This little girl´s mother died giving birth to her

One night while having dinner in San Marcos, I noticed an older Caucasian woman with a young Guatemalan child. Nosy me was trying to figure out the relationship, as there didn´t seem to be a mother present and this woman was either babysitting or a guardian. Finally, I just asked and wow – what a story.

While this little girl´s mother was giving birth to her, the mother died. The father, unable to take care of the new baby or the older brother, relinquished guardianship of the brother to a grandmother and gave this Caucasian woman who happened to be in the room for the birth, legal guardianship of the new baby.

Talk about an instant change in one´s plans. Unfortunately, because of the woman´s age, the Guatemalan government won´t let her officially the little girl which means she´s either staying in Guatemala for a long time or she will have to relinquish guardianship of the child.

As one of the tenants at Pasajcap on the lake was a midwife from the States, I learned a little bit about maternal mortality here in Guatemala from her, and it isn´t pretty. She had attended two Guatemalan births – one the mother died, the other, the baby died. Legally she wasn´t allowed to assist, but was simply an observer in the room. She felt that both deaths could have been prevented with better supplies and training. Hemorraghing is a major issue as many women are already anemic and midwives are apparently being urged by “modern doctors” to hurry up the delivery of the babies. Babies and mothers are not adapting well to this new method of a process as old as life itself.

From my research online, I learned that the maternal mortality rate in Guatemala remains the highest in all of Central America at 190 deaths per 100,000 live births. On the other hand, in the US, the maternal death rate was 11 maternal deaths per 100,000 live births in 2005

Child mortality in Guatemala ranked the highest of all Central American countries in 1995, with 51 out of every 1,000 dying before the age of five. However, in the past seven years, this number has decreased to 45 out of every 1,000 so we are headed in the right direction, mostly due to the work of many NGOs (non-governmental organizations) in the country.

On one of our last boat trips on Lake Atitlan, I sat beside a young mother with a little boy 3 years old and a young baby of about 6 months. It was nearing dark but she told me that they would have to walk 1 ½ hours home up the mountain to their village home. Dangerous – yes. Isolated – definitely. This problem is one of the reasons for high maternal mortality.

The book “Too far to walk: Maternal mortality in context” explains that isolation and then lack of proper staff and equipment is a problem in the Guatemalan highlands.

It´s one of the reasons that I can only applaud and support the amazing work I have continually witnessed over the last few months. Incredible dedication coupled with a wonderful commitment to helping the Guatemalans has meant that real progress is being made on many fronts.

The example of this little girl who is being so lovingly cared for by a foreigner in her time of need is a perfect example. I´ll be letting you know soon how you can help make a difference. There is lots of work to do here and if we all do a little, it will add up to a lot!

The little house I am currently staying in on the Rio Dulce

It seems like a lifetime ago that I was sitting in my place on Lake Atitlan making arrangements for Brenda and Adrian´s trip to Guatemala in February. Now they´re gone and I´m wrapping up the last couple of weeks in Central America.

One of the places I reserved was on the Rio Dulce (literally Sweet River) at a place called Hotel Tortugal. With thatched roofs and a real jungle feeling, we decided it was a bargain at $50 a night for an adorable little house in a romantic setting for Brenda and Adrian and reasonable for a bungalow at $40 a night for me.

However, when we arrived last Friday, the romantic little house was very cute but my bungalow was dark, small and wasn´t at all conducive to getting any work done this week. So off I went to speak with the owner about what we could do. Thankfully, she understood completely, especially when she heard I was working on my next book and would be spending lots of time in my place writing.

Once I made it clear to her what was important to me (light, space, privacy and a place to work), she took me to this little house behind where Brenda and Adrian were staying. Very private, located at the top of the hill overlooking the river with jungle all around, Brenda and I were pretty impressed by the size and amenities the little house had. Lovely livingroom furniture, a wrap-around balcony with tables, chairs and plenty of places to work, a full kitchen and a large bedroom all added up to a nice house.

I was thinking, “yikes, if the little bungalow is $40, Brenda and Adrian´s is $50, this place must be $150 a night.” I was calculating in my mind how much I would be willing to pay to have the place which coincidentally had just been vacated that day after a month´s occupancy. Fortuitous or what?

So of course my only comment was, “how much for the week?” She stopped and said, “we normally only rent it out for the month and to people we know and trust but I´ll rent it to you for the week for….$200.” I heard Brenda almost gasp behind me and I quickly said, “it´s a deal. Can you get a cleaner in here this afternoon so I can move in? It will be worth a nice tip if she can do it?” Needless to say, I was moving in before the cleaning lady was locking up the door.

Don´t ask me how she did the math on this one, but what Brenda has noticed repeatedly throughout our journey together is that I know when to shut up in negotiations. I never speak first and I always allow the other person to put out the first offer. Amazingly, it is often better than what I was willing to pay.

So how do you get what you want? First of all, be clear on what you want. Secondly, expect to get what you want OR better. I had told Brenda and Adrian several times on the trip that I couldn´t wait to see what my surprise at the Rio Dulce was going to be. The beauty of Antigua had completely taken me by surprise – I wasn´t expecting it to be so pretty. The weather in Tikal was a complete surprise to all of us as we donned jackets and sweaters instead of sweating profusely. The only thing left was my surprise in Rio Dulce. I expected it to be good but this was an amazing surprise!

Thirdly, learn to keep quiet. Maybe it´s all those years of training as a Jehovah´s Witness going from door to door, I don´t know. But I do know that as much as I can talk, I can also shut up when it´s in my highest and best interest to do so. Negotiations is definitely one of those times and I have repeatedly found that silence and patience are two valuable tools to get what you want.

The owner is thrilled because I´m happy, she´s already rented out my bungalow and she has an extra $200 this week renting the house. Now if she could only talk to the cockroaches that like this place as much as I do….then I´d be even happier.

The most beautiful church in Antigua

Saturday, Brenda, Adrian and I went ziplining just outside of Panajachel. They had never been before and it was a great time. The weather was perfect and we did 8 fabulous ziplines across the jungle. We fed bananas to the monkeys and a small racoon-looking creature that is apparently endangered in Central America. It was an amazing day!

Sunday, I spent much of the afternoon with Senor Pablo and his family in San Pablo. I took along a French-Canadian couple who wanted to help out the family and community but wanted to meet them first. It was an “eye-opening” experience to see the reality of life on the lake for the Mayan people.

That afternoon we learned that the next morning at 6:00 the teachers were protesting low wages and insufficient educational materials for the students. Therefore, it was decided that we would leave at 4:00 a.m. to avoid any blockages on the Pan American highway. Although it was not fun getting up at 3:30 in the morning, we decided that it was worth the trouble because getting stuck on the highway for hours or even days was worse.

Consequently, we arrived in Antigua at 6:30 in the morning and thankfully the beautiful bed and breakfast we had rented was gracious enough to feed us an unexpected breakfast and take care of us. We spent the day yesterday touring on foot Antigua. All of us have fallen in love with this amazing city. Now deemed an UNESCO heritage city because of the incredible monuments from the 15th and 16th century, Antigua is being restored.

We had wonderful food, pecan pie for $1.00, cappucino coffees for $1.00 and lunch at the most exquisite hotel set in an old convent. The bed and breakfast we are at was an old convent from the 16th century and is absolutely exquisite. It has been the most fabulous 24 hours already here and we are looking forward to another wonderful day and a half before we fly to Tikal to see the ruins.

Each of us had privately been wondering if the people in the “big city” would be as gracious and lovely as we had experienced at the lake. We had nothing to worry about as they have been just as beautiful to deal with. We´ll see how it is as we head to the hot climate on the coast and experience a whole new perspective of Guatemala.