NamasteDirect Notes

Patrick's Journal from Guatemala

2009-05-05T13:10:00.000-07:00

April 1, 2009

5:15 Central time
- Arrived in Houston, very overcast, kind of humid, looking out while landing.
- It is amazing how FLAT Texas is! You can see all the major cities just on the horizons!
- Mr. Lance had tickets to the Presidential Club. It was very crowded and snooty, not very kid friendly. We could not find a place to sit or anything filling to eat. So we grabbed some snacks and coffee and left in search of nourishment!
- We found a Ruby’s Diner to eat, and promptly divided up the tables 5 and 5 - the healthy and the quarantined. (Giorgiani, Addi, Christina, Fiona and I)
- Christina and I both ordered a Chinese chicken salad. When it arrived, we realized we should have just shared. Everything really IS big in Texas!
- Plane flight from Houston to Guatemala City filled with trashy magazine reading and MASH games.

9:15 Guatemala Time (1 hour ahead of San Mateo)
- Descending into Guatemala City, it is crazy to see how modern and illuminated it is. Looks just like flying in back home!
- The atmosphere is very nice, cool, humid inside, much nicer outside.
- I’m having a little trouble breathing; Victor says it must be the altitude.
- I’m going to feel like more of a giant than ever. The ceiling heights are SO LOW!!!!
- Customs and Luggage is quick and easy. :)
- Met Kristen and piled into a van to travel a few blocks to our inn, the streets looked very clean.
-We turned the corner into a dark alley and came across two men holding two VERY LARGE SHOTGUNS! All of our hearts skipped a beat, I think. Turns out they are on our side. *Whew!*
-Kristen explains that there has been some violence in Guatemala City recently. Related to recent narcotics bust, there has been some killing on red buses. She assures us that the incidents are not occurring we are going and we will be traveling in private vans and will have security with us. Feeling pretty safe so far, never felt in any danger the whole trip.
- Bed and breakfast is very cute, cozy. Looking forward to tomorrow after debriefing.

April 2, 2009

-Addi woke everyone up at 5:45 in the morning, Guatemala time! (4:45am San Mateo time!)
- Crazy bird sounds today, we are all trying to figure out what type of bird it is.
- Weather is very nice, clear. A bit too cold for Malini.
- Shower is very nice; facilities are not bad, pretty moderate.
- After a nice breakfast of fruit and toast, INTENSE game of Hearts started. Malini and I, the beginners, did surprisingly well!
- The group then left Guatemala City to head towards some villages and the Namaste office in Antigua.
- The city is pretty modernized; everything is made of mortar and metal.
- We drove by many of the red buses that were being attacked recently. Kind of like the BART transportation at home. Kind of scary.
- We saw the BIGGEST McDonalds, Burger King, and Chuck E. Cheeses here! They’re HUGE!
- Lots of people driving, walking around doing their daily thing. Dresses vary from traditional to casual.
- Drove up into the hills to visit the small village of San Mateo, the same name of the town we're from. :)
- Met with Nelly and Jim, two Namaste employees, who gave us a tour of the town and introduced us to Domingo, a Business Advisor for the local women who receive microcredit.
- Got to visit a local woman who Domingo advised. She had 5 children and was a string bean farmer.
- Fiona got the best picture of Addi communicating with one of the little girls.
- Kristen stressed the importance of not taking too many pictures; we didn’t want to make the women feel exploited.
- Drove from San Mateo to Antigua to the NamasteDirect office, climbed to roof for great view.
- Had sandwiches for lunch and had big discussion for how microloans work.
- The group then drove into Antigua and visited a community center for local women, got to see them in action learning how to sew, make cakes, pizza dough. Malini, Fiona and Jackie got involved and kneaded dough.
- All chilled in the back rooms and outside on the lawn in the sun
- One of the donors who traveled with us that day came and offered us tortillas from street vendors, which we happily devoured. Unfortunately, Kristin came and gave us a big lecture on the importance of not eating street food, scared the CRAP out of us, that we were all going to get sick. Luckily, no one was ill.
- Had yummy yummy ice cream at Marco Polo in downtown Antigua.
- Arrived at Black Cat Inn in downtown Antigua, a hostel for college students traveling in Guatemala.
- Smelly, small, rooms and facilities, but other than that, a very fun time spent with college students from across the world.
- Played cards with Matias, who was born in Argentina and now lives in Israel, who was visiting Guatemala, very nice guy. His next big trip is to New York City.
- A little bit later, Jared filled in the forth spot for Hearts, a friendly funny guy from Virginia. Had a great time playing while waiting for Kristin, James to come back from the office, ended exactly at 6:00 PM after he foiled my attempt to shoot the moon on the last card!
- Went on a nighttime walking tour of churches, lit up at night and being prepared for Semana Santa (the Holy Week).
- Ate dinner at Cafe Skye, fancy restaurant on balcony, huge menu selection. I went with the BBQ chicken, because the BBQ sauce is SO different here, little more spice and natural sweetness.
- The group recognized the music playing as Simon and Garfunkel and -get this- a techno remix of Smells Like Teen Spirit.
- At about 9:00, the group walked back to the hostel. Even though it was pitch black down narrow, empty streets, we never ONCE felt in danger. Very safe.
- Once back into the hostel, the music was VERY loud y muy borrachos! (Many drunks!)
- The entire group came together to play cards with two decks, lotta fun!
- As the group went to bed, Jared showed up again to slap into an intense game of Egyptian War.
- Fun way to end the night.

April 3, 2009

- Couldn’t sleep most of the night with the mosquitoes buzzing around me! Scary!
- While waiting for everyone to pack up, another Hearts game began. Mr. Lance got in on this one, and he really kicked my butt. :( He gave me the really mean cards.
- Black Cat Inn restaurant was probably the biggest, best breakfast on the trip. Christina, Jackie, Giorgiani and Emily all ordered pancakes, and had to cancel TWO orders due to their insane sizes!
- They played “Come On, Eileen” on the soundtrack! I had this feeling that they would, and if they didn’t, I’d have been really disappointed. Woohoo!
- Boarded the “sick bus” and tied the bags to the computer to travel out to rural villages and Panajachel.
- Big yummy breakfast + bouncy car ride = not fun. :P
- On the drive there, we passed numerous smoggy towns with mechanic shops back to back to back. It seems to be those places where you’re born into the job. Doesn’t look like there are too many educational opportunities or good health in these towns.
- Visited a woman and her family in their very rural town, she showed us her beautiful huipiles (traditional woven cloth) that she has been trying to sell.
- Apparently, Semana Santa is the best time to sell her goods, but for some reason, not as many people are buying them this year. (Shows that the global economic crisis is not only affecting just the big countries and cities!)
- The group offered to buy one, but the price was just way too much. Nelly told us that the workshops we visited yesterday were to teach people like her other skills that she could use to make money in the off-season.
- We visited another village that received microloans, this one made up of two families. The conditions seemed very poor, dusty, but the women seemed very happy and optimistic.
- The children were very shy, but this one cute girl was a total ham for the cameras. She loved to get her picture taken.
- We found a lonely turkey that was pining for its mate. Poor thing…everyone sympathized, lol.
- We traveled with a husband/wife business advisor team to the villages who spoke Spanish and the indigenous Mayan languages.
- After hours of driving, the restaurant we were going to for lunch had been CLOSED for a week! Augh! We ended up going to a very touristy, but very yummy, roadside restaurant.
- During lunch, Fiona had a very nice conversation with the husband/wife team. I could catch a bit of the conversation. They were very friendly, and often took in travelers who were visiting Guatemala in their rather large house.
- After a short drive, arrived at the Iximche Ruins, the remnants of an ancient city. The place was not as super famous, or super touristy, as Tikal, but it was a quiet, local spot. Very large spread out buildings and dirt mounds to climb, run around.
- The group reenacted the Soulja Boy on top of the huge temple, very embarrassing.
- Drew the attention of another group, a group of young adults from all over Central America who were part of an economic support group. The guard who was trying to get us to leave ended up taking pictures of the groups together.
- Drove high over the mountains and across gravely, mid-construction roads down to Panajachel and Lake Atitlan.
- We stayed at an AMAZING hotel! The best one on the trip. Like a tropical resort in the middle of a bustling city.
- We have been blowing through out funds, so we decided to order pizza and eat at the hotel instead of going out. Sat on the balcony walkways to have our feast.
- Intense Spoons tournament included everyone in the group, ended up with lots of funny quotes.
- We ended the night with a late night discussion on what we had seen today, and how our loans might help the people we met. Today was the end of the “official” microlending business on our trip.

April 4, 2009

- After a nice shower and breakfast, we walked to the closest bank to exchange American dollars to Guatemalan quetzales.
- Walked up the Panajachel streets to Crossroad Café, the BEST coffee in the world! The man who ran it was a Bay Area resident who moved down to Guatemala to be closer to the business.
- Shipped all across the world, even to the U.N.
- Was very devout, had a very inspiring life story and “live life to the fullest” philosophy.
- Had the best-iced mochas EVER, and got to visit his secret room in the back where he stored HUGE bags and bags of coffee from all over the world. He also had a gigantic grinding machine for cooking and making coffee. So delicious!
- Our next trip was to the Nature Reserve for Zip lining. We were planning on getting a ride for a tuktuk, the local method of travel (small motorized scooters with a backseat covered in canopy for passengers) When Kristen leaned out to hail a ride, a guy pulled over in his pickup truck and told us to hop in! We held up traffic and loaded all thirteen of us into the back for the REAL local way to travel.
- Arrived at the Reserve, and met a small group of boys all begging to sell us things. (Key chains, postcards, jewelry, etc.) This was a very touristy spot, so they hit up the foreigners there almost every day. It was very hard to say no to them.
- We had to convince both Giorgiani and Melissa to go on the zip line with us. After a bit, they finally gathered their courage and decided to try it.
- Hiked through miles of dense rainforest, guide called out monkeys for us to see, walked past coffee plants, and crossed rope bridges. Very Indiana Jones. ;)
- Slid down 8 zip lines across the jungle canopy, had the time of my life. Took pictures of everyone zip lining down. Fiona was very scared, almost ate it against a flat rock wall on the 5th one.
- Returned to Panajachel in truck to eat at a nice hotel next to the lake.
- In efforts not to get sick, Malini ordered the Immunity Booster shake, made of pineapple, ginger, and garlic. Tasted like drinking a pineapple chicken dinner. I helped her finish it, as it was pretty disgusting.
- We were planning on taking a boat across Lake Atitlan to the island of Santiago to visit another village, but there was not enough time. Instead we went to the coastal village of Santa Catalina, and spent the twilight time walking the streets.
- Got to watch the sun set behind the mountains on the boat ride back. Magnificent. Got some great photos.
- A volleyball game was going on between some local men, and Christina and Mr. Lance joined in. Both groups had a lot of fun watching the game.
- After frequent stops to stores and fabric stands, arrived at the hotel for some sandwiches for dinner and some massages from Malini for all of us.

April 5, 2009

- Woke up early to walk to Internet café with Kristen to use computer, buy pastries.
- Christina braided my hair and put it into a ponytail. Pictures were added to the feminina section.
- Hudson gathered all of our empty water bottles and remade Stonehenge in the middle of the hotel walkway. Quite impressive for a three year old.
- Took a VERY long car ride from Panjachel for Chichicastenango for the famous market. Fiona and I talked to Michelle about food for almost the entire time. :)
- Got caught in a huge traffic jam in the middle of the mountains. Trucks, buses, and tour cabs were stuck and honking, while the police guided us around a delivery truck that had broken down.
- Arrived in Chichi to walk a bit to market. It was incredibly important for us to stick together that day, as it was insanely crowded and we were easy targets for pickpockets.
- Rows and rows of stands, canopies, and tent villages selling everything you could possibly think of. I bought a mask, belt for Erin, cloth from an old woman who was walking around for my grandmother, wallet for my mother and a shirt for my dad.
- Had to barter to get a good deal for gifts. They raised the prices a lot for us because we were tourists, but I still felt really bad lowering the prices. I knew this was probably everyone’s primary source of making money.
- In the middle of the market was a great white church. The inside was full of incense and displays blending Christianity with the local Mayan religious customs.
- After hours of shopping, we met at the Hotel San Tomas for sandwich lunch and to wait for the others. The hotel was very touristy, had macaws and parrots on perches that squawked and talked to the visitors.
- One had crawled off its perch and camouflaged itself within the bushes. Very pretty. Got some great up close shots of it.
- We arrived in Antigua to find the roads completely blocked off for Semana Santa, and had to walk our luggage from the Namaste Office all the way downtown to the Black Cat Inn.
- We saw tons of alfombras artwork on the streets, and men dressed in purple and white ropes for the first procession for the week that night.
- The whole group cheered up when we had a delicious dinner at Las Palmas, a fancy restaurant across the street.
- By the time we got out, it was very late at night, and we were only able to catch the tail end of the procession. We watched the huge statues of Mary, Jesus, and angles file into the main church surrounded by a large brass band and a sea of people filling up the plaza.
- Spent the rest of the evening playing cards.

April 6, 2009

- Woke up even earlier in the morning to the haunting melody of a nightingale. I wish I could have remembered the tune.
- Started the day off with another yummy Black Cat breakfast.
- Drove from Antigua to the Volcano Pacaya for a day of hiking. The trail looked pretty daunting, so all the women except Jackie rented horses to ride on. I thought is was a tourist trap, but they only rented them for the hike up, and would walk the way down.
- The hike was BRUTAL! Hiked hill after hill through a dusty forest until we finally reached the lava plain beneath the volcano. Looked exactly like the surface of some distant planet.
- The horses stopped a safe distance away from the bottom of a ravine. We could see huge dust clouds kicking up when red-hot rocks would tumble down the hill. And we were climbing up there!
- Crawled up a nearly vertical slope of crumbling, loose rock to the near summit of a hill. We weren’t going up to the very summit, but up a pretty high hill, with a flowing river of lava at the top!
- Unfortunately, Christina, Addi, and Giorgiani did not make it all the way up, but everyone else got the magnificent experience of standing about 20 ft. away from molten rock! Awesome!
- Our lunch eaten, water bottles drained, and already hot and aching, we hiked all the way pack to the base camp, miserable, thirsty, tired, and we could not stop until we reached the end. Once we downed bottle after bottle of water, every member of the group slept the whole way back.
- The whole car woke with a start as we passed the Semana Santa procession just beginning with a huge drum! Within thirty seconds, we all had our cameras out. :)
- Huge statues of Jesus, Mary, and other saints carried by men dressed like Roman soldiers, large brass bands, and devout followers marched down the street, right over all the beautiful alfombra art. An amazing spectacle to see.
- Devoured pizza at the Namaste office, and took cold showers to clean up from the hike.
- After collecting everything, left for our last long car ride back to Guatemala City for the last night at Patricia’s.
- Mr. Lance introduced us to a fun new game called Psychiatrist, SO much fun to play with a large group, and watch Addi get all flustered.
- After a long, emotional reflection, the group stayed up late for one final fun night of cards.

Now Playing: Viral Action!

2009-04-24T13:17:00.000-07:00

We have an exciting development here in Guatemala - we are starting to experience viral demand in our program. It happened in San Mateo, a village near Antigua, which we abandoned as a growth area last December.

You may remember how excited our crew was last August when we were introduced into the community by a local activist. Nelly and FAPE presented our program to more than 80 women in meetings of 50 and then 30. We thought that with a little recruiting we could soon have 100 borrowers. So FAPE put their two best loan supervisors plus a crew of loan officers to work going door to door.

Then our balloon lost air and what happened ... we only had 10 women sign up and take their first loan on September 16th. Meanwhile we had recruited two Business Advisers, Domingo and Sarita to serve the community, a more than slight bit of over staffing under the circumstances. So, as soon as we got our feet on the ground, we and FAPE instituted a Really Intense recruiting effort, including beating the bushes in the immediate countryside. That effort was the joint work of our four staff members plus an ample FAPE crew. The result was the launching of group two early in December with another 10 members. Given the intense recruiting efforts and the meager results, Nelly put a permanent stop to all recruiting and we all thought San Mateo would be a footnote to our early, misguided days.

Imagine the surprise when NG was called to come present the program at a self-organized meeting to be held in the village. Imagine the further surprise when one of the attendees, Gloria Marlene, a member of group two, told Nelly that she had been out recruiting new clients for us. Why? "Because my experience of the program had been so good, I wanted to go to my neighbors and explain how they could benefit!"

The result: Group 3 with 11 members funded last month. The cost of door to door recruiting? Nothing. The requirement for this Viral Action: a good program executed by good people in a way that the clients experience financial benefit.

We see something similar in the recruitment of business advisors. Initially these were recruited by the MFIs and then our staff came into play. Now 2 out of the 3 newest BAs came from the networks of existing advisers meaning this Viral Action now accounts for 3 of the 9 total. When we consider that we interviewed 33 likely candidates to get those 9, one can see how cost effective this can be as the BAs have shown that, generally, they know what is needed to do the job and are pretty good judges of a candidate's potential. Also before they put a candidate forward they have had discussions with the prospect about what a new hire can expect. Also the person then comes to the interview better informed and more motivated.

Bob

Back at Hillsdale

2009-04-15T11:09:00.000-07:00

Hillsdale High is back from their adventures in Guatemala and would like to share a few memories from the trip with you. You can view the entire album here.

The Hillsdale Effect!

Domingo, a NamasteDirect Business Advisor, working with his clients

A Weaving Expert

At the Namaste Direct office

Visiting the Santo Domingo

Climbing Volcano Pacaya with Addison taking the "Taxi Natural" and the Ixemche Ruins

The Hillsdale Effect Checks In

2009-04-03T11:35:00.000-07:00

After three hours and fifteen minutes of air time, we finally landed in Houston, Texas. After dinner at Ruby´s Diner, we boarded our final plane of the day to Guatemala City. We arrived in Guatemala City at around nine, and luckily everyone´s luggage made it here with us.
We are currently staying at Patricia´s Bed and Breakfast, located not to far from the airport. In fact, it kind of sounds like the airplanes might land on top of us, but the hotel is beautiful and very, very clean. After a breakfast of fresh fruit and french toast, we´re just hanging out until we go visit the Namaste office in Antigua today. The weather is beautiful!

Adios!
The Hillsdale Effect

Can you believe it?

2009-03-24T18:23:00.000-07:00

Can you believe it? We are already in the end of March! Between the disbursement of loans, individual meetings, business education sessions, vocational training, donors visits, board field visits, and staff meetings in the five regions (Mazatenango, Suchitipequez, Quiche, Sacatepequez, and Chimaltenango) we have our hands full, so time really flies.

I will describe for you in the following paragraph our experience with the fourth component of our program: Vocational Training. If you remember, we have four components in the Namaste Business Development with Microcredit Program: the loan, a personal business mentor, business education, and vocational training.

On February 17th we held the Marketing Training in Mazatenango which is located in the western part of Guatemala, northwest of the capital.

We woke up at 3:00am in order to start driving 4:00am because James, Elvira and I needed to be in Belen at 8:30am. Belen, one of the rural areas on the coast of Guatemala, was the site of our first vocational training in Marketing in the Mazatenango region. A beautiful dawn was breaking as we left from Antigua. We met with 23 women on Monday and Tuesday and we discussed the 4 P’s of Marketing (Product, Price, Promotion, Place). They discussed the positive and negative attributes of their businesses. Well, dear reader, I have to confess it is not that easy to teach all of these concepts to our clients. Sometimes our clients tell us, “I do not need to promote my business because all my neighbors know about my business” or “I do not need to do promotion, there is no need and I can’t afford it” or “My business is not big enough to warrant promotion”. This is pretty much the idea that many our clients had we started the Marketing Training. After the 4 hour training, they confessed, “Well, I might need to promote and advertise “a little bit” so I can gain new clients” and “I probably can use this nice flyer to give people, so they will know about my business.” We are happy that our clients have realized that they may need to promote her product through flyers, customer service, keeping her business clean and tiny, and other good entrepreneurial practice, so she can gain new clients and raise her business.

On February 6th and March 18th, we held the Design and Colors Training and during these two days, we trained 17 women. This training was held in Tecpan.

It is a real adventure driving on a terrible road full of dust toward to our poor rural communities in our five regions, but seeing the beautiful landscape that Guatemala has; it really makes you forget that you are full of dust and struggling to drive on a bad road.

Well, that’s how we started the Tecpan training on March 18th - driving toward the Pachorotol community. We arrived in the meeting place, but no one else was there yet. The women were late to the training because they were carrying the water from the only water faucet in the entire community. I wondered how heavy that big container was that they were carrying on the top of their head. I was not brave enough to find out; I just observed them. The woman that you see in the picture below was the president of one of the Namaste groups that was participating in the training.

Finally, after all women finished carrying their water to their homes, we started around 9:30am, even though the training was supposed to start at 8:00am. 11 women were ready to learn and I know they really did not know exactly what they were to learn; but they were there eager to learn something new. After the welcome and presentation by each woman, the trainer asked them to draw some things they saw on the table. It was funny how they started giggling and chatting with each other when they were asked to draw a box with a glass and scarf that was on the table. Of course, they all ended up with a different interpretation of these things, which was the point of the exercise. We, as human beings see the same things, but each one of us has a peculiar and distinct point view of things. They all laughed about the different and funny drawings. After few more exercises, it was time to mix color, yes! Our clients have never had the chance to mix primary colors to create secondary colors. Even though they create beautiful and unique weavings, like guipiles that are very colorful (the guipil is the typical blouse that an indigenous woman wears), they have really never had the chance to learn how to formally mix color. The bottom line is that they are all natural artists and we are just providing new ideas for potential designs for their products. The women seemed very peaceful mixing the yellow with the blue and were amazed when they got green. They went on and on painting and enjoying that moment that they were supposed to discover when they were kids; but because of their destiny, they are discovering it only now. During this training, they created a list of potential new products that they can make which will generate income for themselves and for their families. In addition, they were making new designs for their current product which is the guipil. Finally, it was time to evaluate the training. I asked them to tell me one thing that they liked and did not like. They really could not tell me one negative thing. They said that they liked to paint and learn new designs and in addition, to come up with potential ideas for new products. They were satisfied with their time in the training and they want another one. Then the 11 women agreed that they want to learn how to make a belt that is made with ribbons. This belt is very fashionable, so this new product can be sold quickly and it does not take too much time to create it. The group planned to have the ribbon belt training on June 2nd. So; my loyal reader, our great supporter and Namaste family, if you are in town and want to learn how to make a ribbon belt with our clients, you are more than welcome. And I will definitely keep posted with our progress when the time allows me to write you and thank you for your support and tell you that we are really making a difference. My next blog will tell you more in detail the ways in which we are making a difference with our business mentorship in this part of the world. Thank you for reading these blogs and for supporting Namaste!

Finishing Up 2008

2008-12-18T17:06:00.000-08:00

December 16th, 2008

It is sunny, the sky is so blue and beautiful, and James and I are wrapping up things before we leave for home. I am going to Ecuador and James is off to Philadelphia. We are also preparing the last general meeting with our business advisors on Wednesday afternoon. I am also looking forward to our Christmas dinner. You may remember that we were looking for business advisors (BAs) - now we have seven BAs. Yes, we have so much to tell you from our last blog. As they say in Spanish: Más tarde que nunca (better late than never)! I will summarize all our standout experiences in the field as our Christmas gifts for you, our loyal reader. Thank you for reading our stories.

We went to Quiche back on October. It was very special and we met with 26 indigenous women. These women speak K’iche. We had an interpreter who helped us to translate the conversations that we had from Spanish to K’iche and vice versa. Our partner in Quiche is CARE and this organization is also doing great things with our clients. The loan officers from CARE explained the program to the women. They liked the program but they really wanted to receive their loan right away. Then we organized a second meeting to give more clear examples about the program. We met with the BAs for Quiche, Jose and Mary, who taught the business education from Freedom from Hunger. The session is about using your loan for your business. All women were introduced to some new concepts: personal money, money from the business, separating the personal money from the business money. Their faces told me that these topics were new for them. After Jose taught a session in business education, he told the women: “Now, we will see how the business advisors can work with you. We are going to analyze a business.” Then he asked, “Who wants me to analyze her business?” After few minutes, a very small and cute lady told him: “Ok, I will do it”. She said, “My business is the kiosk that you see in front of the school. I sell fruit.” Jose asked her how much just the oranges cost and decided to simply analyze the orange sales portion of her business “la venta de naranjas”. He added up her costs and found out the cost of selling oranges is Q0.63 (~$.08) but she has been selling them for Q.50 (~$.05)! Everybody in the meeting hushed when they realized that the lady who volunteered to publicly analyze her business was selling at a loss. After that I told the women, with the help of the interpreters, that this situation is very common and please do not get discouraged. This is exactly the reason Namaste wants to offer an extra service - business mentorship. I asked the BAs to offer advice to the lady. Maria and Jose told her: you just need to raise the price and you will make a profit. The lady immediately reacted and said, well I can’t do that because my competition sells the oranges cheaper than I do.” We asked her, “Do you think that your competition has the same costs?” She said, “Well lets ask her because she is the meeting, too”. Then we turned to other lady and she said, “Yes I do have the same costs.” Everybody in the meeting was amazed and started chatting with each other and having excited conversations. The BAs told them, “You both need to raise the price of the oranges.” Both ladies said, “We can’t do it because people will not pay a higher price”. We asked the rest of women if they agreed that these ladies would need to raise the price in order to make some kind of profit. Everybody hesitated a little bit in the answer, but then they said, “Yes we will pay the price because they are losing money” After this intense discussion, BAs told them that this is basically the role of the business advisors of Namaste. The BA’s will offer good advice to help their clients make a profit in their businesses. Following this explanation all women in the meeting wanted to have an individual meeting with the BAs. The following day, we realized that the lady was selling the oranges for Q1 ($.13) and everybody was paying the increased price. This was one of the immediate changes that we have seen in the field and we are very happy to tell you that the lady is already making a profit on her business of selling fruit. Not only that, but the community is aware of this and they are willing to pay the price to make it happen. Now we have 38 women in Quiche, each one have has an individual meeting with their BA, and participated in the first business education meeting.

After Quiche, we went to Suchitepéquez, which is southwest of Guatemala. This is also in a rural area but it is on the Coast, whereas Quiche is located in the mountains, north of Guatemala City. We are working with RAIZ, one of Guatemala’s largest microfinance institutions. We hired two women to be our BAs in this region. Our BAs know the region very well and they are themselves leaders in this community. For this reason, we formed small groups very quickly. Right now we have about 54 women with loans and each of these 54 women have had an individual meeting and a business education session. Suchitepéquez has a very diverse mix of indigenous and ladino people. Most of women are ladino (ladino is a mix of Spaniard and indigenous people). The communities where we work are far away from the main towns. One day, I was visiting a community in Suchitepéquez where I had to cross wooden bridge in my car. This bridge was so scary. It feels like it is going to break down, especially when you are in the middle of this bridge, but luckily I survived the round trip. The communities are in remote areas, not very accessible by public transportation. But still, the Namaste team is able to reach the communities.

You probably are wondering how we are doing with the third region: Sacatepéquez, where San Mateo is located. Now we have 20 women with loans and business mentorship. We are not able to get more clients because there is a strong competition amongst microfinance institutions in this area. These institutions are giving credit away very easily and people are receiving loans that are rarely pre-qualified. Our program is very specific that the loan has to be used for the business. This proliferation of microfinance institution in the field is very intense and this makes the recruitment of new clients in this region very difficulty.

Besides all this field work, we have had other exciting activities in Guatemala. We had the wonderful conference and a great donor trip. The conference was a huge success. It was wonderful to put all these businesswomen together. They shared their information with each other, learned from the workshops, and made some international and local new friends. Our donors- perhaps you are one of them- are really amazing people. They are generous and they are incredible. Many of them told me that the experience of sharing with the borrowers is very special and they feel like they learned from each other. I was lucky to get to know some of them and I feel very honored to be with them during a few days of their trip. I really admire them; especially knowing they have taken time from their busy lives to get to know our clients’ worlds. I know everybody got something very special to keep and remember for many years to come.

That was my “brief” update of our activities. I hope you have enjoyed reading these blogs this year and from the bottom of our heart I wish you a Merry Christmas and Great New Year full of Happiness and Love for you and your family. Thank you for being a loyal reader and supporter.

2008 Conference - Un Exito!

2008-11-25T12:57:00.000-08:00

I had hoped to blog much more often, but as it turned out, everyone was constantly working hard to make the event a success. And what a success it was!
I am still feeling overwhelmed emotionally and physically from the conference. The three days were jam packed with activities and new experiences. The one complaint was the weather - it was so windy, I imagined a hurricane was coming. Of course, I have never experienced a hurricane, but then again, this forceful, wicked wind was 100% new to me, too! We adjusted though and moved activities indoors. Day 3 was a combination of work and fun. There were two workshops in the morning, followed by office hours. The office hours were newly implemented this year. I hoped that the women would attend to ask any outstanding questions, or perhaps to speak to an instructor from a course they could not attend. To my surprise and pleasure, the office hours were attended very well and they had to be cut off of they would have missed the boat! This reinforced the determination of the women to take every advantage of learning opportunities.
I unfortunately missed the boat trip around Lake Atitlan because I was running all over town withdrawing money and paying instructors and other tasks, but from the photos, everyone appeared to have a wonderful time!
The evening concluded on a very positive, happy note with diploma presentations and photos. We lost the marimba band momentarily because they were still eating when we finished the ceremony. Luckily, Ron Waslohn from Vacaville surprised us all with his Kenny Rogers impersonation! The women danced the night away - doing the Som (traditional mayan dance), the Mexican Hat Dance, a Conga Line, and more until 10pm, wind and all!
I am already looking forward to 2009.

Jen

2008-11-20T16:42:00.000-08:00

Hello from the second annual conferencia de mujeres microempresarias! This is Amy Hillyard, I'm a member of the Namaste Direct Board. Today was a beautiful and productive day. The borrowers started their day with a panel talking about their experiences working with different MFIs. The most moving part of the program was whenn Nelly lead them to look at each other and proclaim "Si Podemos" (Yes we can!) and then hug their companeras. There was much energy and support in the group and even a few tears of emotion where shed.

The rest of the day was spent in the various programs offered. There were classes on international marketing, display of products, textile design basics, technology and animal husbandry. All the sessions were well attended and the woman where very engaged for the full session.

In the afternoon the woman shared their products in the conference marketplace. Many of them also took the opportunity to purchase the beutiful textiles for Christmas gifts.

As we speak the woman are enjoying a tasty dinner of chile rellenos and afterward will watch a movie together! Que devertido!

Tommorrow we start again in the morning with more classes and in the afternoon the woman will have the opportunity to have 1:1 sessions with the Business Advisors. Followed by dinner, diplomas and celebration. All in all it has been a very successful conference. You can see the delight and inspiration in the women's eyes...we look forward to learning how this experience transforms their business and ther lives!

Conference Prep Has Begun

2008-11-17T16:04:00.000-08:00

Just a quick note today from Jennifer. I am in Panajachel and had a great afternoon with a team of volunteers. Sandi is from Canada, Simone is from Washington, and Elvira is a local girl from San Pedro La Laguna. We spent the afternoon shopping, which is a big adventure. There is no such thing as Office Max or Staples where you can buy everything you need in one convenient place. Plus, you get to barter when purchasing large quantities! We later worked from home base - imagine your home base in a beautiful hotel, surrounded by lush greenery and a swimming pool. We giggled like a typical pack of girls and prepped the materials for Wednesday's opening ceremony. Tomorrow is a busy day of making sure everything is ready to go for 100 excited women from far parts of Guatemala. Stay tuned!

A formal ceremony has started…

2008-10-13T21:35:00.000-07:00

Yeah! Finally women have gathered to get the loans that they wanted since we started talking about loans and education business in San Mateo.

The pre-credit phase for the first group is done. Now 10 women in San Mateo have received their loans. The loa

n average is $20

0. All these women were very happ

y to get their loans and the president of the group gave a nice speech. The executive director of FAPE gave another speech and made an oath with each client -the oath promised to use the loan for a business and to be responsible and practice solid

arity with the group. The new group

borrower is called "Sembradora de San Mateos" (San Mateo Seed Planters).

You probably want to know what happe

ned with the 50 that I have talked to back in July. We met with around 50 women, but 10 women wer

e prepared to get the loan and business education. We advised some women that the loan was not going to help them, especially because they were going to lose money on their business or because they already h

ad a loan. Other women had a viable business plan, but they did not want to participate in the business edu

cation courses. Other women did take out a loan but from other organization that is not our partner. These women just wanted a loan because this was more suitable for them.

FAPE, our partner, is forming a new group of borrower so we will have 100 borrowers who are

ready to be in the program of credit and business education in San Mateo. At the same time, these new 10 borrowers are going to have the first individual meeting as part of the follow up process. Business Advisors (BAs) will have a semiformal conversatio

with each client to give business advice and

to monitor the client's business progress.

Namaste now is moving to the second region, Quiche. You can even see the main town of our second region, here is a link of the municipality: http://www.inforpre

ssca.com/chiche/#

and here is the map, now we are in zone 18:

http://inforpressca.com/municipal/mapas_w

eb/guatemala.php

Keep reading we will tell you about first "encu

entro" (meeting) with indegenous women in Quiche in

next blog.

If you are following our blog, you probably are wondering how we are doing in the field.

2008-10-01T15:26:00.000-07:00

Well women did a good job being

prompt during the interview week. We were kidding with them saying that we are not working

by the "hora chapina" and that

we work on "gringo time". We started at 8:00 am. on Thursday, Friday and we finished at 11:30 on Saturday with the diagnostic or poverty assessment for the potential borrowers.

Most women told us "no se asusten de mi casa" (do not by shocked by my home). Many of these women felt embarrassed of their home. Of course, we told them that for us it is a privilege to be in their home. And yes it is definitely a real privilege for us to be in such humble and simple homes. Most of the houses are made of sheet-metal, wood or block. Half of the floors are made of dirt and many of these houses only have two rooms. All houses have old latrines. These women cook with wood and their house is filled by the smoke of "la lena" (wood).

All women opened their doors to us with the hope that they are going to get something good for them and their family. These women desperately want money.

First we interviewed a women with her husband, they were a very humble family. The husband talked with us, the wife said very little. The person who is charge in this family, definitely is the husband. We can understand that, he provides the daily support for the family and she takes care of the children and the house. In addition the culture here is that men make the decisions. We would like to work with this family and generate a business for the woman so she can start being empowered like her husband. We want to introduce something new in this culture. We are sure that we are doing this work with all our good willingness and heart.

We interviewed around thirsty-five women. Each case is different and similar in many ways.

Many women who have a business do not have a clear idea of how much they are making or their profit. Other women would like to set up a business, but they do not know the cost of her

business, the marketing aspects of their business, or the client and

competition. We explained to them that the business advisors are going to help to elaborate a complete business plan with these aspects. We use the simplest words to explain this role to them, and why we think that it is important for each borrower to have business advisor. We took time to go through their business's expenses and sales. We did this with the

goal to make them realize that in many cases they are not making any profit. That they invest 600Q to make tortilla and

they sell 600Q with no profit at all. We also realized that these women use their business to feed their children and this may count as their "ganancias" or their return, and they are satisfied if they at least can feed their children with the food that they are selling in their business.

Doing this poverty assessment was hard because I had to tighten my heart and hold my tears because it is absolutely very sad to see so much poverty around us. I will never get used to see so much poverty, and we should not rest until everybody reaches a better standard of living, we are definitely blessed to have what we have and we should really do our best to help others to have a fairly living condition. Thank you for being part of Namaste's family working in many ways to reduce this poverty and create a better reality for the most vulnerable. We know that it is possible and we only need to have the patience and perseverance to reduce poverty through one loan at time and many other social projects. Thank you for reading these blogs and being part of this army against poverty.

Against the wind, raining and lightening…

2008-08-22T16:21:00.000-07:00

August 20, 2008

…We had our meeting with San Mateo women at “Semillas de Amor y Esperanza” (Seeds of Love and Hope) center. Semillas de Amor y Esperanza is a small NGO that operates small community projects in San Mateo. Lyz, our leader and community facilitator, is the founder of this organization. This past Sunday, Lyz and I went to church to ask permission to publicize our program of credit and education in San Mateo during the mass. We also invited them to the meeting for this Tuesday. Twenty women and eight children came to the meeting. We had a lot to plan with the women. We started the meeting in Guatemala time, so we really were tight with time.

We presented to the women the idea of the business education and business advisor. We introduced this idea again because these initiatives of having a business advisor, as a mentor, in addition of business education and vocational training are foreign to them. We also explained that they have to pay a minimal amount for this. We made clear that Namaste will pay 370Q ($50) for each women to participate in the vocational training such as animal husbandry, textile design, etc and each women will pay 25Q ($3) for this service. In addition, Namaste will pay 500Q ($67) for having business education, mentorship and a personal business advisor for each woman; and that woman will need to pay 50Q ($7) for this service. Studies have shown that when people pay services or product then they value more whatever they are paying for. We want these women to feel that they own and “buy” these services. We also explained that we are doing this to see if having all these services and a loan can guarantee women success in their business. Moreover, these Q75 will have a money back guarantee. What this means is that if in the end of the cycle women would feel that it was not worth it to pay Q75 for these services, Namaste will reimburse their money. This policy will furthermore help Namaste to evaluate if the education part is worth it for the client and if the education business and mentorship was delivered effectively. Women were pleased that these services come with a guarantee.

After having explained this important piece, Jim, the program regional assistant, was introduced as the women’s business advisor. Jim explained with examples what he is going to do during this 6 month loan cycle and he asked permission to go their home to proceed with the baseline study and to do the feasibility study for each business this week. Then, we started asking women what are the best time and day that Jim and I can visit them. This part was a little bit hectic and funny as well, especially the part when we asked their addresses. Many women did not know their exact address. We asked them “Donde vives? (Where do you live?) Most of them answered, “Arriba en la loma en un callejon” (up in the hill on the alley). Finally, we founded solutions in how to get their home, and we will see if we actually could get to their home, we will tell you our adventure in finding our client’s home. As you remember, we are implementing the pilot program and we want to evaluate and monitor the progress and impact that the business education, mentorship, personal business advisors and credit have on the women’s businesses and the general social-economic situation. Therefore Namaste team has designed evaluation surveys that we will use to compare results with a control group. This control group will only have credit. San Mateo women are borrowers who are going to receive credit and business education; therefore, we will have three individual meeting at the borrower’s home to before FAPE disburses the credit.

Well, Jim and I will be in San Mateo doing the baseline and feasibility study in the next following weeks. We will be very busy but we will do our best to keep you informed through our blogs. Please do not hesitate to contact us at nelly@namaste-direct if you are eager to know how we are doing. We would love to hear from you.

Moving forward!!!

2008-08-14T14:43:00.000-07:00

August 13, 2008

Well, you probably are wondering what is happening with the project in San Mateo. As you probably remember from our past blog, this community has never before received credit. Microfinance Institutions (MFIs) in Guatemala call this type of community a "comunidad virgen" (virgin community). Namaste’s team and partners did a brief assessment to decide if this community could be the first region to launch the microfinance plus program. San Mateo will be part of the pilot program, so we are happy to announce this news to you and to the San Mateo women.

We were on our way to have our second meeting; the weather conditions were not that favorable. It was foggy, raining, and cold. Eighteen women and twelve children came to the meeting at the community center. We were surprised that so few women came to the meeting, when we had expected 100! Well today was "cut day". People call it "cut day" when it is time to cut vegetables in the mountains, so many people were in the campo (country side) doing farming work. You probably are saying, “Wow what a day to be outside cutting the vegetables!” but this is our borrowers' world and we can see how fortunate we are that someone is doing this to get our fresh vegetables to our tables.

Fundacion para la Asistencia de Pequena Empresa (FAPE) is an NGO. They are our partner and they work as a microfinance institution. FAPE has been working with micro entrepreneurs since 1984. FAPE is going to lead the meeting; they are going to handle the credit component of our pilot program in this region. FAPE delegated five local women to be in the pre-credit phase. These women have a lot of experience working with loans in the Guatemala communities. They were aware that many of the women are unable to read and write, so they brought drawings to explain the process, the requirements, the time, and the interest rate of a loan. The FAPE team started the meeting with a prayer. Most people are Catholic and we can see how they incorporate their beliefs in their professional practices.

The FAPE team explained the concepts well, but of course, many women still find this credit concept new. They have a lot of doubts, but they are also shy to directly ask all their questions. We know that women have a lot questions because they converse with Lyz, our community leader and facilitator. There were a few women who asked questions about the loan periods and the type of the business. We told them that the loan officers and the business advisors will work with them to create a business plan to guarantee success in their business. Many women want to raise pigs and it looks like this is a good business there. However, too many businesses like these could hurt them because we will help create too much competition. We decided that we are going to create new ideas for business and see what members of the community buy in Antigua, the near-by big city. This is Bob's idea and we think it is a good concept. Bob suggested that these women need to see internally what they need from outside of the community and create a business selling or doing what they get outside of their community. Transportation costs are becoming too high to buy most goods outside of your town. Therefore, we will work next Tuesday exclusively in this idea, so if you have any ideas that you would like to share with us for a business for our new clients, please write to me to nelly@namaste-direct.org. We definitely will share your ideas with them.

Lyz and I are also going to visit the mass this Sunday, where we will talk in the church to communicate officially that we will start the credit of Namaste in the community. Keep track of our blogs to learn about our success and challenges in the pilot program.

Meeting with women at San Mateo

2008-07-21T12:15:00.000-07:00

July 16 2008

Today was a beautiful day in Antigua. It was sunny and everybody was enjoying the pleasant hot weather. I met with the new business advisor (BA). I explained about our pilot program and our main goal. She now knows that our main goal is that our borrowers have success and that the credit and the business education components will help our clients guarantee their successes. Then we went to Lyz, our potential loan officer. We had a meeting with her and we explained in brief the whole program. Then we started to drive toward San Mateo. My little CRV was like a bus, we had to pick up several women who also were going to the general meeting at San Mateo community. We took 8 people in my car, and the car only has room for 5 people, so you could imagine how tight we were, but it was fun to see everybody hugging each other because there was not enough space inside the car.

San Mateo probably will be our community for FNG. We all were excited to meet all the women in the community. We did not have any idea how many women we would meet; but we had already been there last week and we knew that the whole town knew that we were coming today.

We started at 2:30 and we brought some snacks, so women and children ate during our meeting. Lyz, the community leader of San Mateo, introduced us. Lyz told me that everybody has been asking about the possibility of receiving a loan. Lyz had already had a meeting on Monday 14th with 36 women about business plans. Therefore, we expected a similar number. Everybody introduced herself and they told me how many kids they have. Oh my God! There was a woman who has 13 kids. The average number of kids in a family is 4. So we can understand how busy these women could be in their home.

There were 50 women and 29 kids, so the room was pretty full, but they were motivated and curious to know about the loans. Many women did not have an idea clearly what a credit or loan are. I dramatized what it means to receive credit or a loan.

We explained our idea of having loans with an education component and they seemed interested to know more about it. After that we did a brainstormed about possible ideas for business. The most common idea was animal husbandry (pig, chicken, calf, and cow), others businesses were food such us making tortillas or selling food. Other women want to sell flowers, handicrafts, clothing and vegetables. They were also a group of women who want to cultivate vegetables as well. Many women want to sell pigs, I helped them to realize that if all women want to sell pigs, it probably will be not be a good business because there could be too much competition. They were very concerned about the payments and I explained to them that they only receive a loan if they are going to put into a business. If they conduct the business well, the business is going to pay the loan back. After I explained this, they seemed to be releived. I told them “si tu no pones el dinero en el negocio, no podemos hacer negocio” They laughed about this expression, but they seemed to be more relax to know that their business is going to help them to pay back the loan. This look so obvious, however we have to be aware that when we work with this population, there are so many needs that they can use the money for everything but for the business at least.

I also explained the business advisors idea. They seemed also very amazed about this idea, and I could see on their faces that this idea of having a personal business advisor was absolutely a strange idea. They were surprised when I told them that they have to contribute for the payment for their business advisors. I also explained that they are going to pay for the 7% of the loan amount for business education, mentorship and vocational training. All women were interested in receiving a loan and these education components. Nelly.F (the new business advisor) and I will visit each family in the following week

We also explained that we are visiting other communities, and that we need to further evaluate the community and the members in order to proceed with the program. They understand that nothing has been promised to them, that we are just learning about the communities and about them.

I also have to tell you that all children were amazed with the car, and they were trying to see what is inside the car. It seems difficult to be there sometimes and my heart gets small and I feel the need to cry to see so much poverty around us… But I also feel that we need to show some kind of “prueba” (proof) that we can really break the cycle of poverty with some extra effort and help, but we can do it. I have done it and they could do it too, and we, Namaste, are here to facilitate this process…and how Kristin H. said “we are here to provide new opportunities”

Maria Asuncion Climbs the Ladder of Success

2008-04-21T12:27:00.000-07:00

Recently we had the pleasure of visiting with NamasteDirect funded borrower, Maria Asuncion of Jocotenango. In 2007 she heard from a friend that Namaste partner FAPE had a loan group called “Banco Flor Del Frijol” in the town of Pastores, a 20-minute bus ride to the north. Maria soon joined the group and took out a loan of 1,000Q ($133). She used it for operating capital to open a home business. Every day she took a bus into Antigua, about a 15-minute ride to the south, and purchased fruits and vegetables to sell in Joco. She also made and sold tortillas to go along with the produce. Her business was profitable and she was content.

Her business life changed when she attended the Annual NamasteDirect Businesswomen’s Conference at Lake Atitlan last November. She told us “I learned that it was not only possible but that I really needed to grow. We were shown the steps to take and I returned home determined to do so.”

Like a true entrepreneur, she looked around for a business opportunity. She noted on her biweekly trips to the bank meetings in Pastores that the village was short of restaurants. So she enrolled her daughter, Sandra Rivera, who had also become a bank member, to launch a “to-go” sandwich place. To raise the 5,000Q ($667) needed to rent a place at 500Q per month, do some remodeling, acquire a refrigerator, a cook stove, utensils and food inventory, Maria took out a new loan for 1,500Q from FAPE and daughter Sandra did likewise to the tune of 1,000Q. They “raided” the family savings with the consent of Papa for the balance and talked him into building the rustic furniture needed.

They had only been open a month when we visited and Maria said, “It’s too early to tell how good the business will be.” But she is smelling success and has already determined what her next loan will go for – a chicken business because, she said, “I also went to the animal husbandry classes at the conference and raising chickens looks like a good bet!”

Maria has maintained her original business in Joco along with the new business. A year from now she should be well along with her third, giving her something of a “mini-conglomerate.” It is so much fun to see what great things these women can do when given the opportunity for a loan and some training!

A Visit to Parramos

2008-04-15T15:49:00.000-07:00

Dear NamasteDirect Friends & Family,

It's Jennifer, reporting back from a quick trip to Guatemala. I am constantly scolding Kristin and Bob for neglecting to blog from Guatemala, yet here I am, guilty of the same thing! The short time I spent in Guatemala last week was jam packed with activities, meetings, visits, and decisions.

The most notable visit was to a town called Parramos, just 20 minutes north of Antigua. We spent two days visiting with the borrowers in their homes. I'd like to tell you about Lety, the mother of two grown children and successful businesswoman. Lety is about 4'10" and she weighs perhaps 80 pounds. Kristin and I joked with her after she complimented our "curves". We said she'd fit right into the "thin club" of the US. I suppose you always want what you haven't got!

After attending a group meeting on Wednesday, we decided to return to Parramos. We went straight to Maria Asuncion's restaurant, mostly because it's the location we could remember. Lety came riding up on her bicycle, in heels no less, in a huff because we were supposed to have met up at her house! Shame on us! Lety is the secretary of her loan group and one of the original members, having joined up about 5 years ago. She knows just about everything in the town of Parramos. She was responsible for taking us around town on visits. Lety grows and sells avocados. She goes to the market on Mondays and Fridays, so aside from picking and preparing meals for the family, she had some free time to spend with us.

Lety and I chatted about the day to day struggles that exist anywhere in the world. I remarked that I sometimes wished for a calmer, simpler life. Lety said that she looks at the president of Guatemala and he is always surrounded by an entourage, protecting him from the many people who wish to hurt him. She says to me: Look at me! Free as a bird! I can walk around here and do whatever I please! I was impressed with her positive outlook.

From left to right: (Top) Sandra & Lety, (Bottom) Sandra's daughter Jennifer & Jennifer. Sandra's daughter really got a kick out of meeting another Jennifer!

Lety later impressed us by providing some very constructive, feasible advice for her fellow loan group member Sandra. Sandra's tortilla business is really struggling, but after hearing Lety's advice, Sandra felt as though she could begin implementing some changes right away. Lety has a way about her that is not arrogant or presuming.

It was a real treat spending the morning in Parramos with Lety and I look forward to seeing her again! Stay tuned for Bob's recounting of our visit with Maria Asuncion!

Visit to the Alta Verapaz Region

2008-03-14T16:04:00.000-07:00

Sophy Wolters is back home in Panajachel after a visit to the Alta Verapaz region:

After a drive of seven hours we arrived in Coban, the department capital of Alta Verapaz. The trip takes you through a few totally different climate zones. From Guatemala City the area is first very dry and arid. And then going north the landscape becomes more and more green, lush and wet. It rains almost all year in Alta Verapaz, with cloudy overcast afternoons and little drizzles in what in de rest of Guatemala is the dry season. So we pass by the Nature Preserve where the last Quetzals live, since their habitat is cloud forest.

Care Guatemala has their office for the region in Coban so we stopped there to meet the staff and talk about the program. Namaste is forming three groups of a 100 women with the Edubanco program from Care, two of them located in two different counties in Alta Verapaz.
Edubanco is a program that combines credit with a solid capacity building program for women and an education component for girls, the daughters of the women in the Trust Banks. The Millennium goals are particularly focused on bringing up the attendance in the primary school. In Guatemala half of the girls in rural areas drop out before 4th grade. One of the reasons for this drop out rate is that the families don’t have enough financial resources to send all their children to school and then choose for the boys to go on and keep the girls at home to help with chores. But Care’s educational specialist also mentioned another reason. Most parents don’t feel good about their daughter being one of the few left, the higher they get into the school system. Since girls go to school older they hit adolescence when they are still in primary school, so the parents are worried about the girls sitting in a classroom full of boys. Another reason for school drop out lies in the girls themselves: the education system in Guatemala is based on road learning and is quite boring. Teachers will show up late or not at all in rural areas. Most teachers don’t speak the local language of the area (Qeqchi in Coban) so the children don’t even know what’s going on half of the time. So they drop out because they feel they have something better to do.

Care tries to work all these angles with their specialized educational staff that works together with the loan officer. They give workshops for the schools to improve on educational quality. They talk to fathers and mothers about the importance of girls’ education. They work with the girls on capacity building so they are well prepared for their school experience. And they help the mothers with additional income activities to be able to afford to send their girls to school by giving them credit combined with vocational training.

The next day we went to visit the communities in rural San Pedro Carcha, one of the counties where Care works. The 4 wheel drive ate itself through mud and loose gravel to come to the remote little communities where the women that Care serves live.

The first group had been organized for a while. The women told me what they wanted to do with their loans. Most of them will invest the capital they will be receiving in animal husbandry activities: from fattening chicken, laying hens, pigs, and cattle. Edubanco’s loan cycle is a nine months cycle, but the women had requested a year cycle because the cows take about a year to get to full weight. What surprised me here in the region is that the women don’t sell their animals to butchers but prepare the meat themselves and go and sell in the market. That way their profit margin on their business is higher than if they would sell their animal to the local butcher. All of the women were also weavers and when asked wanted to learn more about that too. Some even asked to learn to weave on a foot loom, until they found out hat was a full time 4 months commitment to learn. They also wanted to learn to make soap, shampoo, candles end pastries to sell. When asked about the problems they were facing with their girls in school their main complaint was that the teachers would show up for an hour and leave again. The education facilitator Ermelindo, present at the meeting is going to pick that up with the school after Easter week.

The second group we met with is from a little village called Aldea Chajixim (Ixim is he god of corn they explained me). The auxiliary mayor was present, because it was his original idea to form this group, trying to get them to grow vegetables. When they asked Care for help, Care took the group on and will be working the education and loan part of the group’s development process. The mayor talked to us in qeqchi. When I asked the Care facilitator later if really nobody here spoke any Spanish he told me lots of women do, but it is a custom under qeqchi indigenous to talk to visitors in their own language. So the Care facilitator translated everything. The women told me that they were very happy to be in the group. For most of them this was a first time experience to be in a women’s group and they all looked very excited about learning, sharing and working together.

The third group met in the house of a young powerhouse woman, who we think will be the mayor of her town in ten years. She learnt to use the foot loom in a capacity building workshop. The loom was standing in the room with ten yards of beautiful cloth for wrap around skirts the women wear here already woven. Here the businesses were more diversified. One woman goes to a town 5 hours away to buy chili and resell on the markets around the region of Carcha. A few of them know how to manage the foot loom; some of them will invest in animal husbandry. Two women will invest in grains to sell on market days. One woman is a candle maker and will invest her capital in parafina and thread to make the candles. She was the oldest of the group, almost 60, and a solid business woman with great leadership qualities. They also will be receiving their loan right after Easter week.

After the long day of driving through this beautiful landscape of green lush steep mountains we came back to Coban and talked about our experiences with the head of the regional programs, Efraim. Care is an old NGO, in NGO terms in Guatemala. They have been working here in Guatemala for 48 years. You can feel the experience in different programs, starting as a nutrition program in all their staff. I was very impressed with their dedication to development. At 6.30 most of the staff was still present to finish their chores for the day. I am very content and proud to be working with them to help these wonderful women.

AND JUST HOW DID MICROCREDIT GET INSIDE THAT PRISON?

2008-02-26T16:31:00.000-08:00

In the first installment of this story we took an overall look at the project from the perspective of a prison visitor (namely yours truly, Bob Graham) to the women microcredit borrowers. For me, it was a revelatory and moving experience!

But how about what it has taken behind the scenes to make this first-in-Latin America program come to pass?

Yes, behind inspiration there must always be good old-fashioned hard work. Besides the on-the-cement-floor work of FAPE Executive Director Sergio Gonzalez and his staff, there have been other important players in key roles.

Gloria Elizabeth Cruz dispays her products:

First was the Guatemalan government department of Social Rehabilitation in the Penitentiary System. It took some foresight and courage for those people to step outside their internal bureaucracy and hold a belief that private institutions could bring support and inspiration to some of the 200 women housed in the Preventative Center of the Santa Teresa Women’s Penitentiary.

They worked alongside FAPE to develop a plan of credit with financial education. Early foundational aspects included a decision that the loan amounts were to be based on the business plan of each woman. It was determined that the loans would not be made in the form of cash, instead the women were to be provided with the corresponding amount of materials, equipment and tools needed to create the products. Standard, “real-world” microcredit procedures were to be followed … 2% monthly interest rate, monthly principal and interest payments, monthly meetings to evaluate business plan execution.

The Penitentiary System officials were also instrumental in obtaining a grant of about $5,600 from the European Union to finance educational services from the School of Business & Economics, Universidad Rafael Landivar.

Assisted by student volunteers, the university personnel created and taught skills training based in the following phases:

n 35 hours of coursework in “Entrepreneurial Spirit – How to Run a Business
n 15 hours of coursework in “Life Planning”
n 35 hours of coursework on “Creating a Business Plan”

By the way, the 15 FAPE and University personnel involved didn’t just waltz into the prison and start their “gigs”! No, first they had their own coursework – several meetings to understand the penitentiary system in order to develop how to best initiate the program.

Margalena Lopez & Irma Carina Martinez set up their storefront

Some 47 women indicated initial interest in the program and were evaluated for appropriateness. Most were accepted and 27 have graduated to date. Purposefully only 5 projects capped at 12 women participants were selected for the first six-month trial, following the theory of “work the plan, listen, learn, and adjust”. The next cycle will likely be 8 new businesses. In two years the expectation is that 50 women will have participated.

Yes, this is a program that is labor-intensive and it can be seen as costly. On the other hand, it also can be seen as a labor of love and an investment that will pay dividends to society in the form of avoided costs of criminal activities.

And anyway, whom among us can put a price tag on helping a sister get back on the path?

MICROCREDIT GOES INSIDE, HELPS WOMEN IN PRISON REBUILD THEIR LIVES IN GUATEMALA by Bob Graham

2008-02-12T16:18:00.000-08:00

For the first time in history in Latin America, a microcredit provider has received permission to conduct a lending circle in a prison for women. An initiative of the dedicated staff of FAPE, a NamasteDirect partner located in Guatemala City, the Second Chance program began providing business loans last fall at the Santa Teresa prison located outside that city.

When Sophy and I were driven to the prison site by FAPE director Sergio and loan supervisor Marco we were stopped and checked out at the perimeter of a huge facility. The first complex we came to was the men’s prison and the women’s complex lay beyond.

We parked there and went through a frisking and metal detection after surrendering all of our valuables including cell phones and cameras. Clearing that, we then trooped way down hill along huge walls capped by guard towers which surrounded the facility.

The walls, razor wire, towers and guards patrolling on foot with wicked-looking automatic weapons soon let us know we were not entering a “country club prison.” We then had to undergo the same metal detector/search routine before being marched up to an iron door with a major league padlock.

The door opened and we followed the authorities, passing by a huge room filled with women and their families, for it was Visitor’s Day. We then were shown into a room set up with tables of the products of the loan borrowers and a circle of chairs.

We sat down and waited. Soon nine women entered and they looked like … well, your grandmother, your mother, your sister, your aunt or a kindly neighbor. Since they were going to show us what they had been producing and selling, old and young were “power dressed” to make a good impression.

They sure didn’t look like they fit the picture I had in mind when I had been told the prison population profile: mostly awaiting trial, average stay of two years there, credited to their final sentence, most frequent offences being “drug horses” (delivery women who are part of a narco-trafficking distribution system) and burglary. Yes, we were told, some were in for murder, but only a few.

The point is, they looked and acted like normal women. In fact, one of the women told our group “We want the outside world to know we are not just delinquents, but good women trying to make an honest living.” Later Sergio put it this way, “Look. We believe everyone is good in their hearts but sometimes there is a slip, a stumble, a wrong turn, a fall. It makes us at FAPE feel good to try to help these women get back on their feet.”

TO BE CONTINUED......