Guatemala City trip overwhelms students.

LEELANAU SCHOOL student Dylan Rostoker has some
fun with an elementary school student in
Guatemala City.

Zach Stanz said he will “never complain” again about the way he lives.

The 18-year-old Glen Arbor resident and senior at The Leelanau School was one of 10 people with ties to the school who traveled to Guatemala last month as part of an outreach effort with Safe Passage.

Stanz, the son of John and Sonya Stanz, said he had traveled with a school group to Greece when he was a freshman at the school. He called his experience in Central America on Oct. 13-23 “more rewarding” than the Mediterranean trip.
“It was nice to see the Parthenon, but the trip with Safe Passage was something else,” he said.

The Leelanau group had spent the past six months planning the trip after an idea that was sparked by a viewing of the 2006 documentary Recycled Life. The film presented the dramatic and touching story of thousands of adults, children, and generations of families who have been living and working in the largest and most toxic landfill in Central America, the Guatemala City Garbage Dump, over the last 60 years.

Six students and four adults spent much of the 10-day period working directly with children who live in the unsanitary conditions, but are able to learn at a day care center and school supported and run through Safe Passage.

“I worked with kids ages 11 to 14 doing math,” Stanz said. “Some of their stories are terrible. But they were very happy to be in school.”

The 18-year-old noted that something as basic as privacy is not always available in a place where, in some cases, the only things separating a sleeping area from the outdoors is a fabric shower curtain.

Sarah Wadleigh helps children in a day care
center who were playing on a slide. The school
and day care center help provide a sanctuary
for children living in poverty and inhumane
conditions.

Sixteen-year-old Chris Omerza and his father, Ray Omerza of Empire, also went on the trip.

“I thought we had been well prepared (for what they would see), but when you’re surrounded by it, it’s a lot different,” Omerza said. “The enormity of it struck me.”

Chris Omerza read lower elementary age students books in English and Spanish, helped out as a hall monitor and played games with the children. His 18-year-old classmate Dylan Rostoker of Glenwood, Ill., was also affected by the trip.

“It hit me like a ton of bricks,” said Rostoker, whose bushy red hair scared some of the children when he first arrived in the classroom. “To go from those living conditions into the school … it was like the Garden of Eden.”

The second graders took quickly to Rostoker, who served as an imaginary frog and horse during the brief visit.

“I was essentially their riding slave,” said Rostoker. Although not skilled in speaking Spanish, he found himself easily helping the youngsters with their grammar lesson.

The contingent is the most recent in a series of people with Leelanau ties to travel to Guatemala to work with families there as part of Safe Passage, an organization formed in 1990. Sharon Workman of Cedar and Glen Arbor native Paul Sutherland of Traverse City are two of the 10-member board of directors for Safe Passage, which is based in Maine.

Great Lakes Friends of Safe Passage, a local chapter of the larger group, was formed over 2005 and 2006.

“We had spent so much time preparing that we didn’t organize any drives to collect what they need,” said Spanish instructor Kim Speicher. “The Friends sent us with 10 suitcases of school supplies, baby clothes and medicine so we didn’t have to go empty-handed.”

Kelsey Malone, 18, and Sarah Wadleigh, 16, both of Chicago, worked in the Safe Passage day care center.

“I’ve done some volunteer work in inner-city Chicago and thought that was bad,” Malone said. “This brings it to a whole other level. It makes the problems we have here seem trivial.”

A group of students from The Leelanau School
look down on the Guatemala City Garbage Dump,
which is considered the largest and most toxic
landfill in Central America. The group visited
Guatemala City on Oct. 13-23 as part of an
outreach dffort with Safe Passage.

Wadleigh agreed.

“I had never experienced that kind of poverty,” she said.

In addition to the poor living conditions, all those who made the trip noted respiratory problems that they believe was the result of pollution. Methane gas from the dump and exhaust from the diesel engines hung over the area.

“I couldn’t breathe very well,” Omerza said.
Overall, students said the 10-day trip was something they’d want to repeat. Speicher said she hopes to make the outreach trip annually.

Although Stanz will graduate in the spring, he has expressed an interest in making a return trip to Guatemala City and working with Safe Passage.

“Sign me up.”