Beginning Phase 2 of the Greenhouses Project, January 2023

Additional details are in these emails, November surprise…for Phase 2 of the Greenhouses Project and Two villages will receive agricultural…sustainable solutions in January 2023!

The origin of Phase 2 (January 2023) is detailed at this page: Mini Greenhouses, January-March 2023

On January 8, 2023, Sowing Opportunities’ Project Manager Ricardo San José Roca and our Agricultural Engineer, Federico Arriola Cuéllar traveled to the two villages of Chajmaic and Salaguna.  Ricardo stayed for seven days and Federico is living in the villages, among the people, for a minimum of two months. 

In the village of Chajmaic, where we’ve worked since 2018, the team had a meeting with a group in Chajmaic, and below is a video of the meeting, with one of the village elders thanking us for not forgetting them, and for continuing to help them:

One of the women leaders of the Greenhouses Project in Chajmaic, Lety, showed our team how she was growing in the greenhouse that was established in March 2022.  She is utilizing every available space, and even has a small chicken coop at the end of the greenhouse bed, which is doing well:

Lety’s greenhouse, taking advantage of all the available space

Lety led us in November 2022 to learn about a nearby village which is even more destitute because many of the men have gone to the U.S.   This nearby village (30 minutes away, along the same highway number 5, and using the same river, El Río Cahabón), is Salaguna.

Our team went to Salaguna on January 8, 2023 and began teaching greenhouse farming.  One of the key points about Salaguna is that, because of their isolation, almost none of them speaks Spanish.  Therefore, Lety was our team’s translator from Q’echqi’ to Spanish.  Because Lety couldn’t translate everything, the team relied on gestures and eye contact to convey meaning and establish trust.

Lety translating – in Salaguna almost no one speaks Spanish

In this video, our Chajmaic leader Lety, explains to the women of Salaguna that the agricultural project is real, that it does work, and she tells them that we are very good people, that they can trust us.

They hear this, see the corn kernels, and see the Sowing Opportunities team as having been sent by God.  (42 seconds)

A village elder in Salaguna thanked God that we were there, to help them. (2:51 minutes)

Federico laid out the corn kernels for the 30 family participants.  At this moment, 11 additional women and their children came up to our team, pleading to be included, saying that they will work hard and that they are in great need.  Federico turned to Ricardo and asked him to make some phone calls to our vendors, and work the numbers.  After locating a cell signal, Ricardo came back to the group and told them, “Success!”  We are now working with 41 families in the 2nd village of Salaguna!