Our Cajola

In case you would like to know a little bit about where we live, our
Cajola is a mostly Maya Mam town in the western highlands of
Guatemala. It is beautiful here. We live among lots of mountains, and
you can see how beautiful it is when our corn is so high that it
nearly hides our houses. As you may know, corn is sacred for us Maya,
and the planting and growing and harvesting of corn is an important
part of our lives. Right now we are harvesting the corn and can eat it
fresh. We make a delicious drink called “atol de elote,” we eat the
corn right on the cob, we prepare it with a special squash named
“ayote” or we make special tamales called “tamals de elote.” Of
course, we eat corn all year long, but dried, in our tortillas,
tamales, and sauces. (You can ask us for a recipe if you are
interested!)

Unfortunately, there is a lot of poverty in our town -- half of our
children never have enough to eat. Some people don’t even have land to
grow their own corn. In our photos you can see the corn ready for
harvest, our market, and a traditional but old adobe house. (Many of
our family members have left for the U.S. to work to send money back
to build houses of concrete block.)

You can see why it is so important for us to be working, to make a
better world for our children.