February 27, 2007
At last a high school graduation!
I was with a group that has had a partnership in Guatemala for
eight long years. The focus of the partnership has been education.
An educational center in the grimy frontier town of Sayaxché,
in the northern department of the Petén, was built so students
could live there while availing themselves of classes available
only in the town. Sayaxché is well known to everyone in
Guatemala as the transition point for 75 perecent of the drugs
that pass through Central America from Colombia on their way to
distribution points in the United States. I once spoke to the
mayor to encourage his support of our Kekchi students living in
the center. A member of a visiting group once gave the mayor a
wristwatch in an effort to curry favor, little realizing that
the mayor was “narco traficante numero uno” in the
region. A rival gang subsequently murdered the mayor in 2004 as
he left his office. The following year the same gang murdered
his two sons, although neither crime has ever been resolved or
investigated. But at last there was something to celebrate in
Sayaxché—the first graduate from high school!
Concepción Seb Choc is a 20-year-old indigenous woman,
a Kekchi, one of 23 different indigenous groups in Guatemala.
She wears traditional Mayan garb: a colorful wrap-around skirt
with a net-like blouse. Her long, black hair is pulled tightly
back from her forehead and her ponytail is bound in a scrunchy
at the back of her head, which accentuates her wide face and dark
eyes. She may be five feet tall. She smiles readily but is becoming
more reluctant to do that since, like most Kekchi women and men,
she is missing teeth and is self-conscious about their absence.
Still, she has an air of confidence, speaks willingly, holds her
head high, and looks strangers in the eye. She is the first graduate
from her village, and since she is not married and has no children
she is already very different from Kekchi women her age.
She says she would like to attend university. She has found temporary
employment as a primary teacher in her village, Las Camelias,
about an hour south of Sayaxché. It remains to be seen
if she is sufficiently trained to pass the entrance exams to enter
university next year or if she will be encouraged to attend by
family and friends. She is venturing into unknown areas not only
for herself but for her people as well. There are still many hurdles
to overcome, but her supporters are hopeful. Her graduation represented
such a milestone that the visiting group hosted a dinner in her
honor in a local comedor attended by other students,
leaders of her church group, and, surprisingly, her father, Francisco,
a campesino.
Victories such as this are rare in Guatemala, and Concepción
may become a champion for others just as she has for the visiting
group of North Americans. The drug business still flourishes in
Sayaxché due to the magnet of easy money in the United
States. Prensa Libre, a Guatemalan newspaper, reported
recently that about 40 percent of Guatemlans suffer emotional
problems due to insecurity (there were 5,000 murders last year
in a country the same size as Tennessee, which during the same
period had 495 murders), anxiety over economic woes, and increasing
political corruption. The same paper reported in late February
that criminals are running for office and buying votes in order
to make it easier to conduct their nefarious schemes. The local
governments in the departments of Jutiapa, Jalapa, Zacapa, Izabal,
the Petén, San Marcos, Alta Verapaz, and Quiché
are all infiltrated by criminals, which discourages the participation
of honest candidates. In 2006, three candidates were assassinated,
which tends to keep others from running.
Every organization involved in eliminating poverty indicates
that education is the first step that must be taken. But a population
that lacks education tends to maintain the status quo, which is
to the advantage of those in power and to the criminal element
that appears to be growing. In the face of this disturbing trend
the fact that one indigenous girl graduated from high school is
no small feat. Nothing is simple in Guatemala for those at the
margins. Visiting groups that work in education find it a difficult
thing to do. It does not offer the immediate satisfaction of constructing
a church or house or fixing a reparable health issue.
Pedro Cabnal, at age 27, is due to graduate in October; Marco
Rax is scheduled to graduate in 2008. With persistence, prayer,
encouragement, and faith in the future, numerous graduations will
take place. It may not appear like much but it is a huge step
for those in the two-thirds world.
Jesus calls us to be more human and to live life as fully as
he did, which requires pointing out the hypocrisy, injustice,
and repression that separates us from one another and from God.
This calls us to take on the hard tasks of education, recognizing
that results are far in the future and that not only will we not
feel good during the process, but we’ll often be disappointed
and frustrated when capable young people quit school for lack
of money, lack of job opportunities, and lack of familial encouragement,
and return to work with hoe and machete. But today we celebrate
Concepción’s achievement while working toward that
day when the good things God has created are within reach of all
his children.
May those who sow in tears reap with shouts of joy!
Psalm 126:5
Roger and Gloria Marriott
The 2007 Mission Yearbook for Prayer & Study, p. 65 |
