Elias was a coffee picker....now he is a policeman!

My first meeting of Elias was last year when he and his wife paid an unexpected urgent visit too Jutta one night to try come up with a solution to thier problem. For the past school year, they have taken in 2 young girls sponsored in the school. The mother of the girls fled to the coast to get away from an abusive drug addict husband. Bringing only the youngest of her children she left the older 2 girls behind so they could continue their educations. They were around 11 and 13. Elias and family live in a tiny one room very small home as it is, but taking the girls in was no problem for them. The problem has now arizen where the drug addict father is now threating Elias's family. You see, along with the girls come $12 a month in sponsorship for school expenses. Very little, but some of this money goes to the family for basic food. The only way to keep the children from working picking coffee beans is to contribute some of the money they would otherwise bring home to feed the family. So the father is now causing trouble in the village for Elias and his family. What can they do? When it comes to the safety of his own family, he has to decide to send the girls to their mother on the coast. But this means the chance of further education is slim...at best.

This is what I like about Jutta and her concepts of keeping the program simple and under her control. She talked directly with the woman who sponsors the girls and gave her the situation details and allowed the sponsor the choice. Do you now sponsor another child? The sponsor wanted to continue helping the girls. Now Jutta and Heinz agreed they would go directly to the coat once year now, buy all the supplies and pay all the expenses to the other school directly. Certainly not an ideal situation for Heinz and Jutta, but for now this seems to work well for everyone and they are willing to put in the extra effort.

Back to Elias....last year was a terrible year for coffee pickers in San Pedro. A virus of some sort killed off much of the crop. No beans to pick....no money. Elias decided to answer and ad that was for police training in Guatemala City. He was chosen and for 2 months went to the city for training. This process was a huge amount of work and sacrifice for his family.

Luckily, when we arrived back this year, he just started his job that day. Elias came over to my house in his uniform and you could not imagine a prouder person. He wanted me to take a photo of him saluting! You could tell it meant so much to him that Jutta, Brittany and I wanted photos with him in his uniform! It is hopeful to others in the village to see someone being able to better their lives and the lives of their family! Elias and his family, have been a great help to us helping the village. We are very proud of all his hard work!