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Pueblo a Pueblo Relief Activities
Besides major support for the interim hospitalito, Pueblo a Pueblo also used donor funds for the following disaster relief activities:
ADISA
 ADISA is non-profit organization providing services to disabled children. During the disaster ADISA ran out of anti-convulsant medications. With the help of Dr. Gil Mobley, about $4000 of medications were brought from the states. The supply was augmented with additional drugs purchased in Guatemala City.
Bomberos
Pueblo a Pueblo donated $7,000 to the volunteer rescue organization to complete their funds to purchase a new ambulance. These were the first responders to the disaster and are true heroes. They try to maintain three working vehicles at all times, as often they have to transport medical cases to Guatemala City or respond to calls from other towns around the western part of the lake. One of the ambulances had finally given way and was beyond repair and they were down to two working vehicles.
 In appreciation, the Bomberos hosted a celebration dinner to thank Pueblo a Pueblo. I told them that we at Pueblo a Pueblo were companeros as everyone at Pueblo a Pueblo was avolunteer as well. I told them that I had received many, many emails from donors, thanking me for my work. These emails were really meant for them….and that we all thanked them for their heroism during this disaster and for giving so much to the people of Santiago. Besides helping with the purchase of an ambulance, we have purchased the second round of Hepatitis vaccines for all Bomberos.
Elementary Schools
Pueblo a Pueblo is supporting Bonnie Dilger’s Tree of Life Project that is repairing and building schools as well as providing educational supplies to aldeas near Santiago. Bonnie is working at La Escuela Promade de T’zanchaj, Chacuyá and Panabaj.
Housing
The homes of three staff members of the hospitalito were destroyed by the mudslides. Pueblo a Pueblo is renting interim facilities for their families as K’aslimaal negotiates construction of permanent housing. With the support of Pueblo a Pueblo, Cojolya Association of Maya Women Weavers is designing new housing for its affectados.
While visiting David at the Posada, we took a short trip to see the new house of Cruz Chiviliu Tzina. His fourth child was born ten minutes before the mudslides. He didn’t even know if the child was a boy or girl when he lost his wife, the baby, his ten-year old son and the midwife.
 He escaped with a young son and daughter. When he came out of shock a week later and began talking again, he approached David at the Posada, who wrote to the Board of Pueblo. While there are thousands of individual cases, the board felt that David’s request was a leading to which we had to respond. Donations enabled Cruz to purchase a small piece of land and buy materials for a new home for his children.
After walking up a long path, through coffee groves and groups of small houses, we found Cruz and a friend mixing cement and laying the foundation for his home. I got word, about five days later, that the walls were complete and he was ready to put on the roof. He asked me to thank everyone for helping he and his children. David wrote, “Thank you for helping this young man. I think you will notice that, in the attached photograph, he is smiling.”
Additionally, a donor has rented a house in Santiago. This multi-story building is housing damnificado kids who need ongoing medical care and have no other place to live. We are housing a psychologist with the children and will be pay his salary to provide much needed psychological services to daminficados, affectados, townspeople and providers. Two of these children lost more than 40 members of their families in the mudslides.
Susie’s Loom and Thread Project
The entranceway to the Posada Hotel and the bathroom foyer were stacked with boxes of threads and parts of looms when I arrived for a breakfast meeting with Susie. She began with an impulse, an idea, a few words and then followed it through. She has now identified 570 weavers who have lost everything. They were living in churches originally. Now she was working with women in all the shelters and plastic housing towns.She had a delivery this morning so we drove to a school where distribution of threads and looms was scheduled. People showed up slowly at first, but soon a crowd began to form in front of the school.
We were attracting attention by many of the townspeople, so Susie moved the distribution into a schoolroom where it could be handled more systematically.
Susie’s T’zutjil ayudante read off the name of a weaver who had been previously certified as a damnificado. She came up to give some information, sign the sheet with her fingerprint, receive her loom and supplies and have her picture taken.
Other’s asked for a loom and supplies and Susie took their names and asked where they lived and explained that they would be contacted to confirm their housing status and for future distributions. I was particularly impressed that the project had been designed with such organization and security.
Each woman is receiving materials to weave a traditional guipile. She can either weave this for herself or for sale. Subsequent distributions will include materials for men’s and children’s clothing as well as women’s guipiles.
Workhouses
David has identified a critical barrier to gainful employment. Artisans who are homeless have no secure place to keep their materials, workspace to make their art, nor space to store their works in progress. Along with other volunteers, David is designing communal, sheltered buildings that can be secured. These will provide shared workspace and a way for artisans to secure their materials. Pueblo a Pueblo has invested in the first two of these work houses.
Future
Work, housing and health – these are the three areas that Pueblo a Pueblo is planning on concentrating on in the immediate future. The recovery process will be a long one. We will need to begin again, to work with Santiago’s townspeople to rebuild their hospitalito. We will also need to support housing and work opportunities so that the town’s damnificados and affectados can have an opportunity to re-establish their lives once again.
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