at the "Foundation." The Foundation is the group that oversees the Refugio as well as the projects in Santo Domingo that we are going to go see. They also helped to coordinate our well project. After a fair amount of hugging and kissing (they were glad to see me again and to meet the Vicar) we all hopped in a truck and set off for Santo Domingo.

Now, Santo Domingo is about 3 1/2 hours southwest of Quito. To get there, you climb uphill to about 14,000 feet and then shoot down to about sea level. Most of the 3 1/2 hours are spent going downhill. Quite exciting, to say the least. The road was pretty good, but what made it really fun was the fact that much of the guardrail consisted of yellow caution tape strung between a couple of tires. Past the tape, it is a couple thousand feet straight down. Yes, you read that correctly, a couple of thousand feet! VERY exciting.

Once we got there we found out that Santo Domingo is basically a jungle climate - very hot and humid. Too, Santo Domingo is a city of about 300,000 with another 150,000 undocumented illegals (mostly Columbians: read drug dealers) I would describe Santo Domingo as the wild, wild west. You get a feeling of dumpy lawlessness. It made me learn to appreciate Quito far, far more than I had in the past. 

Sorry about the lack of pictures. I can't get an internet connection strong enough to get them uploaded into the blog ;-(
You'll have to come see them when we get home ;-)

We arrived!

We arrived in Quito around 10:20 pm local time (11:20 pm your time) and were met by Susette Goff and our good friend and driver Washington. We had set out from the Church around 8:00 am this morning. Thanks to Dan Landis for driving us up to Reagan National in Washington this morning. - If Dan tells you he's not susceptible to road rage, don't believe him ;-)

Our flights were smooth. We were at the airport early enough (thanks, Dan) to get bumped to an earlier flight. This just meant we sat in Atlanta longer than expected. We left for Quito a bit later as two people were on the manifest and didn't show up for the flight, so we had to wait until their baggage was unloaded.

We got through customs quickly, as the plane was only 1/3 full. After our bags were scanned, I had to open one, but the guard gave up when he saw the 9,462 pencils in there. Obviously, it was dark outside, but I did recognize some things. Washington was particularly pleased that I remembered Gringoland.

We head out for Santo Domingo and the wells tomorrow morning. There is no internet down there, so we won't write again until Wednesday. Hopefully, we'll have some pictures to share with you at that time!

Peace,
the intrepid pilgrims

Getting Ready for Another Trip to Ecuador

It seems that late October is becoming my time to go to Ecuador. This year, in the midst of getting things ready to leave, I'm also planning on taking an iPad and keyboard with me to write in this blog. This is a test to see how the BlogPress program will work for what I plan on doing. Hopefully, it will work because it will save a considerable amount of weight! Stay tuned ...



- Posted using BlogPress from my iPad

Some Final Thoughts

Some of you have heard me say that there are three things that bind us to the ancient church as far back as the apostles. The first is a vigorous proclamation of the name of Jesus, the second is the confession of the ancient creeds and the third is to remember the poor. All three of these are as old as the church itself and, in many ways, when you forget one or more of them you stop being a church. These are the things that make us different from other groups that do nice things, and sometimes they are the things that make us different from some who claim to be Christian.

When we remember these children in Ecuador, when we collect shoes and clothes and send money for scholarships and buy nativities and speak of them in our prayers, they keep us Christian. They make our hearts bigger, they remind us of the strength of our faith by seeing the strength of their faith, they remind us that the possibility of ministry in the name of Jesus is as large and grand and wide as our imagination. I know that we do things closer to home that help us in all of this and those things are equally important. But I believe that this is not a case of either/or, but both/and.

There is no doubt that it is important to remember the neighbor that you see, the one who lives in our community. But now we also remember the neighbor who lives a bit south of the middle of the earth. And you know what? They remember us too! They pray for us and send us the best they have to offer, and in this we are bound together over all of these miles in the one, holy, catholic and apostolic church, just as we say every week.

May God bless us so that we may be a blessing to his world and in doing his work, be blessed again.

Peace from Ecuador for the last time, this time!

Time to Leave

It's time to leave. There is the ongoing sense that if we had more time and more money, there are more things that could be done. Then we see the kids here and we know that there is a mountain of things that have been done. When we see kids with no family to speak of, who come from horrid situations go to college, we know that what's happening is worth the effort and is paying off. When a small child sees violence at home but knows that there is someplace to come after school for a few hours, for a safe place to hang out or do homework and have a meal (probably her only meal for the day) we know that what happens here is more than money, but the love and dedication and prayers of many many many people.

We saw a fair of street missions today. Many people in Ecuador are helping lost and abandoned and forgotten kids. The ones at the Refugio are ours and the things we do in Jesus' name here matter more than we can probably imagine or will ever know until we see the Kingdom in its fullness.

The hearts of the people here are very large. A sign of this are the unending gifts they have given to us to bring home to share with all of you; their best crafts, cards, pictures, paintings, some of their most treasured possessions. Among the people we work with, we saw no pleading for more or excuses for why things may not be working, but a hard determination to help these kids make something of their lives, to give them a chance, to remind them that they are loved, to teach them of Jesus and to make us, their American sponsors proud of them.

Gourmet Dining in Quito

Our dinner this evening was prepared by our college students. Raphael, my guy, is attending culinary school, so oversaw the cooking of a fabulous 6 course meal. As you can imagine, we couldn't be prouder of them. All of them come from the Refugio and are the first group to break out of the cycles that held kids in poverty before. It's true, not every kid is going to make it out of poverty for a number of reasons. But these kids had a dream, worked hard, tolerated the ill-will and taunting of their classmates and are seeking to make a new life for themselves. They don't have families or homes to fall back on and all of them are making it financially because someone from St. Mark is helping them pay for school and they are not allowed to make bone-headed mistakes and stay in the program.

If most of the kids we see at the Refugio are living under the pressures of crushing poverty, it is your help that gives them a respite, a place to go and find a meal (probably their only meal of the day) and an adult who doesn't beat them, who loves them and who encourages those who dare to dream of a better life. This happens because some people who live far away in a strange place called Virginia care enough to help make it happen. And some believed enough and are desperately trying to break out of a cycle that sucks so many back in. And because they were with people who loved them (even when parents wouldn't our couldn't) and demanded that they do their best (because charity without expectations only leads to dependancy and not responsibility and freedom). And because some people in that far away place loves them enough to help them, their dreams are becoming reality.

Tonight, one of the girls who spent the whole night chattering away, wanting to know what it was like to be a priest who wasn't Catholic and what the differences were and was a little frustrated with my lack of Spanish skills (she is working to be a lawyer, wouldn't you know) finally got to the nub of the issue; why was I there with her? Because Jesus wanted me to be there with her. She finally stopped talking for a while and sat there with a smile on her face. That's what it is really about, isn't it? We're here because Jesus has called us here.

la Mitad del Mundo - The Middle of the World

Today was the day we traveled to the middle of the world. About 1 hour 15 minutes north of Quito (yes, we've been in the southern hemisphere) lies the equator. When I was a kid, I never imagined being on the equator, but here we are! The day began with a stop at a monastary that makes ice cream. Remind me if I ever say I want to be a monk, to join a monastary that makes ice cream. Then it was off to an inactive volcano (at least that's there story and their sticking with it!) near the equator which you can see in one of the pictures. It is thought the mountain had been twice as high as it is, but blew it's top 400-500 years ago. The mountains here are really high, but it is the Andes, after all. And yes, there are llamas!

After the volcano it was off to the equator, the middle of the earth. Yes, I spent a fair piece of time hopping from north to south. In the picture, Rob and Suzette are in the north, Anne was in the southern hemisphere and I had a foot on both sides - I felt very balanced. There is a museum nearby so we stopped and watched all of the funk equator effects. Gravity is slightly less on the equator - you weigh 2.2 lbs. less on the equator and you're not quite as strong. Things should balance better. One is invited to balance an egg on a nail - you can see Rob giving it a try (unsuccessfully, I might add). I did it 4 times and got a diploma to prove it! We also watched the Coriolis effect. A few feet one way or another and the water spins left or right as it goes down a drain. On the equator, it falls straight down the drain. Pretty funky.