Please donate to my Team Dayā fundraising effort – all funds go directly to building schools. If you are curious about Building Change with Team Dayā, please contact our Head of Recruiting Jaryd Knutsen.
By Scott Cunningham, Team Dayā member
There is nothing greater than to take a risk, to embark on adventure, and to find unexpected surprises along the way. In many respects, it is a reward often greater than the expected outcome. In this case, uncovering truths with first hand knowledge, some might consider primary research, of the people of Aldea Santo Tomas Xacalta Guatemala was equal to or greater than the expected outcome of building them a new primary school. To raise money and build them a school was the visible part of the iceberg above the water line. To understand who they are, see how they live, and learn about their desires is the far greater substance of the iceberg below the water line that you often don’t get to experience.
We all hear and some of us feel the migration and immigration challenges the U.S. faces. And even on a trek to Central America to build a school with Team Dayā, the relevance of U.S. immigration is an association at best in my consciousness to start. Living among the people of Aldea Santo Tomas Xacalta, who speak the Mayan language Qʼeqchi, it becomes very real when the realization of their inadequate infrastructure is in stark contrast to the basic human amenities nearly all Americans enjoy.
Language. The people of Aldea Santo Tomas Xacalta speak Q’eqchi (pronounced Quay-Chee). This is a Mayan language common in the north central part of Guatemala and parts of southern Belize and Mexico. Many speak some Spanish as well, especially males. However, upon the covenant signing at the beginning of the week when all community adults agree to the school covenants, such as gender equality, many signed with their fingerprints thereby making their mark indicating the low literacy level of the community.
Water. There is zero potable water supply or infrastructure. Living with the people of Aldea Santo Tomas Xacalta, you appreciate their resourcefulness. They manage to construct crude gutter systems from their roofs to capture as much rain water as possible and fill up large storage basins, buckets, and even drinking glasses. If it can hold water, they use it. They use this water for everything from drinking to bathing to washing mud off boots. This was the rainy season, or the end of it, and mud was everywhere. Get used to it, they did. There is a stream nearby which is used in the non-rainy season while some women are seen making the trek in the day as well.
Sanitation. There is no sanitation or plumbing infrastructure. All families have some form of latrine, though in the evenings, any bush tends to provide cover for boys and girls rooms to get business done. In one situation, we were asked to do a large dig next to the new school for the school latrine. We spent half a day per the site supervisor digging the new latrine area when a village elder stopped us. He informed us that any deeper we were about to come in contact with an old latrine buried years earlier. Ok, mental note one, always find the village elder or the equivalent of the HOA president to learn where the previous crappers have been buried. We moved our dig 7-8 feet away. Sanitation in this part of the world is a step above back country camping, every day and night, with leave no trace behind protocol.
Food. Corn is the largest owned and operated crop from their land. Each family by all accounts, is a farmer. Chickens roam their property as does the rooster who served as our daily alarm. They harvest their own land and many have animals as would any small farm. Corn, coffee, beans, and some spices are the primary crops in this region of Guatemala. What they don’t have, they trade for. Their nutrition seems well, including the children. Cultivating their land is only limited by size and lack of harvesting equipment so as to say, they really have giant gardens (a few acres) which limits their income as most food is stored, consumed or traded.
Cooking here is log fire based and indoors. While these homes are all “ventilated” based on their poor quality and large gaps, the respiratory issues from inhaling this much smoke was not lost. All of our clothing and the entire valley for that matter, has the same fire-based smell as the smoke is contained either in the home or cloud cover.
One evening, at about 10 PM, rifle shots rang out across the valley. This was a bit surprising, but we were told the next morning the locals were trying to save the animals from a predator. We are in the land of large cats, panthers, jaguars, etc. A day later, we were told by our host family that no, this was a deer hunt. The community members hunt at night as the deer come out then to feed on their crops and they trade the deer skin. This made much more sense. Mental note two, make sure to wear a headlamp or bring a flashlight when finding that bush to go number 1 at night, you do not want to be confused for a deer.
Telecommunications. Before our trip, we were told not to expect mobile phone signals or electricity. Bring battery backup and make sure all family know the contact info which was straightforward in case someone needed to get a hold of us. However, the valley had 3G and in some cases 4G LTE. This was amazing. Not because we could WhatsApp back to family, share photos, or occasionally check email, but because the people of Aldea Santo Tomas Xacalta had phones on one of the country’s telecom networks, Tigo. There are parts of the Rocky Mountain West in the United States that are dark, but here, what seemed as the most remote place in Central America, we could remind our kids to feed the dog and water the christmas tree (lucky them).
As much as they lacked everything else up to this point, phone usage, notably smart phone usage, was common. In fact, within a day of us arriving, one of the daughter-in-laws of our host family video called the father of her daughter. He was in Los Angeles (more on this later). She wanted us to be introduced, plus he spoke fluent Spanish (many in Aldea Santo Tomas Xacalta speak Spanish) as does Dr. Maureen Cunningham. He thanked us for being there and building the school. We asked what he did. He was working at a “manufacturing plant” around Los Angeles whose name was difficult to understand (maybe intentionally).
And all the while these people communicated globally, I was curious to where they get their power and what other forms of information they received.
Electrical. I can only assume (as I never asked) that the reason many had some form of solar grid with battery storage at the home was for mobile communication. To our surprise, we found rooms with a light and some of the more developed homes had electrical outlets. Note: no large appliances ran on any of this, but it was a step above camping even if a dirt floor was common. Our room had a single, low powered light that could be turned on connecting two wires that originated from the solar battery pack. Some families offered to charge our phones which we happily accepted to save our own mobile power packs.
But make no mistake, the electrical capability, while extremely limited, was used to power mobile devices.
Communication. The multiple translations proved difficult for interpersonal discussion. However, we gathered in gender specific discussions with the community. Dr. Maureen Cunningham met with about 15 women, and us guys met with about 15 men. This proved very enlightening.
In this discussion, the men asked as many questions of us as we asked of them. This dialogue really started to shape the knowledge of the ice berg below the water for me. We touched on life, and lifestyle including marriage, information sources, religion, and labor choices.
The community of Santo Tomas primarily uses radio and Facebook to gather their information. There was no comprehension of synthesis of what may be real or not. This weighed on me given the disinformation systems even in the developed world. However, most of the younger generation used Instagram and Tik Tok was growing in usage.
We found that arranged marriage is really no longer a thing, most couples meet through social gatherings now and communicate on social media. It is important to note, many females first conceive at 15 or 16 and the men are in their early 20’s when they marry per our discussion with the males. (Note: Maureen confirmed the women do not practice any form of birth control).
Given the lack of males in the community compared to females, we asked these men why they hadn’t migrated. They were scared. They cited a few men who migrated to larger plantations in Guatemala and they had not returned, losing their life at the plantation. The wages to these men were not worth the risk. While I do not know what the equivalent of OSHA is in Guatemala, I suspect labor practices are not well regulated. As for the trip to the United States, the risk was not worth the reward with little idea of when they could return safely and then make it back to the U.S. Maureen and I confirmed, the son of our host hadn’t been home in 10 months while living in Los Angeles. Because if they left the United States, there was no guarantee they could return to the wages they left behind in the United States. While in the community, or on the way in, and on the drive out, it was called to my attention a few times regarding a few homes being built. It was always communicated with a preceding statement, “that family is in the U.S”. How did they know? The money was the only thing driving them to build that home, to take the chance of migration, knowing their fortunes, and in some cases their lives, were anchored in the outcome of migration even if living in fear of death, or living illegally, or both.
I asked the men in front of me, what is it they hoped for? And right there, through two translations, the answer grounded me with all nodding in unison with the man who responded. We want our children to have a life better than we had. In the most simplistic of answers, they wanted what I wanted. The only way I could respond was that “our values are the same” with a smile. I wanted my kids to have it better than me (and I had it good, make no mistake). In that response however, I remembered why I was there, and finished by saying, I wanted their kids to have it better too by giving them a school. I locked eyes with many of them and even if we couldn’t speak the same language, we were communicating through our shared hopes even if our experiences and means were different.
They just did not have the resources to be successful.
Before we departed the end of the week gathering, we left a few gifts. A soccer ball, games, and a notebook. I told the two hundred or so community members that one page was for every girl there and was theirs to write about their hopes and dreams. In order to do that of course, they must learn to read and write. That was my challenge to them. Through our corporate partners, industry friends and family, Maureen and I raised half the money for this school. In a two room school, we can say there is a classroom we built with our names on it.
However, building a school was not all that was built. When saying goodbye to the host family and kids, they watched as we packed. They tried to gift me a squash. I walked away knowing that not only did this school serve as a foundation to improve the education from roughly a first grade to sixth grade level, they gifted me a chance to build a connection that truly served as a foundation for building change.
Three Ways You Can Help
- Make a Donation Online
- Example investment opportunities:
- $250 All the nails, nuts, and bolts to build a roof for the school
- $500 In-country mason during the entire construction of the school
- $1,000 Paint for a school
- $40,000 Fund an entire school
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- If you have a combination of fundraising chops, an adventurous spirit and the belief each of us has the capacity to be Building Change, get in touch with us and have a conversation.
Team Dayā 2025 Plans
We are now actively recruiting members for our 2025 groundbreakings. These builds represent our second schools in Nicaragua and Malawi and our third school in Nepal.
Our Team Dayā 2025 school building dates:
Nicaragua, Central America
Sunday, February 9, 2025 – Saturday, February 15, 2025
Malawi, East Africa
Sunday, June 22, 2025 – Saturday, June 28, 2025
Nepal, South Asia
Sunday October 26th, 2025 – Sunday, November 2nd, 2025
If you are curious to learn more about joining a build, please reach out to our Head of Recruiting Jaryd Knutsen. Not sure? Watch the documentary Building Change, the Team Dayā Story (8 minute run time), by Kathmandu based filmmaker Shyam Karki of Samson Film Productions.
Thanks again for your continued support,
All of us at Team Dayā
