For our last morning together, we held our devotional in the beautiful outdoor chapel on the GYTTE ranch. The staff members prayed over us, we prayed for them, and we were surprisingly emotional as we sang our final hymns together: Here I Am Lord. They presented us with beautiful clay-painted necklaces (talavera) in the shape of a cross.
We signed our names to the wall that documents each of GYTTE’s mission teams and loaded up the buses to depart for Cholula near Puebla. In Cholula, we enjoyed lunch and visited the ruins of the pyramid. While it is still being excavated and restored, they estimate the base width of the pyramid to be almost twice as large as the ones in Egypt and were apparently built by many civilizations over many years. We even got to climb the many tall steps for a beautiful view of the city from above.
Afterward, we enjoyed some shopping and headed to our hotel in Puebla. In our free time before dinner, some of the group explored the nearby antique stalls called the Toad Market.
The team enjoyed our final supper together and said farewell to missionaries, Nan and Miguel. Some of the team visited the nearby Zocolo in the evening for a last churro and saw an aerial acrobatics show put on for a large crowd in front of the main church. A grand finale for our time in Mexico which definitely lifted our spirits after a lot of farewells.
Today is our last full day at the GYTTE Tree of Life farm in Tlancuapican! We have had such a wonderful time getting to serve with the staff and this mission team! God has truly blessed us this week.
We began our day with coffee, banana bread, and reflection time. Today we learned about the effect that overcrowded animal farming can have, not just in Mexico but all over. Unfortunately, there have been damaged water systems due to pesticides or pandemics like bird or swing flu as a result. In one area where the farming practices have improved here in Mexico, there are still pesticides found in women’s breast milk in that community 40 years later.After a breakfast of chilaquiles and eggs, we split up into our teams. Colleen and 2 others joined a group of local ladies harvesting flowers off jamaica plants. The flowers are then dried, bagged and sold. The leaves make a wonderful drink which we were treated to several times. The jamaica is a type of hibiscus plant. The petals surround a center with sharp edges so you have to be careful pulling the petals.
After a break we headed to church in Tlancualpican. One of our team, Pastor Pat, from St. James church in Maryland, gave the sermon with interpretation from Miguel, one of the missionaries. We were then welcomed with a fellowship supper of nachos. Back at the farm some of the group played games and stargazed, seeing several shooting stars. It was a beautiful day of fellowship.
It’s hard to believe we are already more than halfway through our trip!
We began the day singing songs with our team while we enjoyed sweet bread and coffee. We then had a devotional which provided insight into food insecurity in both the US and Mexico, its higher impact on minorities, and the increased need in recent years. The statistics and effects on real people across both our countries are hard to wrestle with, but it is comforting to be surrounded by fellow Christians who are passionate about being part of the solution.
For our work project, we helped begin the stone walls of a house for one of the local employees at GYTTE. They have a beautiful spot on a hill with a great view of The Valley!
We used traditional construction methods that help keep the home cool and insulated from the heat and are also cheaper because they are readily available vs modern materials (like using rock instead of bricks or cement). Thankfully, GYTTE has a local mason to double-check our work and teach us the correct method!
We completed 1.5 small walls today! The house will be finished over the next few months, but we were glad to work alongside the husband and wife who will live there soon.
Afterwards, we enjoyed a delicious Chile reyeno for lunch with fresh juice and then some time to relax and shower.
In the evening, we joined a class the GYTTE staff were having in town. Hosted at the Methodist church, community members were invited to join and bring their children to learn about self-esteem and self-worth.
While this class was put on by GYTTE staff, they also have about 80 ambassadors across the country who are trained to conduct health classes in their communities on topics like infectious diseases, how to check for breast cancer, living with diabetes, and much more.
After dinner back at the ranch, some of the group played an old classic game, Pig Mania, which garnered a lot of laughs and shouts of “sooieee!”
Today we got to experience how to do things as the locals do in this community, or as GYTTE calls it, Rural Realities training!
We began the day with devotionals and learning more about the cost of living and the value of a dollar. Here, it costs about $15 USD a day to feed a family of 5 or so people, however, the minimum wage is only $11 USD per day. Many people work multiple jobs to make ends meet and don’t have a lot extra.
As part of our rural realities training, we used machetes to chop and gather firewood, learned how to make dough from Maize and made our own tortillas, and got to peel the jamaica (hibiscus) plant by hand which is used to make juice or tea. A full bucket of hibiscus flowers generally takes 2 hours to fill and earns a worker about $1.50 USD. As novices, we had barely filled our bucket more than a couple of inches in that time! It definitely gave us perspective on the value of a dollar.
We also learned about the efficient outdoor kitchens that GYTTE builds for community members which require a fraction of the firewood and have a chimney to make them safer/healthier to use. The fireplaces that are used locally are often under a roof with open walls, and when people are cooking all day around the fire, the smoke exposure is the equivalent of smoking ten packs of cigarettes a day.
Lunch was a dish called mamelas with several different fruit juices and fresh fruit. Mamelas are flat toasted cakes of masa with a sauce and cheese on top. Delicious.
After lunch, we went to the town of Tlancualpican. It is a nearby village on a hilltop. We saw the church Santa Maria de la Ascension. It is a beautiful church with statues of saints on the outside. Then we were treated to ice cream at a local shop. Next, we visited the huge statue of Jesus on a giant rock near the top of the town. Jesus is the patron saint of Tlancualpican. Lastly, we drove by a house built by GYTTE.
Back at the farm, we spent time learning about the effects of NAFTA on the Mexican economy which has hit the Mexican farmers hard. Many lost their farms which is one reason so many have been coming to the US for work. The majority of the men in town are working in the US and sending money home to feed their families and provide for school and medical care.
The last meal of the day was potato salad, chicken salad, and green salad with rice pudding.
A few of us ended the evening stargazing and even spotted a few shooting stars, which we decided was a good omen for the week ahead! Others played games or rested.
What a busy day! Checked out of the hotel at 9:00 and headed to La Fonda de Santa Clara restaurant for a wonderful breakfast buffet – a great way to sample a lot of local dishes at once. The group then headed to tour the underground tunnels that the Mexicans used during the Cinco de Mayo battle against the French. Then off to tour the GYTTE office in Puebla and leave our donated medical supplies. Next, we boarded our bus to the farming city of Tlancuapican where the Tree of Life (Arbor de Vida) training center operated by GYTTE is located.
One thing we learned along the way is that the new president is a positive influence on Mexico. He has raised the minimum wage to $11 USD PER DAY. This has made a big difference in quality of life across the country although the positive effects are slower to trickle down to the rural communities. There is a stark difference as we drive out of the big prosperous city of Puebla.
We drove through lots of agricultural land where the main crop was sugar cane. This is primarily harvested without heavy equipment — with manual labor by people and mules.
When we arrived at the farm, we were shown our dorms, taught how to use the ecological toilets, and then were treated to a wonderful meatball soup for “comida” (lunch). Next, we took a brief walk around the farm – went by the animal stable, the chapel, down to the river where we saw the original missionary house (built from straw-more on this to come), saw the tilapia pool, worked the well and then returned to our dorms to make our beds and settle in. Next, we met in the dining room to get an orientation about GYTTE. We learned about the history, the mission, and the work they do. The mission of GYTTE is to improve lives through community and family health, community development, agricultural development, livestock development, church and faith development, and AWARE development which is what this trip is about. Over our 10 days, we will learn more about what GYTTE does to achieve these goals.
Next a light dinner of salad with lemon meringue pie. Free time after that till bedtime. Looking forward to tomorrow where we participate in a “rural experience day”.