I spent the weekend out in Patores the other side of Antigua where much of the village was badly flooded and damaged, including the little school.

It was knee deep in mud and the young volunteers from Antigua , language students and back packers, were absolutely fantastic, It made me very proud to see them pitching in, literally up to their eyes in mud, and doing it with a camaderie and enthusiasm which helped the locals to smile and pitch in too, although so many of them had been traumatized, It was heart breaking, too to see the mess made of a very well decorated and tidy school. Finding the kids plastic mugs in the dirt and the quadernos completely trashed.

Anyway of helping them, or adopting them by Maya? Right now they need brooms, mops, hoses and cleaning materials( and not just the school, but all the houses affected) and lots of able bodied people to work hard. We even pushed brooms with people from the town of Bryn Mawr and Villa Nova…I was wearing my Bryn Mawr Mom sweat shirt, so Antonia made some new contacts immediately. Small world!

Sylvia Jauregui