Fran's needs for the next 6 months

Fran and her father on a long hike to a neighboring village (5 miles away) in Cuicatlan

Fran and her niece and nephew in front of her family home in Cuicatlan

Fran will follow that trail 5 miles to a neighboring village, returning after dark.  She has often walked long distances at night, alone or with her family, by the light of the moon.

Hello friends,
As many of you know I am providing housing and coordinating efforts to send Fran, an indigenous young woman from the region of Cuicatlan, to 4 years of rigorous college education to get her degree in Computer Engineering. Fran is so many things -- brilliant, focused, a symbol of what is possible for indigenous women from impoverished villages in Mexico, and soon to me a major factor in improving the lives of her family.

Today we sat down to review her budget as we do every 6 months. While I was visiting the States. she ran out of money for food, which alarmed me. It turns out she does need a bit more of a monthly stipend to stretch to the end of the month, and this is an appeal for that extra food money. She needs an extra $25 per month to cover that.

If you can commit to a monthly contribution for the duration of a year or more (4 years would be ideal!) that would be great. It can be $5, $10, $20 or $25 per month. You can make a donation by clicking the link below.

And that's not all. Fran needs one-time donations for the following during the next 6 months:

$1,000 pesos/$78.00 dollars for clothes
$700 pesos/$55.00 dollars as of June 1 for a linear calculus class over the summer
$1,800 pesos/$140.00 dollars tuition on August 1 for September semester
$500 pesos/$39.00 dollars for materials

Please, please give what you can, and perhaps approach a friend or member of your church to help a little too.  We don't need much, but every penny is important.  You can donate easily by going to this site set up for Fran -- THANK YOU!

http://franciscaeducationfund.weebly.com/donate.html

Fran's Easter Vacation, Part I

Here is a rare treat, LOTS of photos!  Fran went on several long hikes while she was visiting her family and friends in Cuicatlan.  Last Thursday, May 17, she and a group of 5 from her village decided to take a long, circular hike to a waterfall.  On the way they met another 10 people from her village who by amazing coincidence were taking the same hike, so they all went on together.  After they reached the waterfall, they walked home a different way, passing through gorgeous open country near where her parents were born.  They left at 6 a.m. and got back at 8 p.m., and Fran said that the route was not easy or flat.  Enjoy the photos! (They are a little out of order...the last 11)

A pause for some snacks w/Fran's little brother

Fran and her father on a dark section of trail

Part of the larger group taking a rest stop in a clearing

Fran in a carrizo clearing must have been taken by her little bro

The hot season is upon us!

April and May are the hot, dry months in Oaxaca.  I can't overstate this!  HOT!  DRY!  The sun feels as though it is burning through your skin after only a minute of exposure.  I have discovered that people here value the shady side of the street so much, that there is a kind of unofficial hierarchy (based on sheer pugnacity) about who will cling to the inside lane of shade nearest a building, and who will be forced to walk around them into the sun.  I have an advantage because I am tall and old, but not much.  Sometimes I pretend I am not paying attention and barrel straight ahead, threatening to mow everyone down who dares block my way.  That always works!

Fran continues her steady march towards excellence and her degree, carefully organizing her life to accomodate study -- the most time consuming activity -- food purchase and cooking, washing all her clothes and bedding once a week, and helping me keep the house clean.  We used to have a young woman to help with the housecleaning, but our budget no longer allows that, so Fran and I clean the house from top to bottom every Thursday.  That was today!

Without going into any details, we recently passed through a disappointing (shocking, unless you are used to it) set of circumstances involving a bit of intimidation to get students to get out and rally for a certain political party here in Mexico.  Those who live here can fill in the blanks.  Life goes on.

Fran is consolidating a small group of friends, and no doubt will continue to find more along the way.  Her studies come first, and she is too earnest and sincere to be a social butterfly so this process will be slower and more meaningful than most.

I am still looking forward to her learning English, since we are still basically depending on my Spanish skills which are approximately 4th grade level.  It IS interesting to note that though Fran has heard Spanish most of her life, she says she has been speaking it only about 3 years.  Her first language as you will recall, is Cuicateco!

So, we can communicate about most basic things in Spanish, but all the subtleties are lost.  If both of us put a significant effort into raising our abilities in each other's language, we might someday be able to share on a whole new level sometime before I pass on to the Happy Hunting Ground!

This Summer, we are thinking about sending her to full-time English classes while she works part time.  It's only a 2 month break, but her young mind will be able to wrap itself around my language much more easily that I can hers!

Please consider: A gift for Fran's family

This is just a suggestion for someone out there who would like to do something for Fran's family.  They live in a very remote village and use a bucket of freezing water for bathing.  I thought they would enjoy having a couple of these to hang in a tree, and it might even improve their health in the cold weather. 

You can see it here. 

I have heard that this is the best brand, and that having two 3-gallon sizes would be better than one 5-gallon.  These are small people, and lifting the 5-gallon to hang it in the tree might prove impossible.  They live in the mountains where there is lots of sun, so I think it would function excellently for them.  Their source of water comes from the mountains higher up, and is delivered through a pipe that the whole village uses.

If you would like to send one along, just let me know and I will make sure it gets to them.  You can email me at lcassady@gmail.com.

Well into the second semester!

I know Fran lives with me, but I rarely see her!  She has been just as tenacious and dedicated this semester as last, and is confronting a variety of different situations that demand her attention.

One of them is a difficult teacher, which has forced her to find outside support -- never a bad thing.  She had already turned the situation around as much as was humanly possible by visiting the teacher in his office several times to get him to actually teach her.  In the classroom he simply puts difficult problems on the board and sits diffidently at his desk while students try to solve them.  He's an older man, with health problems, so not much can be done.  Fran's job is to pass the class, and she seems to have created a way to do that.

Her classes this semester include a Java programming class, business accounting, research, and integral calculus.

As summer approaches she is thinking of attending classes over the summer to keep her chops, and also to shorten the total time of her matriculation.  Things do not get easier in this school, they get more difficult, and suck up more and more time.  Last semester she attended classes 4 days a week, this semester it is 5.  We have heard that they throw in weekend activities and projects in later years.

At Quaker meeting last week I had a fascinating discussion with an attender about the intricate caste system in Mexico, created by the Spanish friars, that included 35 or more castes.  To drive the point home, they commissioned a series of paintings of family groups, showing people what to look for as they made sure to put everyone around them in their proper place -- the clothing, the color, the things of daily life.  Today a main word of this kind of thinking is "muchacha" -- an indigenous girl who is basically brought in from the village to work as a slave for Mexicans who have enough money to pay (which isn't much).  That is what Fran could have been, if she had not had the strength of will to find her way out of that oppressive system.

I found a few of the caste identification paintings and include them below.

English Class for Fran

It looks like we are going to have to pay for a quality English class for Fran over this summer.  Partly because she is required to get an official certificate from a real school, and partly because the free lessons she is taking now are not moving a long as fast as we had hoped.  So this summer, I want to enroll her in Harmon Hall in Oaxaca.  Each month costs 2,000 pesos or $150.  If we can afford 2 months, great.  If only one, that's fine too.  If you would like to make a donation towards this class, you can go here:

 http://franciscaeducationfund.weebly.com/donate.html 


Thank you!

FRAN WILL RECEIVE AWARD FOR BEING #1 IN HER CLASS!

Fran will receive an award tomorrow for being the best student in her class last semester.  She is stunned and happy, and I am feeling like the goose who laid a golden egg.  Please join me in congratulating Fran for her very hard work, laser-like focus, and endurance.  It isn't often in life that I have had a chance to bear witness to accomplishment like this, and I can't stop smiling!

This is a huge encouragement for her, and I can't wait to see what she does this semester!