Hallelujah Heartbeat: Light Through the Fuego

A few of you may know that nearly a year ago, June 2018, Volcan de Fuego in Guatemala erupted, wiping out entire towns within a matter of minutes with its deadly polycratic flow of rock and gas. At that time I was in the US, in my comfortable house, surrounded by everything I've ever needed or wanted, looking at pictures and videos of the aftermath.

I felt my heart go out to the people, but like most natural disasters in the world, figured there's not much I can do, there's plenty of people already helping, I would just get in the way…and I went on with my life.

Now, I no longer want to go on with my life without doing something. A few days ago, I personally met two victims who lost everything to the volcano, as well as a few of the firemen who were there to help. Erica, Rudy, Edwin, and several others gathered around a table with us, and for an hour and a half, they shared chilling stories.

Erica, a young mother of six, was born and raised in Los Lotes, a small town at the base of Volcan de Fuego. The morning of the eruption, Erica noticed that the volcano was acting strange, and things just seemed...different. Erica suggested that they should leave, but her friends and neighbors replied with, "we have lived here forever, we will be fine." A few hours later, Erica heard the explosion and left her house to see, her kids trailing behind, all barefoot. That’s when they saw the lava and huge plumes barreling towards them.

The kids started screaming, Erica desperately trying to console them, even though she was paralyzed with fear. In the next few minutes, Erica´s family of 38, mothers, fathers, cousins, grandparents, aunts, uncles, and children, witnessed a scene that would change the rest of their lives. They felt the heat; they saw it all. They saw the wrath of the volcano consume their neighbors, just ten meters from where they were standing. If they had lived ten meters closer to their neighbors, they too would have died.

They jumped in their cars and sped away, "We didn’t close our doors, we didn’t grab anything, we didn’t put on shoes, we just left."

Erica and her family were lucky. Tears filled her eyes as she told me, "It is so hard to remember…all of my neighbors died."

I asked Erica how many people lost their lives that day. The government says the death toll is 165, but she told me, "At least 500 people. Almost our whole town died."

Rudy, a father of three, said that the hardest part after the eruption, was dealing with the nightmares. "Now it has calmed down, but in the months after, the kids would wake up at 1 am screaming and crying saying, 'the lava is coming'."

The bomberos shared stories as well, about how they were there for nearly six months, searching for people, cleaning up, taking food to the people. The chief of the Antigua Bomberos told me that there were so many donations, but he saw the money so misused. He encouraged me, "[If you want to help] Go do it yourself. Buy the things and deliver them, because if you give money, it will not get to the people."

Thanks to the kindness of others, people affected by the volcan were welcomed into homes and given food and shelter as they tried to recover from the devastation.

But people lost everything. Everyone knows people who have died. Everyone lost their homes, their cars, their pets.

It feels like such a daunting project, everyone is in shock in the days and weeks after, and then everyone's lives go back to normal...Except those affected. So, I asked the one biggest need, If there was one thing, how I could help. The answer? Tin for siding the kitchens. They have no kitchens, they are cooking food outside in makeshift tents.

And that leads me to where I am at today.

The price for one sheet of tin is just under $10. For the one community where Rudy and Erica live, they need 215 sheets of tin to complete all of the kitchens - A total of $2,150.

My goal is to raise enough money for 225 sheets of tin, and I will personally go buy the sheets, deliver them to the community, and help to build their kitchens.

But I am asking for your help. Just one sheet will make such a difference. For the price of one night out, you could provide tin for a kitchen for one whole family to eat for years.

The crazy thing through it all, was they were so thankful just that we were there listening. They were not asking for anything. They have nothing, I have everything, yet they asked for nothing. They simply responded to my question on how I could help: they need tin to finish the kitchens, to have a safe place to cook.