Category: Travel News

Every year, Christopherson Business Travel sponsors an volunteer trip for a selected group of their employees. A non-profit working in seven countries, Choice Humanitarian strives to end extreme poverty by focusing on raising up small communities. This year’s employees ventured to a small village in the mountains of Guatemala. There, they helped dig foundations for future buildings and painted.

Volunteering in Guatemala

I was not sure what to expect with on my team’s recent expedition to Guatemala. You hear stories and read articles, but nothing compares to actually being a part of such a trip. I cried, laughed, and tried to take in as much as I could of the scenery and people. It was a trip designed to give, but in actuality, it gave me more than I gave. It was a trip to help eradicate “extreme poverty,” and while the area is certainly not like what you typically see in our cities, it gave me insight into “extreme wealth,” but not in ways that one may see visibly.

Christopherson Business Travel sponsors a group of employees to participate in a humanitarian expedition with Choice Humanitarian annually. Being a corporate partner with this international non-profit organization, we engage and volunteer whenever possible. This amazing organization assists villages across the globe in extreme poverty by providing self-sustaining techniques to improve their community from within. This year, the group, including myself, assisted in the Polochic region of Guatemala.  Read my story below, and be sure to leave comments on our blog or Facebook page.

Carmen’s Story

I knew that going on a CHOICE humanitarian trip would be a life-changing experience—traveling to a remote village in extreme poverty is bound to be eye-opening. But to be honest, I wasn’t ready for what I found.
The objective for our trip was to install new stoves in the villagers’ homes. Their current stoves were simply open flames constantly burning. The smoke was a true hazard, harming their lungs and eyesight. But the stoves we installed have a metal stovetop which contained the flame. More importantly, they have an exhaust pipe to push the smoke outside the house.

The conditions of the villagers’ homes were one of the first things I noticed and something that will stay with me forever. Most had one or two rooms total, but some families had additional buildings. Their ‘living room area’ was often their kitchen. Beds—typically just wooden boards with a blanket—were separate. It made the camping pad I brought with me look like luxury. Floors were made of dirt, hardened from years of wear, yet they still kept their homes clean and swept. Animals roamed everywhere, particularly chickens, running inside and outside of all buildings and structures. Though they had dogs and cats in the village, they were not kept as pets and were malnourished and starving, only bones and skin. One family had a pig. We were told they were one of the wealthiest families, as this was a luxury.

The village children were a highlight. They were always happy, generous and intrigued. I never saw them argue over a toy or gang up on one another. One girl named Carmen was particularly bright, ambitious, and creative. She was one of the only girls not wearing the traditional skirts the other girls wore. Someone told me her family could not afford the traditional clothes for her, so she continued wearing the ‘modern’ clothes that most girls transition out of.

It could be that Carmen and I share the same name, but I know she will stay with me forever. Though she’s bright and clever, she was born in a small village with very strict gender rules. She will likely never go to college or travel abroad or even experience life outside of this rural mountain. Though I obviously can’t foresee political or social changes for Guatemala, it’s unlikely things will change for her. Thinking back to how stressed out I was about little things before going on the expedition now makes me feel so selfish—things like how annoyed I was that Target didn’t have my favorite mosquito repellent to bring with me, or how mad I get when a show won’t load on Netflix. I haven’t been simply handed much in my life, but I have opportunities that many, many, many others don’t.

I am so grateful for the CHOICE expedition experience. The main purpose of the trip was to help others in our world, but I can confidently say I will continue to do so for the rest of my life. See more photos from the expedition group on Facebook.

Read next:

• Laura’s story
• Marta’s story
• Merrilee’s story
• Donna’s story

Christopherson Business Travel is a proud corporate sponsor of CHOICE Humanitarian. In addition to voluntary employee contributions and matching program, Christopherson annually sends a group of employees on a week-long humanitarian expedition.  CHOICE Humanitarian provides support to these small villages in extreme poverty with a village-centered approach. By teaching self-sustaining skills and implementing needed updates, CHOICE is driven by eliminating extreme poverty. This year, the group of nine employees visited a small village in the Buena Vista region of Guatemala. Marta Musich, a corporate travel agent from our Denver office volunteered this year. Below is her experience.

Traveling with our team on the CHOICE Expedition was a fantastic experience, even though it was somewhat bittersweet. It was a long ride to get to the village in Buena Vista, high in the mountains. It was a beautiful and bumpy ride into the jungle. We arrived at the village in the late afternoon. There was a wonderful and joyous welcoming from the villagers. We went down a steep mountain trail to end up by their small but clean school where we would be spending the next few days. I was sure happy to hear that the village men would be bringing down our luggage for us.

They put on a dance for us by the children, The Dance of the Dear. This is a dance that has been used over the years to welcome the visitors to the village. I really enjoyed watching all the children and villagers welcoming us. They were quite happy to see us and I was getting excited to start helping them with our assigned project.

We split up in groups. I was in the painting group. We were going to paint their community center. We were handed our supplies to complete this task and worked with several men from the village.

This was quite a highlight for me. I was able to spend time with the men and the children too. The villagers I painted with tried to teach me Q’eqchi. I had to pronounce the words over and over until I had them just right. We made a game out of it, they had to pronounce them in English. This helped break the ice. My favorite word was “us” which mean good. I used it a lot. The child were great. They wanted to help us too, until we brought out the coloring books. Then they decided they liked that a lot more.

After finishing the painting. I went over to help with the stove building. Everyone was helping to make their homes a much healthier place for them to live. The old way of cooking caused the walls and ceiling to be blackened with soot.

Some of my favorite moments were trying to grind the corn and make tortillas. I never realized how hard it was to do from scratch. I never was able to form one correctly. I need a lot more practice. It was quite fun laughing with the women in their homes. I so enjoyed being with the people of the village.

They really enjoyed the soccer balls that were brought and the children had so much fun with bubbles, coloring books, and jump roping. It made me smile from inside out.

The week was filled with many emotions. It saddened me to hear that their government would not pay for a teacher to come to the school and that the children had been without one for six months.

One day, I really wanted to take a shower after hours of long hot, sweaty work. But after I learned that the villagers were not using water so we could have a shower, I felt that I could stay a little dirty. It was so selfless of them to do this for us. They already a have so little; how could I take more from them?

There was hardly anything in their homes, yet they all seemed happy with so little. You hardly ever heard a child crying or not sharing with the others. These are lessons that so many of us need to learn. Maybe a few less possessions and more time spent together doing things would be good.

The saying “It takes a village to raise a child” still seems to apply here. I’m not sure if this is one of the reasons our children have become so isolated, where we don’t even know the family that lives next door, but it was such a wonderful time watching everyone together. A movie was shown one night and for some of the children this was the fist time they had seen one.

Personally, I have been downsizing for many years. I have realized that you don’t have to have a lot to be happy. But I am saddened that these villagers don’t even have the basics. There aren’t many ways to make money that far in the jungle. My outlook on poverty has changed a lot after this trip. I see how stuck people can become when it comes to getting out of poverty.

I was so lucky to meet such wonderful and caring people from the CHOICE group. We are so fortunate to live where we all can get an education and have an opportunity to make our lives better. I am very thankful for all that I have. This has opened my eyes and I hope I can find opportunities to help out the less fortunate here, near my own community.

See more photos from Marta’s expedition group on Facebook.

Read next:

• Donna’s humanitarian story
• Merrilee’s story

Christopherson annually sponsors a group of employees to travel with CHOICE Humanitarian. Based out of Salt Lake City, CHOICE Humanitarian is a strategic non-governmental agency (NGO).  Working in seven countries, their goal is to end extreme poverty.  Using a village-centered approach, they work to improve quality of life through self-sufficiency. Christopherson has been involved with CHOICE for more than 20 years and is also a corporate sponsor. This small group of volunteers provides one week of service on one of Choice’s international work sites. This past year, the group assisted in the Polochic region of Guatemala, helping the villagers build in-home stoves and painted the community center. Employees who are part of the employee contribution program are eligible to go on an expedition. These employees contribute donations to CHOICE monthly, with Christopherson graciously matching the donation.  Merrilee Rease, a corporate travel agent out of Salt Lake City shared her experience from this year’s trip to Guatemala:

“Participating on the CHOICE Humanitarian Expedition was a life changing event. In fact, I highly recommend it over a regular family vacation. The villagers’ daily struggle just to prepare meals and get water from the river both amazed and saddened me. They even conserved water leading up to our arrival so that we could take quick showers while we were there. We didn’t learn about this until about two days before we were to leave. I decided not to shower after finding this out. My most memorable times were playing with the kids. They are so happy, even with what little they have. It was like Christmas for a week for them. CHOICE brought a movie screen and projector for the village to watch movies. To hear their giggles and screams during the movie made me incredibly happy. It was the little things like this that we take for granted that meant the most to me.”

See more pictures of the 2016 expedition team’s photos here.
To view pictures from previous expeditions, visit our Facebook page.

Read next:

• Laura’s story
• Marta’s expedition story
• Donna’s humanitarian story

Every year, Christopherson Business Travel sponsors a group of employees to participate in a humanitarian excursion with Choice Humanitarian. As a corporate partner with this international non-profit organization, we engage and volunteer whenever possible. This amazing organization assists villages across the globe in extreme poverty by providing self-sustaining techniques to improve their community from within. This year, the group assisted in the Polochic region of Guatemala.  Secluded in the hills of Northern Guatemala near Cobán, they helped build stoves and paint the community center.

Laura’s humanitarian expedition story

As I boarded my flight to Guatemala City, I knew I would be seeing firsthand what extreme poverty would look like. Once I arrived, and began our four-hour bus ride (which really took seven hours until our first stop), I was amazed at the beauty of the country, the colorful but poorly constructed buildings, heavily congested roadways and traffic. Trash also seemed to be a huge problem, as it was strewn everywhere!

Once out of the big city, I saw another side of Guatemala. The landscape was still beautiful and colorful, and the people seemed pleasant and genuinely happy. I think overall, they accepted their way of life and appreciated the things they had.

My next five nights spent in a Q’eqchi’ village was the best experience. The landscape was like the movie Jurassic Park! I thought I’d really see a dinosaur come tromping through the trees! Of course I never did … but I did see a couple of lizards!

Our living arrangements were similar to primitive camping. We all brought our sleeping bags and air mattresses. CHOICE provided and prepared all the food. All of our meals were delicious! Even the daily homemade tortillas were a treat!

I was overwhelmed with the children’s eagerness to learn and help. I never once saw a child in tears or angry. Even the adults were curious of our presence. I was always reminded of this at our meal time! There was always an audience of villagers watching our every move.

Our project in the village was to assist with building cinder block stoves and painting the inside and outside of their community center. Our purpose was NOT to change their way of life, but to enhance and/or minimize their daily tasks. These people were proud of their way of life and their traditional heritage.

I’m still processing everything that I experienced and would go back in a heartbeat! “Laain Sa Lin Ch’ool!” (Q’eqchi’ for: I am fine, happy in my heart.)

Stay tuned for stories from our other adventurers. Check out our Facebook photos from this trip and past expeditions. Chirstopherson Business Travel is an award-winning corporate travel management company with 60 years of experience. 

Read next from our blog:

• Donna’s Story
• A CHOICE opportunity in Kenya

Nine of our employees had an experience of a lifetime this summer. Every year, Christopherson sponsors a group of employees to travel with CHOICE Humanitarian to volunteer on one of their international work sites. Based out of Salt Lake City, CHOICE Humanitarian is a strategic non-governmental agency (NGO) working in seven countries: Kenya, Nepal, Bolivia, Guatemala, Mexico, Ecuador, and Peru. Their overriding goal is to end extreme poverty and improve quality of life through a bottom-up, self-developing, village-centered approach. Christopherson has been involved with CHOICE for more than 20 years and is also a corporate sponsor. Employees who are part of the employee contribution program are eligible to go on an expedition. These employees contribute donations to CHOICE monthly, with Christopherson graciously matching the donation. Below is Donna Alford’s story from this year’s trip to Guatemala:

There really isn’t any way to adequately describe my recent CHOICE Humanitarian trip to the Polochic Region of Guatemala.

Was it hot? Yes! If anyone hears me complaining about the heat and humidity in Alabama, you have my permission to whack me on the head.

Was it exhausting? I typically sit at a desk all day. So, yes! It was exhausting.

Was it amazing? Absolutely. I would go back in a heartbeat!

It was such an incredible experience and I’m so honored to have met and worked with the villagers of Chimaxyat. To say that these people don’t have much is an understatement. At the beginning of the trip, my first inclination was to feel sorry for them. By the end of the week, I realized that what they lacked in material things, they more than made up for in their wonderful spirits. They were so gentle, happy, and full of grace, and I am so thankful that they welcomed us into their lives.

The CHOICE model states that “rather than participating in short term service delivery, we focus on building long term, sustainable solutions to issues related to extreme poverty” and boy, did we see that in action. Instead of CHOICE deciding what is best for a community, CHOICE involves the people of the village themselves. They determined what was needed for their village and we all came together to make that happen. In this case, it was a stove project.
Before this project began, the women and small children spend all day in close proximity to an old, unvented stove or, in some cases, just a re pit, which causes many health problems. Our project was to build new, more efficient stoves that were vented to the outside. They were so welcoming and kind to us as we went into their homes for this project.

We were also fortunate to visit the Sikaabe (meaning “Seek your Path”) Training Center. This is an educational and vocational school that can accommodate up to 32 students. It is a real life changer. The school teaches classes such as masonry, animal production, farming, hospitality, and culinary arts. The students gave a presentation and it was incredible to see the pride in their eyes. No translation needed for that! As a bonus, one of the students was getting married the day we were there and we were all invited. After the wedding, the groom changed back into his work clothes and proceeded to give us a tour of the animal production facility. All in a day’s work!

From the moment we arrived to a ceremonial dance performed by the children, to the end of our stay with the men of the village carrying our luggage on their heads, up the muddy, slippery trail to the bus, we were wrapped in love and caring from “our” village. The CHOICE staff did a wonderful job taking care of all of the logistics and the in-country team of cooks and servers were incredible. They served us three delicious meals each day and I am craving more of their hot chocolate. I am forever ruined for Swiss Miss in a packet.

See more pictures of the 2016 expedition team’s photos here.
To view pictures from previous expeditions, visit our Facebook page.

Read next:

• Marta’s story
• Laura’s expedition story
• Merrilee’s humanitarian story