a different normal

"Across all barriers of land and language, wealth and poverty, knowledge, ignorance, we are sill one, created from the same dust, subject to the same laws and destined for the same end. With this compassion you can say, "In the expression of the oppressed I recognize my own face and in the hands of the oppressed I recognize my own hands, which speak of powerlessness and helplessness. Their flesh is my flesh, their blood is my blood, their pain is my pain, and their smile is my smile. Their is nothing in me that they would find strange and there is nothing in them that I would not recognize. In my heart, I know their yearning for love, and down to my entrails I can feel their cruelty. In another's eyes I see my plea for forgiveness and in a hardened from I see my refusal. When someone murders I know that I too could have done that, and when someone gives birth, I know I am capable of that as well. In the depths of my being, I have met my fellow being for whom nothing is strange , neither love ,nor hate, nor life, nor death."

Henri J.M Nouwen

I sat on my hotel bed flipping through the interview questions. "The 5 most common causes of death . . .The number of women who have died in childbirth each year. . . the number of disabled. . . incidence of malaria, tuberculosis, aids. . .the number of children less than 1 year old that die each year" seriously. Nothing like a good icebreaker. The first day was the project of just learning how to ask questions in a way that conversation could flow well. The hospitality shown was humbling, the responses. . . surprising. Almost everyone has had malaria in the village, but because of the socialized medicine most have been able to recuperate by purchasing pills from the local health clinic for 5 lempira/pill (cheap). Most suffer from p. vivax (the less harmful form) but p. falciparum, a deadly strain, is also common. And the most common cause of death. . . getting hit by a car. Flood season comes and when village roads turn to rivers, villagers are left with no choice but to use the nearby highway to go to and from school. 18 children have been killed since 2000. "They die like animals," says one father. Drivers don't even stop, due to the risk of confrontation with families (death by violence/scuffles/breakouts with is also common)

Since we wrote the grant for the project, there has been some political tension in the village. Guadalupe, once a land reform, was bought and taken over by a wealthy Honduran government commissioner in 2000. Long story short, conflict in late 2008 caused villagers to surround the commissioner's house and burn it to the ground. This didn't go down well with the commissioner, who was in another one of his houses during the protest. He blacklisted all of the village's influential leaders and council members, prohibiting them from leaving the village to get jobs at the penalty of death. 2 people tried to escape earlier in January, but were apprehended and incarcerated, awaiting execution . Diane, the missionary, got in contact with amnesty international and they got involved, delaying further action. The villagers are still imprisoned but alive. The stress from this situation has shifted the main concern of the village from the issue of drainage to the need for freedom. The presence is evident there. . .every day we stop at a barricade to get searched by battalion officers before we can enter, and must also pass the same checkpoint to exit.