I found an interesting article on Guatemala Adoption. I think it may give some insight as to why birthmothers from there relinquish their children in the hope of giving them a better life.
Finding Home in Two Worlds
By Laurie Stern
Produced by Ellen Guettler
Once a month, we get together with a group of families who have adopted Guatemalan-born children.
Our son Diego is six. He's a Mayan - Tzutujil Mayan. There are maybe 60,000 Tzutujiles who live in a couple of small villages in the mountains of Guatemala. Most Tzutujiles are small and strong like him.
As Diego gets older, he's noticing the physical things that set him apart from his friends. That's one of the reasons we wanted to be in a group like this, because these kids have something in common. And in a way, they're growing up as cousins.
A lot of the families in our group really like going to culture camp with their kids. We respect that.
But Diego's culture is complex. He is a Minnesotan. He is an American. He is a North American. He is a Native American. He is a Central American. He is a Guatemalan-born American. He is a Tzutujil Mayan. They're all Diego.
And we feel like we can give Diego more authentic information about who he is by spending time in his village. During Diego's adoption when he was a baby, I stayed with him in Guatemala for nine months. Dan and I went back with him when he was three to visit his biological mother, Isabel Xicay Petzey, and her three children. Now Diego is six and we're going there again.
The journey to Diego's village is spectacular. You take a boat across this huge volcanic lake. There are three volcanoes around it and a dozen small villages. Santiago Atitlán is one of them and it sprawls from the base of one of the volcanoes to the lakeshore.
On our fourth or fifth day in Santiago Atitlán, I ask my son Diego, "Who are we expecting to show up?"
"Isabel," says Diego.
We don't know whether she'll bring the children or how many she'll bring. We're kind of hoping that she'll bring Juan.
"Juan and, what's her name? My sister's name? My sisters?" asks Diego.
"They were Julia and Josefa," I say.
"Julia and Josefa and Juan and me are all brothers. Brother and sisters," he says.
Isabel never wants us to go to her home. Her neighbors don't know about Diego, so our translator and friend, Dolores Ratzán, brings Isabel and her children to us. On the morning she is going to come to our hotel, we wait pretty anxiously. Finally, I hear Tzutujil voices coming down the path.
"Come on. Let's go see them. Let's go see if it's really them," I say to Diego.
We run over to say hello. It is Isabel and two of Diego's siblings, Josefa and Juan.
"Hola," says Isabel.
"Y Diego, hola!" I say.
I am surprised when Diego goes right up to Isabel and gives her a big hug. Then she takes a step back, looks at him, and starts to cry.
Later, we ask Dolores about it. She says Isabel was wishing Diego's sister Julia could have been with us, because she had loved seeing Diego so much. But we found out just before we came that Julia had died several months earlier. When Isabel saw Diego, it made her feel sadder about losing Julia.
I've asked Isabel many times why she placed Diego for adoption. She always says it's because she can't afford to take care of him. She lives in a cinderblock room with a dirt floor. All she has is a clay pot, a grinding stone and a thin mattress she sleeps on with her children.
She says the children have the same father; I don't even know his name. He was in the military and now he works as a truck driver in a town on the other side of the volcano. The way Isabel puts it, he comes and goes.
At the hotel, she shows Diego, Dan and me a photo of a man dressed in an army uniform, carrying an assault rifle.
Diego asks, "Who's that?"
"That is your birth father," answers Dan, my husband. "What do you think?"
"He's cool," says Diego.
"He's cool?" asks Dan. "You like the uniform and the gun?"
"I love guns," Diego replies.
"I know you do," says Dan.
Diego was excited to play with his siblings. He loves soccer and thought they might too.
Here in Santiago Atitlán, physically, Diego is just like everybody else. But he has trouble communicating with his siblings. He only speaks English and they only speak Tzutujil.
While the kids play, our friend Dolores helps us talk to Isabel.
"Tell me about the health of you and of Josefa and Juan," I ask. "How have you all been?"
"She works hard for food every day," Dolores translates.
"What do you eat during the day?"
"Sometimes she goes to the mountain and if she finds some wild herbs. That's what she brings to feed her children," says Dolores.
I want to know how Diego's sister Julia died. Isabel says she had stomach problems that got worse because of an infection or a curse, but it wasn't clear. A lot of times, Isabel tells me stuff that doesn't make sense to me. Still, every time we're together, I feel like there's a mutual respect and affection.
It seems like visiting Julia's grave is something we should do together. Julia reminded me so much of Diego. She was so sunny and she laughed exactly like he does.
Dan stays at the hotel with Diego and the kids. Dolores, Isabel and I get into a three-wheeled taxi called a "tuk-tuk." The cemetery is part-way up the volcano, overlooking the village.
The cemetery is a jumble of pastel tombstones and unmarked mounds of dirt. Julia's grave is covered with weeds. Isabel begins yanking them out.
I help her pull weeds because it seems like the right thing to do.
When the grave is cleared off, Isabel stands at one corner of the mound and begins to cry. It sounds like it might be a prayer, it is so mournful.
Later, Dolores tells us that Isabel is crying to Julia; calling out the memories they'd shared. She says poverty always pursued them, that she tried to save Julia and she couldn't.
While we're at the cemetery, Dan and the kids play in the hotel pool. Dolores's son speaks Tzutujil and English and Dan can hear him translating for Diego and his siblings. When we get back from the cemetery, Diego tells us he's found out the real cause of Julia's death, and it wasn't a stomach illness.
"One of my sisters died," Diego says. "I know how she died. ... She was sick and she stole a mango and her dad got really out of control and he kicked her in the stomach and she died."
"How did you find that out?" I ask. "Because when we asked Isabel about it, Isabel told us that Julia had been sick and died? … Is it because you asked? Did you say what sickness did Julia have or something?"
"Yeah," says Diego. "I said that kind of stuff."
"The way I remember it," says Dan, "you said, 'What sickness did Julia have?' … And they said she didn't have a sickness, her papa … killed her. That's what they said.
And then you said, 'Well what did he use?'"
"His foot, he used his foot," says Diego.
Then Diego asks, "What was her grave like?"
"Oh, well, we have pictures of it," I tell him. "It was just a mound of dirt that was covered with weeds. So the first thing we did when we got there, especially Isabel, was to pull up all the weeds to make the dirt look nice. … Isabel was crying and maybe saying a little prayer. It was hard to understand. ... And what she said was about how Julia was always so interested in you and excited when she heard you were coming to visit. And that ... even though Julia's in another place, we're here at the grave to tell you Diego is here to visit and we're thinking about you. And we know you were thinking about him."
"She said that?" Diego asks.
"That's what Isabel said," I answer.
Diego starts sniffling.
"It's OK to be sad," I tell him. Diego bursts into tears.
We do wonder if this is too much for Diego. Dan worries about it more than I do.
"My view is that he, at the very core of his being, is [sad] because he knows he was separated from the place that he was born into," says Dan.
I feel like, "Yeah, there's sadness in Diego and there's joy and that makes him just like everybody else." Where Dan and I agree is that we feel looking this hard stuff in the face has helped Diego be articulate about his own feelings and that he should know all there is to know about his circumstances.
Also, by being in Santiago Atitlán, Diego knows what it means to be Tzutujil. He feels it. The people in his village taught him his Tzutujil name, "Atico." They tell him, "Never forget. You are Atico. Wherever you go in the world, know that you are Tzutujil and it's something to be proud of."
The last thing we do in Santiago Atitlán is visit this mischievous Mayan God called Moximón. You pay a little money to a kid in the village and ask where Moximón is living at the moment. They'll take you to a dark, incense-filled room. When your eyes adjust, you see a bunch of men, called the Brotherhood, guarding a life-sized but legless wooden figure. Moximón has a mustache and at least one cigarette sticking out from a hole in his mouth. Diego sits down next to Dolores in front of Moximón while the Brotherhood and other visitors look on.
"This is Moximón," says Dolores. "He is the holy grandfather. This is the main God for the Mayan in this village. The Mayan Tzutujil. And people come here, they worship Moximón. They want a blessing from him for studying or a job or anything they want to do."
"Can you ask the people who own Moximón to tell them can I visit anytime?" Diego asks.
"Anytime," says Dolores. "He says this is your home. You can come anytime Diego."
"Gracias," says Diego.
"Maltiyox chi aawe is thanks to you," says Dolores. "Can you say that?"
Diego tries, and the crowd giggles. Diego giggles too.
Back in Minnesota, we visit Diego's Guatemalan family through the photo album. Diego pulls it out a couple times a month, even though seeing Julia and the others makes him sad.
He loves knowing his Tzutujil name, "Atico." And being in Guatemala has made him want to learn Spanish.
We're not sure how Diego will deal with the difficult stuff he learned on the trip, but so far he's been his usual soulful and resilient self.
We're already talking about when to go back.
Produced by Ellen Guettler
Once a month, we get together with a group of families who have adopted Guatemalan-born children.
Our son Diego is six. He's a Mayan - Tzutujil Mayan. There are maybe 60,000 Tzutujiles who live in a couple of small villages in the mountains of Guatemala. Most Tzutujiles are small and strong like him.
As Diego gets older, he's noticing the physical things that set him apart from his friends. That's one of the reasons we wanted to be in a group like this, because these kids have something in common. And in a way, they're growing up as cousins.
A lot of the families in our group really like going to culture camp with their kids. We respect that.
But Diego's culture is complex. He is a Minnesotan. He is an American. He is a North American. He is a Native American. He is a Central American. He is a Guatemalan-born American. He is a Tzutujil Mayan. They're all Diego.
And we feel like we can give Diego more authentic information about who he is by spending time in his village. During Diego's adoption when he was a baby, I stayed with him in Guatemala for nine months. Dan and I went back with him when he was three to visit his biological mother, Isabel Xicay Petzey, and her three children. Now Diego is six and we're going there again.
The journey to Diego's village is spectacular. You take a boat across this huge volcanic lake. There are three volcanoes around it and a dozen small villages. Santiago Atitlán is one of them and it sprawls from the base of one of the volcanoes to the lakeshore.
On our fourth or fifth day in Santiago Atitlán, I ask my son Diego, "Who are we expecting to show up?"
"Isabel," says Diego.
We don't know whether she'll bring the children or how many she'll bring. We're kind of hoping that she'll bring Juan.
"Juan and, what's her name? My sister's name? My sisters?" asks Diego.
"They were Julia and Josefa," I say.
"Julia and Josefa and Juan and me are all brothers. Brother and sisters," he says.
Isabel never wants us to go to her home. Her neighbors don't know about Diego, so our translator and friend, Dolores Ratzán, brings Isabel and her children to us. On the morning she is going to come to our hotel, we wait pretty anxiously. Finally, I hear Tzutujil voices coming down the path.
"Come on. Let's go see them. Let's go see if it's really them," I say to Diego.
We run over to say hello. It is Isabel and two of Diego's siblings, Josefa and Juan.
"Hola," says Isabel.
"Y Diego, hola!" I say.
I am surprised when Diego goes right up to Isabel and gives her a big hug. Then she takes a step back, looks at him, and starts to cry.
Later, we ask Dolores about it. She says Isabel was wishing Diego's sister Julia could have been with us, because she had loved seeing Diego so much. But we found out just before we came that Julia had died several months earlier. When Isabel saw Diego, it made her feel sadder about losing Julia.
I've asked Isabel many times why she placed Diego for adoption. She always says it's because she can't afford to take care of him. She lives in a cinderblock room with a dirt floor. All she has is a clay pot, a grinding stone and a thin mattress she sleeps on with her children.
She says the children have the same father; I don't even know his name. He was in the military and now he works as a truck driver in a town on the other side of the volcano. The way Isabel puts it, he comes and goes.
At the hotel, she shows Diego, Dan and me a photo of a man dressed in an army uniform, carrying an assault rifle.
Diego asks, "Who's that?"
"That is your birth father," answers Dan, my husband. "What do you think?"
"He's cool," says Diego.
"He's cool?" asks Dan. "You like the uniform and the gun?"
"I love guns," Diego replies.
"I know you do," says Dan.
Diego was excited to play with his siblings. He loves soccer and thought they might too.
Here in Santiago Atitlán, physically, Diego is just like everybody else. But he has trouble communicating with his siblings. He only speaks English and they only speak Tzutujil.
While the kids play, our friend Dolores helps us talk to Isabel.
"Tell me about the health of you and of Josefa and Juan," I ask. "How have you all been?"
"She works hard for food every day," Dolores translates.
"What do you eat during the day?"
"Sometimes she goes to the mountain and if she finds some wild herbs. That's what she brings to feed her children," says Dolores.
I want to know how Diego's sister Julia died. Isabel says she had stomach problems that got worse because of an infection or a curse, but it wasn't clear. A lot of times, Isabel tells me stuff that doesn't make sense to me. Still, every time we're together, I feel like there's a mutual respect and affection.
It seems like visiting Julia's grave is something we should do together. Julia reminded me so much of Diego. She was so sunny and she laughed exactly like he does.
Dan stays at the hotel with Diego and the kids. Dolores, Isabel and I get into a three-wheeled taxi called a "tuk-tuk." The cemetery is part-way up the volcano, overlooking the village.
The cemetery is a jumble of pastel tombstones and unmarked mounds of dirt. Julia's grave is covered with weeds. Isabel begins yanking them out.
I help her pull weeds because it seems like the right thing to do.
When the grave is cleared off, Isabel stands at one corner of the mound and begins to cry. It sounds like it might be a prayer, it is so mournful.
Later, Dolores tells us that Isabel is crying to Julia; calling out the memories they'd shared. She says poverty always pursued them, that she tried to save Julia and she couldn't.
While we're at the cemetery, Dan and the kids play in the hotel pool. Dolores's son speaks Tzutujil and English and Dan can hear him translating for Diego and his siblings. When we get back from the cemetery, Diego tells us he's found out the real cause of Julia's death, and it wasn't a stomach illness.
"One of my sisters died," Diego says. "I know how she died. ... She was sick and she stole a mango and her dad got really out of control and he kicked her in the stomach and she died."
"How did you find that out?" I ask. "Because when we asked Isabel about it, Isabel told us that Julia had been sick and died? … Is it because you asked? Did you say what sickness did Julia have or something?"
"Yeah," says Diego. "I said that kind of stuff."
"The way I remember it," says Dan, "you said, 'What sickness did Julia have?' … And they said she didn't have a sickness, her papa … killed her. That's what they said.
And then you said, 'Well what did he use?'"
"His foot, he used his foot," says Diego.
Then Diego asks, "What was her grave like?"
"Oh, well, we have pictures of it," I tell him. "It was just a mound of dirt that was covered with weeds. So the first thing we did when we got there, especially Isabel, was to pull up all the weeds to make the dirt look nice. … Isabel was crying and maybe saying a little prayer. It was hard to understand. ... And what she said was about how Julia was always so interested in you and excited when she heard you were coming to visit. And that ... even though Julia's in another place, we're here at the grave to tell you Diego is here to visit and we're thinking about you. And we know you were thinking about him."
"She said that?" Diego asks.
"That's what Isabel said," I answer.
Diego starts sniffling.
"It's OK to be sad," I tell him. Diego bursts into tears.
We do wonder if this is too much for Diego. Dan worries about it more than I do.
"My view is that he, at the very core of his being, is [sad] because he knows he was separated from the place that he was born into," says Dan.
I feel like, "Yeah, there's sadness in Diego and there's joy and that makes him just like everybody else." Where Dan and I agree is that we feel looking this hard stuff in the face has helped Diego be articulate about his own feelings and that he should know all there is to know about his circumstances.
Also, by being in Santiago Atitlán, Diego knows what it means to be Tzutujil. He feels it. The people in his village taught him his Tzutujil name, "Atico." They tell him, "Never forget. You are Atico. Wherever you go in the world, know that you are Tzutujil and it's something to be proud of."
The last thing we do in Santiago Atitlán is visit this mischievous Mayan God called Moximón. You pay a little money to a kid in the village and ask where Moximón is living at the moment. They'll take you to a dark, incense-filled room. When your eyes adjust, you see a bunch of men, called the Brotherhood, guarding a life-sized but legless wooden figure. Moximón has a mustache and at least one cigarette sticking out from a hole in his mouth. Diego sits down next to Dolores in front of Moximón while the Brotherhood and other visitors look on.
"This is Moximón," says Dolores. "He is the holy grandfather. This is the main God for the Mayan in this village. The Mayan Tzutujil. And people come here, they worship Moximón. They want a blessing from him for studying or a job or anything they want to do."
"Can you ask the people who own Moximón to tell them can I visit anytime?" Diego asks.
"Anytime," says Dolores. "He says this is your home. You can come anytime Diego."
"Gracias," says Diego.
"Maltiyox chi aawe is thanks to you," says Dolores. "Can you say that?"
Diego tries, and the crowd giggles. Diego giggles too.
Back in Minnesota, we visit Diego's Guatemalan family through the photo album. Diego pulls it out a couple times a month, even though seeing Julia and the others makes him sad.
He loves knowing his Tzutujil name, "Atico." And being in Guatemala has made him want to learn Spanish.
We're not sure how Diego will deal with the difficult stuff he learned on the trip, but so far he's been his usual soulful and resilient self.
We're already talking about when to go back.
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