The second Big Update

Year Two!

As the last rays of sun set aglow the field of corn across the road, small groups of women carrying the smallest of a number of boisterous laughing children, walk together without hurry towards the church, as it warms up and tunes instruments near by.

Horses and motorcycles pull up to homes with Papa and a big armful of dry wood that sitting awkwardly behind him. Running to greet him at the squeaky metal gate, his toddler daughter who is learning her first words. They are ceremoniously tested and shouted with her by her mother and father at the top of their lungs, on lazy teeshirt-less, hot end of days, on the front patio.

The pig, arriving slightly late finds the gate shut. Calling out by clanging it with his snout, to see if anyone is home to let him in. The chickens, done with their daily rounds around the block, head back to their respective owners, into the trees, and makeshift pole roosts. Night comes in. The crickets are competing at equal volume with church and a big lunged lady hitting all her notes on a Haleluya loving evangelical gospel song.

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A site specific environmental installation from the "Vantage Point" series by yours truly, Lake Peten Itza, Peten 2024

Hey Everybody,

 These days I have been reflecting a lot on the fact that I feel like I have been given a second shot at life. I have been thinking a lot about my childhood and how strikingly similar it is to where I am and what Im doing now.

My step-father Gary, my Pa, grew up in the Adirondacks in a blue collar America mining town. My Canadian mother was the duaghter of a single mother who was a teacher. My mother wasn't a hippie, but she had travelled across by land through Asia to Australia in the 60's. She had two of us kids there and the other two of us in England which gave all of us from birth, passports to an international world .

My parents instilled in me from a young age a strong work ethic, a love of people, nature and the world.. Throughout my childhood I was often with my parents at their respective places of work. Growing up Gary was the manager at Weleda USA in Spring Valley, where he'd hoist me up so I could take a sniff of the big barrels of rosemary oil- in the making, and bring me on business trips to endless iris fields. After that he managed the Farm Store for many years, when it was still attached to the cow barn at HVS. I got to see the first ever 18 wheeler organic produce delivery truck pull in all the way from California. Boy was that a day. Gary started writing from home on the side. In the evenings he'd be found sitting at his bedroom desk, clacking away on one of those ancient computers with the age old square floppy disks.

In Spring Valley my mother was a Caregiver at the Fellowship where I got to watch her taking impecable loving care of the sick and the elderly, who also became my friends. Although I was only 4 or 5, I remember like it was today, how exquisitely beautiful the common hall was where Linda's body was layed for her funeral. At home on the side she took up weaving. She'd call me excitedly into her weaving room when a new box of yarn arrived, showing me the beauty of all her new colors of silk, wool and cotton threads. Many of our weekends were spent at craft fairs. With endless booths to explore with handmade crafts and people of every trade, it created a lifelong appreciation for them from a very early age. When we moved upstate she kept up her weaving, while also working as a cashier at the Farm Store. I grew up as one of the Valley kids, surrounded by nature, in the sprawling fields of its biodynamic farm, seeing cheese age in the deep dark coolers, playing in the huge hay loft, brushing cows who I knew by name, visiting the latest new born calves and pigs. Picking up a fresh baked roll in the mornings and heading just across the road to attend the dear old Waldorf School.

From as early as about 16, I always envisioned joining some kind of 3rd world international mission like Doctors without Borders or the Peacecorps. To actually find myself after all these years later with a heck of a lot more life experience and history in between, working full time with my own non for profit for the last 7 years, in the 3rd world, in a critical global spot where nature is at risk, in a small remote farming community, creating handmade crafts, caring for my neighbors who are are amongst the poorest of the poor.

To look it in the eye and not look away, to be surrounded day in and day out, day after day by families living in extreme poverty; I realize its not that I have become numb or "used to it" being the number one of the thing that is the most heartbreaking, devastating, and challenging...

A year later... I think the main difference for me, is that instead of feeling hopeless in the face of the enormity of so many issues, I am generally so much more optimistic with changes and improvements in my surroundings becoming visible- as a direct result of having a plan in place.

The outcomes of having 'worked the ideas' with the community for a year are becoming both tangible, and more broadly understood- As we continue to take determined concrete actions, and unwavering steps to achieve them.

We will only ever succeed as societies if we lift from the bottom up.

Considering 85% of the world moves at a much slower pace, not necessarily because they want to, but because they simply don't have the tools, resources, infrastructures, or technologies to be able to do it any faster. It puts a whole lot of people at a huge disadvantage as the rest of the world is speeding along. How do we level it up?

As the head of an organization working within the Global South, it is essential for me to move with people at their own pace. It is vital and critical that I be open and flexible to realtime change. To be actively supporting folks here as they define their own development in their own terms. It is a new and strange approach most of them have never encountered before. But in order for longterm solutions and natural growth of internal structures to take root, we must allow people TIME to gain the experience of trusting in themselves, to be able to take up the reins and step into the ownership of the ideas as their own.

An overpowering majority of solutions are created and put in place by people who don't really know the underlying problems. Far too often decisions are made by powerful people who have little to no actual understanding or true awareness of the baseline issues at hand, except for a little tour or a 5 minute briefing. Many people including myself have come to the conclusion over the years, that the only way to do it if we truly hope to succeed- Is to listen to and support the people at ground level whose daily experience makes them the ultimate authority on the subject- as they are both closest to the issues, and know the issues the best.

So thats where we begin!

Urgent Mayan Land Conservancy Fund Update

We thank each and every one of our contributors for making our Urgent Mayan Land Conservation fundraiser of $6,000 last year a mega success. We reached over 100% of our goal. Your participation has allowed us to continue to support our families in Peten as we launched our projects forward into year two.

The stakes are raised and we hope that you will join us this year creating even greater impact through our combined strength, pioneering change, and powering a goodly bit of good in the world. Every contribution is profoundly appreciated, and greatly valued. It goes a long way here, and is enormously significant to us.

We have made impressive progress in the past 12 months

So we have set our goals a little higher, to be able to increase and Double Up our efforts this coming year

New website domain If you recently clicked on one of our older links or blog posts and nothing came up, we renewed our official .org and its taking the posts a minute to catch up- but you can always find them here @ www.adacguatemala.org 

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Here we go!

We are Negotiating the purchase of 500 acres of Association Land

This past year I have been serving as the primary representative on behalf of our Adica Peten / ADAC collaborative partnership, acting as Co Administrator. I am grant writing to be able to apply for international grants regarding cultural development, community development, environmental conservation, agricultural projects, ecological, green energies, and green building funding.

We have entered into dialogue and negotiations on two properties totalling 500 acres of land with a national Guatemalan based conservation foundation ( confidential for the time being) regarding the the purchase of the Association land for 2025.

The first property is 100% for conservation purposes only. It is already home and one of the few refuges left for a large variety of wild species, some of which are on the extinction list, including howler monkeys. The majority of the surrounding land entirely deforested, it is one of the only remaining, barely touched, large pieces of land available for sale on the lake. Because of its location there is a proposed plan for it to adjoin with another project nearby-to become part of a greater regional conservation initiative that reconnects more natural causeways and increases protected habitat zones.

Our second piece of land is in the Buffer Zone and only 15 % intact for straight up conservation. It has mostly been cleared to field level for beef cattle. In this case we will add in 40% reforestation, 20 % agro forestry, 30 % regenerative agriculture, and 5% or less in housing that strategically placed on the property to have a minimal environmental footprint.

Based on holistic thinking and ecological design, our Association Land Trust initiative is the regions first Green, Mayan Indigenous, intentional shared living, agricultural community eco village.

Rejuvenation & Conservation of the Biosphere's Buffer Zone

This second piece of land plays a critical role in so far as it gives us the abilty to influence what happens in the future to the whole divvied and divided massive block of farming land called "The Buffer Zone". It starts at the back of our village and runs all the way up to the edge of the Mayan Biosphere. Its plots are in majority owned by small holder families from our village.

There are some larger land owners ( mostly non locals) who have beef cattle, but the majority of the land out back are our village families who use their land for planting their staple food of maize. Only a few still use more organic methods, and the ancient way of the 3 Sisters Crops of corn, beans, and squash.

Because we already have direct relationships as friends and neighbors, when we look at our future impact, we recognize our ability to take into considderation how we may affect the whole Buffer Zone as a part of the Associations larger plan. We will be example setting, be able to offer educational workshops, offer guidance as we aid those in our community to transition towards more sustainable methods, for increased profitability, and higher yields. As an organization with a formalized sales and distribution system we will be in the position to assist other land holders by taking them under our wing.

Associations and Cooperative Models    

-Are especially important in Guatemala where the vast majority of individuals have little to no resources, may not ever even dream for the chance in a lifetime to get anything of their own off the ground.

Whereas over the course of the past 20 years we have seen an ever growing number of Mayan indigenous communities joining forces to create incredibly successful model Association and Cooperative initiatives in the country- Proving over and over that power in numbers in Guatemala is definitely the best way to go.

The Human Reasons

At the moment our Association families and those in our village who do not own land are contracted on a month to month basis to do field work by those who do own land. Finishing up one job, timing is escential, as they are continually running to be the person to secure the next available job first. If they miss the window of time, they take a direct hit- and are immediate emergency mode, without money or food for their kids.

The Assocation is comprised of 50+ of the villages lowest resource, mostly younger families, and was formed to counteract precisely this. Every family's eyes light up when they talk about the Association. They have put all their hope and faith in it. That in having joined forces, they will be able to leave something beautiful for their children, to have a home, land to work, and a stability that each and every one of them dream of everyday. Its a tremendous honor to be working with them for their dream.

As the younger generations are growing up, it is incredibly critical not only that we purchase the Association Land for our 50 Association families, but for the future of all of the families in our village and beyond. With the limited and extremely few local employment opportunities, having a larger Associations Initiative set up in our village opens up flood gate to a broader diversity, choice of local livelihood, and jobs.

Slowing the devastating Social Cost of Migration has to Start Here!

By creating more Income producing Activities and Diversity of Opportunities

As it stands... for the children growing up... the brutal truth is there is no future here. Even if they do finish school, there is nothing after that. The majority of girls will have babies young, and the boys end up back in the field. As our numbers increase, the chances for boys and men to find a job here IS already decreasing! It means 1 in 10 people heading for the States.

Just this past year so far... its been Jonny leaving his wife and 2 kids, Orlando leaving 3, Jaime 3, Rosa was finally going to meet up with her husband- who took the baby up with him 7 years ago, Noe left 2 and a new baby, Chenie took her son Snyder (13) with her, and Lilian (19) went to her fathers, and the list goes on.

We must all do everything in our power to help people to not to end up in the position of needing to go to the US in the first place. Wanting to go is an entirely different thing, but feeling like they have no other choice and that they have to, is another. The last two on the list Chenie w Snyder, and Lilian are the only ones who wanted to go vs. needed.

These guys dont want to leave their wives and their children. They go because their children are starving, because they are tired of working their hands to the bone and never being able to make ends meet. The majority of Guatemalans do not go to the US to stay. The go to make money to send home for food, to build a house, leaving their wives, grandparents, aunts and uncles to raise children without them, and almost all of these guys... do eventually return !!!

From the time they are born children take care of one another

For Guatemala, this thing of migration is no longer for amnesty, its due to economic necessity. I cannot reiterate strongly enough just how hugely detrimental this migration thing is to the social fabric of the country. It has created a sociological loop of unfathomable disempowerment and normalization of unspoken loss. An orphaned country.

For the number one thing these kids to be talking about, to be dreaming about -to be to go to the US... not to be a doctor, or a golden buzzer on AGT... To be the kid who was left behind, who's mom and dad, and brothers and sisters, and uncles and aunts are all in the States and sending the money to prove it? What kind of future does that leave you? From the time you were old enough to remember, your broken heart has been aching to go too...? Maybe not even because its the USA, maybe it's because you just want your big sister and your mom and dad. It's absolutely devastating.

I live with these kids. I love these kids. I think it is super important that I am from the US, and that I am here with them. To show them that someone from there is here. That I love it here, and its a good place, to maybe build other dreams in their mind, to maybe offer some kind of a little consolation. In the end, the short and long of it is that "This one is for the kids". To leave something in place for our children and their children, and for generations to come. Isnt that what its all about?

Yes, it is.

“If you give a man a fish, you feed him for a day. If you teach a man to fish, you feed him for a lifetime.”

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SO on we go...

Starting Up Community Solar

The black outs in Peten are rediculous! And when the power is on, its often at such a low voltage that electrical equiptment struggles to stay on. I sometimes dont even bother trying to work on the computer for days at a time, as it will only get turned right off. Its costing the people millions and billions in losses. Everyone is paying out of pocket for ruined store product, fried domestic equipment, phone calls that couldn't be made, deals and transactions that couldnt be done. The governement doesnt seem to making much progress on negotiating the matter. So one, would be to file a public case and sue the electric company, as the situation is frankly criminal. But two, is to take the matter into our own hands, get our village set up with community solar, and encourage others to do the same. We are taking it on, and will be beginning to apply for green energy grants. I believe it will make us the first community in Guatemala to do Community Solar.

Peten is all about conservation, ecology, and the environment. As one of the northernmost villages in the country, sitting on the edge of the Mayan Biosphere, here seems like more than an appropriate place to start.

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Environmental and Human Health

As you know we have been firmly committed to addressing the major health and environmental issues in our village, not only because of the Environmental cost, but also because of the toll it is taking on our Human Health.

With already compromised systems due to lack of poor nutrition, those with the least resources are generally hit hardest, and the first to get sick.

In Resolving the two issues below, I am pretty sure we will see some significant improvement in our villages health. However until we have more of the longterm solutions resolved, a significant part of our budget continues to go to our Ad Hock Food and Medical Emergency Fund. We continue to serve 12 of our extremely vulnerable families through critical moments when they are hit with irregular unexpected situations that they are unable to meet on their own.

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A) Wrapping up our plastic trash issue

Having had no public or private trash pick up system in place here, almost all households have been burning their plastics in their yards- adding up to dozens of fires that all our little children and everyone in the community is breathing every day on an ongoing basis. Plastics are also discarded into the watershed running down to the lake.

This past year we have been coordinating an effort between community leaders, church leaders, the village mayor, municipal mayor, the National Government Health Department, Environmental Department MARN, Government Lake Conservation Commission AMPI among others. Our proposal of a unified group, effectively makes our village the first on the lake to address the issue in this way. Our proposal was accepted as a Replicable Model with expected positive results, and may be used for other villages near by that are in the same situation as us.

Our community and many other rural communities are not able to afford a paid garbage service. If families had to pay, they would just go on burning it instead.

Thus- It must be a community service!

With little community or planned budgeted government resources available, we are looking at setting up large-ish shared community garbage bins made from recycled materials stationed at intervals every few blocks or so. The proposal includes 101 orientation for all of our families, capacitation for the villages leaders, Municipal workers and the village's Municipal Heads.

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B) Ending the Residential use of Glyphosate " Round Up"

around the Lake.

I do not think that any parent would knowingly, on purpose, put their child in harms way. Im pretty sure that if they had ever been presented with the information, not a single person would be burning their plastics, or applying Round Up in town. They just don't know. They have never been presented with the information.

Since I have been here, and as it still stands, Round up is being applied and used in the domestic environment; with children, people, and animals not even leaving the premisses for the first 24 hours. This time of year Im surrounded on all sides. Ive counted 10 houses within just 2 blocks around my house, and thats not even counting the rest of the village, just around my house! Our village is also on a hill, and our dear glyphosate is also ending up the lake.

So for one we are working with the local government Health Department who have committed to get the information out.

And two we are working with AMPI the Government Lake Protection Commission to ban its use around the lake.  

It's been very hard to keep my mouth shut about this saying OMG under my breath and just keep walking. I knew from the beginning, to resolve the issue it must come from corresponding departments higher up.

I dont know which is worse the burning plastics or the Round up, but when picking battles we needed to strategically choose which came first. The Trash initiative got us in and provided us a platform to work off of to then be able to address the Glyphosate issue.

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Getting more food in the ground Community Gardening for local Food Sovereignty

We are on a slightly different seasonal climate than the north. We were wathcing your cool fresh spring gardens bloom with envy, while we were in our seemly endless upper 90's day after day bone dry months and rampant wildfires. As you moved into your hot- hot mid summer days, our cool fresh rains came, and green life began again.

Only just into our planting season- We have been hit by a plague and are heading straight into- A state of Emergency 

Maize for tortillas is our communities number one staple food, and everyone's most recent planting is gone. We are an agrarian village, and with few exceptions everyone here is dependant on the crops. Those who have land and plant maize for their families, also sell surplus to those who don't have land.

We have two planting seasons in Guatemala, generally October- November, and May-June, is the one we just lost. The Oct/Nov crop just finished being dried and bagged, but when that runs out- there will be nothing.

Our community is going to be hit incredibly hard in the months to come without their daily staple food or the money to buy it, we are going to see more and more people going down into even deeper into hunger and starvation.

This is a huge blow. As the folks in the village havent started to address what is to come yet- As a new village nobody has been capacitated, no one has experiece in leadership, or government, no one really knows who to go to, or how. They are not accustomed to have any power to do anything about it- Most of our villages decisions are made from down the road and higher up. I know I cant , nor should take this on alone, but as I do see it coming, I am also responsible to do what I can to help coordinate- To try to set aid up ahead of time, to prevent catastrophe. Because if I don't... it's going to come back even harder on me, with more people coming to my door asking me to support them.

I am talking to my neighbours. I will try not to leapfrog and will take it up the line... But if I dont hear results, although against my principals, I may pull clout, pick up the phone, and make that phone call, this time. Staving off a crisis in my village was not in my plans and it is going to take out a chunk of my days stopping in on people, doing the rounds, to see how we can best avoid it.

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Planting Semillas de Promesa /Seeds of Promise

Pastora Angelica and Pastor Amilcar lived in the US for 14 some odd years and are the first to take on our seed share promise...which is... that if the crop works out, seeds are kept from that harvest to share with other people, and those other people are to share with next.

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We are seeing a 10% increase in diversified backyard plantings, and we hope to see a lot more in the coming years. The majority of fruits and vegetables are still coming up to Peten in unrefrigerated trucks from Guatemala city arriving in wilted and bedraggled conditions, at unaffordable prices- While we have lots of dirt begging to be planted, and lots hands that know how...

 Malnutrition and Hunger here are fairly rampant, and while most houses just have bare ground around them, the idea is that while the men are out back in the "Milpa", the corn fields- that the ladies at home- Start to get their dirt planted up- so everyone has greater direct access to a wider variety of food right from our own back yards .

Ive recently seen more women out of skirts and into boots and jeans getting dirty. That right there is top great news ;) Not the out of skirts thing, the getting their hands in the dirt thing.

We are continually promoting sustainable methods, balanced ecologies, diversification of crop plantings, natural soil health improvement, organics, agroforestry for healthier people, and more prosperous abundant yields.

We have also increased whats planted this year in our Demonstration Garden. We are crop testing Green Beans, Snow Peas, Sweet Corn, Lettuce, Chard, Kale, Sweet Potatoes, Potatoes, doubled our Tomatoes, and Basil along with our usual list of Papaya, Coconut, Lemos, Avacadoes, as well as Native species like Asian Basil, Hoja Santa, and more.

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Aaaaaand Saving the best for last;)

Launching Barro Itza Traditional & Contemporary Ceramics

ADAC receives its first Institutional Grant!!!

a Mayan Qʼeqchiʼ women- led Ceramics workshop space and Creative Community Center

 We are incredibly proud to have received a special small business start up grant from Melania, a charitable organization based in the Netherlands, supporting indigenous and marginalized women around the world. Thank You Melania!!!

The grant has allowed us to purchase the majority of our start up equipment and helps to cover our initial training sessions during our first six months. As the first Ceramics Cooperative style Initiative in the region, we seek to learn, and work together to build up a beautiful flourishing hub of activity.

Our Community Center for Creativity is promoting new forms of cultural sharing, arts enrichment for children, building a greater diversity of skills and income producing activities opening broader opportunities for people in our village. We are Closing the gap creating equitable bridges that enhance shared prosperity for people , while fortifying the cross over between the nations nature, culture, and the arts.

Why this Initiative is so important for our women

 Many of our women are raising children alone. With a high male illegal migration to the US rate, many men are absent in the home and are often unable to send sufficient money to their wives and children the first year they are gone. They have high interest rates on their Coyote Bill and it is essential they pay off as quickly as possible.  Many men here have also left women as single mothers with no support at all period.

There are even less employment or income generating opportunities for the women than the men, and they are desperately seeking to do more and to create additional family income. Given the majority of women and mothers only have a very basic level of education, the few and limited types of jobs that they could take would be as domestic maids, to live in a small servants quarter room often only slightly larger than a small bed, away from home, where they are only permitted a weekend time off to see their children- every two months or so. (P.S. Medieval modern day slavery)

This leaves them in a limited position to remain at home with hungry children, and they have tremendous interest, drive, and motivation to make extra money given the opportunity, especially within in a supportive community setting:)

Our native wild clay, along with their matching respective fragments of ancient Mayan ceramics that you can literally just find lying on the ground.

The bottom line...

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All of our proposals in Peten are in alignment with a way of living that is

 Ecologically Centered, and Nature Based.

Our work is Based on listening, and that of call and response. Build on personal caring and genuine interest, the projects we develop reflect a call to action that comes from an expansive collective community voice.

Our primary goal is to set in place longterm solutions that are created and informed by the community itself. Strategically co-designing tailor-made community driven social and cultural initiatives, working at ground level in collaboration with our neighbors, community leaders, local authorities, national government branches, organizations, institutions, and other non for profits with similar missions, to combine forces, to connect the dots regarding our mutual interests, visions, and goals. 

What distinguishes our organization from other non for profits in Guatemala, what makes us unique as that ADAC was created for the sole and rather unusual singular purpose of paving roads and opening doors.

ADAC has been designed to put the power in the peoples hands. To help get things started, to set things up, to mediate processes, to make connections, to bridge gaps, to propel ideas, to share information, to aid transition solutions that will ultimately be self owned, so the people of Guatemala may be the protagonists and shining stars of their own successes and wins.

My ultimate success as an individual and as an organization is to see others suceed.

I speak for myself when I say- I do want my life to mean something, I do want to make a positive difference in people lives, to positively impact our world, to be of service, to fight for human dignity, to advocate, to ease the suffering of others, and to do everything in my power to see how, and in what way I can help.

Thats all folks. Over and out.

With all of my heart,

Yours truly,

Love,

Em

Earth Day Parade, my village's children with home made costumes from recycled materials:) 2024