Threads – Climate Resilience in Guatemala Starts with Choice

Episode transcript:

Kyle Rudge (00:02):

It begins with a single thread woven through other thread and then another and another until we have a single piece of fabric. That fabric is stretched, cut and stitched together with another just like it. This process is repeated over and over and over until we have a beautiful tapestry that all began with a single thread. Welcome to an MCC Threads, where we look closely at how our stories in Manitoba weave together with the stories of MCC and its partners around the world.

Marta Bunnett Wiebe (00:51):

I left Guatemala full of stories and the faces of people who had shared their stories and also lots of questions.

Kyle Rudge (01:00):

Today we hear stories from a learning tour in Guatemala. Meet Marta.

Marta Bunnett Wiebe (01:05):

My name is Marta Bunnett Wiebe and I coordinate the peace and advocacy program for MCC Manitoba and I work out of the Winnipeg office.

Kyle Rudge (01:13):

Marta recently went on a learning tour to Guatemala, but what did she do there?

Marta Bunnett Wiebe (01:17):

I have spent a lot of time learning about Guatemalan history in the last number of weeks, wanting to understand the context in which people like Dario and like Noreen are living.

Kyle Rudge (01:29):

We'll hear both of Dario and Noreen stories in a moment. But first, what does a Peace and Advocacy Coordinator do?

Marta Bunnett Wiebe (01:37):

Yeah, I often say the peace and advocacy program could include a million different things. For me, at this time, my focus within the peace and advocacy program is around connecting with churches and community groups and schools a lot around climate change and creation care and our responsibility and role in responding.

Kyle Rudge (01:59):

Marta also organizes local workshops that help people have really difficult conversations with one another.

Marta Bunnett Wiebe (02:05):

That could be around creation care and climate. That could be a really difficult family situation you have, or a church conflict your community might be facing. It could be, you know, tough political questions that you are trying to navigate with family and friends.

Kyle Rudge (02:22):

So there's the context. That's who Marta is. That's her job. That's her role. So what did she do while in Guatemala?

Marta Bunnett Wiebe (02:31):

So, as part of my role, I had this opportunity to go and visit partner organizations of MCC to learn about what those partner organizations are doing, to listen to understand the context of Guatemala more and to bring some of those stories back and share those with folks here in Manitoba. I was gone for just over a week in the middle of February. In that really cold week or two, I had the fortune of being in the tropics.

Kyle Rudge (03:02):

One of the things that sets MCC apart is their intentional and deliberate work with local partners and the local church and trusting them and empowering them to know what is best for their local communities.

Marta Bunnett Wiebe (03:14):

One of the partners that we visited, MCC Partners, INEMGUA or the National Evangelical Mennonite Church of Guatemala, also known as the K'ekchi' Mennonite Church. The K'ekchi' are one of 22 indigenous people groups in Guatemala that trace their history and their origin to the Mayan people. K'ekchi' is also the language of the K'ekchi' people. There's a thriving K'ekchi' Mennonite church in Guatemala, mostly northeast of Guatemala City. And so this national church is a partner of MCC.

Kyle Rudge (03:55):

The K'ekchi' people are primarily located in the hilly highlands and tropical jungles of Guatemala. The history of the K'ekchi' Mennonite churches goes back to the late sixties, early seventies where missionaries from Eastern Mennonite missions in the US came to Guatemala.

Marta Bunnett Wiebe (04:09):

To provide health supports and education within the K'ekchi' community. And I think through their presence, a evangelical church was formed and continues to grow. There are between 150 and 200 K'ekchi' Mennonite churches in Guatemala today. The day we went to Bezaleel and met students at the school there, was a hot sunny day. We were driving in by bus through the mountainous area, lots of curves and hills in the road. We were greeted and taken to the gymnasium at the school and met I think there were 12 students that we met with there. And they told us about their lives at the school and their lives with their families and how their families are seeing climate change impact them in their day-to-day lives.

Kyle Rudge (05:03):

Guatemala's agriculture is what you would call a subsistence farming agriculture. Farmers would perhaps grow a little crops for themselves, but primarily a cash crop specifically to be sold. While you might think a primary cash crop in Guatemala is coffee, which is definitely one of the major ones. Marta's answer of what the biggest one was shocked me.

Marta Bunnett Wiebe (05:23):

In Guatemala, a very common cash crop is cardamom. Guatemala is one of the highest exporters of cardamom even though it's not used in the local diet or culture very much.

Kyle Rudge (05:39):

So who did Marta meet and speak with while she was there? What are the stories that she heard?

Marta Bunnett Wiebe (05:44):

Noreen was excited that they are having squash as one of their snacks at the school, a squash that she and her classmates are involved in growing and learning how to grow right on the schoolyard. We also got to tour a bean field and see where they're planning to put in their crops for the rainy season this year. We saw them preparing the land for that. Noreen is also very committed to taking care of the land and the forests in which she lives. She was very adamant that that was part of her and her community's role. Noreen alongside her classmates, were excited to be learning about these new crops and how to grow these crops, how to incorporate some new techniques like intercropping so that they can grow as many vegetables as they can on their small families' plots of lands. They were looking forward to being able to take this knowledge and these learnings home to their communities to support their family's nutrition, their family's health, as well asto hopefully provide a bit of income for their families as well.

Kyle Rudge (07:05):

As you can imagine, the effects of climate change are probably most felt by communities like this. A community that relies not only on the crops for their livelihood, but also for their sustenance. A bad year can really spell disaster that became readily apparent. When we heard the story of Dario.

New Speaker (07:26):

When we were visiting in INEMGUA, we met with a number of young adult leaders within the K'ekchi' Mennonite Church. So these are individuals who have a leadership role in their local church communities. They were folks coming from across the region. In particular, the story of Dario stands out. Dario is a passionate young man. He is a husband and a father to two children, and he has a third child coming soon.

Kyle Rudge (08:03):

Dario, as you could expect, was a farmer and his primary cash crop was cardamom.

Marta Bunnett Wiebe (08:08):

He lives in a remote villagein a lush, mountainous region of Guatemala called Alta Verapaz. Dario's tall, dark Hair, was excited to teach us a couple phrases in K'ekchi'. And so we had, he taught us in K'ekchi', and that was translated to Spanish and then translated to English. He was very excited to tell us about his home community and the things that his church is doing, and also to tell us how his life is being impacted by climate change, specifically by severe drought. Dario spoke of the past several years being difficult with decreased rainfall and less cloud cover or shade, which is really important for cardamom and also for coffee, which is another export crop in Guatemala. Due to the severe drought and the lack of rain, Dario's corn yield was cut in half and because of the severe heat and no cloud cover, his cardamom plants died. He spoke of them as burning up. There was just no rain and no cloud cover, which cardamom needs. Because there was no rain in the rainy season, it also meant that the natural water springs in the mountains also dried up. And so whereas in a dry season, families and communities would rely on these natural springs, that disappeared. Dario spoke of needing to travel into towns from his remote village in the mountains into towns to buy water, an expense that wouldn't usually be expected, being limited in how much water he could purchase in the nearby town. Likely not enough to irrigate his crops, maybe just enough to get by with household water needs. And should you decide to attempt to purchase water for irrigation, needing to travel even further afield to purchase water and also pay for the transportation of that water to your community.

Kyle Rudge (10:20):

So how does this affect somebody like Dario? What are their hopes, their dreams, their desires for their own future?

Marta Bunnett Wiebe (10:27):

Dario has a desire to stay on the land to continue growing food for his family, and he really doesn't want to have to leave his home to seek work elsewhere. But he's also concerned about how he will make a livelihood and take care of his young growing family.

Kyle Rudge (10:47):

What were some of the running themes, the consistent stories that kept cropping up through her time in Guatemala?

Marta Bunnett Wiebe (10:53):

One of the reoccurring themes or messages in our time in Guatemala was that the work of MCC and its partners is about providing individuals and families and communities with agency, with choice, with options such that they're not forced into something by a challenging situation like drought. Whether that's supporting communities to be able to organize solve problems locally or supporting young adults to learn new things, giving their family different options and possibilities of things to grow in their fields. And that feels like it connects to peace. Peace looks like many things. And one of the things that peace looks like is families and communities having options and opportunities and not having to be forced to make really difficult decisions. Decisions like leaving their home to seek work or send a family member away to a different part of the country to get work. So as I think about Climate Action for Peace, I see now MCC working in Guatemala, offering these opportunities to young people and to their families by responding to climate change such that these families and communities can continue living in in more peaceful ways and aren't forced into hard decisions

Kyle Rudge (12:25):

When it comes to climate change. It can feel very overwhelming. My actions here in Manitoba, how do they have an impact in Guatemala? And if they do, but what can I possibly do to change that and how do I know what is the right thing to do and what can - and those questions just keep coming and coming and one can feel very overwhelmed. So I asked Marta how we should deal with that. How do we consider that and how do we make a difference with climate and peace?

Marta Bunnett Wiebe (12:59):

Now when I think of that question, I think of Noreen. Noreen comes from a family that doesn't really have as many options as I do in my home and the place where I live here in Manitoba. Even so, Noreen is committed to doing what she can in her place and bringing her community along to respond to the things that she can. How can I do that one thing in my neighborhood? How can I take up even small practices and involve my community? Even if I can't change all of the big global issues I can commit to doing something in my neighborhood, in my community, in my province? That can be one of those pieces. Why shouldn't I join in that group of people who are doing what they can in the places where they're living, in their neighborhoods and communities?

Kyle Rudge (13:57):

If climate change is affecting you, whether emotionally, spiritually, or even physically, there are options. There are things that you can do, and you can head to mcc.org and search for Climate Action for Peace, to find out more, MCC Threads is produced by KR Words with story assistance from Jessica Burtnick. Big thank you to Marta for telling us all of the stories of Noreen, of Dario and the learning tour to Guatemala. I'm Kyle Rudge, and this is MCC Threads.