A letter came this week, by neighbors around the Nueva Vida Clinic, via the Mayor's office of Ciudad Sandino, asking that we trim our trees! Wow!
In 1998, when Hurricane Mitch wiped out Nicaragua, thousands of flood victims were resettled just down the dirt road from us onto what was then rough pasture land... blocks and streets delineated by bulldozers... no water... no electricity... AND no shade from the tropical sun. Black plastic lean-tos simply acted as solar cookers.
That neighborhood, Nueva Vida, became the focus of our Ciudad Sandino disaster relief work, and hundreds of international volunteers and local community workers helped to construct temporary housing (which gradually turned into tiny cinderblock houses), dig latrines, and construct the Nueva Vida Clinic while providing health services out of suitcases. But ALSO, we planted TREES... thousands and thousands of trees.
Every household received four trees when holes were dug and they were ready to plant... three for shade and one for fruit. And because nurseries were thrilled with large bulk purchases, "Tree Sarah" our forestry volunteer, was able to get hundreds of "extras" while shopping. So we planted at schools, and on the Nueva Vida Clinic property as well... anywhere folk wanted more trees.
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| Nueva Vida Clinic Monday AM patient line & trees - 2015 |
Today, in spite of the poverty and the obvious need for a sewage system and all the other needs of our Nueva Vida neighbors, I marvel at the trees every time I enter Nueva Vida... tall trees offering shade and producing oxygen, green against the sky. So why the clinic neighbors' letter?
The Nueva Vida Clinic trees have gotten so large that their enormous branches reach out over the property line... over the street and the neighbors' homes and tiny yards. Dropping leaves, if left unattended, will erode the zinc roofing of their small houses, and in windy thunderstorms, there is fear of branches falling.
So our maintenance folk, Rogelio, Pedro, and Lucas, trimmed trees this week. No city maintenance truck with a high bucket on it to use... nope... they constructed a combination of movable scaffolding, ladders, rope guidelines, and using a chainsaw and machete, trimmed back the overhanging branches, working their way around the clinic property line.
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| Trimming trees - setting up scaffolding, ladders, and guide ropes - 2020 |
While I hate cutting any branches, I understand the need to trim. But isn't it marvelous that those trees are there and so large that they even need to be trimmed? What a difference 20 years can make. What a difference all those volunteer helping hours years ago made to breathable air for us all today. What a difference one woman made as Tree Sarah took off day after day to procure truckload after truckload of tiny seedlings for planting.
I am grateful! Breathe!
- Sarah
