Life from abroad

Week #38 – 10,000 Filters

Robert J Kent Jr — Fri, 27 Apr 2007 00:27:00 +0000

On Tuesday, we presented our project results to the La Ceiba Rotary club. They were so impressed with our girls, they asked them to present at the Rotary District's Incoming Board Members' Conference.

In short, everything that has been going on for the last month has ended well. At our local Rotary meeting, Enelida and Keyla did a PowerPoint of what Pure Water has accomplished so far in La Ceiba. The Rotarians were very pleased and asked if our girls would be interested in doing the same presentation ( Download Here) to all the clubs in Honduras at the District conference. They thought it was important to emphasize what Pure Water and Rotary have been accomplishing by working together and what we could continue to do in the future. This was a great honor for us not only because it showed that our local club supported us but also because Pure Water was the only NGO invited to present at this conference.

What we had to say was impressive. With Rotary and Pure Water working together, we have installed over 10,000 filters between six projects in Honduras. This is over 50,000 people with clean drinking water since 2003. We have another five project sites coming online with grants this next year in Honduras, El Salvador and Nicaragua. Plus there is the work that Mike Swirp is doing in Guatemala and our other project in Haiti. We didn't even touch on the additional benefits of skills and knowledge transfer, job creation, and the grant money injected into the local economies. All told, I think we have made a big difference in this country and we are only now just gearing up.

The rest of the week we spent moving our filter molds into the new workshop. Willie, the owner, is a retired construction manager that is now raising Tilapia and making cinder blocks. He lives in one of the communities where we were installing filters and was so impressed with the technology that he practically leapt out of his seat when I first mentioned moving our workshop. Let's just say at 55, he has more energy than I can possibly keep up with. So with our new partner, we delivered a contract for him to review and dropped off the molds to get production tests started. Next week I will spend out there going over the process of full production but I think he will do just fine.

We also went back to El Recreo to drop off the water bottles and to visit Digna. She was sleeping when we came but her mom said she was doing well. She also said that none of her 11 kids have had a water sickness since installing the filter and Digna has added some weight back on. The mom was actually so thankful for the filter, she made her full payment. Quite a vote of confidence considering how poor she is. Next week we will return with the Rotarians to conduct stool samples and give out deparasiting meds to everyone who has paid for their filter. I think this was also a big reason why she wanted to finish paying off her filter.

All in all, a week a great relief and finally some normality. I can't wait to get filters going again next week

Here is Enelida presenting to all 25 Honduran clubs

Two of the many brothers and sisters of Digna

Bath time for the boys

Delivering the filter molds to Willie's warehouse

Robert Kent Jr- robkentjr@gmail.com
Wat/San/Health Consultant
www.PureWaterForTheWorld.blogspot.com
www.RobJKentJr.blogspot.com
Cell: +504 9871-5318
Work/Home: +1 (631) 458-1119

Week #37 – A corner turned?

Robert J Kent Jr — Wed, 25 Apr 2007 19:17:00 +0000

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This week had us on the edge of our seats. We thought we were that close to having everything we had worked for being wiped clean.

Let me start by saying how much I hate politics and how it can drive good people to make stupid decisions. Moving the filter workshop opened up an opportunity for some people to raise a fuss about the project. This, unfortunately, was directed at our site manager and health promoter, Enelida and Keyla respectively. At 'issue' was their ability to manage the project and how poorly they had done, for example, letting the workshop fail. I don't agree with this at all and thankfully many other people didn't either. I think what happened here is that these two girls speak their minds and in a macho culture they stepped on some toes so they became an easy target to implement a bigger plan.

This larger objective goes back abouttwo years when the La Ceiba project was first put to paper. A contract was drawn up allowing MAMUCA to make, install and follow-up everything to do with the filters, the local Rotary Club would pay them for each filter completed and Pure Water would provide MAMUCA with the technical support it lacked. By the time the grant money finally arrived in October 2006 all the players involved had changed except MAMUCA, so they were still expecting the work and money. When they were told this would not happen a lot of people weren't happy, especially so after we left the filter workshop MAMUCA is still using. This gave some MAMUCA loyalists the perfect opportunity to try and reclaim what had been lost.

Hence, the big meeting this week. All sides were called in and taken to account for what had happened. Rasa and I opted to stay as uninvolved as possible because this decision is for the La Ceiba club to make. They pay Enelida and Keyla out of the grant and it is their Rotary project. Besides, to build sustainability after we leave all decisions need to take place between the people who will stay here and continue the work. As hard as it was to keep quite on this matter, it is ultimately not my project (the mantra of Peace Corps) and the La Ceiba Rotary club has to live with the results. So with four hours of talk, each person was able to give their side of the story as to why we changed workshops and why they are unhappy with our girls.

The result of the meeting took a week to work itself out. This hanging shadow of the girls being fired was extremely damaging to our team moral and for the rest of the week, they were difficult and quarrelsome with Rasa and I. Lashing out at the ones closest to you I suppose. Rasa and I were sick with the thought we might have to go through the whole process of finding and hiring two new people again. Not to mention the possibility of having to work with an ex-employee of Pure Water who might be hired back on by MAMUCA. So not relishing the thought of this, I tried all the Machiavellian options I could think of to turn the situation in our favor. I was tired of being outmaneuvered and smiled at by the same people.

Stay tuned to see how it all turns out. I'll give you a hint: this whole episode ended not at all how I planned but much better than I could have imagined.

It was Keyla's birthday so we brought her to Applebee's

We made another trip to San Pedro Sula to meet Tom Kennedy and his family

Delivering the water bottles, which are much better than buckets

This is Willie and he isthinking how to turn these buckets into plastic filters

Our new filter workshopand Tilapia farm

Robert J Kent Jr- robjkentjr@gmail.com
Wat/San/Health Consultant
www.PureWaterForTheWorld.blogspot.com
www.RobJKentJr.blogspot.com
Cell: +504 9871-5318
Work/Home: +1 (631) 458-1119

Week #36 – Back to the grind

Robert J Kent Jr — Thu, 12 Apr 2007 18:19:00 +0000

As expected, nothing happened with our project while we were gone. Mostly due to the fallout of our decision to move the filter workshop.

The week after we pulled our molds from the workshop there were plenty of second thoughts. Ahem, or maybe bruised egos might be a better way of putting it. Either way, everything was put on hold until we returned from vacation and were able to explain our decision again. So basically, we re-explained all the reasons why we decided to move (poor quality, late delivery, no personal interest in the project) to the same people as before. Today, Rasa and our site manager had another meeting with MAMUCA to do the same thing but as usual no one showed up. So maybe with a stroke of luck everyone will be happy this time and we can finally move into our new workshop and start making filters again.

What happened? Well, in short everyone who needed to know about the decision to move wasn’t told. Our fault? Hard to say. We always try our best to keep everyone informed and accommodated but we are not perfect and can’t be in three places at once, only two. In our first meeting, everyone was invited but of course the people who didn’t show up were the ones who raised the biggest problems. This resulted in us losing three weeks now and then being accused of falling behind schedule. We can’t win. But with a flurry of diplomatic efforts, a show of strength (thanks to Maria our country director) and some down right brownnosing we made everyone happy once again.

Where does this leave us now? We are waiting for a contract to be drawn up for the new workshop. We are all ready and just itching to start producing filters again. The best thing about this has been the time to catch up on all the little things we have been putting off. We were able to make it back to our first community and deliver the plastic water bottles. We also got to check up on the filters we installed to see if they were being used. Out of 68 delivered, 3 have not yet been installed due to lack of payment, 4 made the payment this week and will be installed tomorrow, 1 person didn’t understand how to use it so we retrained them, 1 person wasn’t using it but lied that they were, 58 were being used correctly, and only 1 person didn’t want theirs anymore.

Why didn’t this one person want his filter? I don’t know exactly but I suspect his neighbor of influencing him. When we first installed the filters this particular neighbor didn’t want her filter because she said the sand was dirty and the filter was just a scam. She raised quite a ruckus and we needed the community leader to tell her not to spread lies. It’s a shame because the person who doesn’t want it is very poor with six kids. But what can we do? Keep it in his house hoping he might use it or take it out and give it to someone who wants it? We are going to move it to a house who wants it. There were also seven more houses who asked for filters. I think this community is a success.

I still have one more post to make from our vacation. Maybe this weekend, if we don’t work…

Robert J Kent Jr- robjkentjr@gmail.com
Wat/San/Health Consultant
www.PureWaterForTheWorld.blogspot.com
www.RobJKentJr.blogspot.com
Cell: +504 9871-5318
Work/Home: +1 (631) 458-1119

Granada, Nicaragua

Robert J Kent Jr — Tue, 10 Apr 2007 17:28:00 +0000

We made it to historic city of Granada only to find every single hostel fully booked for Semana Santa. Luckily, Kevin had a Peace Corps friend there who helped us find a place.

We got into town about 9pm at night and had three places we wanted to stay at. But because it was Easter week all our initial choices were full. Not having a lot of money to spend we didn’t really have a choice and ended up staying in the refugee lodge. At least it was a bed even it did feel like I was sleeping on a single 2×4. Ah, the joys of traveling. No matter, the next day Kevin and Ray checked out to leave for Managua and we changed hotels to one on the main street ( 11° 55′ 47.2″N, 85° 57′ 6.0″W). We had planned to leave that day with Kevin but couldn’t get confirmation for a bus. So we decided to stay an extra day to eat waffles and go house hunting with Kevin’s friend Sam.

Granada is in the process of trying to get World Heritage status so it is investing heavily into fixing up the city. In the last three years, this has sent house prices on an upward trajectory. And compared to all the other cities we have seen, Rasa and I really enjoyed Granada and think it is by far the grandest of them all. It was nice of Sam to take us into the best houses on the city and show us all the local hotspots. He is a returned Peace Corps volunteer that decided to stay in Granada after his service and open a surf camp. In the mean time he is selling property with Coldwell Banker until he can make enough money to get his dream started. If we only had money…

After our day of house hunting and unsuccessful trans-national bus tickets we had no choice but to get home using local buses. The next morning (Good Friday) we set out at 5 am on the first minibus out of town. In Managua, our driver tried to run over a traffic cop to beat an oncoming parade to the intersection. We ended up having to take a taxi the rest of the way because it looked like our driver was going to be spending Easter in jail. The bus terminal was deserted and there was only one more bus to the border town with Honduras. Fortunately, we made it there three hours before the bus left and were able to get seats because if people could have hung out the windows to get on they would have.

The bus dropped us off on the main street of Ocotal and told us to wait for another bus. By now it was 3 pm and the border closed at 4. We waited until 3:30 and then decided that we would get a hotel because there was no more transport today. Then a taxi found us and said there was plenty of transport on the Honduran side, he had just got back from there. Reluctantly, we decided to go. We ended up sneaking across because there was no more money to pay the exit tax. Once in Honduras, there was nothing! Not a single car, person or even a fricken bicycle to get us to El Pariso. So we started to walk the 12km to town and food. After about an hour a bus of church goers came by and decided to pick us up!

From El Pariso, it was old hat to get home. We finally made it back to La Ceiba at 10 pm Saturday night.

The recently renovated promenade, at night the street is full of restaurants

Just another building in the historic district

Want to buy a house? This palace sold for $350,000.

Or this 6,000 ft² hacienda with sugarcane lined ceilings and 3 ft adobe walls for $180,000?

Or this potential rental property with a view of the volcano for only $100,000?

Every house must have at least 8 rocking chairs to sit outside at night and people watch

Rasa hitchhiking home because there were no more buses at the border

Robert J Kent Jr- robjkentjr@gmail.com
Wat/San/Health Consultant
www.PureWaterForTheWorld.blogspot.com
www.RobJKentJr.blogspot.com
Cell: +504 9871-5318
Work/Home: +1 (631) 458-1119

San Juan del Sur

Robert J Kent Jr — Mon, 09 Apr 2007 03:13:00 +0000

Nicaragua is a place where you have to stay on your toes. San Juan del Sur had some surf but nothing to hop on a plane for.

So far on this trip we have had a decent time, I think mostly because we have stuck to heavily touristed places. But since in Nicaragua two taxis have tried to gouge us, a third dropped us off at the border saying there would be transport on the other side and there wasn't, the touts put us on the bus to Rivas not San Juan del Sur, and worst of all our ATM card was hacked. We were in Managua for all of 30 minutes to change buses and pull money. Turns out 6 hours after we used the ATM there were two more withdrawals for the same amount. We lost $200, got our cards canceled, and are now stuck with limited funds to make it home 5 days early. Bummer. Called the bank right away and they said it shouldn't be a problem, we just need to fill out a dispute form.

Before we were bummed out by our bank cards, we spent the weekend in San Juan at the beach. The city was packed with school buses of people and the crowds didn't really make for a relaxing time. Also because there are so many great bars there, the nightlife gets a little wild. Unfortunately, it is a lot of drunk people looking for trouble and fights. This was horrible for us because we couldn't keep our hotel door open at night to cool down our room. Ah, but the endless stretch of deserted beaches outside of town were worth the sauna room. Kevin and Ray had two days of great breaks, high enough to roll them around. Our days here really reminded me of when we would go beach camping at San Onofry, CA.

Alas, all good things must come to an end (mostly because we couldn't get any more money and needed to go home). We left at 7am for Rivas and then on to Ometepe Island. It is the island in the middle of Nicaragua's central lake and it was formed by two large volcanoes. The best and worst thing about this day was the constant drizzle of rain. It made for a wonderfully cool hike but also killed all chance of seeing the island from the mainland. We could see nothing but clouds and the occasional squall in the distance. Once on the island though, we got a ride out to the lagoon and hiked around for about 4 hours. All the beaches there have black sand and the trees are filled with these blue birds that followed us around as we walked. Sadly, there were no turkeys here only monkeys.

So now we are stuck in Granada trying to find a room to sleep and bus tickets back to Honduras. Everything is filled because of Easter but at least it is a beautiful city and we are looking at property.

Here is Ray learning how to surf (11° 13' 10.7"N, 85° 50' 51.4"W)

I was playing with the turtles instead of getting pounded (11° 17' 44.5"N, 85° 54' 48.2"W)

A tree

a crab

They look pretty nervous

The rain broke on the way home and we could see the twin volcanoes

This is the lagoon within the lake (11° 28' 35.5"N, 85° 38' 4.6"W)

Robert J Kent Jr- robjkentjr@gmail.com
Wat/San/Health Consultant
www.PureWaterForTheWorld.blogspot.com
www.RobJKentJr.blogspot.com
Cell: +504 9871-5318
Work/Home: +1 (631) 458-1119

Passing through El Salvador

Robert J Kent Jr — Wed, 04 Apr 2007 06:46:00 +0000

This leg of our journey took 48-hours but we got to see San Salvador. I think we are just mad in the pursuit of reaching a Nicaraguan surf beach .

We left Flores at 10pm and arrived in Guatemala City at 6 in the morning. With no leg room, it made for a very long bus ride. The capital city is vast and traffic is horrid. The taxi driver actually broke out a paper as we were trying to make our way to the next bus. It made me glad we decided not to spend any more time than necessary in Guatemala City. This whole trip came about because we decided to go to a beach for Kevin to surf. The closest beach with surf, and good food for Rasa, turned out to be 48-hours away in Nicaragua. So this is how we found ourselves on a night bus towards El Salvador and not Belize, as was planned.

El Salvador seemed to be a nice place, from the little we saw of it. Driving along the roads we noticed how much higher the population density is compared to Honduras; same population but 1/3 the country size. They also have a lot more malls than I have seen so far in Honduras, Mexico and Guatemala. I would say El Salvador is a well off country but very expensive because everything is in dollars; all the prices are American because they use only dollars there. Subway cost us a ridicules $14 for lunch, granted this was with extra cheese though. Another noticeable difference was we were out until 1am and then walked home. This is something we could never do in say San Pedro Sula. But overall, I'd say San Salvador is larger and more developed city than any we have seen so far in Central America. And we had some fun here.

We did spend the night in El Salvador but left at 4:30 the next morning. Only about 12 hours total in the place. Our ultimate goal was to make it out of El Salvador, through Honduras, and deep into Nicaragua to San Juan del Sur by the end of the day, which we did by 10 at night. It is official that Nicaragua has the worst roads in Central America. Distance is meaningless when you are stuck in a roadblock for 45 minutes. The trip from the capital to the beach should be 2 hours by HONDURAN time, it took us five! We were floored that roads could be so bad and take so long to travel over. Whatever, we made it to the beach and the journey had its interesting moments.

Tomorrow we surf.

At 6:00am in Guatemala City the traffic is so bad you can read a paper

This was our $6 room in San Salvador (13° 42' 34.9"N, 89° 12' 37.6"W)

Immigration to leave El Salvador at the border with Honduras

Just a poster in the trucker stop bathroom

This bus had one of those new elastic stick shifts

Our sauna room with no ventilation in San Juan del Sur (11° 15' 8.5"N, 85° 52' 15.9"W)

Robert J Kent Jr- robjkentjr@gmail.com
Wat/San/Health Consultant
www.PureWaterForTheWorld.blogspot.com
www.RobJKentJr.blogspot.com
Cell: +504 9871-5318
Work/Home: +1 (631) 458-1119

Flores, Guatemala

Robert J Kent Jr — Tue, 03 Apr 2007 02:10:00 +0000

Our first morning in Flores we had two goals: find an ATM and get to Tikal. Luckily, since the place is crawling with minivan drivers, a guy found and took us everywhere we needed to go.

We decided to stay on the island of Flores and not actually in Tikal. Flores is only a 45-minute ride away and it was easy enough to find transportation back and forth. The main reason we decided not to stay in Tikal was the price, everything there is about twice as expensive with much worse service. Besides, Flores is a great backpacker town and had no shortage of good restaurants, wireless hotspots and cheap places to stay. Our room in the Hotel Pasado Tayazal (16° 55' 51.7"N, 89° 53' 32.3"W) was on the top floor, overlooking the lake, all for $13 per night. The biggest problem with staying on the island is there are no ATMs and we needed to walk into town for money. Not fun at high noon in the relentless sun.

The Tikal Ruins are the best we have seen, even better than Chichen-Itza. This is not because there are wild turkeys running around everywhere, but because it is such a massive complex preserved in harmony with the jungle. A highlight was the lack of crowds, letting us climb a temple and have it all to ourselves. Adding to this remoteness was the abundance of wildlife; turkeys!, birds galore, civet cats, monkeys, alligators, etc. We loved the trails because they were cut into the jungle so as to preserve the canopy and provide shade for the 20 minute walks in between ruin groups. Some of the pyramids are still in their natural state so you can see how the jungle reclaimed them after a thousand years of abandonment.

My favorite part of Tikal is Temple IV. This is the biggest and highest ruin of the whole complex. The base of the temple is still covered in jungle and you need to use a stairway up to the top. But once there, you are well above the jungle canopy and can see the entire site (10 mi²). The top is in the process of being renovated so it has been cleared of all its trees and the stone work is being refaced. I hope they leave the bottom half covered in jungle because it just adds to the romanticism of the moment. It's hard to explain climbing up 12-stories of stairs, engulfed in cool, damp jungle and then emerging onto the sun drenched alter to peer out over a never-ending jungle with only punctuated temple tops breaking through in the distance. (17° 13' 25.7"N, 89° 37' 47.3"W)

The next day we decided to skip Belize and take a night bus to Guatemala City so we had a free day to sit around and finally spend some time relaxing. We woke up and basically spent the entire day in a cafe drinking coffee, eating Panini and playing on the internet. Ray being an explorer took a half day tour to an animal sanctuary and view point looking down on the island. Kevin and I thought it would be more fun to stay in our cafe and continue adding to our Central American Beer Comparison. Rasa and I also did some shopping that night and I almost bought a giant quilt but decided not to because Rasa wouldn't let me put it on the bed if I did. She just doesn't have an appreciation for multi-color garments like I do.

Tonight we start out on our 48-hour bus journey to San Juan del Sur, Nicaragua. It's supposed to be a great surf spot and beach resort on the Pacific side.

Turkey crossing! Go slow please

A wild Oscellated Turkey

The Gran Plaza

Temple #1 taken from atop the Central Acropolis

Remember this scene from the original Star Wars in 1979?

Our very own pyramid to sit on top of
(Did I mention I got my hat back?)

A typical street in Flores, Guatemala

Robert J Kent Jr- robjkentjr@gmail.com
Wat/San/Health Consultant
www.PureWaterForTheWorld.blogspot.com
www.RobJKentJr.blogspot.com
Cell: +504 9871-5318
Work/Home: +1 (631) 458-1119

Bonampak & Yaxchilan Ruins

Robert J Kent Jr — Mon, 02 Apr 2007 02:18:00 +0000

We had to leave at 6am and didn't arrive until 10:30pm, another long day of traveling. In the end though, it was worth it to see some recently uncovered ruins.

The first site we stopped at was Bonampak Ruins (16° 42' 13.8"N, 91° 3' 53.5"W) and is famed for it's graphic frescoes. It provided the proof that changed archaeologists' minds about the Mayans being a peaceful people. It is small, really only one main complex uncovered so far but impressive none the less. The frescoes reminded us of the king's tombs in Egypt. The site was only opened up to mass tourism by road in the last 10 years so you could still see where the first airstrip was cut into the jungle. Other than our group, there was only a couple of other people there so we got to spend as long as we wanted in the painted chambers.

Yaxchilan: where Indiana Jones would come for fun. The site is only accessible by boat and sits right on the edge of a remote river with howler monkeys, iguanas, and all sorts of birds adding to it's ambiance. This was the first Mayan ruin we have been to that had a temple passage actually going somewhere. You enter the complex through a narrow valley and then are herded into a long corridor with a single doorway at the end. You enter at the base of the ruin and go around three corners and up some stairs in complete darkness until you see light at the end of the tunnel. You exit at the top of a temple and are looking down into the main acropolis. Quite a grand entrance and was unique compared to the Mayan ruins I have seen elsewhere.

After here it was lunch and then a 1-hour boat ride to the Mexican border with Guatemala. We got off the boat and walked into Bethel and waited for our bus. After about 45 minutes a group of guys got up from a table playing cards and drinking and went to the bus. We followed thinking it was our bus but it was only the local one. I guess it's okay to drink and drive if it's local. So after that we waited so more for our 5:00 bus to arrive 20 minutes late. By time we made it to immigration it was already 5:30 but they were still there. Luckily we got our passports stamped for another 90 days in CAFTA. From here it was only a 5-hour ride on a dirt road to Flores. Starving and exhausted by the time we arrived, we dumped our bags and set out for dinner.

Tomorrow we are off to Tikal. These are supposed to be some of the best ruins in Central America.

A doorway lintel showing the sacrifice of a captured warrior

Also in the left of this fresco is the beheading of a sacrificial victim

These are the nests for a noisy little bird that made it sound like a real jungle

Kevin walking up to a ruin in Yaxchilan

The entrance way into Yaxchilan (16° 54' 0.3"N, 90° 57' 56.1"W)

Our river transportation to Yaxchilan and the Guatemala border

Kevin walking across the border into Guatemala

Robert J Kent Jr- robjkentjr@gmail.com
Wat/San/Health Consultant
www.PureWaterForTheWorld.blogspot.com
www.RobJKentJr.blogspot.com
Cell: +504 9871-5318
Work/Home: +1 (631) 458-1119

Palenque, Mexico

Robert J Kent Jr — Fri, 30 Mar 2007 02:18:00 +0000

We arrived in Palenque about 10:30 at night and went strait to our hotel. It was like we found a lost hippy commune of the 60s.

The hotel is right outside the entrance to the park and about 3.5km from town. The whole complex is made up of little cottages set in the jungle; ours was a six minute walk to the main restaurant. Apparently, the place is run by a bunch of hippies who perform fire dancing, music and make jewelry to sustain themselves. At night there are two stages, both with great bands that play as long as the crowd keeps buying beer. They also cook some great food and the best pizza I've had yet on the trip. I guess if you are out in the middle of nowhere and you get the munchies, you would want to cook the best food possible. It was a great value for only $20 per night and we split that three ways.

The next morning we were walking on the main road to the ruins with a group of other people ahead of us. Watching them, they all crossed the street and walked into the bushes. Thinking it was a shortcut and always excited to run through the jungle, I tried looking where they went in as we passed by. The only thing I could see was a big bush. Disappointed, we turned to keep going when a guy popped out of a bush and offered us mushrooms. Not really wanting any because I had some on my pizza last night, I turned him down. But we did see those other four people at the ruins later and they seemed very happy. They must have been vegetarians eager to have fresh organic mushrooms.

The ruins were okay. Rasa and I feel we are a little jaded when it comes to seeing ruins now. It's a shame because Mayan architecture is so amazing when you think of seeing such a great culture right on our own continent. We got some pictures but felt it was, as usual, packed with bus loads of tourists. The other eyesore was the stands of very bad handicrafts covering any available open space and not a single person selling water. It's hard to believe a culture once capable of building pyramids can't even carve a piece of wood now. The best thing about Palenque though, is the trail through the ruins and down past the waterfalls. This was actually very enjoyable once we got away from the throngs of people. We had the park to ourselves and were able to stroll at our leisure.

The highlight of Palenque has to be the Agua Azul waterfalls. The water is very high in minerals so it gives the river a chalky, blue color and creates these basins to catch the water. It's the same process that takes place inside a cave but only on a much larger scale in the river. We booked our transport to the river for $10 per person and got there about 2pm. It was the perfect time for pictures as we hiked up stream, finding our own little swimming hole. The rest of the time we picnicked and played with the local kids until 5pm. Something we only noticed because we needed an empty plastic bottle to collect my sand was there is no trash here. Then thinking about it, we have seen very little trash the whole time in Mexico. It's a beautiful country!

Tomorrow we leave for Flores, Guatemala. We will stop by two more ruins and travel on the river for part of the way. More when we are back on line.

Our jungle hut hotel at El Panchan (17° 29' 18.5"N, 92° 1' 28.2 "W)

Agua Azul waterfalls about 50km from Palenque (17° 15' 9.5"N, 92° 6' 55.8"W)

Note the sign: DANGEROUS NOT TO SWIM

So Kevin decided to be safe and go swimming

Rasa made some friends that tempted her in

The main temple in the Palenque Ruins

The main acropolis of the ruins

Robert J Kent Jr- robjkentjr@gmail.com
Wat/San/Health Consultant
www.PureWaterForTheWorld.blogspot.com
www.RobJKentJr.blogspot.com
Cell: +504 9871-5318
Work/Home: +1 (631) 458-1119

A special PWW moment in El Recreo

Robert J Kent Jr — Thu, 29 Mar 2007 18:40:00 +0000

Installing 70 filters in our first community, we were exhausted by the end of the 4th day. We had only the most far flung, uphill homes remaining and we were ready to call it quits when we met Digna.

Rob, Jeff and I hiked up to one of these mountain-top houses to scope out the trail. Arriving at the house we were all ready to put it off until the next day, when we could make a proper sling to carry the filters. As I was speaking to Maria, a 39-year old mother of 11 children, I noticed the huge eyes of her youngest daughter. I commented about how frail she looked and the mom immediately began to tell me that Digna has had diarrhea for the past 8 days. She was so weak, she couldn't even stand on her own and her skin had no elasticity because of dehydration.

I began telling the mother she should use SODIS (Solar Disinfection) until she can get a filter. SODIS is when you keep a plastic bottle of water kept in the sun for 24 hours to kill all the bacteria. Ironically enough, with all the plastic trash in this country this family was too poor to even buy a bottle of coke so there were no bottles to be found. I rushed over to Rob and Jeff, my ears filled with the sounds of Digna howling, and told them, "We have to install this filter today!". Before I turned around to talk more with Maria the boys were already off looking for sticks to make a stretcher. By the time I fetched Enelida and our buckets, the boys had already rounded up an army of help and had the filter harnessed to a stretcher.

The trail was not really a trail at all but a stream channel with a lot of big rocks. The best thing about this whole situation though was to see all the people who pitched in to help bring this filter to the family in need, which could not afford to wait another week. We arrived at the top of the hill at their house to see Maria beaming at us and her new filter. Enelida and I started installing the filter right away with our little army of helpers watching everything. I almost felt like we were in an operating room “water, we need more water”, “bucket, dump this bucket”. We finished up and said we would return in three weeks with the water jugs and to check up on how Digna was doing.

20 Days Later

Upon returning to El Recreo, I was very pleased to see Digna wobbling on her own when I entered their house. This community is very fortunate, they have transportation that passes by about twice a day. It is a small truck that makes the hour trip to the main road and from there to the health clinic. Luckily, Digna’s mother was able to make the trip and get the medication she needed to save Digna's life. She had parasites, amoebas, and a urinary tract infection, most likely all caused by poor sanitation and dirty water.

The filters are not a cure but a preventative solution. Now that Digna’s system has been cleared of parasites and infection, the filter along with the health education her mother received will reduce and potentially eliminate instances of gastro-intestinal illnesses. That means children like Digna will have the strength and can get the needed nutrients to develop properly instead of losing them to parasites. In the long run, this will lead to an increased attendance at school because they are not home sick, they can pay attention and not be suffering discomfort, and hopefully from their improved education they will have better opportunities in life.

Digna Dunia Marisol Martes, 17 months old on February 7, 2007

Our army of kids helping to carry whatever they could grab

The valiant group of porters passing through a stream trying not to trip

Over the hills and through the woods, while carrying 150 pound filter

Success, we made it up the hill!

Rasa Siminkas Kent- rsiminkas@gmail.com
Wat/San/Health Consultant
www.PureWaterForTheWorld.blogspot.com
www.RobJKentJr.blogspot.com
Cell: +504 9871-5396
Work/Home: +1 (631) 458-1119