Today on March 1st, 2022 our group split into two separate service groups and headed to different work sites. One location was in the process of building a house. The workers there had three people working on mixing and laying down cement for the walls and outer parts of the house. The rest of the group worked on building doors and shutters. The second service group dug up dirt from one area of the plot and moved it across a creek through an assembly line to carry it up a hill to the work site. The construction workers then laid the dirt on the ground for the floor of the house. 

Lots of hard work was done at the work site before making our way to lunch. The day we had a special activity planned for the afternoon, we had a speaker who spoke to us about his life in the Finca and how difficult the work was. The Finca is a plantation that pays workers very little for hard and long labor. Our speaker told us that he as a young boy would work for twelve hours a day, maybe more. He talked about how he and his friends decided one day to leave the Finca and visit Father Greg. Father Greg took them in and offered them to choose what work they wanted to do, they had never been asked before. Father Greg gave them work and our speaker has worked with Father Greg for a long time after. After leaving The Finca he met a woman and married. They had two children, a daughter and a son. He ended his story with a message about how much he supported women and how strong they are. 

The speaker gave us a lot to talk about so we decided to have our group reflection earlier. Today we t to talk anhad a group reflection that had a deep conversation about perspective. We talked about discrimination as well as some of our first time witnessing discrimination. Our reflection left us emotional and even got us to connect more as a group. Group reflection finished and we were able to have some down time. Some of the group rested up in the hotel. The other half explored the park and the waterfront. The group was exploring the San Lucas park area where Nathan our accompanyers and Nicole one of the travelers got egged with confetti and a real egg! This is a tradition in San Lucas the day before Ash Wednesday. Young boys run around the park with these eggs that can be filled with confetti, colorful flour, or even in Nathan’s case real eggs! The kids try to get as many people with eggs as they can. The group reunited at the hotel before making our way to dinner. Our group had dish duty so we arrived earlier than the other groups to bring out food. Since we decided to do our reflection earlier we were able to have a special evening treat. ICE CREAM! The ice cream shop we visited was located right across the street from the Church. Our entire group had an amazing time choosing the ice cream, we had Cata translate for us to make sure we knew what we ordered. The ice cream was so yummy and everyone enjoyed. All of our bellies were full so we headed to the hotel where we had game night. For tonight’s game we decided to play the game, We’re Not Really Strangers, which was a lot of fun! The game was our own way of getting to know each other better. To wrap up our long eventful day we cleaned up before heading to bed. What another great day in San Lucas!

Lily & Nichole and the Guatemala Girls and Nathan