Terrero Colorado (by Todd)

James and I work in two aldeas: Terrero Colorado and Los Izotes. I've finally gotten around to putting up some pictures for them.

This entry is about "Terrero." It's the closer of the two aldeas to Talanga. James and I spend every Tuesday there. At first, it used to take us half an hour to get there, bouncing over this bumpy, pot-holed, dirt road. Now that we're old hands at the deal, James and I can get there in 15 to 20 mins.

Terrero Colorado is divided into two parts, an upper and lower part. In between, there's a stretch of road with no houses. The lower part has a pretty good water supply, although it is not piped INTO their houses, just to right outside. The upper part has water that goes INTO their houses, into sinks and stuff, but that water supply fails for most of the summer. No one has electricity.

As seems typical of the aldeas, the men typically work during the day, in some sort of agriculture. The women stay around the house doing house work. And the kids go to school or play around.

James' and my typical schedule is like this: In the morning, we go in and play with the kids. Since school started, instead of playing, we've been helping out in the one-room, one-teacher, 50+ kid school. Around lunchtime, we visit a few houses, just to spend time with the people and see them in their homes. Then, in the afternoon, we run an adult's group (the idea being that the adults can help us organize the community), followed by a youth/kid's group.

Ok, enough talk. Here are the pictures.

This is a view from the road through Terrero (in the lower part). You can see how gorgeous the vistas are - I love them. You can also make out three houses. They're spread far apart, which is pretty typical.

Gosh, these guys are cute. They're three of the younger kids we know well: Mauricio, Fernando, and Marcela.

This is me with Margery (left) and Bessy (right), two of the kids we know best from the aldea. Since day one, these two love to hang out with us and play games all morning. At this particular moment, we were singing Christmas Carols, and, unbeknowst to them, I was preparing to tickle them!

This is us with a bunch of the kids from the youth/children's group we run. More than anything, they love to play games. Sharks and Minnows, Red Light Green Light, Marco Polo - all of them are HUGE hits.

I am quite, quite proud of this picture :). I really can't claim credit; it was just dumb luck. Her name is Danisela - she's three years old and just ADORABLE. She's also a bit of a terror to all the animals that live around. She's been known to toss kittens through the air and leave puppies stranded on a stool. But she is cute.

I took the picture when they had just harvested the corn, which they themselves grow. Most of their food they buy with the wages of the men, who typically work with crops for some bigger land owner. But they grow their own beans and corn (for tortillas). For about a month there, every time we'd visit a house, the people would be scraping the corn kernels off the husks.

I love this picture. I like to call it, "James enjoys the company of the children in Terrero Colorado." As they all grab his ears. Heh heh.

And that's Terrero Colorado. This is one of the aldeas where we are sponsoring two girls to go to secondary school.

Until next time!