Rotary Guatemala & Honduras Projects

Our very own Ted Gilliland shared experiences and photos from the Honduras/Guatemala trip that Centennial Rotarians took last fall. The group consisted of 11 people who spent a total of 9 days split between the two countries. The trip seemed to be nothing short of a "Rotary Moment"

While in Guatemala the group met up with some representatives from Starfish One by One which is a group that encourages the empowerment of Mayan women in the region. In general they found that Mayan women are shy and timid due to their culture. The primary goal of Starfish is to help these girls breakthrough those boundaries to become leaders in their community and culture. During the visit our group was able to participate in team building exercises with some of the girls in the program to see a small process that these women go through in the program. The Rotary group split up and did family visits with two families who had daughters going through the program. The daughter of one family was right at the the completion of the program and was preparing herself to go to University to study business. The daughter from the other family had just begun her journey in the Starfish program. Part of the Rotary Global Grant was allocated to provide a new Starfish office with new appliances and Toshiba laptops which the Rotarians actually purchased during the trip.

During the other half of the trip the group traveled to Honduras to see the progress on the Union Cedral school that Centennial Rotary helped furnish with desks and schools supplies. This project was completed through a partnership with Simple Suppers for Kids. The Centennial Rotarians were able to see how the money was spent and interact with the children we were able to help through this meaningful project.