We DO own our land!

This week we had some GREAT news! We received notification that Yelba Carvajal's attempt to annul our legitimate title and register her false title to our land have been denied! (Remember in February 2008 when she began trying to steal our land?)

This is one of two false titles she used to try to claim ownership of our Center (with our house, offices & volunteer dorm) and the Industrial Park (where the Genesis co-op, the cotton gin and the sewing co-op are all located). Now that her attempt to register our land as her own has failed, we are no longer in danger of getting the ground stolen out from under us!

WOO HOO!

This has been a long fight, but we've counted on important support during the process thanks to more than 1,000 emails you, our supporters, sent to the First Lady Rosario Murillo in a matter of days! Thank you so much for all your support!

We are still waiting notification about her attempt to register her false title on the Industrial Park. Stay tuned to start celebrating when we finally receive that notice! -- Becca

A Clinic Organized...

Organizational skills elude me…almost completely! In the 90’s I read a book on housekeeping entitled Sidetracked Home Executives…and I bought the index cards and the file holder…then wrote all the tasks and how long it took to complete them…and that was it. I was perpetually sidetracked! But…

My friend, Nora…she is an organizational whiz and a retired physician’s assistant. She and Becky, a pediatrician, came and gave three weeks to our bodega (our large clinic storage room)! They sorted and sifted and cleaned and blustered about what we had! They kindly taught me what all we had since I have no medical background.

Volunteers put on masks and moved instruments we would never use to an unused room. And we gave it all away! Some of it was golden for hospitals and some, not so much…but it went to the government clinic and hospital to be shared and used.

Nora and Becky labeled the medicines and supplies so we could restock easily. Becky pointed out the medicines we would never use, so there was no need to keep them. We decided what date was too dated and weeded out those medicines as well. What remained was the World’s 8^th Wonder to my eyes! AND…

A shot in the arm to do some more organizing…

Danelia organized the pharmacy and labeled it all! It looks great and so, so easy to pull those random, not-used-much medicines.

With the help of the delegation from Lopez Island we went through the second building and separated out equipment we could realistically use in the clinic. We saved potty chairs, Depends, walkers and wheelchairs for the infirm to give to our elderly patients. We kept a reasonable amount of crutches and “pieces parts” to fix machinery that we do use in the clinic…THEN…

We gave stuff away again!

The clinic staff…our Nicaraguan staff…are *Just. Like. Us*….in that we are all terrible pack rats. So, Danelia would say, “What about this thing? We might use it in the future?”

“If we need it THEN we will ask for it again, until then someone else can use it.”

It is wonderful. I feel energized instead of heavy about needing to go through stuff. We could – would – never have done it on our own. We needed volunteers with skills none of us had. -- Kathleen

"Anyone" can learn...does that mean me?

From a purely egotistical standpoint, it’s been good for me. Since I spend most of my time fretting about the next step for the Genesis co-op and writing grant proposals that are never accepted, I’ve found the last few weeks entirely refreshing. Together with Pat and our volunteer coordinator Liz, I’ve been working with a wonderful Cuban ophthalmologist to learn to do eye checks and hand out glasses to patients.For several years we’ve been working to get an eye correction program up and running at the Nueva Vida Clinic. We received bits and pieces of donated medicines and glasses, and then a year ago we received a grant to purchase a hand-held autorefractor which would allow us to do fast eye checks and give us the flexibility of doing them not only in our clinic, but in places like El Porvenir where people have such need and no access to eye correction.

 
Through the Cuban doctor, we set up a program last year where optometry students spent one morning a week doing their practicum in our clinic. That worked pretty well, considering that students the world over – and here I’ll insert the Southern phrase bless their hearts – are not known for excelling at follow-through. Although we had hoped to continue with a new group of students this spring, that just hasn’t materialized, and in order to keep the program going, we decided to take the ophthalmologist up on his suggestion that “anyone” could be taught to do this.

 
So far, Pat, Liz and I have managed to grasp the concept of myopic vs. hyperoptic, spherical vs. cylindrical and have learned that presbyopia is a condition that sets in after the age of 40 that has nothing to do with an irrational fear of Presbyterians. More importantly, we get to play with fun stuff: we can now use a lensometer to check the prescription on glasses, a retinoscope to check eyes for cataracts, the autorefractor to get a starting place on a prescription, and a phoropter to fine tune the prescription. I think I speak for us all when I say we’re feeling pretty good about our ability to catch on to new things.

 
Of course it’s totally another matter when you’ve got living breathing patients in front of you! (I think that must be why they call it “practicing” medicine!) Last week we went live: in the first 2 days we saw 15 patients all from the Genesis co-op (better to practice on folks you already know) and since then we’ve seen another 15 “real” patients. One of my first was an older man who insisted that every new lens I tried out on the phoropter was better than the last. For about ten minutes I’d say “Which is better, one or two?” And he would say “Two” every time, even while I moved from -3.75 right up to +4.00. I’ll admit I was sweating it…what do you do in that case? Since we are working with donated glasses and can’t find anyone’s exact prescription anyway, I started trying on glasses. And with those he was absolutely unequivocal – he left with the thickest pair of specs I’ve ever seen, and thrilled right down to his toes!

 
We’ve managed to work out a system of who does what, and Pat is doing a noble job of organizing our donated glasses so we cut the searching time down. We’ve found a table that is the right size for Liz to prop her arm on to get a good reading with the autorefractor without having to physically hold her patients still. We’ve found a picture chart that works better for folks who can’t read, and once we get the phoropter oiled so that the lenses don’t stick and the swing arm doesn’t whap patients across the head anymore, I think we’ll be in business!

 
Of course our prescriptions aren’t exact – and I’m relieved that the ophthalmologist tells us that much of the eye correction process is purely subjective– but it is very satisfying to take a break from fretting one morning a week and go to the clinic where I am told a problem, can do some tests, and can hand someone a pair of glasses that will help them. -- Becca

Unplug

We live in an era of unprecedented technological advancements. When we moved here in 1994 we didn’t have any kind of phone for four years. Now almost everyone we know here has cell phones, which is good…families can communicate, work places can call when a staff member doesn’t show up, and family members in other countries can call their loved ones.*

I am a little intimated by all the technology around but I do not yearn for the “good old” days when everyone just had a land line and there were no microchips. I love being in touch with my family anytime I want through email and the “magic” phone that operates through internet. I do not want to return to air letters that take a month to get back to family and friends. But….

There are many times that I feel that instead of technology enhancing our humanity, it is becoming our god.

We work more hours to have what we feel we MUST have in the newest, the fastest, the most memory. We stay plugged in…or text non-stop with our “friends” on Facebook, My Space or just the phone. We seem obsessed as a Developed World society.

But are we losing ourselves? Do we avoid the pain through typing insignificant froo frah constantly and never look up from the screen to see the people around you? Technology has given us a way to block the people around us on the subways, the sidewalks, and even our home. We do not have to see the homeless if we are texting. We do not have to hear the cries of sadness of the broken hearted when we have constant music in our ears. We do not have to interact with our loved ones if we just text a phrase every two minutes. We do not have to see the poor.

We need to stop…unplug…become that person that was created to interact with others, help others, and love others. After all, can you see Moses facing Yahweh with an iPod plugged in, or Jesus texting “brb” to his followers before going to the wilderness, or even Thoreau taking a walk through the woods on a Wii? -- Kathleen

*Cell phones here can receive calls even if there is no time on it. You can put as little as $1 on your phone.

**Note: In the photo volunteer Tyson is just pretending to talk on his cell phone while picking coffee up at El Porvenir, although his phone did have coverage up there!

Genesis co-op field trip to El Salvador!

When I arrived at the Genesis chilamate tree at 2 AM, all 18 co-op members were already gathered under its branches, holding hands to form a circle, heads bent in prayer.

“Dear God, please look after our families while we’re gone…Dear God, please look after the driver of our bus, help him drive well so we all arrive safely…Dear God, thank you for this opportunity, may we learn much from it.”

And then we were off to El Salvador to see a real working spinning plant! We had managed to convince the Interamerican Development Bank to finance a trip for all members of the Genesis co-op to visit the factory in San Salvador that purchased all our organic cotton this past year. The owners of the plant had agreed to show us around so that we could all see how a spinning operation works, an important precursor to training in spinning production, and something that we could do while we wait for results from the lawsuit against Coker International and equipment.

But more importantly, the trip was meant to boost the low morale of the Genesis members, give them something to focus on and look forward to, and – if they were thrifty with the per diem they were given for the trip – a little extra income.

During their preparations for the trip co-op members voted to spend some of their per diem to purchase polo shirts with the monogrammed Genesis logo and each member’s name embroidered on the sleeve. To you or me, the shirt-buying might seem like waste of precious resources, but it was symbolic for co-op members. When Jamileth showed up at her extended family’s home and showed them her two Genesis shirts, their response was, “Wow, so you really do have a business.” And the monogrammed uniform shirt proved it.

For others, the fact that we were finally able to arrange the trip to El Salvador was in itself significant – former co-op members had gotten wind that a trip was planned and said, “That trip is never going to happen, that’s just the gringos telling more lies to manipulate you.” When we bought the bus tickets for the 12 hour journey north, Genesis members practically blew raspberries in the faces of the naysayers – it felt good to be doing something concrete and big after so long waiting around! Sara overheard her mother – who has been worried about Sara wasting her time at the co-op when she’s sure equipment will never arrive – bragging about her on the telephone. “Sara has a trip to El Salvador now, her business is up and running and this is just the first trip of many, nothing can stop them now!”

It was the first time out of Nicaragua for most co-op members, and many who had never even seen the north of Nicaragua watched out the windows in fascination as we headed up to El Salvador. I think everyone was scared – of leaving their families, of going so far away, of being in an unfamiliar place. I know they missed home, I know many cried themselves to sleep at night. But they shared food, drink and cell phone minutes with one another, and in the morning everyone was in the lobby of our hotel at 6 AM, showered and dressed in their monogrammed Genesis shirts, ready to head to the factory.

The plant manager himself met us and not only showed us all the different sections of their (97,000 sq ft!!!) spinning factory, but gave us extensive information specific to the spinning process as well as general business advice (“It’s easier to prevent a problem than fix one.” “Time is golden.”). Everyone was awed, practically tripping over themselves as they walked around open-mouthed filming the factory with their cell phone cameras.

Our host was kind enough to answer our endless questions and when the Genesis folks began to say, “It looks like we’ve got to go expand our building,” he kindly replied, “It’s all about scale. Everyone has to start somewhere.” He then told us the story of how their factory was started 30 years ago in a space the size of the Genesis factory, and how over the years it has grown to include a whole complex of several city blocks employing 1,230 people. The Genesis co-op was much encouraged by that story. And when we met a 98 year old woman who started work there 30 years ago and is still employed (as a greeter at the knitting factory), the older women of the Genesis group rejoiced, hugged her within an inch of her life, and all had their pictures taken with her.

One of the most helpful parts of our trip was gaining an understanding for the entire textile process. The Genesis folks had already met some of the technicians from the Salvadoran plant when they came to Nicaragua to teach them how to inspect the cotton for polypropylene contamination, but while in El Salvador they were able to see why that inspection was important. We were also able to see our wobbly, loose-packed bales of Nicaraguan organic cotton next to the neat, tightly packed bales of cotton imported from the U.S. and see firsthand why that causes problems in the spinning plant (the Salvadorans have offered to help check our baler to see how we can increase its packing pressure). Seeing the spinning process allowed us to put a mental picture and process to the machine names we’ve heard for so long. On our last day there we were able to see the knitting and dying factory, which allowed us to understand why determining color and characteristics of the cotton to keep different lots of yarn separate is important to the end product.

We were able to squeeze in a morning of sightseeing around San Salvador (learning about Archbishop Romero, first trip to a real art museum) and an afternoon at the beach eating shrimp cocktails, which made it seem like a real vacation for the Genesis folks. Still, when we crossed the border into Nicaragua, everyone breathed a sigh of relief. “Even if I get lost now, I can still find my way home!” Geovanny told me.

There were many wonderful moments during our trip to El Salvador, but one of the best came at the end, when the Genesis members all began calculating what they could do with money they had left from their per diems.

Jamileth waved her leftover cash at me and said, “With this, I’m going to buy a washing machine. I’ve already found a deal on new ones at the market.” Imagine what Jamileth and her daughter can do with all the time they’ll save once they don’t have to wash the family’s clothes by hand all weekend long.

Ramona’s mother celebrated her 95^th birthday the day we got back to Nicaragua. “I’m going to buy a toilet and have it installed in the house,” Ramona told me. “That way my poor mother won’t have to go out to the latrine in the mud during the rains.”

So, was the trip to El Salvador a success? Absolutely. – Becca