Obrigado Productions’ “SON OF NONE” has been accepted to screen as part of the 26th Boston Film Festival, the Sidewalk Moving Picture Festival and the 42nd Chicago International Film Festival!

“Son of None” is a short docudrama about Joshua, a seven year old Liberian war orphan who is constantly disheveled, falling behind and failing at school.  When the orphanage’s goat goes missing, Joshua shirks relationships and responsibilities to reveal where his priorities lie.

Read more about “Son of None” here:  http://www.obrigadoproductions.com/SON_OF_NONE.html

Onward: Part 6 of 6 – Children of Hope: The Liberia Mission Story

This final video – Onward: Part 6 – is an inspiring and deeply moving look at the way that Liberia Mission truly saves and transforms lives – now and in the future.  We reconnect with Handful, Serliae, Benjamin and Marcus and see how they continue to work hard to succeed in school and improve conditions in Liberia.  We also learn about the connection between the U.S. and Liberia, and we see the inspiring potential for growth and continued success of a mission that was called by Msgr. Karnley of Liberia, “… the greatest thing to happen to Liberia since the end of the second civil war in 2003 … We are a blessed country because of this mission.”  Click on the picture above to watch and learn more!  Inspired to donate or sponsor a child?  Just $1 a day can truly change a life.  Learn more at:  http://www.missionhonduras.com   Thanks!

A Tragedy: Part 5 – Children of Hope: The Liberia Mission Story

A Tragedy: Part 5 tells the story of ten-year-old Elijah Koko. The story illustrates how precious and fragile life is in Liberia. It also illustrates the great need for public health and health education in Liberia, a need that Liberia Mission, Inc. will be addressing very soon.  In May, an American doctor will take up residence at Liberia  Mission.  He will look after the health needs of the children and provide education and care for those in the surrounding villages.

Elijah’s Story:  Elijah had been slightly ill for a few days, but this morning was joking with his mother as he was getting ready for school in his family’s small, mud-brick house directly across the street from Liberia Mission. She told him that she was taking him to the doctor after school. His mother walked outside for a moment and when she came back, she found Elijah unconscious. The family flagged down a cab and rushed him to the Doctors Without Borders Hospital. Elijah regained consciousness on the ride telling his mother and uncle that he was going to die. When they arrived at the hospital, Elijah asked for his father who was on his way. When his father came to the hospital, Elijah told them all that now he could die. And tragically that is what happened. The family returned to the village and would have to go to pick up Elijah’s body for immediate burial as soon as the body was prepared. Jerome Cabeen, Liberia Mission Director and Elijah’s former teacher, agreed to help the family with all logistics and transportation. This tragic part of the the web-series follows the family’s ordeal as they pick up their son at the hospital, host a visitation in the village and bury him at his father’s family plot.

This story illustrates not only how precious and fragile life is in Liberia, but how Liberia Mission is making a difference and how the addition of a doctor on site will help the whole community. Click on the picture above to watch and learn more.

HOMECOMING: Part 4 – Children of Hope: The Liberia Mission Story

Homecoming: Part 4 tells the story of Marcus Gborman and his family.  Marcus, one of the Mission’s newer students and a consummate entertainer, is having a hard time adjusting to the structure of the mission and school.  His father, Eric, makes coal to sell and farms for a meager living.  It is Eric’s greatest dream for Marcus to receive a good education, an opportunity he never had.  In “Homecoming,” we follow Marcus as he visits his parents and learns what education means to his – and his family’s – future.  Marcus’ story illustrates just how rare and valuable education is in Liberia as it recovers, rebuilds, and looks to a better future for the next generation. Click on the picture below to watch and learn more!

A Woman’s Place: Part 3 of Liberia Mission Documentary Series,
Children of Hope: The Liberia Mission Story

A Woman’s Place: Part 3 tells the story of Serliae Johnson.  Like Handful, Serliae was one of the first students to be taken in by Liberia Mission, Inc. after suffering the loss of her parents.  Serliae has a love for singing and dreams of becoming a doctor one day.  She was also recently elected vice-president of St. Anthony of Padua School – the first female elected to that position.  Serliae also talks about her love for “Momma” Helena Gonyon, a House Mother at Liberia Mission who always dreamed that she would have the opportunity to help Liberia’s war-orphaned children.  Serliae’s story helps explore the unique opportunities women have in Liberian society – especially women with a first-rate education – following the lead of their President, Ellen Johnson-Sirleaf – the first woman President in Africa.  Click on the picture below to watch and learn more!

Serving: Part 2 – Children of Hope: The Liberia Mission Story

Serving: Part 2 of 6 tells the story of Benjamin Wollor who was never able to attend school prior to turning eleven because of Liberia’s brutal, 14-year civil war.  He also tragically lost his older brother during the war, a fate he escaped by inches.  Ten years later, Benjamin was elected the President of his high school.  His mother, not having seen him in years, traveled 3 days by boat to see his installation as President.  She addressed the school about her son and the future of Liberia – a speech which nearly brought down the house.  Benjamin lives at Liberia Mission and is a “big brother” to the younger children.  His main goal in life is to become a Franciscan missionary priest, inspired by St. Francis to give up all he has to “serve the poor.”

World Premiere – SEEDS: part 1 of 6 of Liberia Mission Video!

Seeds: Part 1 of 6 features Handful Kollie.  Handful was found hungry, homeless, and with little clothing in an internally displaced persons (IDP) camp in 2003.  He lost his parents in the war, and he was the first child taken in by Liberia Mission. Nearly seven years later, he is in the 8th grade and is determined to become an agriculturalist, so that Liberians will never again have to suffer the hunger he had as a child. He is also a respected leader at the Mission, where many of the younger children follow his lead, bearing dreams that focus on re-building their country.  Click to watch and learn more!

Children of Hope: The Liberia Mission Story

Watch the new trailer for the Obrigado produced web-series, “Children of Hope: The Liberia Mission Story.”  We’ll be releasing this six-part documentary series over the next six weeks. The doc tells the story of Liberia Mission, Inc. through some of its most remarkable children and explores the history of Liberia, its unique ties to the US and its drive to rebuild.

Watch the Trailer here! www.liberiamission.com/video.html

We just returned from Liberia, Africa carrying over 40 hours of some of the most moving footage we’ve had the privilege to shoot. From this footage we hope to make a series of documentary shorts and one narrative short.

We witnessed the heartbreaking, sudden death of ten year-old Elijah Koko which provided a troubling glimpse into the fragility of life in Liberia.

We followed the remarkable stories of Serlieah Johnson and “Handful” Kollie, two of Liberia Mission’s first students.  Both had lost parents in Liberia’s brutal 14-year Civil War and were found hungry, homeless and with little clothing in an Internally Displaced Persons (IDP) Camp.  Six years later they are among the best and most hard-working students at the Mission, and their futures appear very bright.

Because of the war, Benjamin Wollor was never able to attend school prior to turning thirteen, an age when most Americans graduate 8th grade.  Eleven years later, Benjamin was elected the President of his high school.  His mother, not having seen him in years, traveled 3 days by boat to see his installation as President.  We were lucky enough to witness her addressing the school about her son and the future of Liberia – a speech which nearly brought down the house.

Finally, one of the Mission’s youngest boys, Joshua Cooper, has a face and demeanor that begged to be filmed.  He also proved to be a natural actor.  Our collaboration resulted in an experimental narrative short which aims to provide a glimpse into the precarious life of one of Liberia’s (and, therefore, the world’s) most vulnerable human beings.  Though in great need of help himself, he shows remarkable compassion for those with even less.

For more information on the sponsoring organization, please visit the Liberia Mission website (operated by Mission Honduras International).  You can sponsor a child – including their housing, food and education – for as little as $1 / day.  You can also become a fan of Liberia Mission on Facebook.

Please check out this special video below featuring the Liberia Mission male chorus and the children of Liberia Mission, Inc.  In this very special – first-ever of its kind – video of Liberia Mission, you will experience – in less than 6 minutes – scenes from Liberia, the Mission, and meet the children, some of our emerging leaders.

What is Home?

Well…it’s been a while since we posted.  If you read this issue’s content, you may understand why (46 beds on 63 moves in 5 countries in 19 states).  We’ve been very mobile since returning from Honduras in April.  Since that time, we’ve moved ten times.  Finally, we are somewhat settled, enough to catch our breath and let you know what we’ve been up to and how our time in Honduras ended.

Since we have racked up numerous thoughts and ruminations since returning, we will split this final issue up into two installments.  The second of which will be posted next week.

This edition will focus on the theme of Home and Homecoming.  Next week’s issue will include the latest article in the “En Carne Vida” Series as well as an article on the “culture shock” we experienced when first coming back to the US.

Make sure you check out the slideshow re-cap of the trip on the photos page.  And take a few minutes to read this week’s articles:

by Todd Looby

Head-laying Location #6

Personally, I have never been one to set up a stable home base, in the past 10 years I have lived in eight locations in Chicago alone.   Not that I had anything against stability per se, it just wasn’t high on my priority list.  The past year, however, has probably forever changed that notion.   It has been almost a year to the day that we first touched foot in Honduras.  In that year’s time, we have slept in 46 different beds, and moved a total of 63 times (sometimes back to the same bed)….  (more)

Back Home

by Todd Looby

Home Pride

At 35,000 ft, Honduras looks like any beautiful Southwestern state of the US.  Sparsely populated mountain forests surround little, non-channelized streams.  Dirt roads lead up to small villages or solitary domiciles.  The low hum of the jet and serene sweeping of the clouds created the atmosphere of peace, the first moment of which we felt in the past couple of days.  Looking at the landscape once more before nodding off, I imagined being over the high desert of Eastern Washington, our final destination in 24 hours.  That’s precisely when it hit me:  We were entering into an entirely different and foreign realm of existence…. (more)

Back Home

by Todd Looby
At 35,000 ft, Honduras looks like any beautiful Southwestern state of the US.  Sparsely populated

The Last Goodbye

mountain forests surround little, non-channelized streams.  Dirt roads lead up to small villages or solitary domiciles.  The low hum of the jet and serene sweeping of the clouds created the atmosphere of peace, the first moment of which we felt in the past couple of days.  Looking at the landscape once more before nodding off, I imagined being over the high desert of Eastern Washington, our final destination in 24 hours.  That’s precisely when it hit me:  We were entering into an entirely different and foreign realm of existence.  For the past seven months, we had been immersed in a culture with vastly different standards than the one we were now entering: One with a quiet desperation, but also one that easily accepted the little that was granted them. It was also a culture that collectively wished they could join us on that plane.  At that moment, I cried like a woman.  Perhaps it was the dearth of sleep in the past two weeks, or the emotions I vigorously withheld while trying to keep a steady shot of some of the most beautiful human moments I had ever witnessed.  Nevertheless, I cried for the first time in a long time, suddenly realizing the insurmountable gulf that was now between us and the families to which we had become so close.

It is simply a lie to assert that one can truly empathize with a people that want so badly the exact and only thing which they cannot have – a flight to the US.  In fact, as we sat on the tarmac in Tegucigalpa, we saw the perfect example of this reality.  A gray plane, with no carrier insignia and a small American flag on its tail was letting off at least one hundred, dark Honduran men that carried no baggage.  They were being led

Honduran School-room

into a special part of the airport by tack police officers.  No doubt they were going to a special part of the airport to be reintroduced into the country from which they fled.  For most of them, it was the first time they had been on a plane.  And their trip home, a mere three hours, was a laughable contrast to the trip they had taken North, one that was not a day short of three weeks.  A trip where constant fear, fatigue, discomfort, hunger and thirst accompanied them the entire way.  I imagined them in the plane also commenting on how similar the topography looked to America’s Southwest, perhaps even to the South Texas desert in which they were rounded up by border patrol – tasting victory if for only a few fleeting moments.  I imagined that one of those men may well have been a father to one of the abandoned kids to which I been so close.  And I understood that it was the lure of the North that just may have led to the child’s abandonment.  And here we were, on a plane to the US.  All we had to do was pay a few hundred dollars for a ticket, wait in a short line and we were off to the land of plenty.

There is no doubt that each Honduran we met during our time there was immediately and fully aware of this gulf.  Yet the majority welcomed us anyway, masking the envy which they most certainly felt.  For a fleeting moment, I felt that we had betrayed them.  I felt this unbelievable guilt.  We came to Honduras

Where're the Gringos?

open-hearted under the premise of giving what we could.   Now we were leaving “enriched” by the experience, as if we were emotional imperialists.  Wasn’t it bad enough that America had to rape Honduras of its superior banana-growing fields?  Now we were coming down to mine their spiritual superiority for our own good?  It felt that in the end all we were doing was taking from them once again.  I saw this big globalized mess, taking from them with one hand and giving back with the other only to take more away.  All they want was a plane ticket to where we were going.  And the majority of them would even settle for the opportunity to take a three week journey through jungle and river to mount a train in order to cross a perilous desert.  And here I was, only a month prior writing with confidence that the best thing you can give to the developing world’s poor was a sense of “self-respect”.  What an insult!

And to make matters worse, I had also cried because I was entering a world of much higher standards of behavior and personal hygiene.  I was entering a world of obsessive cleanliness and law and order, as if these are repugnant things that should be avoided at all costs.  I pictured myself back in Honduras, sitting

Filthy, but Who's Lookin'?

on the sidewalk in front of one of the houses at dusk.  Our feet planted in the dirt and our clothes unclean, having spent the majority of the day outside.  There was a kid sitting on my lap, with food and grease all over his clothes reaching to touch my face with his filthy hands.  And there I was, laughing at something one of the other kids did or a smartass remark one of the mothers said, not paying an ounce of attention to the way I looked or the germs that were undoubtedly crawling all over me.  I knew that I would never spend another minute like this as long as I stayed in the US and it made me incredibly sad.

But then again, I knew deep down that, though completely illogical on the material level, there was some absolute truth to my sadness and it lacked hypocrisy – something of which the Hondurans had no idea.  For in imaging life in America, as part of their daily exercise, they most likely never imagined what they would be trading.  Sure they would encounter some cultural similarities in the barrios of America’s cities,

Actual Nostalgia for Manual Laundry

but they would never be this immediately close to a community again, having left for “greener” pastures.  They would never feel welcomed in that place.  They would never have close contact with family.  They would never enjoy the simplicity of simply being.  In coming to America illegally, they would constantly live in fear and most certainly be constantly looking for different forms of work – always hustling as every American, native or foreign is trained to do.

In this life, we are always making trade-offs between our spiritual and material needs.  Most world religions teach that all material needs will eventually and miraculously be fulfilled in a life devoted solely to the spirit.  And most advertisements will assert that all spiritual needs will be fulfilled in a life solely devoted to acquiring material products.  I search in desperation to believe in the former, but the inundation of the latter makes it virtually impossible.  And for all Hondurans, lucky enough to have electricity to power their televisions, they search for the latter, forgetting their gift of the former.  In this globalizing world we constantly talk of trade. Most

Leaving The Only Community They've Known

economists will use the promise of cultural gifts as a wonderful side effect to the primary goal of mutual economic benefit in free trade.  Little do they realize that these cultural gifts, like the economic gifts, are mostly one-sided and are skewed towards the “haves”.  Perhaps one day as these forces play out, we will reach an even playing field.  When those whom I was leaving will not dream of going North, realizing that up there, that economic promise is not worth the trade-off.  This will be a time when I will not have to go all the way to the developing world to receive the spiritual gifts of the poor.  In order to realize this, there would have to be something of a serious economic downturn in the US economy.  Something similar to what is happening now…

For too long, Americans have been trying to live simultaneously on these two levels, the spiritual and the material.   We pride ourselves on our “Judeo-Christian” roots, while stocking up all the treasures and

The Community

security we could possibly obtain.  There is nothing wrong with wanting security, but acquiring “things” (security being one of them) is undoubtedly the primary focus of almost every person in the US.  When one travels to a country such as Honduras, one will hear how the faithful “Thank God” for every bit of the little they have.  And when they say they rely on God’s grace for deliverance from every evil, they actually mean it.  They do not look to cheat someone else out of something in order to receive that deliverance.  North Americans see this faith and are humbled.  They see what it truly means to believe in God.  It is not lip service.  It is not something they say to make themselves feel more “well-rounded”.  It is not a social event.  It is not a political ideology.  It is a true belief that God will take care of everything if we act His Will with sincerity.  The practicing of faith is simply their primary focus, whether they attend church often or not.

Being back in the US for over a month, the memories are already fading and they are fading rapidly.  Almost completely gone is that feeling of ease the poor exuded.  It is almost indescribable, but it most surely is a result of a life lived on the edge, of a life given away long ago, a life where “things” were never the primary focus.  Memory will never serve to bring back that feeling.  It is one that must be lived to be truly felt.  And it most certainly has not been lived in the US.  As we see our material goods taken away from us, our 401Ks rapidly decay, our insurance programs gone, we may see that the promise of our things has been false.  We may see that the spiritual level is the only constant upon which we can truly

The Spiritual Level in One Shot

rely.  We can live with an ease in the US that none of us has ever known prior.  In living like that, with that feeling, we can sit on any plane, travel to any country and not feel that we are traveling to another existence.

In short, we can live on one level, where the spiritual and material meet.  At that point, conflict with each other and, more importantly, within ourselves will cease to exist.  The only question that remains is if we will passively wait for the entire world to change in order to bring about these conditions, or if we will first actively and individually create those conditions in our own lives.  Due to the overwhelming nature of changing the entire world, I’m going to bet that working within our own lives will be the easier of the two scenarios….so long as we have the necessary faith that our work will provide the dividend of true and everlasting security.

What is Home?

by Todd Looby

Personally, I have never been one to set up a stable home base, in the past 10 years I have lived in eight locations in Chicago alone.   Not that I had anything against stability per se, it just wasn’t high on my

Head-laying Location #6

priority list.  The past year, however, has probably forever changed that notion.   It has been almost a year to the day that we first touched foot in Honduras.  In that year’s time, we have slept in 46 different beds, and moved a total of 63 times (sometimes back to the same bed).  As any member of a touring band will tell you, this way of life is completely unsustainable.  Though throughout this time, we have received gracious hospitality, typically moving into someone’s house, apartment or improvised domicile.   We have seen incredible generosity.  And we have observed a diverse lifestyle sampling of the Western Hemisphere’s inhabitants.   All this adds up to an incredible learning experience and adventure and having lived by the grace of God for one year, a re-discovered faith in….well…faith.  However great the experience was, we are glad to come to its conclusion.  I have found a new respect in the concepts of “home” and “stability” and, as with everything else, the Hondurans helped foster this notion.

We came into close contact with and had in-depth interviews with six single mothers in a desperate, politically unstable country.  When I asked each of them what they wanted most, each invariably said “una

Pride in Their Humble Home

casa”.  At the project they had a nice roof over their heads and a stable supply of food, but, as with virtually every other place they lived since having been left with young children, they had lived in someone else’s house or, sadly for some, on the street.   Or, as the situation at our project shown, they were allowed a house only as long as they were able to tolerate very strict rules and the lack of personal freedom.  “Una Casa” was all they wanted.  They would’ve worked like dogs and made incredible sacrifices to be able to obtain one.  (My God, they already worked like dogs simply to maintain a borrowed home).
But, I have to admit, after hearing them say that, even in the context of the other unbearable difficulties they experienced, I couldn’t understand why that was such a priority.  For, to me, they had a house here, something better than could be expected in a country without any real hope or promise.  They had access to clothes, food, babysitters, and companions.  But, they also lived with the uncertainty that they could lose it all suddenly after breaking one of the community’s arbitrary rules.  Then they would have to put all of their belongings back into the two suitcases and three unwieldy boxes with which they

Came Looking for a Home

came, carry their youngest child on their hip (if the child was less than two years old, after that, the child would be lugging a box) and search in vain for someone to put them up for a couple of weeks while they looked for another home, again temporary, that came with great compromise.  They simply wanted a couch that they could collapse on each day after the last kid went to bed and not be bothered again.  This concept they had never known except by seeing it on a Mexican telenovela…

One can never truly know, understand and empathize with the plight of another until they live it.  Although we’ve come close to living in poverty and being homeless, we haven’t lived it.  Simply put, if all else failed we had credit cards and an Embassy of the most powerful nation on earth.  This is not “living it.”  And, having as been as close as

Only 5 Months Ago...A Home We Could Have Accepted

we’ve have, I can lie and say I understand what they’re going through, but truly I can’t.  The best I can do is advocate for them.  To help their critics better understand:  those who refuse to understand the plight of the poor, the immigrant, the homeless, those who espouse “personal responsibility” from the comfort of their suburban McMansion.  And I can now do it from the comfort of a decent-sized apartment in a good neighborhood and risk being called a hypocrite.  It’s a charge I can’t justifiably counter, knowing how good I have it compared to some others, but, at the very least, I can attempt to understand the other side before I begin to judge.  I’m pretty sure that’s really all we’re asked to do.  And if we do take that time, we’ll most likely do something more than ask…

Chicago Premiere Tonight at the Gene Siskel Film Center!
Filmmakers in person!

LEFTY
2009, Todd Looby, USA, 93 min.
With Thomas Madden, Carrie Norris, Billy Phelan

Homecoming, home-wrecking, and home team are all themes in a wry drama set deep in the heart of Chicago’s Irish American subculture. Prodigal son Danny Malone (Madden) comes home to his indulgent mother and bullying father after an absence of thirteen years as his best friend Fudd (Phelan) arrives home from Iraq. Danny, harboring a potentially fatal secret, and Fudd, with his dark memories, are pulled back into the boozy embrace of the old neighborhood, where the bonds of schoolyard loyalties have been loosened by adult failures, jealousy, and infidelity. Director Looby evokes the South Side milieu with the accuracy and affection of an insider, including the adrenalin-rush chaos of the St. Patrick’s Day parade. DVD.

– Barbara Scharres

The film will be preceded by the Trailer to Solo Madres:  Stories of the Families Left Behind, our documentary about the mothers we worked with in Honduras.

The Obrigado Times

Issue No. 4, April, 2009

New in this Issue…

New Articles and Picture Sets — Today we are posting several new articles and reflections: En Carne Vida, Part II; Walking through the Clouds; and Transparent Eye-Ball. We have also posted new sets of pictures from the past couple of months. To access the pictures go to the photos page and follow the links to each new set.

In General…

It is summer here, dry with temperatures in the very hot range. Last Friday the girls at Guadalupe held a “mini festival of summer” – a talent show with singing and dancing and a lot of laughter. Saturday was a beautiful day which included hanging out and playing with the kids, helping the new moms make bread, tending to the goats with the older girls (see pics of baby goats); and laughing for nearly an hour straight while Todd and a dozen children ran around the site throwing water on each other. The sheer joy that a water fight on a hot day brings!… Even the moms were helping out Todd who was severely outnumbered. Everyone was soaked; and one five year old girl, with squeals of joy, jumped into the pila (the clean-ish part of the tank where clothes and dishes are washed) dunking her head and splashing around as though it was a luxury swimming pool.  More Updates…

Articles…

En Carne Vida, Part II
By Todd Looby

The Arrival

From what I was able to gather from her garbled Spanish, they had been walking all night since her husband, whom she clearly referred to as “loco”, woke them up at midnight and kicked them out.    They had on what they were wearing at the time, a cell phone, and a small plastic bag containing some papers and a little bit of food.  From the look of them, dirty, bedraggled, they may have caught an hour or so of sleep on the way, sprawled out in the dirt.  But, here in Honduras it is a sad fact that, being amongst the poorest of the poor, they may look like that daily.  Read More….

Transparent Eye-Ball
By Todd Looby

Hangin with the Madres

Sometimes I can sit with the moms and the kids at the project and simply “be”.  When the day gets late and orange rays of sun shine through holes in the mountain clouds, and when the noise subsides in a final surrender to another day perhaps a hard one or perhaps a slow one, there are a few minutes when a universal tranquility interjects itself in an otherwise setting of pure madness.  In the film world it is called “the magic hour” because of the perfect, most beautiful color of natural light that hits a face almost laterally.  This is most certainly the aesthetic reality, however, for whatever reason it is also the utmost emotional reality.  Read More…

Monica pauses to take in the rays

Walking Through the Clouds (A Meditation in Monteverde)
By Todd Looby

Even the ground in this forest seems to breathe
Foot pressed down on the soft decaying earth
An inhale of body, lifting up, exhaling soul
I am back in the womb of dripping, foggy green.
Feeling like a virus in an expecting mother
I step slow, careful not to spread my disease
Evolved by my consumption, reproduction
Breeding and moving on disregarding what I eat
Programmed to take advantage of all I encounter
Feeling that it is only my own wit for which I depend
Forgetting this forest for these trees
I almost missed it all, lost only in thoughts of me.
Forgetting that without this, there is no me
The birthplace of the oxygen on which my blood feeds
The origin of beauty for which my soul needs.  Read more…

Photos…

New picture sets, accessible through our flickr links, are now posted on the Photos Page.  They include several sets showing daily life and recent events with our neighbors – the families of Margarita Cook and the girls of Guadalupe.  They also include sets from several trips we’ve taken in the last couple of months – to Marcala, Honduras; West Virginia; Lake Yojoa; Tegucigalpa and Olancho.

En Carne Vida
by Todd Looby

It’s typical of the Spanish language to use a phrase in order to express a word. “En Carne Vida” is one of a few ways to say the word “raw”. And this particular phrase can be literally translated as “in live meat”. The word “raw” is of course used in other contexts than simply in referring to the cooked status of meat. One context used often today is in describing behavior or a situation that may be viewed as “uncivilized”, “backwards” or simply “rough”. In many ways, it can describe the life lived by the poor around us. And, as is also typical of the Spanish language, their words seem to poetically describe a situation. For, down here, the way life is lived is often hard, but simple. And, though most in the First World may view it as “uncivilized”, we have seen that in this “rawness” can be witnessed the “meat” of human existence.

To say that people here suffer passively is inaccurate; though if you look closely, you do see that suffering is most definitely accepted and often a source for later (or, at times more immediate) humor. But, as one sees more and more of the daily lives of poor Hondurans, you begin to see examples of patience and bravery that you wouldn’t have thought possible. It will hopefully also serve in conveying what it is that we in the First World are missing. It’s not to say that suffering is something to seek, all of us in America have suffered greatly and legitimately, however, many of our problems are emotional. When you get into the realm of material suffering, it is something different entirely and it has a distinctly life-affirming effect on the people in that condition.

There have been two recent events that got me thinking about this concept. One was the arrival to our “Abandoned Mothers Project” of a family consisting of one mother, her ten children and one grandchild. The mother stands about four feet, ten inches, she has large eyes sunken into her skull resulting in a look of a lifetime of hunger. Those eyes convey a simple message of strength that I have never seen before. Although she is slight and has thin arms, I wouldn’t dare test her strength. Her children all have those eyes, ranging in age from two to sixteen. The young ones, having just arrived in a new place, stared at you with those inquisitive eyes for many minutes without change of expression, oblivious of your attempts to make them smile. Whether this stare was a result of shy inquisitiveness or severe malnutrition, I do not know.

The family came from a small town near the Carribean Coast. They had been living without a father for over a year and the strain and desperation was wearing on them. It is evident that their entire lives had been difficult, but it had been approaching an even more desperate level when the father left for good. When the mother could provide food (which wasn’t every day), it was only rice and beans. The doctor who examined them said it had been a long time since they had had any protein. This resulted in many of the children weighing nearly half of the normal weight for their age. Their heights were also stunted significantly. One of the younger boys’ legs were so swollen with symptoms of malnutrition that you could press on the skin and it would leave a dent. Every step the child took on his bloated feet, must have been accompanied by an unbearable pain, yet he never shied away from staring at you with those big brown, expressionless eyes in what was either a sure sign of strength or a wordless, proud plea for help.

Honduras is at a point where many people, no matter how remote, have some sort of running water. However, what is absolutely not guaranteed, is that the water is clean. This fact was confirmed by the doctor when he said that most of the children have one or even several different parasites in their bodies.

I filmed the family’s arrival as the rest of the community, rich by comparison, gawked at this spectacle of a mother trailed by eleven kids arranged roughly by height. The bigger ones were able to carry the two suitcases that comprised the family’s total possessions. As we all stood watching, I know I wasn’t the only one thinking, “Wow, people still actually starve.” Through the lens I saw old pictures of Okie families from 1932, dirty, hungry, tired, hopeless. I felt uncomfortable filming them, reluctant to add any additional hardship to their arrival. However, I felt less guilty when the other mothers would point out to me something more to catch on film, without any hint of subtlety. “Oh, Antonio (my Honduran name) grava sus piernas” as they pointed obviously to the boy’s legs. These were the poorest of the poor, and although the workload of the other mothers doubled the instant this family arrived, they were eager to welcome and help them. I also couldn’t help but think how close this family was to completely wasting away. The mother cannot read or write, most of the children too young to bring in an income, no community on which to rely for help, no transportation to get them anywhere “better off”, no local government to help them into a welfare program, no church close by to get them enough help or food to sustain themselves. They literally could have stayed in their mud hut and slowly starved to death one by one. It’s a chilling picture, but a possibility that is very real here. Luckily for them, Fr. Emil has a strong presence up on the North Coast, and they were able to make some sort of connection. This family could severely tax the resources of any aid organization, but as is often the case with Mission Honduras, some way is always found when a need is clearly identified.

They have been here for over a month now. I look at those same eyes (which have now gained expressions) and wonder whether those years of starvation has wrought a lasting stigma from which they may never recover, or if they can regain their heights, weights, emotional availability after receiving consisten nutrition. But, however raw their state may or may not continue to be, they are alive and they all know that their life is a gift. Now, when we come up by their house we hear at least eight little voices, scream our names and in no time you can have all of them rush you, hugging your legs tight. They are a presence here, but one of the meekest and most innocent kind. There is always something either too eerie or sentimental to comprehend when watching the bait of death, now alive in front of you laughing, swinging on swings.

(Since originally drafting this article, the mother left the Project abruptly taking her 11 children on the bus back North. There are rumors that the father returned and pledged to take the family back. Also uneducated, it is hard to conceive him getting sufficient work to feed this family. Only by another miracle can we imagine that the children will someday again be ok at a place where they have food, lights, water, medical care and an education.)

Hector, another boy of the mission, has a mother with an obvious a mental deficiency. She has three children, who all struggle as a result. Hector seems to have the most promise of the three, due to his obvious intelligence, but he does still suffer from the stigma of being the “dirty” kid. Before coming to the shelter, the family lived on the street, surviving only God knows how. On one of my jogs I began by going by the project. I had headphones on and, although the families all have radios, the kids are fascinated by music from headphones. Thus, they do nearly anything they can to listen. As I ran by the houses, four boys spontaneously began following me, begging for a listen. Immediately making the obvious “Rocky” reference, I gladly obliged them by letting them follow, handing my headphones off and letting them take turns. Hector was one of the kids who followed. Now, this was not a planned event. The kids were doing any number of things right before, therefore, they were running in school shoes or work shoes. Not Hector, like many of the boys on a leisurely afternoon, he was barefoot. Most of the other boys in the same situation stopped, deciding to forego this opportunity for the next. Not Hector, he joined right in, we were about a half-mile down the dirt and stone-laden cattle road before I even noticed he was barefoot. He was still smiling, waiting his turn for the headphones. Another volunteer who was jogging on the same road soon joined us. Although our immediate reaction was to show mercy by grabbing his hand, lightening the weight on his feet, Hector did not ask for this, nor did I see him wince once in pain the entire two miles we ran.

Besides being the “dirty” kid of the group, Hector is also the one most injured. He is seen with many scrapes, cuts, bruises due to the lack of prudence demonstrated in the above story. Most recently, he had his index finger smashed by a big rock. This resulted in a gash extending up to the nail, which required about six stitches. The injury was a week old before I even noticed it. By this time, I saw one of the community mothers taking a long look at his finger. Having the mother that Hector’s family has, it is the other mothers that mostly take care of Hector and his sisters. When I saw the mother and Hector huddled down, I took a close look at the finger they were peering at. It was black from the bruise and dried blood. (And, I found out later, the beginnings of gangrene.) Though the gash was mostly healed, the finger was swollen to what was most definitely a painful point. Reina, the mother-nurse, retrieved a pair of rubber gloves, a razor blade, tweezers, and a pin from her house and went to work. She sterilized the razor blade with an alcohol pad I had in my pocket and began cutting the stitches and pulling them out. By this time, a small crowd gathered around watching and wincing at the slow extraction of each stitch. At this time, Hector still had yet to show an ounce of pain. When all the stitches were gone, it was clear that the cut was in danger of reopening from the pressure of the swell. The fingernail, most definitely due to fall off, was still taking its time. So, Reina took the pin, again sterilizing it with the alcohol pad and poked around the nail to relieve the pressure. Unfortunately, she had to squeeze the finger to get some of the puss out. This is finally when Hector first showed a recognition of pain, as it got worse, he screamed and cried to the point where I could see the back of his throat. Meanwhile the engaged crowd let out there own “ooohsss” “aahhhhs” and gags as the puss and blood mixture oozed out of the black finger. His own mother finally arrived on the scene and tried her best to comfort him by patting him lightly on the shoulder. After letting a sufficient amount drain, Reina sterilized the finger with an alcohol-iodine mixture and properly bandaged it. Hector jumped up upon the completion and sucking on a piece of candy was back smiling, holding his fat, bandaged finger vertically, otherwise not showing a hint of what had just happened. There have been few instances where I have seen such bravery and an acceptance of pain. He has been running around with that fat bandaged finger held vertically for about two weeks now and every time you ask him how his finger is, he never hesitates to answer, “bien”. He will forever lack a small part of the finger, which the doctor had to shave off, to serve as a constant reminder of his raw life. One he will escape if he is able to continue school. He has already made it past first grade and although he has a mother and a sister three years his senior, he is the first in the family to make it that far in school.

A new mother arrived at the Project about two months ago with three little children. She is 22 years old, and has a sixth grade education. (It’s hard at first to imagine that some guy left this woman pregnant with two young kids and absolutely nothing else. Then I snap back into reality and realize that this happens everyday in every corner of the globe.) The youngest of the children was an infant of two months. When we asked what the baby’s name was, she smiled with embarrassment, “No tiene”, she said, meaning that the baby had no name. We stood in disbelief that she had this baby for over two months without naming her, and it didn’t even seem like a priority. The mother is completely together. She does not bear the same challenges as Hector’s Mom and she shows a genuine love for the baby. “What in God’s name is stopping her from naming the baby,” I thought. Then, again, I snap into reality and realize that in this world, when keeping a baby alive is such a struggle, names fall lower on the priority list. Upon asking our names, “Monica” struck a cord with her, and in a manner of minutes, the baby had its name at the prompting of the other mother present.

These anecdotes hopefully provide a window into the things we see and the lives lived by the poor down here. I tell them not to shock or to elicit pity, but to explain that life here is lived with an immediacy and randomness that is exhilarating to witness. Not that anyone of them would not change places with us in America at the drop of a dime, and we would surely regret changing places with them. However, I am convinced that this “raw life” holds the secret to the true exuberance to be found in living. We see small babies, loved and unconditionally cherished by parents who seem to simply accept the fact that it will not be easy to raise the child but that it’s a hardship well worth undergoing.

There were several lambs born, a few calves and, this autumn, at the complex on which we live has seen the arrival of at least fifteen puppies. Life is everywhere, growing here at the end of the rainy season. It’s hard, it’s undesirable, but it is celebrated everyday. Preoccupations with life’s troubles most assuredly exist, but they are open for all to see and, hopefully, for someone to help. Embarrassments are also a part of life, but are a welcomed jab to affirm that one is indeed alive. This is the “meat of life”: the things that happen and our willingness to accept them or our willingness to lend a hand to someone in a worse position. This is when we realize that we are living in a strange, unfair world amongst others who struggle everyday. And in this realization, we forget our own selfish struggles and preoccupations. This is the core of life: witnessing then doing what we can to help and, through helping, living life’s true essence.

On being a long-term volunteer with Mission Honduras
by Monica Desmond

Learn. Laugh. Work. Play. Pray. Share.  This is the heart of daily life as a long-term volunteer in Honduras, where we are invited to become a bridge, built with these beams, supported by the arches of compassion, solidarity, hope and love.

We often see these words, but wonder “how can we give them life – make them leap off the page into our hearts and into our world?”  Volunteering long-term with Mission Honduras is one answer.  Here we are invited to put these ideals into practice.   As a bridge between the mission children and families, and the many generous volunteers from the states, we are grounded in the simple and profound act of building relationships.  In relationship, we see first-hand the life-giving transformation of both mission children and volunteers when they walk together for a week or so of their lives.  Side-by-side, they paint a house, read together under a tree, play soccer, make tortillas, screen windows, teach new words to each other, build a fence, pray the rosary, celebrate graduation and the little joys of daily life.

As long-termers, we are blessed to be the eyes, ears and hands of the Mission, knowing the needs and then helping to fulfill them through the generosity of donors — shoes, sheets, books, blankets, medicines.  Living here, we truly see the fruits of the Mission’s work – like a little girl learning to read, a young man being the first in his family to graduate, or a mother becoming a community leader – fruits which, as we also see quite clearly, would never be possible without the support of donors in the U.S. and the people who give the gift of themselves as volunteers.

Fr. Emil often says that when you see a need in the world then God has already spoken to you.  The question is, then, when will you respond?  Mission Honduras, an instrument of bridge-building in the world, invites us to say “yes” to the chance to build relationships with the mission children and families and, in doing so, to be a part of building a world of solidarity, compassion, hope and love.

This reflection was originally published in the Mission Honduras newsletter.

Life’s Toughest Challenge By Todd Looby

I suppose it is religion that originally instilled in all of us some recognition that our fellow humans are beings that illicit some sort of special treatment. In other words, we’ve come to learn that most other humans are not simply living things to be used to benefit us in some way, or to be easily disposed of when causing us hardship. Regardless of how this actually plays out in real life, especially when considering the atrocities of war, we all harbor some recognition that the human form of life is special. The true challenge of many religions, and most explicitly of Christianity, is that not only are humans more sacred than animals, but that each individual human being is equally sacred. I never contemplated what this actually meant, though I heard it often in my twelve years of Catholic education. It essentially means that we are supposed to treat every fellow human being equally despite our relation to them, our common nationality, our shared language, our similar heritage, our accomplishments (or lack thereof), our societal status, and, most difficult of all, our current moral standing. I suppose the difficulty in making this concept practical is most likely the reason why it has never been generally accepted in the history of the human race.

An imagined example of this concept that comes to my mind is the following:

Say your young son is begging you for a piece of candy at a grocery store and you see another strange child, lost, looking for something simply to eat. Now your kid is really about to lose it in front of the entire store. I mean the sprawled out on the floor kicking and screaming kind of losing it. Still you see this strange kid, looking at you with some sort of deep, intrinsic material need. People are starting to stare at you and your unruly child. They’re definitely at the point where they have all at least thought how terrible of a parent you are, if they haven’t yet openly expressed this. And for some reason this other kid is looking only at you, regardless of the fact that other perfectly viable shoppers are standing around doing nothing. The kid looks at you for something. The thought almost instinctively comes to your mind, I will never see this other kid again in my life, but my own kid will make me pay for his rebuffed request every minute of the day and possibly into the next. Besides, I can’t let these people think I’m a horrible person because I’m ignoring my screaming child. Finally, you consider the fact that there are plenty of other people to give this kid a damned banana or something, besides, where the hell are his parents anyway? So, you pull your kid up by the arm, shove the Snickers bar in his hand, throw him in the cart and walk briskly off. After about five minutes, even the thought of those innocent, hungry eyes is easily forgotten as junior sees something else he must absolutely have.

Throughout our travel in Central America, we’ve encountered several situations that were more subtle versions of the above scenario. We had very little time to make a decision and invariably chose our own interests over those of a person in need. In one such scenario, we chose another’s interest, but I had to ask myself if this would unconditionally be the case.

In renewing our Visas, we traveled to Costa Rica. We were scheduled to return to Honduras right before Christmas. In trying to buy bus tickets back North, we found out that Costa Rica is full of Nicaraguans living abroad to work. Apparently, they had all booked the buses solid to make it back home for Christmas. Luckily for us, the travel agent had a “gringo special” that would take us directly to the border, but no further, for an insane price. Reluctantly, we had to accept.

We shared a microbus, which holds up to ten people, with only a father and son pair from Quebec. The son spoke decent English and very good Spanish. The father spoke only French. Although it was very early in the morning and no one was in much of a talkative mood, we were at least able to exchange basic information about ourselves. Apparently, the son spent a couple years doing some missionary work in Manuas, Nicaragua, working with the kids who lived at the garbage dump. He had somehow convinced his father to come down to check out Costa Rica and the islands in Nicaragua’s giant lake. It was evident his Father hadn’t traveled to Central America before. I say it was obvious, because as we passed the ramshackle fruit stand/houses on the side of the road, he couldn’t stop looking, trying to comprehend the real poverty that he just witnessed for the first time. He craned his neck to catch one final glimpse as the bus sped far beyond the point of visibility.

Traveling through Nicaragua to get to Costa Rica we saw how desperate the country was, even more so than Honduras, the perennial title-holder of second poorest country in the Western Hemisphere. Upon reaching the Costa Rica-Nicaragua border on the way back, this fact was even more apparent as the line to get across stretched over a half-mile. It was 9:00 AM. By some estimates, it was taking the average person 8-10 hours to get across. Luckily, for us, borders are stocked full of opportunists on both sides. They saw the “gringo-special” pull up and immediately approached with offers to shrink the wait time from 8-10 hours to an impossible-to-turn-down, 20 minutes. This time could be bought with the one-time, easy payment of only $9 / person. Being naturally cheap and traveling on donated money, we had to carefully consider the offer, but after a quick 30 seconds, we agreed. The Canadians were also on board as soon as they could get to the cash station to withdraw the necessary funds. Meanwhile, the line heaved around us, as eyes caught glimpses of the proposal. Hungry, tired babies ate sparsely from their mothers, balanced carefully on a thin, pleather suitcase. Men, barely scraping together the necessary funds to make it home on public transportation, couldn’t even consider this proposal, which no one bothered offering in the first place.

The bank was closed. There was no way for the vacationing Canadians to get across the border before nightfall. That is, without the aid of someone with not only an extra $18, but with and extra $22 on top of that, to pay the regular “gringo fees” to exit Costa Rica. Luckily for them, we had gotten some cash before leaving and had enough to lend them and a little extra to get a bus on the other side of the border. The Canadians made it pretty clear to us that they would pay us back as soon as they got to a town with an ATM. And if that didn’t work, we knew we could trust them with sending a check sometime in the future. It didn’t take long for us to accept the request for help. We knew full well that they were good for the money. But, as soon as this agreement was going down, I looked around me at the heaving, snaking line and thought, would we have done the same with one of these people? These same people that had already been on the road for 6 hours that day (it presently being only 9:00 am)? These people that were going to spend the next 10 hours in line? The same people that might not even make it home for Christmas Eve to be with their families? Yes, $9 buys a lot in Central America.

Perhaps I don’t give ourselves enough credit we deserve, but I couldn’t help but think of the little instances where we chose ourselves over others during this journey. Along the way we could blame the language barrier for not allowing the other party to earn our trust. Or, unclear communication could allow us the excuse that we didn’t fully understand the other party’s request. And, finally, when digging hard for an excuse, I could actually hear myself thinking that these people are used to not having luxury, it’s ok. Of course, it’s not a bad thing to hold on to your own money a little tighter here as avenues of obtaining more are often more difficult. And real danger exists when money is tight. Hotels are seedier and the opportunists can easily smell a gringo’s desperation for which to take advantage.

Although we didn’t exactly share the same primary language as these Canadians or the same nationality, we shared the experience of being accustomed to luxury and a common distaste for lines, two traits that separated us from every other traveler that day. Besides, it was most likely because of their skin color that we were able to easily trust that we would get a return on our favor. But, the final decider is that we were easily able to put ourselves in their shoes and wish that we would have received the same treatment. That realization is the kicker to this entire argument. We were able to imagine ourselves in the same situation; and thus, could empathize.

The exercise of putting oneself in another’s situation becomes a very labored use of one’s imagination when considering the world’s most poor. These are people with which you share very little common experience. The hardships they face on a daily basis are those we’ve never faced, let alone those of which we can consciously conceive. Most of us reading this have never gone to bed hungry even one time in our lives. Unless we voluntarily fast and choose the most difficult manner of doing even the most simple task, we can not even begin to empathize.

Of course the cynic would question the wisdom in undertaking these exercises in empathy. They justify their indifference by hypothesizing that perhaps these people never worked as hard as them in school. And, thus, they were never able to get a good-paying job. Or, they were unable to keep that job, unwilling to put in the long hours they have, or except the burdensome responsibility of managing others at work. Besides, one might also say, charity can also be dangerous in generating dependency and rewarding laziness. These people may have born children when their financial situation should have advised otherwise. And, worse yet, they may have actually gotten themselves in trouble with the law or alienated themselves from family by their behavior. Finally, they are willfully ignorant in not wanting to learn the language of business: English.

For all these reasons, it’s perfectly justifiable to pass on the opportunities of true charity to help someone in real need. The hardest reality to consider is that though justifications abound, our real obligation continues to elude. That is, we are absolutely supposed to ensure the well-being of our brothers and sisters, regardless of causation and blame. Most of the world seems to align with the Christian religion. It is one that very explicitly assures us that if we respond to another’s need we will never regret it. And although we have been told this repeatedly, we continue to live as if this promise is an outright lie.

The World’s Cold
By Todd Looby

There is a popular saying, “ When America sneezes, the rest of the world catches a cold.” I think it is now safe to say that America has not only sneezed, but has a cold, if not absolute influenza. Responsibility aside, we are indeed in this situation and there is no immediate end in sight. We seem to be only at the beginning of the period of job losses and the devastating fallout from it has yet to be seen, especially around the world. It is evident now, that Americans are tightening their belts, hunkering down for the time when they will be vulnerable, if they aren’t already there.

“Tourists” (as Monica and I are currently classified) have only a ninety-day Visa in Central America. Thus, every ninety days we have to leave the country for at least five days to renew our Visas. Honduras is in a “Union” with it’s adjacent neighboring countries (Nicaragua, El Salvador, and Guatemala) and, thus, our closest choices were Belize and Costa Rica. I know the mention of the latter, may have ended all sympathy for our condition and that notion is justified. But, nonetheless, we did choose to go to Playa Tamarindo, Costa Rica, one of the closer beach destinations. Tamarindo is an interesting part of the “third world”. (I quote third world because after traveling through Honduras and Nicaragua by bus for 2 days, Costa Rica is at least second world in comparison). Tamarindo seems to be at the early stages of where a place like Cancun must have been fifteen to twenty years ago, that is in full “Gringo-ization”. This entails the construction of multiple hi-rise hotels and condos, strip malls, bars, clubs, restaurants, golf courses and, of course, Gringos. You can spend the entire week in Tamarindo and not have to speak Spanish. After talking with a couple of ex-Patriots, it was clear that they knew very little, if any, Spanish. Naturally, with this type of infrastructure in place, more and more tourists are coming, which seems to be upsetting the “established” Gringos. Apparently, there is some sort of unspoken acceptable amount of infiltration. I always thought this mentality disturbing if not outright hypocritical. People seem to want to keep elements of paradise to themselves, forgetting to ask if they themselves had been invited in the first place.

One restaurant we frequented for its bottomless cup of coffee was very much involved in the “Save Tamarindo” movement. We gathered that this movement involves lobbying the local zoning board to reject plans for high rises and to enforce the environmental protection laws. They seem to remain steadfast (at least in there placements of signs and bumper-stickers) regardless of what is going on around them. And what is going on around them is the construction of a colossal, 10-story, fat, rounded condo building practically right on the beach blocking the ocean view of nice little villas in the hills. Apparently, this particular battle was lost. When I asked the waitress how that project “slipped” through the zoning board, she said that even the President himself feels that Tamarindo has already “gone Gringo” and that stopping future development would be pointless. His view is that most Costa Ricans have already abandoned the area years ago and that the only harm to be done would be to the Gringos already living there. Costa Rica on the other hand, would be gaining a lot of tax and traveling income. Another victim here is the environment. The waitress complained that many “government protected” trees were cut down during construction. She said this while standing directly next to a column made from a twisted tree-trunk holding up the roof of her own restaurant. I’m just guessing that this column was made from one of the tree species of which she just spoke. It’s an interesting and sad fact that the greatest draw for tourists to go to Costa Rica, its ecology, is at the greatest risk.

Of course, most of this development occurred during the same construction boom that took place worldwide over the past several years. Tamarindo is not alone in having half-finished hi-rises and empty, sparkling new hotels. Housing development was drinking the kool-aid by the tankful. Coming from the commercial construction industry, it was evident that over-exuberance was in play as early as 2002 when hi-rises were going up all over Chicago with little regard to the lack of population needed to fill such places. Nonetheless, the same build-build-build mentality was going strong in 2007.

Then something strange started happening. Among the very early reports of credit and foreclosure problems, you also saw steep rises in violent crime in Chicago’s Public Schools on the South and West Sides. These were early sniffles in the world’s cold. It’s no secret that the poor are the first affected when there is a down-turn in the economy. It was at first the poor who were foreclosing, not having the savings to float a month or two of mortgage. Families were displaced, gang-members from warring factions were in closer proximity. Without family incomes, even some otherwise good kids had to find less-desirable means of employment.

Next “jumbo-loans” were going into default and the middle and upper-middle class clientele for places like Tamarindo chose to stay home or go to more proximate playgrounds. Everyone we talked to in the area was feeling the fallout. Most complained that business had been down at least 40% around Christmas-time, typically a lucrative part of the year. For all the cursing of Gringos in the normally busy times, both ex-Patriot-business owners and Costa Ricans were now lamenting their absence. A North American vacation surplus is now the bread and butter of the Costa Rican economy. One North American tourist helps employ the people that guide planes into terminals, the luggage handlers, the taxi drivers, the hotel and restaurant busboys, the cleaning ladies, the cooks, the lady selling hammocks or trinkets on the beach, the guy renting beach chairs, the locals giving surf lessons, the construction workers, and on and on.

Though it is lamentable that the poor people who benefit from the hospitality sector are feeling the pinch, it is sadder still for those who never even figure into that equation. That would be the type of poor that Mission Honduras serves. Mission Honduras is feeling a similar 40% decrease in donations. December is typically one of the most lucrative months for the organization. However, some of the children’s sponsors, who normally give about $30/month seemed to be holding on to that money a little tighter. This is the type of reaction to recession that can send a world’s cold into full-blown pneumonia.

As I have written before on this blog, Americans, for all of our faults, are the most generous of nations. It is precisely in times like this where we need to look more on the death-bed sickness of the rest of the world than our own colds. These countries don’t have bailouts, social security, welfare programs or worthwhile public health programs. Though, we in the States have legitimate reasons to hold onto our wallets a little tighter, there are those that will be much worse off if we hold on too tight.

La Vida Tranquila
By Todd Looby & Monica Desmond
November 26, 2008

After just over a month of being here, we can give a preliminary account of our daily lives so far.  Though many things will change and become clearer in the months ahead, we can paint a broad portrait of our daily life in Honduras. 

 

            We live at the “Casa de Santa Theresa de Lisieux”.  It is a rectangular, 25-odd-room, single story complex with an open courtyard garden.   It sits near a corner of two highways about one hour north of Tegucigalpa, Honduras’ capital city.  The closest major town for groceries and other supplies (about 8 miles to the north of the house) is Comayagua, the original capital of the country.  It’s a quaint, colonial-style city with plenty of markets, restaurants, internet shops, etc. to satisfy the American consumer (who is willing to lower his/her standards a little bit).  We typically find ourselves going to town at least once a week for groceries, email, mail, and construction supplies.  When our driver is unavailable, we walk up to the highway and catch a bus into town for about $0.50.

 

            Our rooms are located in one corner of the house, next to the chapel.  We have two 100 SF rooms to ourselves, which are connected by a private bathroom.  We have two twin beds pushed together, which is technically an upgrade from our queen-size at home (with the added bonus of two wood beams and a space down the middle, and the added laundry of two sets of sheets).  One of the rooms we turned into an office where we set up the computer to write and edit video. 

 

Our rooms are fully screened.  This is a fact that merits special mention, because it is not necessarily a “given” in Honduras.  Although we have low-cut doors, screens and a well-constructed roof, we get our fair share of critters.  Mosquitoes remain the most adaptable, innovative and annoying of our visitors.  Mosquitoes have always had a special affinity for Todd’s blood, so he had to hang a mosquito net over his twin-sized bed for nighttime protection.  Other frequent visitors are the geckos, which mostly hang out on the screens to catch dazed bugs that fly into the window going hell-bent for the light.  They are our collaborators against the mosquitoes, though they simply aren’t enough.  There is an occasional scorpion that finds its way into the complex, but they are few and far between.  They are of a small breed but we hear they still give a nasty sting (which isn’t poisonous we’ve learned).  And oftentimes, we hear the nails-on-chalkboard sound of iguanas running across our roof.  A few seem to have set up a casa in the eves of the chapel. 

            We have a toilet, sink and shower in our room, with cold water.  On hot days a cold shower is welcomed, but with the wind and relative cold we’ve had lately, it takes some will power to jump in.  We recently bought an electric showerhead attachment to provide warm, if not scalding, showers.  I know the concept of an electric showerhead is automatically oxymoronic in respect to safety, so I (Todd) enlisted the help of a volunteer with some electronic expertise to inspect the conduit and wiring work, which passed, though you can still get a sting sometimes when turning on the water.  Also, all lights in the house dim for the duration of the shower.  But with all this, I (Todd) have found that most accommodations can satisfy me as long as there is electricity for lights and computer.  It is a sad fact that this is my new universal standard of good living.  And once cellular internet technology is as fast or faster than current DSL, I’m confident that I’ll be able to live anywhere in the world contently. 

 

            There are four other long-term volunteers who live in similar rooms alongside us.  Most only have one room because they are down here alone.  Our fellow long-termers are an even mix of 2 men and 2 women, 2 twenty-somethings and 2 sixty-plus-somethings.  Much of the remainder of the house is our 16 dorm-style guest rooms that can house up to six short-term volunteers each.  Short-term volunteers (ranging in age from teenagers to octogenarians and most often in groups of 10 – 30 people) come down to Honduras to tour the many sites of Mission Honduras and to do work projects in maintaining or helping to build new facilities. These visitors pay $15/day for full room and board, which supports the volunteer center’s entire year-round operations.  Volunteering at the mission is also a ‘retreat’ experience, a time for prayer, reflection, and breaking away from the distractions of daily life in the States.  The house is designed, then, with lots of hammocks, a garden with benches, a chapel and library which provide space for volunteers to “be” on retreat just as much as, if not more than, they are “doing” projects.

 

            We have a large dining room and kitchen where our full-time cook prepares all of our meals.  We do eat well.  Most of our food is indeed predominantly rice, beans, eggs and tortillas, but the variety also includes many of our American staples, like beef, chicken, vegetables and fruit.  Todd had long ago mastered the art of making oatmeal, so we are heart-healthy most ever morning.  Papaya, bananas, pineapple or oranges top off a delicious breakfast.

 

            In one corner of the building is a library/ arts and crafts / study / TV room, which has a diverse selection of books brought down and left by visitors.   There is also a healthy selection of movies, that if I (Todd) were to watch one a night for our stay, I couldn’t get through them all.  They aren’t exactly my 4-star Ebert picks, but at least I’ll be able to keep up with popular culture (though delayed about 1 year) and find refuge in the fact that no matter how bad my own movies may or may not be, there are plenty that are worse.  I also discovered Internet movie rentals on iTunes, so things are indeed looking up.  All I need is to get a hotel room with high-speed internet now and again and I can download a month’s worth of good flicks.  I (Monica) use this library space for a lot of my daily tasks related to groups and hospitality.  We try to create a space here too that groups can use for evening reflections and personal time to read, write, draw, or whatever else they feel inspired to do.  “Free time” and evening reflections for groups is an important part of their experience, as we try to create a retreat-like environment for them to reflect on their own lives and to process their experiences in Honduras. 

 

Across the courtyard garden in the opposite corner of the house (next door to our room) is the Chapel.  Lined with windows that look out to the trees and mountains beyond on two sides, the chapel is a peaceful, quiet place, my (Monica’s) favorite spot in the house.  Its simplicity is beautiful – wooden benches that can hold up to about 40 people if packed in; a large wood alter, tabernacle, and lectern; and a small statue of Our Lady of Guadalupe.  We gather in the chapel every morning at 7:00 am for either a communion service or Mass, and every evening at 5:30 pm for evening prayer.  People visit the chapel throughout the day; and I particularly like to be there in the evening, when all is dark except for the warm red glow of candlelight. 

 

            The house itself is located on a 10-acre stretch of land, owned by the Honduran-partner organization, APUFRAM (Asociacion PUeblo FRAnciscano de Muchachos y Muchachas).  The land contains the organization-run grade school, Our Lady of Guadalupe, as well as the seven boarding houses for orphaned or underprivileged girls who attend the school.  Finally, there is the Margarita Cook Homes for single and/or abandoned mothers.  There are currently eleven families living in these homes.  It is very much a communal organization, where the boarded girls assist in the cleaning and cooking at their houses.  The mothers also make bread in a panaderia, attend to the chicken coup, and herd the 20-something goats on the property.  Although far from self-sustaining at this point, the work that is done by the women and children drastically reduces the overhead needed to sustain the one hundred plus lives that depend on the complex.  The facilities are maintained (and there is always something that needs repairing) by APUFRAM maintenance staff and American volunteers who most often bring monetary donations for facility improvement projects. 

 

            It is a rural life.  The closest I’ve (Todd) ever coming to living anything like this is when I went to college in Champaign, IL.  It’s much quieter than city life in Chicago, although living close to a highway (2 lane) full of gear-grinding rigs, it can get pretty loud at night.  Although it’s “rural” relatively speaking (Monica thinks) in that it’s a bit of a trek to get anywhere, there are goats and cows wandering around the property, and you can see a lot of stars on a clear night, it is interesting to think that to many Hondurans we are probably pretty urban – we walk 5 min. to catch a bus on a main highway, while many people in the mountains or eastern part of the country may walk hours to get to a paved road.  Our days are typically filled with one activity or another, so it’s not the docile, daily siesta-life of my (Todd’s) ideal situation, but it’s good to be useful and active.  It’s difficult to describe a typical day, because no day is ever much like the one prior, but we can give a general idea.

 

            Todd: I get up anytime between 5:45 and 6:15 depending on if I wasn’t awakened prior by mosquitoes or trucks.  Every other day I’ll take a ½ hour jog down the highway.  And on the alternate day, I use that time to write.  Monica:  I get up about 6:00 each morning (after pressing snooze three times).  My morning generally begins with about 15-20 min. of yoga – a session from a video that we’ve long since memorized.  At 6:30 I begin setting up the chapel for either the communion service or Mass – opening windows, looking up the readings / psalms and canticles for the day; setting out the alter cloth, corporal, and other items (the names of which I’m still learning), and lighting candles.  Preparing the chapel in the morning is a ritual I really enjoy – it is quiet still, and getting things in order in the chapel for our morning prayer also serves to begin to order my own thoughts for the day.  On Mondays and Tuesdays we gather for a communion service, which incorporates parts of Morning Prayer.  Every Wednesday thru Friday, when Fr. Emil is nearby (most of the time he lives about 4 miles away at the Mission Honduras / APUFRAM high school in Flores) we’ll have an hour long mass at 7am, which includes about a 20 minute open discussion in lieu of a homily. (On Sundays we celebrate Mass with the kids and moms at the school nearby, Guadalupe). 

 

Todd: This sort of model (the weekday, open discussion model) I highly recommend for any Catholic (or non-Catholic) that is as ignorant about their professed faith as I found myself to be.   During this open discussion, people are encouraged to say what the readings brought to mind, or questions they have concerning the tenants of the faith, or assorted history of the church.  In a month, there hasn’t been a question that Fr. Emil hasn’t been able to answer.  And it’s good to know that no matter what the preconceived notions of the Catholic faith may seem to be from the viewpoint of popular culture or Protestantism, it is much deeper and more flexible than most give it credit for, when one truly understands the concept of “intention”. 

 

Following mass is a breakfast, which usually consists of eggs, pancakes or French toast or to the aforementioned oatmeal.   And, of course, supplemented by coffee.  In America, one never hears of Honduran coffee (more Costa Rican or Guatemalan), but I have to say, Café Maya is some of the best coffee I’ve had in the region. 

 

            After breakfast, we typically get to work in one way or another.  Todd: Since I arrived, I had been designated the 1^st and 2^nd grade English teacher.  Luckily for the kids, my tenure only lasted a few weeks, as their school years ended in early November.   It was a good experience; I was amazed by their willingness to learn despite their teacher’s difficulty with trying to explain in Spanish their lessons, tests, and homework assignments.  Almost all passed the final exam and continue to desire to learn from us in casual conversation. 

 

Monica’s primary responsibilities are to serve as “Hospitality/Community Activities Coordinator.”  This entails working around the house, as well as doing special activities with the mom’s and kids.  I maintain the volunteer house rooms; coordinate the daily schedule for volunteer groups; assign rooms and make sure volunteers have whatever they may need; coordinate shopping lists, the weekly meal and dishes schedules, and at times transportation schedules.  I also help maintain the chapel, prepare for and at times lead community prayer services.  At times, I also facilitate group reflections in the evening.  Essentially, I am the generalist around the house – helping with whatever needs to be done, including just about every aspect of running a retreat house from basic daily chores to being the backup for the House Director if needed.  I also visit the school or mom’s project sometime during the day – whether for a specific project, prayer, reading with the grade school kids, or just hanging out. 

 

Todd’s official title is “Director of Group Construction Projects”.  This entails figuring out which facilities need work, coordinating the effort with APUFRAM, procuring materials needed, assembling and running the crews.  So far, it’s been a lot of cleaning and painting work.  To the average American-eye, the entire country of Honduras could use one solid coat of paint.  It’s interesting to see the difference in our two cultures.  In America, we are continually painting our houses, schools, etc. inside and out regularly to give a fresh look.  Here, not only is paint less affordable, but dirt has so many more avenues to enter buildings than in America.  Exteriors and interiors of buildings are not as distinct as they are in America.  Plus, without much temperature control in Honduras, they don’t have our obsession with air tightness.  Thus, painting can often seem like a futile task when its fruit is only temporarily enjoyed.  Despite the uphill climb, I’m devoting a lot of my energies to painting, especially now that the school year is ending.  (The Honduran school year runs from February to November.  This allows students to return home for Christmas and for the harvest.)  We will use the break to make all the schools a little nicer for the returning students.  I do believe that clean, kept school facilitates can somehow make learning less daunting.  Most of this work will always be done in the morning so that short-term volunteer groups can visit some of the kids that are in one of Mission Honduras / APUFRAM schools in the afternoon. 

 

            Two miles down the road from us and another mile up a dirt road is a small grade school, situated next to large cornfields, called St. Anthony’s.  This site also contains the facilities to house orphaned or underprivileged boys, as well as a pond stocked with tilapia.  Four more miles south of that (on the way to Tegucigalpa) is the Maximilian Kolbe High School and the San Francisco and Santa Ana boarding facilities for the students who go to the high school.  (Boys and girls are separated at night by a locked gate with barbed wire – and, says, Fr. Emil, possibly the addition of tigers or a mote). 

 

            Mission Honduras / APUFRAM also has orphanages or boarding facilities in eight more cities, and two more countries – the Dominican Republic and Liberia.  There are three more houses in Tegucigalpa, which house students going to the University.  All of these facilities add up to a system to which it has made schooling infinitely easier than it would have been otherwise.  The interesting thing that I have to keep in mind is that some of these kids need to be taken from their homes in order to go to school, or avoid the temptation (of their parents and themselves) to quit school and work for the extra and needed incomes.  These facilities take one less mouth away from the family to feed, while providing safe housing, good nutrition, an education and the support for success in school and elsewhere. 

 

Most of these facilities also include some sort of work/vocational program, where the kids help to essentially feed themselves by farming the organization’s crops – rice, corn, papaya, beans, etc. – and growing coffee, raising cows, or making furniture or palm oil.  It’s really a fascinating setup when you take it all in.  And it is a model that is as sustainable as it can be; and always striving to be even more so.

 

            After lunch, we typically run errands for food or construction supplies in Comayagua, make checklists and take pictures of the conditions of the various facilities in the area, tend to the basic operations of the volunteer house, or work on special projects/immediate needs with the school or housing sites.  Volunteers who stay here short-term also typically tour one of the sites in the afternoon to hang out with the school kids.  This is always the most rewarding part of their experience here.   Most leave in or near-tears at the utter openness and happiness of the kids.  The kids also never tire of getting really attached and left by a different group of gringos every week. 

 

In short, as long-term volunteers we essentially help staff the guest house/volunteer center that welcomes over 800 short-term volunteers each year.  Our main responsibility can be generalized as facilitating the needs and experience of the volunteers, who typically wind up amassing the largest amount of donations that keep the organization afloat.  There are times, though few, when no groups are visiting.  At this time, we are typically coordinating and preparing for the arrival of the next group in one way or another.  This is also good time to get more deeply involved with the people with whom we are working for and with – The Hondurans, especially at our site.  It’s an interesting experience to approach a group of kids who immediately swarm around you looking for a quick hug, smile, or simply some affection.  As stated above, most spend the majority of the year away from family, and sadly, some have no family for which to return.  It is the most rewarding part of the experience – navigating through the slow, and sometimes painful process of breaking through language and suspicion barriers to befriend the Hondurans.  From them we are learning a lot and hopefully, helping to make their lives a little easier in return.

 

    Most of us also have some sort of side project that we work on directly with APUFRAM — whether it is smaller construction project, working with the mom’s at the Margarita Cook project, or being American liaisons to the other housing sites throughout the country. 

 

One of Todd’s side projects is to make a promotional video for fundraising.  In addition to this, I’ve taken to filming the groups and documenting their experiences, in the hope of maintaining the experience after they return to their busy lives back in the states.  As part of all of this, we should be able to come up with some sort of documentary on the entire organization.  Hopefully, I’ll be able to post excerpts of its progress soon.  I’m also in the process of researching for my next screenplay.  Monica recently completed a newsletter for Fr. Emil, which he’ll include in the hundreds of personal letters he mails each month.  He is an exceptional fundraiser, whose secret seems to be not in efficiency, but in his commitment to personal contact and the work ethic that makes it possible to build and maintain those relationships.  In putting together the newsletter, I was amazed by how extensively and rapidly Mission Honduras International is growing.   We could have filled the entire newsletter with descriptions of projects just opened or expanded – boarding facilities, churches, schools – or new projects underway in the coming months; and the continuous growth is happening simultaneously in all three countries.   Monica is also helping the sponsorship coordinator with the 1500 Christmas letters sent from the mission children to their sponsors in the states.   Taking pictures of the children, having each one write a letter, and then translating them is a huge undertaking that takes several months.  It has been a delight to get to know more of the kids during this process – they never tire of seeing themselves on the camera’s screen and I never tire of trying to make them smile (which they try so hard not to do in photos).  The support of sponsors in the states (about a $1/day) is one of the single most important sources of funding for APUFRAM’s general operations, supporting the housing, food, clothing, books, and teachers for all the children. 

 

            Our days are capped by pre-dinner “Evening Prayer” in the chapel, dinner, and some hanging out either with our fellow long-termers or with the volunteer groups.  Then (for Todd) it is back to work on the computer, writing or editing and watching a movie one or two nights per week.  For Monica, when groups are here, evenings are usually spent talking with volunteers, tidying up in the kitchen, getting coffee ready for the morning, answering all sorts of questions or walking back and forth to the “hospitality room” for supplies like band-aids, bug spray, or the ever-important toilet paper.  Later, and when groups are not here, I read in the green chair outside our room, often with the company of the house’s cat, Fe, curled in my lap. Typically, Todd’s fading off by 9:30 or 10:00 (and Monica shortly thereafter) as the night becomes too quiet too remain awake.   For about eight years, I’ve (Todd) been trying, unsuccessfully, to go to bed consistently by 10:00, which seems to match my natural rhythms.  This seems to be working well (see “Brain Plaque” article below). 

 

Overall, though time may move a bit slower here, it does seem that, as in the States, there is not enough time to accomplish all we want or feel called to do.  But, one thing we’re currently learning is that this atmosphere is an unbelievably forgiving one.  It’s an interesting and reassuring feeling to be enveloped in that kind of world.  This whole organization is built on the concept that we’ll use whatever resource we have at our disposal at the time to do what we can with it.  If we have the money, we’ll do it the “right way” (ie. The American Way); if not, we’ll figure out a way to do it anyway, however imperfect, though functional and sustainable.  Fr. Emil will be the first to tell you that it’s a miracle we’ve made it this far and that in his wildest dreams he never would have seen himself working simultaneously in four countries (US, Honduras, Dominican Republic and Liberia).  Something good began with a sound philosophy, work ethic and commitment — and with those three qualities, it attracted others in droves to sustain it well into the next generation and beyond. 

Thanksgiving Litany from Honduras
By Monica Desmond
November 27, 2008

Thanks be…

To Incarnate Love, who breaks through from eternity into all our todays.  Thanks be…

For the sun that nurtures and ripens the crops tended by the mission children – corn, black beans, mango, coconuts, papaya

For the rain that renews a thirsty earth, bringing forth life for another season – wet rice paddies the hope of hungry little mouths

For graceful palm trees that shade the coffee – working together on steep slopes high in the western hills

For the winding-clear-blue expanse of Lake Yojoa, dotted with a solitary fishing boat — reflecting the green mountains above and a long colorful row of tilapia restaurants

For make-shift wooden stands with bananas, pineapples, platanos, honey, oranges – lining the narrow road up to the mountains

For evergreen trees like in Washington, a surprise as the bus rises from the terrain below – and for the families that live under their shelter in small, leaning mud-brick shacks

For praying the rosary in Spanish with the mission mothers and children – gathered after supper in the dim-lit block room – trying to keep up with the words, and then surrendering to the sound of their voices rising up together

For odd-shaped flowers – orange, red, purple, blue – in the garden, framing the path to the cross

For the always-awake red glow from the silent chapel late at night

For the blue and green plastic chairs outside our door and chamomile tea – sanctuary for a quiet night reading, writing, just being

For the house cat, Fe, curled in the crack between our beds – wrapping her paw over her nose in deep effortless sleep

For the smell of tortillas – mixing with new-dewy dawn early on chilled mornings – drifting sleepily from the wood-fire community kitchen of our neighbors

For being read a story in Spanish by a first grader, huddling together close against the wind on the playground – carefully and slowly she sounds out each word of the classic children’s fairytale

For children grabbing your hand tightly as you walk through the yard, for no reason at all – sharing that essential gift of human touch that transcends language

For the La Barca boys guiding us carefully through each one of their crops – a few questions in broken Spanish turned impromptu tour and an all-important chance to change the balance, to learn and receive

For supper prepared by Father at the coast’s retreat house – after a seventeen hour day, offering five Masses – hot dogs and Pringles, blessed and shared

For pausing the day at noon under the warm sun in the cross-anchored courtyard – remembering again that all is gift

For rice and beans and eggs

For the patience of Domi, Berta, Reyna, Lupe, Yoanna – who willingly repeat their words any number of ways until I understand, and who listen carefully, kindly, as I struggle to reply

For celebrations and cakes – graduation, farewells, futbol games, birthdays and baptisms

For the women in Muchilena on the coast – the choir leader with an infectious smile who served us cookies; and the old women and young girl with a newborn walking along the side of the road who piled into the mini-bus with us; there is always more room

For Yessica’s deep heady breathing – too labored for her 4 year old body – when she fell asleep under my arm in the tiny chapel of Guadalupe

For the warm weight, holding a healthy new baby, and the smile of her mother when we understand each other’s words and laugh about the goats

For this school of Love

For cleaning toilets, rearranging mattresses and placing prayer cards on pillows – blessing the space which will welcome new volunteers

For donors whose hands we are privileged to be, as we pass out wool blankets to families one cold dark night, and baby clothes one bright sunny morning

For socks and under ware and sheets drying in the strong wind – sharing clothes pins with spotted paint rags and the just-washed-white alter cloth

For mounds of dirt and plastic tubes that will divert the floodwater – keeping it from running under Sagla’s front door

For donated medicines, packed tight in Ziplocs — twenty-eight suitcases flown from the states for the poor in the mountains who walk hours and wait hours to see the doctor

For the boys at La Barca making their first paper airplanes, watching, laughing – delighted and diligent in all their work; mopping, washing, playing, studying, praying

For vegetable soup with giant fresh carrots, potatoes, yucca, cabbage – boiled all morning on the wood fire out back, beside a hot platter always-crisping newly pressed tortillas

For the puppies at Guadalupe – and the wriggling, gordita “Antonia”, piled on top of the others, legs kicking for a better take of the mother’s milk

For the herd of goats that wander, aimlessly, grazing in our field each morning – the little ones crying out when they fall behind and can’t find the pack

For the brown, black, white cows with horns from across the road that mosey over to join in the goats’ morning feast – stopping at the pilla while I wash towels for a drink in the full basin

For the necessity and the time to do laundry by hand – a form of prayer over the concrete washboard, scrubbing socks, shirts, sheets; hearing the universal rhythm pulsing; caught up there in an infinite moment

For the wet brown baby cow in a muddy field, born just hours ago – legs collapsed beneath, ears licked tenderly by a mother leaning in — a nativity

For the generosity and kindness of family and friends in the states whom we miss, love and remember each day

For the voices of thirty boys praying together before lunch – empty plastic plates motionless as they lift up every small gift of the morning; a symphony of gracias

For the voices of fifty girls singing on Sunday – scrunched together on low wood benches, filling the cinderblock-room church with one word

For geckos chirping on the windows in the darkness – perpetually on watch, tracing the room patiently for dazed moths and wandering bugs

For orange and purple sunsets above the cobalt-blue-green mountains to the west – like broad-brush-stroke-textured paintings hung in the windows during Vespers

For cool clear dark nights, walking down the hill with the moms – taking it slow, holding each other’s arms, pausing in long silences listening; then all looking up, commenting on a particular star or two

Thanks be for all things of the earth and of the spirit and
of the mysterious always-remaking convergence of the two,
that keeps life tumbling forward in childlike grace and wonder
into the intersection of a brilliant crossroads,
seeking… seeing… hearing…. igniting….

Thanks be to Incarnate Love, Who breaks through from eternity into all our todays …

Thanks be…

 

 

by Todd Looby

November 15, 2008

Slowly, day-by-day, trippy dream by trippy dream, my brain is attempting to make sense of all that has occurred in the past two-thirds of my life.  The past

Sunset on the Carribean near Mission Honduras Retreat House

month has witnessed an extremely unique state of mind in my personal history.  Literally, most of my dreams now incorporate events and people from the past 20-odd years of my life into one, strange narrative that would probably tell a lot had one the patience to analyze it. 

 

I can’t say that I ceased to dream in the past several years, but I do know that the dreams I could remember had been very few and far between.  It probably resulted from sleep-deprivation.  Often, while working daily at the same gig (construction management and film work – each with its own, unique preoccupations), I’d wake up after about five hours of sleep and it would take at least another hour to get back to sleep.  If I was able to get back to sleep, it was only for another hour or two max, never enough time to get that really deep REM sleep necessary for a good crazy dream. 

It’s not that I’m exactly sleeping better here or have much more time to sit and relax, but the quiet, distance from home and lack of US-style stress is allowing my brain to take account of its state.  I probably had a flawed methodology at home when it came to my daily work habits.  In other words, I allowed myself little quiet time to let things simply drift in and out of my consciousness, which works to curb brain-plaque build-up.   That may be an unfortunate side-effect of a long-term creative effort.  Quiet moments are instead spent in one’s head, churning out the dialogue, or in the case of an editor, playing and re-playing images in ones head, constantly rearranging them for best fit.  Many people in the States make a good habit of getting away in one way or the other, whether going on vacation, or disallowing themselves to “bring their work home”, and thus, don’t require such long-term excursions such as the one we have undertaken in order to take daily stock of their lives.  However, for those of you that are like me, that keep going and experiencing, without taking stock, I would highly recommend a sabbatical. 

 

 

This is all heady stuff, and I’m not schooled enough in theology or philosophy to articulate it well, it’s just a notion that came to me and one I’ve seen echoed here and there in modern literature and some film.  Another way to look at the quandary of the ¨all-good God allowing evil¨ is to focus not on the suffering resulting from an evil act, but more on the beauty of our reaction, perseverance and the thwarting of this evil we may experience in the world.  The human being has a remarkable ability to endure pain and withstand suffering.  He or she has been doing it consistently for about 100 million years and continues to go on despite, perhaps, an urge to stop.  The only answer that I can come up with is that we are all inherently and quietly optimistic.  That we continue to see the beauty in life that God sees, though we often remember pain more vividly.

 

Sunset in Teguc on Eve of Obama Victory

 

 

This is, in fact one of the basic tenants of Buddhism:  that all life is suffering and that our goal in life and death is to shed that ultimate source of suffering in order to discover and celebrate our true selves and make amends with the world around us.  Thich Nat Han, a Vietnamese Zen Buddhist and anti-war activist who gained popularity during the Vietnam War, took it a step further and essentially said that since all life is suffering, we must learn to acknowledge and heal that suffering within each of us and by which we will be more open and empathetic to the suffering of others.  Or, better said, it is really only through alleviating the suffering of each other that happiness can be found.  In other words, there is no single, solitary or material key that can make us happy, only our love of each other, which will either be preempted by, or result in a love of God, the one entity and source who ties us all together.  Having finally alleviated our pain, through the unconditional love of each other and realizing our common heritage in God, we will cease to see God as the source of suffering and instead as the source of love. 

 

I can understand the atheist’s argument in the old adage that God then becomes the opiate of the people.  That we can turn to this “God” who will magically make all this pain go away, or, in turning to God and away from the world, we can then ignore all suffering in the world.  Or, best still, we can simply accept the suffering in this world and endure it without attempt to correct it, because all will be better in “Heaven”.   Zen Buddhism and Christianity both actually share the “Heaven Now” concept with communism, though this is often overlooked. The small difference is that Communism seeks to end the suffering of the masses by people joining together to work and share in common to better their lot in life.  Their figurehead is the State which they have created.  In order for it to work, they must adhere to it blindly and hope that the figurehead has set up the system well.  However, this figurehead often wields strong power in order to ensure that no one cheats and to severely punish the one who inevitably cheats.  The theistic bent, when properly understood to be rooted in love, cures this pitfall towards the vengeful figurehead and, furthermore, realizes that the love of our figurehead is ONLY found through the love of our fellow human beings.  This notion also thwarts the atheist argument that a juvenile belief in God will result in happiness.  Indeed it is through happiness found in the practice of true, unconditional love that we will eventually find God, whether or not it is the intended “end”.  

 

The sources of some suffering: death, tragedy, and natural disaster tend to register forcefully within us.  They initially shock and remain in our memories longer than those experiences of an active love.  Returning back to Buddhism, it is as if suffering essentially IS, while love is something that most often needs to be initiated and cultivated by our fellow human beings and us.  I think that is the essential difference between the polar extremes of our experience (suffering and love).  Since love must be sought and consciously lived, we often lack the energy, humility or initiative for this cultivation.  And the most interesting corollary between Zen Buddhism and Christianity (especially the more mystical kind) is that both stress that the only way to achieve their ultimate ends, satori and heaven, respectively, is to seek and find it here in the everyday madness of life.  And both also stress that certain ways of life more easily allow these realizations to enter our consciousness.  This involves taking time daily to acknowledge one’s surroundings, taking stock of one’s own suffering and that of others and seeking to relieve it, in a direct and personal way.  This will open us up to that reality underlying everything, the plane upon which all things originate and on which all things are occurring, that doorway to the simultaneous time.  In the smallest, but most intimate of acts, we can be introduced to infinity.

 

It is important to stress that suffering and evil in this world are not things to be accepted and simply made all better in the afterlife.  Or, that we can point to some metaphysical concept of the “illusion of time” to diminish this suffering.  The fact is that we must all work to end the suffering within ourselves through the attempt to end it in others.  And in doing so, in living in this state of selflessness, one will be made aware of this limitless love that is out there and infinitely more powerful than the daily bouts of suffering that we encounter, regardless of how insurmountable this suffering may seem at times. 

 

It is in becoming too busy or self-important to take stock of this suffering that our brain plaque begins to slowly but surely accumulate.  This then tends to erect barriers to the realization of our own suffering and that of others, resulting in a diminished ability to see what is truly great about this world and everything in it.  Sometimes that everything is shrouded with warmongers, disease and violence; and it is then that we must ask ourselves what it is within us that is allowing this to happen and continue and, therefore, how we may work to alleviate it.  It is through the active exercise of taking time to love that our own suffering and that of the world can be relieved.  Just scrape off the brain plaque first….

 

These dreams are deep and even though they are at times disturbing, they are never nightmares.  It’s as if all the events that have happened over the past twenty years, good, bad or indifferent have led me here to this point in my life.  Tragedy occurs in these dreams, but invariably it is always resolved positively.  It reminds me of a concept of God that I’ve been mulling over in my head the past couple of years.  It’s a contemplation of the old quandary of “Why does a God allow us to live in a world that frequently seems so tragic and horrible, if indeed He is a good God?”  What I’ve been trying to work out is the concept that perhaps there is no absolute tragedy other than that which is perceived by our limited consciousness and our strict adherence to natural law.  In other words, our human minds are really only able to view time as a finite and linear entity, and thus, they are unable to conceive of the fact that all time may indeed be non-linear and even simultaneous.   By that I mean that there are not specific occurrences that happen at different times, but that all things that have happened or will happen, are actually happening simultaneously.  There may in fact be no “after-life” that will occur in the future, but one that is now occurring, though on a different plane.  With that, we must also wonder what a singular event like a sudden death of a loved one, or a natural disaster, or a 5-year war means in the context of eternity. 

By Todd Looby
November 3, 2008 

As Americans, we have more than the language barrier to overcome when entering and working in a foreign land.  Right, wrong or indifferent, we are perennial opportunists to much of the developing world.  Sure, most of those same people who hold that sentiment also know the material help that we are able to provide.  It is a complicated reality that both parties can feel immediately upon interacting.  I came across a telling quote in a book detailing the darker side of US – Latin American relationships.  It was from a Panamanian.  In talking about this complicated relationship, he said that most Panamanians regard America in the same way a wife continues to love the husband who beats her. 

 

Most Americans are aware of the untold trillions of dollars that the government has poured overseas in aid.  The majority of allotments (besides direct military aid) have been lent or given with an earnest sense of philanthropy and aid.  However, the sad fact remains that much of that aid actually wound up further oppressing a good portion of the population.  The reason is that almost every Latin American country has always been ruled (and continues to be) by a member of one of the few wealthy families, an oligarchy.  (A major exception is Cuba, and we do not need to go into that).   These families have been able to stay in power mostly because of their close ties with the US government.  For much of the 20^th Century each country had its own bout (exaggerated or otherwise) with the great struggle of that century:  Communism (See Cuba above).  Each government headed by aforementioned families, essentially fell over themselves to renounce Communism, which was often rewarded by a hefty sum of “aid” money from the states.  The money was often provided (most of the time with sizable interest) to shore up economies and build infrastructure.

 

 The only problem is that most of the money seemed to go to paying outstanding and healthy government debts (many held, in fact, by the US).  Thus, most of the aid money was going to the US to pay itself back in one way or the other.  If there was any money left over, it typically went to a business owned by one of these families (if it left the Presidential Palace at all).  As anyone who has ridden on a Central American two-lane highway (often going head-to-head with passing mega-buses) can attest, few of the dollars went to road-building infrastructure. 

 

In Honduras, there were other foreign-born problems.   The American-owned United Fruit Company, aka “Chiquita Bananas” owned most of the banana-growing land and had a very powerful grip on all things that occurred in the country.  Most people don’t realize that the term “banana-republic” actually originates from Chiquita’s actions and influence in Honduras and Guatemala.  Whenever a freely-elected President put the interests of its people over and above Chiquita’s, they were promptly deposed in a military coup.  Although most Americans don’t know the origin of that term, you can bet most Hondurans do, even though that era is long over.

 

Also in Honduras, we still have the legacy of the Contra War in Nicaragua.  Much of our clandestine operation (funded by selling arms to our dear friends, the Iranians) was run from the Southern border of Honduras.  At that time, Honduras had a big anti-communist leader who pledged to help in the struggle for a sizeable sum in aid money.  Where it was spent, I’m not sure – wild guess – not on roads or new airport (Google “May 2008 Tegucigalpa airport” for answer).   For us, this is ancient history, for Hondurans, it is the present.  Launching a war of clandestine soldiers from Nicaragua on your soil is often a large undertaking.  Ensuring that it is clandestine is also difficult in that these soldiers become used to working in the shadows, under the radar, and becoming the “evil” they see in their enemy.  These are learned skills that are hard to forget once the funding country is exposed and then forced to shut down operations, hold a trial for a scapegoat and move on to the next corner of the planet to “aid”.   Again, let me be clear that all this was done with the best of intentions, had Latin America turned Red, we might still be bordered by Communist countries and risk losing Texas or something (yes, worse things could have happened).   However, to the country stuck in the middle, they were left with a bunch of these soldiers with no money and no enemy to fight and, hence they took their pent-up anger out on their new countrymen.  And now, despite a history of virtual peace, Honduras remains arguably, the second poorest country in the Western Hemisphere, with an unemployment rate hovering around 28%. 

 

Justifiably or not, most Hondurans connect the dots to the elephant in the hemisphere, in Spanish, “nosotros”.  It is an unfortunate situation to get thrust into, knowing so little of the language, but knowing a lot of the history.  It is, however, fortunate that most people here will welcome strangers as immediate family members.  As most have relatives in the States, they realize that their goodwill karma may pay off.  And they are just naturally a more open people.  What becomes difficult is the time after the initial meeting.  At that point one is an “aid-worker” and ones motives thus become questioned.  In other words, people tend to ask, “Why would someone live here when they could be in the US?  To do something that stupid, they must be up to something.”  For again, it is the only motive they’ve known prior.  Luckily for us, the organization we work for is a very popular one in the country and everyone has seen it’s proven effectiveness and selflessness.  (Mostly due to its humble figurehead, Fr. Emil Cook.) 

 

But, even so, it’s a very difficult thing to combat, this “ugly American” persona.  For even in our methodology of ‘aid’ and ‘positive change’ we are often bulls in a china shop.  One of my duties is to run small construction projects.  The only way I have ever worked in that capacity is when working for a $3 billion firm.  Needless to say, the methodology, pace and purpose differ substantially.  It’s even harder when I am not able to articulate my best of intentions due to the language barrier. I recognize in myself and other volunteers that we all have this unconscious drive to make everything more orderly and efficient.  I have to often stop myself every time and remind myself that in exporting our American obsession with orderliness and efficiency, we would also be exporting all of our uniquely American neuroses. 

 

It is not only our history that precedes us, but the present as well.  We, like those in Canada, Europe, Japan and Australia, have higher living standards than much of the world, and because of the plethora of TVs in all third world countries, all are aware of our lifestyles.  So, although we may view ourselves as not exactly “well-off” in the States, (ie. most of us have to struggle and save to buy houses, keep those houses and buy the little gadgets we all desire) we are far better off than those down here.  In addition, we also have thousands of safety nets should something go terribly awry.  If the US gets itself in trouble, it can borrow $700 billion on a moment’s notice and temporarily relieve that pain.  There aren’t many countries in the world with that sort of borrowing power.  And the US often does not bestow that favor to such a degree on countries like Honduras. 

 

We live our lives in full knowledge of our safety nets, though at times it does waver.  Here, there is no safety net.  One is on one’s own.  When most people here see Americans, they see dollar signs, right, wrong or indifferent.  At best this can lead to a false cordiality; at worst, it can lead to contempt and/or even theft.  And the potential perpetrator may be of the highest character at normal times, but may find the temptation of obtaining a little extra too great to ignore.  And, at the very least, they know that no matter what they take from us, we will not starve.  Living day-to-day, hour-to-hour as they do, they never have that same assurance about their own lives.  Everyone in the States can confess to having similar notions about “the haves” witnessed when we skim supplies or money from our places of work, or how we may treat or look upon those with much more wealth than ourselves.  We are often less forgiving and treat them on an entirely different moral plane, again, warranted or not. 

 

Fr. Emil has been here for almost forty years and despite wearing the genuine robe of a Franciscan Monk, he has had to fight for the respect of this country’s inhabitants.  In fact, there was a time when the robe of a monk could actually serve as a target sign for malice by the oligarchy.  During a time of land reform in the 1970’s, many priests actually had prices on their heads.  One of Fr. Emil’s assistant priests, an American, was murdered for his efforts to help a desperately poor man walk to the hospital.  In other words, there was a time when work like ours was precisely what endangered us.  We find Honduras in a much different state, when both the poor and the powers that be understand the nature of our work. 

 

But, this has been a forty-year battle fought and won by the philosophy, demeanor, and humility of Fr. Emil.  And the key word here is “humility”.  Fr. Emil learned quickly that political activism was a death sentence and something that could be self-defeating here. When a country has revolution and counter-revolution, and when that counter-revolution is aided by the mighty United States, it often winds up making the country worse off than before (See El Salvador, Guatemala, Nicaragua for examples).  Fr. Emil simply had a dream that the education of a few would eventually develop into the education of many; and that in the education of many, a society could change.  And the means by which he has enacted this revolution, with humility, respect of the culture, empathy towards the people, and an undying gratefulness to the people that had given him so much in return is what led to its success.  This is the attitude that we must all come with and maintain to engender the respect of our hosts.  We must always regard ourselves as guests, since we indeed are.  It is a dangerous thing to hold a pride and boastfulness that our intentions to do good are enough to gain us respect.  People would rather starve and remain in ignorance than to feel inferior by another’s intrusive presence.  Once they are assured of our intention to enter into a relationship of mutual respect, suspicions will subside and a genuine friendship and trust can develop.

 

This is the precise reason why nation-building by the use of force will never work.  Once the status of invited guest is withdrawn or ceases to be deserved, little good may come of it.  Revolutions must be slow, personal, undying, and the means by which they are achieved almost never in contrast to the end for which they strive to obtain.  Once we leave our boarders we are guests.  Our good intentions, our money flowing into an economy and our humanitarian aid are worthless without humility and the respect for the culture into which we are entering.  We all know that the road to hell is paved with good intentions, it’s another thing to live this knowledge in a foreign land. 

In another book on US-Latin American relations, I read of an Ambassador to Honduras who knew less than ten words of Spanish, though he spent almost ten years in the country.  Needless to say, he worked during the Chiquita era.  From this willful blindness towards the history, present reality, and culture of the people one is going to serve, nothing good can come.  Americans are not humble by our very nature, but it is only in humbling ourselves that we will be able to achieve the great things of which we are capable. 

The Rains

By Monica Desmond
October 23, 2008

It hasn’t rained yet today. This is a first in well over a week.  Storm after storm after storm moving in off the northern coast has literally drowned parts of Honduras, severely flooding the central and western parts of the country, from north to south.  Homes are destroyed and thousands displaced and many more have lost everything – literally – whatever they had in their small homes, often sitting along a river or in a river valley, or on the side of a steep hill.  People are saying that in some areas the devastation is as bad as that caused by Hurricane Mitch because the rains have been so relentless for so many days.  On our bus ride a few weeks ago from Copan, we saw dozens of mudslides along the steep mountainous road.  The river below was rushing then.  Now it is probably ten times as high.  Parts of that road are completely caved in, ripped away by the mudslides.  Families along that river are now walking over treacherous wooden makeshift bridges, barely clearing the top of the raging waters, with mattresses and other belongings on their heads, as the news showed. 

For many, the loss of crops is most devastating.  Subsistence farming is all that keeps many families going.  It is nearing harvest time for many crops here and now they are either destroyed or it is not possible to harvest them and they’ll die.  Yucca has rotted in the ground and the rice can’t be harvested with a simple machine because it is too wet.  Crops recently planted are destroyed too – papaya and others.  Mission Honduras and APUFRAM have lost all of these crops, which help feed the hundreds of children living at the many schools and orphanages they operate.  At the high school site near us (San Francisco and Santa Ana), they go through 100 lbs. of corn a day (that’s 3 tortillas, per person, 3x a day).  All the crops help curb costs and supplement the diet. 

Comayagua, about 20 minutes by bus up the road, the nearest major town, has been hit hard by the storms.  The river is flooded; dozens and dozens of homes submerged and people living at the school in town.  Mission Honduras is taking families into the schools to the north.  Many people have lost everything – and people here do not have much they call their own – either to the river waters or to looters.  The road north out of Comayagua has been completely closed three times this week.  Other than the deep mud around our house, and the large pools that have collected in low-lying areas around some of the houses at the mother’s projects, we see few visible signs of the destruction so near us.  We haven’t needed to travel too far this week.  It was startling to see the pictures on the news and in the papers of the flooding in communities so close.  Tomorrow, children and teachers from the school (Guadalupe) are bringing clothes and other items to donate.  It is hard to imagine they have anything much to spare, especially these children.  Yet they offer it.  And we offer sheets, towels, toiletries, water;  items from our hospitality room.  Monday it will go to emergency workers to distribute in town.  As I write this, it just started raining again.  We pray for some relief for the people and the land. 

Hospitality

September 18, 2008

“Hospitality” and “Charity” are two words that often connotate that one is doing something solely for another.  What they often entail is that the one performing such acts, typically gets the better end of the deal through some sort of spiritual renewal or reawakening.  That, at least, has typically been my experience in doing some sort of charitable work.    Through our previous trips to Central America, we were always overcome with emotion and surprise at the undying openness that we’ve found among the people here.  Although, unlike in American they can´t just open their wallets, they open their homes and typically lay bear all that they have.   It’s something that we, as well as many of our fellow travelers, feel is lacking in America.  And it’s true, Americans aren’t as directly or personally open as many of the people we encounter in Central America.  But, that obvious fault is more than countered in an important way.

The Sisters of the Assumption

I had the pleasure of helping to promote and film a recent event to aid the Sisters of the Assumption in South Africa.  The Sisters of the Assumption is a small outfit essentially run by two 80-year old Irish nuns, who are also sisters (save the pun).  In interviewing them for the promotional video, the sisters were very adamant in praising Americans for their generosity.  This is something I think we often forget.  Americans, when called to help, pour millions of dollars into relief, whether it be to small, Non-Governmental Origanizations (NGOs), Hurricane Katrina relief or Tsunami Aid.  I believe we forget this because we all know we can give so much more.

Fr. Emil Cook, founder of Mission Honduras, would echo the Sisters of the Assumption claim.   And our related Mission Obrigado endeavor has already proven this fact.  When we

Fr. Emil Cook

put out the call for support on this mission, we were immediately the recipients of much of this hospitality.  Our recent schedule has included finishing up all the loose ends associated with our work; planning our fundraising events; packing up the apartment and driving out West to drop off Burt with his generous foster owners.  All of these steps were met with offers of help that were often unprompted and always selfless. 

I’ve been a fan of off-the-cuff road trips and excursions for some time now.  Since I took my first unplanned road trip in my early 20’s, I started noticing that things seem to simply fall into place when absolutely needed.  Oftentimes, my fellow travelers and I would be in desperate need of a place to stay or food and miraculously we’d be presented

Hospitality Provided by Canyon (Pictured) and His Owners, Colorado

with something that would exceed our most basic need.  In addition to basic needs, I learned that good things simply happen when we chose to simply put ourselves out there.  We would roll into a town and previously unbeknownst, we would learn that one of our favorite bands was having a concert that night.  Or, when in desperate need of firewood, a short hike would reveal a welcoming chord of wood.

I think that we, as Americans, aren’t used to or feel comfortable with this sort of openness to hospitality because of the ‘rugged individualism’ that has been instilled in us from very young ages. It is a complete contradiction that we live in the most generous nation, but at the same time, a population least willing to ask for that generosity.   It seems to me that latter notion severely endangers the former. We currently find ourselves building up our own protective walls in large houses, cars, bank accounts, 401Ks,

Winston (and Owners) Provide Hospitality Outside Jackson, WY

 insurance programs, etc.  In working hard to obtain these things, we build up a pride and defensiveness that seems to declare “if I can help myself, so can you”.  If we are more willing to ask for help, we will be even more willing to provide help when it is asked of us.  Our obsession with an “ownership society” has an unintended tendency toward isolating us from each other.   This is dangerous because there are ALWAYS times when we find ourselves without the necessary protections.  We never can have enough.  An unforeseen illness, natural disaster or stock-market crash can leave us naked and if we’ve spent our lives in our bubbles, we will lack the ability or know-how or humility to even ask for help. 

“Community” is born of the notion that we are all in this together and we ALL have something to offer each other.  It is a good exercise to intermittently put yourself out there and be vulnerable solely for the sake of discovering community.  It reinvigorates your hope in humanity.  Throughout our one-month journey we have been already found this in spades and for this we thank all of you.  And it is not so much for what you have given us in material need, but in connectedness.  I only hope that we are able to amply provide the same to those in Honduras, the people to which you all now will be inextricably linked.

Thank You, ALL.

Cool Hand Chris

October 2, 2008

“Just like yesterday, he kept comin’ at me with nothin’…”

Prior to heading out of Chicago, I was left in charge of several movies to bring with me to the Mission. One of which is “Cool Hand Luke”. Last Saturday night, on hearing of Paul Newman’s death, we watched the film which is considered his seminal work. As a movie-lover I’m embarrassed to say that I had never seen the whole film from beginning to end. Having only seen parts, most of which were the key parts, I had never seen how carefully this character of Lucas Jackson was developed. For almost the first 30 minutes, Luke’s sparse dialog, starts with “Yeah, well…” and is followed by a short dismissive or self-depricating comment about his own character. This plays to the theme of “Nothingness” in talk and in material. The film continues to develop through Luke’s action and enthusiasm. This enthusiastic commitment to action is exactly what creates the cult-like following from prisoners and guards, as he inspires them to act and think for themselves.

One of the greatest things about La Antigua, Guatemala, besides its plethora of cheap and effective Spanish Schools, is its plethora of cafes that show a few films every day. Earlier this week, one of these cafes showed “Into the Wild”. Anyone that has discussed this book or film with me, will know my fascination with the real-life character of Chris McCandless. For those of you who don’t know, Chris was a blindly idealistic early 20-something East-Coast kid of priviledge, who shortly after graduating college with honors, took off out West without notifying his family. His ultimate aim was to live in the wilderness of Alaska for an undetermined amount of time by using his wit and the little knowledge he had of hunting. Spoiler Alert: Chris winds up starving to death in Alaska.

I first read the book in early 2000 and finished it exactly as I was touching down in Buenos Aires, a young somewhat idealistic mid-20s kid on a lone journey to South America, the ultimate aim of which was to see and experience the Amazon Jungle, among other things. I think I read this book at the right time, for I could identify with everything Chris felt about society and the world which he left, however, it told me one thing, “Watch You Ass”. From then on it served as both an inspirational and cautionary tale.

Chris McCandless sought an uncompromising and actual “truth”, naked of all the comforts for which he saw as society’s protection from “truth”. He wound up relying on nothing but his confidence in his own determination and his wit, finding for a short time, as Luke did that “…sometimes ‘nothing’ can be a pretty cool hand.” Besides, Luke’s fight with Mutherhead, George Kennedy and the eating of 50 eggs, his best accomplishment was leading the crew in a race to finish their roadwork for no other apparent reason than to show that it could be done. Although, finishing the work so quickly didn’t provide any other reward than an exhausted hour of rest and a smile, it gave he and the crew the realization that they were indeed alive and if for only a few hours, they were freemen.

Of course, those who seek an unbrindled truth, will often accept some pretty harsh penalty. That is essentially why it is an exercise that is so seldomly undertaken. After being put in the box for suspicion alone, Luke realized that he could never submit to a system that was illogical and deeply unfair. Having that notion in an authoritarian setting like prison, can only lead to misery and death. And, also having that notion while in the unforgiving wilderness like Alaska, can lead to the same end. However, what one absolutely cannot argue against is that in their journey and seeking, they had lived more fully than those of us who seek to only prolong the quantity of our lives.

Finally, just yesterday, I watched “No End in Sight”, it is a documentary that very meticulously details exactly how the war in Iraq was doomed from before the very start. This isn’t some leftist, anti-War propoganda, it is a film that compiles interviews with some of the governments highest and most experienced, intelligence and military personnel who were involved (and later relieved) of their positions, in lieu of younger, less experienced, political hires. As you watch these men and women lament the fact that they didn’t do more knowing full-well that we were headed for disaster, that they didn’t kick doors down, scream to the American public, run naked through Baghdad’s streets in protest, it makes me think of Luke and Chris and how they would never had let this happen had they been in power. (I know it’s understood that people with their rebellious spirit will seldom, if ever, reach to high power).

When Luke is first put in the box following his Mother’s death, the guard apologizes by saying, “I’m sorry Luke, I’m just doing my job”. Luke, of course responds, “Saying it’s your job don’t make it right.” I thought about those experts, those men in power that had the ability to stop the machine if they did something crazy, something that would shake the idealouges from their flawed philosophy. They would have been fired, they would have been humiliated, they would have probably for a time, been broke, left with nothing. But, one thing they could have had was a command over the truth when it really counted, instead of lamentations and regrets four years, billions of dollars and hundreds of thousands of lives too late.

Not everyone has the ability or inclination to challenge wardens to seek the truth, or live in the wilderness to experience a primordial existence, but we do all have the ability to ask ourselves if what we’re saying is true to ourselves and what we’re doing is truly good for our friends, family and greater humanity, without putting our selfish desires and greed first. And without blindly hiding behind our ‘duty’ at work or somewhere else. Somewhere in between Luke and Chris is a practical way of living, that which seeks truth, that beautiful nothingness which inhabits our souls.

September 30, 2008

On Marriage…
Or, going to a foreign country where you can’t speak the language… (Not so dissimilar)

When you spend every moment
waking and sleeping
with some One
you learn – quickly –
to say I’m sorry 
And often.

You cannot hold on to things
In every moment, you
Let go.

For the boat to stay afloat
one side cannot be too heavy.
Working together to keep in balance.

And it is good.  It is
Honest – Balance cannot conceal;
It does not know otherwise (its work is light)
By necessity – open and supple
Adjusting all the time
Simultaneously.  Equally.

Selfishness and blame
tip; strain.
The weight is dangerous there. 

All is held by Gravity and Grace.

The Rhythm found is good.
Here in this tiny boat
on this choppy lake
we smile, sigh
and lean away …
… again. together.

– md

September 19, 2008

Dark, dense, gray clouds overtook the mountains, and the lush green hillsides turned first a dull resemblance of themselves and then disappeared altogether.  From all directions they swooped and enveloped like ghosts, turning the textured-green-mountain frame of Lago de Atitlan into a shapeless, could-be-anywhere, mist.  The lake picked up, curling south to north towards us, pulled into the sky brushing its surface.  Like filings to a magnet, it gathered and moved closer, as if bringing an offering to our thatched perch above the shore.  Blue and white covered boats below rocked together in an awkward dance, side to side, up and down, to the Latin beats blaring from an empty restaurant. 

– md

THE AMERICAN DREAM 

September 2, 2008 

Final Email of Gainful Employment

It’s hard to make big changes in your life and head out West and not contemplate the American Dream.  As we reached Eastern Iowa I asked Monica what she was thinking about.  She answered that shewas mulling over her self-definition.  Now that she was officially “unemployed”, she couldn’t so easily explain to someone who she was (since “who you are” is usually “what you do”).  The past answer – “a social policy worker” or, “I work for an organization that…” – was enough to allow the other participant in the conversation to quickly categorize her, make assumptions about who she is, which then made it easier for the conversation to either end or continue based on her occupation.  The new retort – “…well my husband and I are moving to Honduras to work on a mission and, um…well…” – although perhaps more conducive to follow-up questions than the previous response, is not as clear or “marketable”.  It leaves one wondering, “well, who are you then?” – or, at times, makes you ask yourself, “who am I if I’m not what I do for my paid occupation anymore”?

Contemplating the West

Now I mention the “American Dream” because this American obsession with others’ occupations is a phenomenon that I had been contemplating almost incessantly since I decided that I wanted to become a “filmmaker”.   Prior to my decision to actually quit my “job” and go on my own, I had struggled with the same questions:  How would I define myself now that I would no longer have the easy category of “construction manager for a large corporation”?  When that answer was muttered, neither I nor the conversant have to worry about how I was going to pay the bills, get health care and progress in social class.  It was all laid out.   What I realized during that time is how our modern concept of the American Dream had been completely distorted. 

When the term was initially conceived it was during America’s expansion out West. — the time of “manifest destiny” and “rugged individualism”. At that time it was widely respected that anyone who had guts and worked hard could have the autonomy over their own lives, plain and simple.  Sure, the promise of “riches” to be gained was always an allure, but the more important aspect of the notion was the unique opportunity in America for all citizens to define themselves. It seems that the achievement of material gain is now the sole measure of success in that pursuit of happiness.   If one actually takes the pains to decide to define themselves, well then, they better make some money if they want our respect.

One cannot divorce the plethora of opportunity available in America without taking into account our system of democracy.  This system is based on the notion that the people are allowed to define government and not government defining the people.  

Anarchist Patrol or McKey Ds Run

That brings us to our first stop on our journey. Heading out West, our first stop would be in Denver on August 27th, the second to last day of the Democratic National Convention.  In the interest of full disclosure, we are both left-leaning moderates and ardent Obama supporters  If you agree or not, please don’t let that dissuade you from reading further, as you will see why we have arrived at our decision as to who we support in this landmark race.  (NOTE:  The intent of this blog is not political comment, though, there may be more entries with political content.  Please also don’t let that dissuade you from reading, for regardless of your personal political views, we are sure to be in agreement on many things). 

Flags = Patriotism

Thursday, August 28^th was the day of Obama’s speech at Invesco Field in front of 75,000 people. We walked among the pilgrims as they made the trek to the stadium to hear the speech.  Never in our times has this enthusiasm over a political movement been matched.  Something is in the air here, and it cannot be denied.  Many people are understandably suspicious of this movement.   They see this attention toward Obama as a sort of blind following of a Messianic figure.  This prejudice, I believe, unfairly separates the man from the message.  “Yes We Can” is a slogan that is becoming mocked and clichéd.  However, it is indivisible from the reason why Obama has gained such popularity.   Although his supporters admire his personal story and his eloquence, they are more inspired by how his story empowers them to define themselves. 

Yes We Can - Walk Far and Chant

The conservative mantra has always been one of “self-empowerment” and “personal responsibility”, ie., that the people take care of themselves.  As I listened to Obama’s speech, I heard over and over again this call for the people to “stand up” and that this is a “bottom-up” movement.  In other words, he is calling on all of us to do our part.  It is a reference to one of our most quoted political speeches:  “Ask not what your country can do for you, but what you can do for your country”. 

The Closest We Could Get = 500 yards

As I contemplate “leadership” in a democracy, I have to conclude that the best leaders we have had (and those that we most desire) all have one thing in common:  Excellent judgment, a commitment to coalition-building and an ability to inspire our citizens to take control over their lives and their government.  Unfortunately, in the past eight years, all that I have seen is a government that has essentially said to the people, “Don’t worry, go about your lives, we’ll take care of everything”.  It was in deference to the market and to military expedition.  It has led to this nation’s unprecedented economic inequality and a country less respected internationally and arguably less secure.  To me, it seems as though many Americans want to do something (besides simply voting) to help us out of our problems, but we’re not being led or inspired to an effective measure.  Unlike during WWII, today there are no similar calls to sacrifice, like the calls to buy ‘war bonds’ or tire-recycling programs.  Our current crises are those heaped on the Federal Reserve and the Military and its families.   Where are the willing people in this model?  It’s easy to blame our seeming indifference on ourselves, but, to me, that seems to be the whole purpose for ‘leadership’, ie. to inspire the people.

Obama is the right man at the right time to inspire us to take back what has been robbed us in the past eight years and for some of us, the past 400 years.  As with Kennedy, people fear what his victory will mean to the status quo.   

Shotgun Knitting aids the contemplation of life decisions

Many feared Kennedy’s Catholicism as many fear Obama’s race.  The fear stems not necessarily from the candidate’s own association with creed or race, but what that would mean to the marginalized masses of the same creed or race.   We have seen that Kennedy’s election did not put the United States under rule of the Vatican.  If we have the courage to elect a President of African heritage, we would also see that this country would remain essentially the same, with the small exception that our fellow citizens of African descent would gain a pride that has been robbed them.  And they would finally feel that rightful recognition that they had as big a hand in building this country as any proud immigrant community.

Please don’t get me wrong, I’m a fan of John McCain.  His story is also one dripping of American Dream symbolism.  He has a record of going his own way.  However, much of that ended in 2001 and seemed gone for good in the summer of 2007 as he courted the support of the zealots he vehemently opposed in his 2000 race.  The election of 2000 was John McCain’s year.  That was the perfect time for the perfect man.  Instead, we were robbed of the chance to vote for him because some primary states feared his challenging of the status quo.  That fear of change robbed us of opportunity in 2000 and we paid a heavy price.  I hope we don’t let a similar fear rob us again. 

If the status quo is ardently maintained, as the false notion of the American Dream wishes, we are stagnant and exactly in opposition to the true American Dream.  The true American Dream that begs us to progress toward a more perfect Union, where all people have the opportunity to pursue a happiness that is witnessed in a diverse and often unconventional self-definition.  

August 30, 2008 

LEAVING

Packing the car amongst onlookers

Getting ready to leave was a much more difficult endeavor than either Monica or I had imagined, both emotionally and logistically.  It was both encouraging to see how many people wholeheartedly supported what we’re doing, that fact, though, also made it more difficult as we saw what good people we would be missing. 

No one likes moving.  In fact, the task is probably up there with dental surgery in the area of activities to avoid at all costs.  Our experience was no different and more difficult than our previous moves.  This time around we were working under the weight of much more accumulated stuff.  Although, we’d been decent at purging junk over the past year, we also couldn’t keep up with the pace at which junk seems to simply fall in your lap in this land of plenty.  We tried to give away all that we knew we wouldn’t want upon returning, but still, our two-bedroom apartment barely fit into a 10×10 storage unit.  

Shutting down my computer for the last time was also disturbingly emotional.   Over the past nine months, I had spent  over 10 hours a day at that computer.   Although, I spent at least 30 minutes of that 10 hour day swearing at the thing for being too slow and, my personal pet peeve, anticipating what I was trying to do (9 out of 10 times it was guessing wrongly).  

Working on HAL amongst onlookers

However, it was because of that computer, I was able to start my own business, keep generating revenue and finish two films in the past year.    It was sort of a HAL moment from 2001:  A Space Odyssey, I laughed to myself imagining the thing pleading with me not toshut it down, but it shut off quietly…for the first time in about 9 months.    

Another thing occurred to me about these things we rely heavily on and also despise:  Although computers and technology sometimes irritate the hell out of us and no matter how much they seem to have overtaken our lives, we benefit tremendously from them.  Because of them, I’m able to write this entry in the middle of the Colorado mountains and send it off wirelessly.  I also plan to download and edit video footage from the trip and post that on YouTube – a task which I am able (though not entirely willing) to complete from the next place we camp.  We are now seven years past 2001 and, thankfully, progress in the area of Artificial Intelligence has been slow.  Although we may have allowed computers and technology to overtake our lives, we did so willingly and not involuntarily as many science fiction writers predicted would happen by now. 

"HAL" from 2001: A Space Odyssey

My final, emotional realization about computers is about their best asset, and that is the beauty of the “undo” command.   I can’t count how many hours and days have been saved due to that “undo” command.  As we all know, our human relationships often suffer from our reluctance to readily and unconditionally forgive. 

Keys to a 1,100 SF Northside Chicago Apartment

As we put the last bag in the car, I removed the apartment keys from my key chain and dropped them in the mailbox.  As I did this, I had to take a picture.  This was the first time I was officially homeless, but it was also the first time I noticed how many damn keys I had for that little, two-bedroom apartment.  Six in all!  I carried a heavy key chain around with me for the past 14 months and ruined about three pairs of pants because of holes made by the keys.   I gave myself an unquantifiable number of Charlie horses by running into table corners because they were in my pocket. Parking my car in the garage I unlocked and relocked four different doors to get into the apartment.   Having taken these keys off my key chain, it was immediately obvious how much lighter my step was.   I couldn’t ignore the symbolic nature of this act.  Now, I’m not as blindly idealistic as to think that “homes” fall into that category of possessions we can shed, but I had to recognize that our plethora of possessions had made us more suspicious and insecure than what should be deemed as healthy.  In fact, while making my last trip to the storage unit and ensuring the lock was secured, I had this tiny voice that kept saying, “God, I hope someone steals all this crap so I never have to move it again.”  (With the exception of all of our wonderful wedding presents, which we will be glad to have once we do have a home again.)