Faces Of Latin America

School Field Trip to Water Park

noreply@blogger.com (Tom Johnson) — Mon, 01 Sep 2008 20:29:00 +0000

While my daughter and I was doing some work in Antigua Guatemala with Escuela Integrada we had the opportunity to go on another field trip with the school. It just happened that when we were in Guatemala on this trip it fell on another time that was the yearly field trip for the school.

This time we went to a water park in Santa Catarina Guatemala;

View Larger Map
Here are a few pics from the trip, the kids really loved the water park but the weather was cool and the water was cold as you can see from some of the expressions on the faces.

The boys really love the water slide as you
can see with the smiles on the faces.

There was some 200 kids that came on the trip. Some of the
kids did not own swim suites but with the help of donations
from people in the U.S. the school was able to get each child a suite.

Even though it was cold each child really had a blast.
Most of these kids have never had experiences like this
in there life. A lot of the children have lost their parents and
family due to the civil war, or they live with alcoholic parents or even worse.
Some of these poor children have come out of some pretty horrific
situations. But with schools like Escuela Integrada it really gives these
children a real chance in life.

Escuela Integrada Field Trip

noreply@blogger.com (Tom Johnson) — Sun, 24 Aug 2008 20:52:00 +0000

While we were in Antigua Guatemala we were assisting our friends that run a school in Antigua, the school is called "Escuela Integrada". The week we were there we took the kids on a field trip to a town close to Antigua called Santa Cantarina. Just outside of town there is a beautiful private park with a soccer (football) field, a very nice basketball court, rest rooms, and a play area for smaller children. From Antigua it is only about a 20 minute trip by bus.

For some of these children it was there first time to go on a field trip. A lot of these children have never been in school before. A large portion of the children in Guatemala don't go to school. In Guatemala you have to pay to go to public school and with such high poverty families cannot afford to send there children to school. But at Escuela Integrada children get an excellent education and it is free to the families.

One big thing that Escuela Integrada does is make sure that the children and families that attend the school don't go hungry. You see in Guatemala malnutrition runs rampant. It is our motto that a child cannot learn when they are starving, so we make sure that there are no starving children in the school.

Escuela Integrada has approximately 225 full time students. We operate 100 % on donation, there is no funding from the Guatemala government, the Guatemala government can barely keep there schools open. With the economy hurting in the USA it is getting tough on us to keep operating but we are doing our best. If you would like to learn more about our operation please feel free to contact us.

noreply@blogger.com (Tom Johnson) — Sun, 10 Aug 2008 16:16:00 +0000

While in Antigua Guatemala we caught these pictures in Central Park.

This young man was sitting on the curb playing his guitar and entertaining the people in the park.

Here is one of the entrances to the park, you can see the beautiful cobble stone streets. The fountain in the center of the park is in the background. While there you can take a horse and carriage ride around the beautiful ancient city of Antigua.

In central park you will find many young children offering the service of shining shoes. These poor children are there every day trying to make a living for there family's. It is a shame but instead of these children being in school there are out trying to help there family put food on the table.

border=0 src="http://www.indiebible.com/images/ibelectronic3.jpg">

Children of Chimaltenango Department

noreply@blogger.com (Tom Johnson) — Wed, 06 Aug 2008 18:08:00 +0000

A small child with her mother at a church service. See the beautiful colors of her huipil.

Females of all ages wear the traditional dress of the Mayan culture as this little girl is wearing. The huipil colors and design represents the village that they are from. The boys and men do not usually wear the traditional clothing, they mostly wear western style cloths

Mayan woman showing off her "huipil"

noreply@blogger.com (Tom Johnson) — Tue, 05 Aug 2008 14:48:00 +0000

My wife in the central highlands of Guatemala in a village called Chuchuca with a local Mayan women. The woman is showing my wife how she go's about embroidering a "huipil". The huipil is a distinct work of art, woven or embroidered, that may take months to complete.

Village Leaders

noreply@blogger.com (Tom Johnson) — Mon, 04 Aug 2008 19:46:00 +0000

This is the village council and Mayor of Chuchuca Guatemala.

"Alcalde", is the Spanish term for the mayor of a village.

Chuchuca is just outside of Patzún. Patzún is a municipality in the Chimaltenango department of Guatemala.