Comalapa

We (the Y staff and I) went to Comalapa, a small village 1 ½ hours outside of the capital. The view was beautiful as we drove up the mountain and down, curved around many times and finally ended up at the top of a large canyon. We arrived at 9am and offered the workshop in regards to the Internal Armed Conflict of Guatemala to 23 teenagers. They mixed the group discussions and lecture with group bonding activities and then connected those learning back to how we can create peace in Guatemala.

After the earthquake of 1976, the YMCA built a hospital, the school, and a few other buildings for the village. This school was built by the YMCA and they ran many programs there for many years until something happened (still trying to get the details) and the YMCA ended up abandoning the buildings and therefore local government took the land and buildings. Now, financially stretched, the YMCA asks for permission to hold workshops at the school that they built and used to own.

The village of Comalapa was hit hard by the war and earthquake and is slow to bounce back. In the evening we had a meeting with 4 adult volunteers that still run programs in Comalapa, the group meets in one of the homes of the volunteer group. The Y staff taught the volunteers how to facilitate workshops for youth and for teachers about the history of internal conflict, human rights and creating a culture of peace. These topics are very personal for the volunteers as they all lived through this is one of the hardest hit villages. They told us stories of people that they know that were tortured and/or killed in the conflict, graphic stories that I won't blog about. I had read many stories like these in regards to the human rights violations of Guatemala (and also in Rwanda) but it is extremely intense to hear the stories from the mouths of the mother, brother or sister of someone that was killed. It was a very overwhelming day!