Painting in El Triunfo Part I

Once upon a time, a long, long time ago, I met an amazing woman who changed her world and who keeps working her magic, even though she looks far from a fairy. Well, a godmother fairy maybe. I’m talking about Maritza Dubon from the tiny village of El Triunfo. One of the few things worthwhile mentioning about El Triunfo is that it is located almost two hours from Copán over dusty roads, just before the bigger community of Nueva Armenia. The road to Nueva Armenia cuts right through the village and thus it sees quite a bit of traffic (at least ten cars a day). Besides that, El Triunfo is more about what isn’t there. Or it used to be, because thanks to Maritza’s tireless efforts, a lot of help has found its way to the village. For starters, the children don’t have to walk to Nueva Armenia anymore to go to school. Years ago Maritza started her own school and soon the students didn’t fit in the one-room building anymore. She then somehow got the municipality to build her another, bigger building and the former school was turned into a kindergarten. Maritza herself taught grade 1-6 while her oldest daughter Lourdes Estela took care of the fifty-odd kinder-kids. Since I met Maritza I’ve been trying to help her here and there and the bond I feel with this community only became stronger when the kindergarten was named after me. (A great honour, yes. Also a great responsibility…)
Last year we helped the kinder with supplies and games and we also went to El Triunfo one day in January to paint the school of bare cinder blocks. We didn’t have any money designated for this, so we used whatever we had and the results was bright and colourful. An improvement, but I was very aware about things that still needed to be done and that even painting was a job half done with leftovers of water based paint. So I promised Maritza I’d try to look for funds and I was very happy to tell her that I indeed had gotten 850 euros from the Dutch foundation Join!forkids to fix up the school and make durable toys and educational material. So for the last few weeks the whole Arte Acción Copán Ruinas team has been working on making all sorts of games and toys. Elsa made a fabric busy-board with buttons, zippers and clips for the tiny ones to develop their motor skills. Marlen made a huge tick-tack-toe board with round and flower-shaped pillows. Kike and Londin made some shelves that I transformed with some paint into an interactive game. A memory game, cans to run on, more shelves… What a great job we have to be able to do this for a living! We haven’t finished inventing yet, but we found a rare gap in our busy schedules to be able to all go to El Triunfo again, to paint the school, but this time for real. We were all set, the car/driver/handyman hired, the only problem was that I hadn’t been able to confirm our visit with Maritza, because cell phone communication is spotty since she lives in a place high up in the mountains with no way to charge a battery. So it wasn’t until last Sunday that I finally got a hold of her and strangely enough she asked me if I couldn’t come another day. Why? Oh, because she was about to leave to El Jaral, to the maternity clinic there.
“Oh, I didn’t know you were pregnant again,” I said, realizing that Maritza always looks likes she’s in her fifth month or so.
“No, it isn’t me. It’s Estelita. I’m gonna be a grandmother!”
Oh. I quickly remembered to congratulate her on this fact while my brain did the math: Estela can’t be much older than fifteen. In fact, she is fifteen. Damn.
Anyway, I assured her we wouldn’t cause any trouble, that she only had to tell someone to open the school for us and that would be it. Of course I ended up buying a big basket with baby stuff and in the end we gave the brand new mom, the two grandmothers and the so far nameless baby girl a ride home. Three generations filled the cabin (Estela with cotton in her ears against the “evil air”). The other grandma, us and the painting supplies in the back of the pick-up. The father of the baby (there actually is a father of the baby) had already gone home from the clinic, because he couldn’t stand standing up any longer (???? I’ve seen women sitting /laying/ stretched out /slouched on any possible surface there for days!). Anyway, it was quite special to be there to take pictures of the father laying eyes on his daughter for the first time and of the baby’s arrival home (and the young mom holding her boobies that now seem to have a life of their own).
Then, after delivering the baby and such, we finally started to paint. We laughed, we worked, we got sunburned, but by the end of the day the furniture and outer walls looked quite nice. And that was just day 1.
To be continued….
Carin Steen