Nourish Goes to Guatemala

By Steve Mullaney

This is anarchic. This is thoughts thrown on a page with a minimum of editing. I don’t care.

One of the things that we’ve talked about ad nauseum is avoiding unintentional harm on this trip. Admirable. I mean, whenever I’ve told people what I’m doing in Guatemala it’s never been followed up with “and I hope that this really messes up the culture of the town we’re in.”

Thoughts torn in many directions inspired from interactions with the wise people in my life rush into my head. The following quotes only get at the surface level of the wisdom that these people have.

A very good friend who has been abroad for a while: “Just like people of color need to prove themselves every day within a racist white aesthetic, so to do white people (in the case of this trip: people with enormous class privilege) need to prove themselves and do uncomfortable things if they want to be in true solidarity with people of color.”

A formal mentor: “The people are resourceful.”

My Mom: “Something needs to be more than just interesting for someone to want to do something.”

A classmate from social justice class: “This is not a game, this is something that affects me every day.”

Aziman, a chief of the Bunun Indigenous Group (Taiwan) explaining how he uses traditional farming practices coupled with organic/sustainable methods endorsed by the Taipei-based Taiwanese Ecological Stewardship Association.

My best friend, a brilliant theorist, researcher and organizer: “Whatever man. Whatever.”

***

The stuff that we are doing will alter the culture of La Pista and Nebaj. Is this good? Is this bad? To answer both questions with one word: yes. Every action has unintended positive and negative consequences. Every introduction of an institution to a community will shift the community in ways we didn’t think possible. Every English teacher I’ve had says that grouping sentences in threes with the third being the most important is a powerful rhetorical tool.

***

I challenge the privilege associated around “This inconveniences me/I paid money to help you/I have good intentions THEREFORE what I’m doing must succeed unilaterally. So there.” We could mess up. Bad. Nobody from this town invited me here. How do I know? It seems like every time I go outside little kids maliciously shout “Gringo!” at me. It hurts; kids should be innocent, right? But I understand that it’s also a self-defense mechanism. Whip out a history book: what do ‘gringos’ do? Murder, rape, pillage, overthrow governments for the sake of the United Fruit Company (100,000 killed in Guatemala so you can eat cheap bananas), create xenophobic immigration policies and a militarized border. Do I blame them? No. I just wonder why there aren’t more people yelling.

***

I met two boys: Eliu and Jacinto. Both just started talking with me. Both are brilliant. Eliu is twelve and is very motivated. He’s aware of how knowing math will positively affect his future. He told me that he wants to go to the US—not to work, but to continue his studies. Like many other Guatemalan twelve year olds I’ve talked with he loves soccer, is fascinated by my stories of Minnesota snow, and is incredibly motivated/talented/brilliant. He asked me to help teach him algebra; I said yes.

Jacinto is someone that I met on a bus with the trip leader Carlos. He is fourteen and in the equivalent of the US’ tenth grade. His passion is chemistry. He can’t really explain why, but who is able to rationally explain their passions? He also wants to study chemistry in the US. As a show of goodwill he showed up at our worksite in La Pista to give us a bag of fruit, as if he had to bribe us onto his side to give him support for his dream. He asked for my e-mail address; I said yes.

So now I’m giving (I think) daily private lessons to Eliu and will be doing something to help support Jacinto.

…and I’m torn up. Of course I’ll be able to teach a lot of stuff to Eliu, on his first day of doing multiplication with two digits he mastered it. In five example problems. Yes, he’s behind grade level, but still—that’s impressive. He’s a sponge whose mind is naturally geared towards excellence in math. I’ve never seen the level of focus and intensity in anyone learning anything. Ever.

But then what? I leave in a month and it’s not the same. Am I setting up Eliu and Jacinto for huge disappointments by working with them? I mean, they’re both brilliant so of course they’ll succeed, right?

This is what I’m telling myself so that I can sleep at night.

And then Nick hits me with a bombshell which I know I know, but wasn’t something I was thinking about at the time and was just so much more meaningful: “It’s like this with kids all around the world.”

Well yeah. Duh. It’s just more comfortable to think about those affected by poverty as stupid, lazy, and/or evil.

***

Racism, sexism, classism, heterosexism, faithism, ageism, xenophobia, ableism, nationalism. All connected, all from the same elite point. I’m less human because of these systems of oppression. We all are.

***

There are also tears of happy. Lots of them, but personal growth only comes from the tears of sad.

We appear to be working in solidarity with the community—perhaps it’s just a few of the elite (I don’t know the community well enough) but still, we’re taking direction and working in collaboration towards goals set by the community.

I laugh a lot. It’s great. We all make very good jokes on the team; a light mood leads to productive people.

The relationships that I do have are great. I’m doing a lot of work with kids in educational settings. Kids are great, so complex and so simple at the same time. I’m teaching math, magic tricks, English, vocabulary, hotbox, games. Everything, really. And connecting too, it seems.

There’s a café called El Descanso. It’s pretty sweet, and the only place I’ve eaten.

At the end of the day I am confident that I can be there for Eliu and Jacinto. The three of us are all too brilliant to let silly things get in the way of dreams.

I’ve realized how little I need in the ways of money—and I think I’m finally at a point where money doesn’t matter. I’ll be poor, whatever. It’s not like this is an admirable decision, more of a lifestyle choice from a very privileged individual, but whatever.

I feel like I’m doing the right thing, more often than not. And that’s good.

***

Confession time: there are tears right now. Tears of sad and tears of happy. I suppose I can dedicate one eye to each. Capitalism says that by maximizing efficiency in how I cry my tears that each eye will benefit from the comparative advantage and operate at peak output.

…but capitalism is also what got us into this mess in the first place. It supports empires, pays CEOs and not parents, and started a war in Guatemala which killed 100,000 people—a number so large it begins to lose its meaning because I cannot visualize 100,000 people in my head.

Pablo Neruda: “The blood of the children ran in the streets like the blood of the children ran in the streets.”

Pablo Neruda: “I love you so much that your hand on my chest is my hand, and that when you close your eyes I too see nothing.”

And so I cry tears of sad and tears of happy.