“Let’s see if everybody wants to go and it started from there.” Such a simple sentence can have a lasting effect on people’s lives and those they encounter.
Such was the exact case for the Desoto family and 20 others from the Bow Valley who recently returned from a trip to Nicaragua, where goodwill and charity played a major role.
Canmore’s Christine Desoto had casually asked her Grade 11 son Johnny if he wanted to bring a friend along on an upcoming trip to Central America. Being torn by fairness and not wanting to discriminate, Johnny simply couldn’t share the trip with just one friend.
The decision set off a chain reaction of group effort, leading to a tribe of over 20 heading to Nicaragua.
“I put it out to the parents. All these guys are in Grade 11, and I told the parents it’s open, anybody can come,” Desoto said. “I was fine to take responsibility for the kids, but it would be fun if more parents wanted to come and some did.”
In all, there 24 in total, parents and youth, also including Desoto’s 23-year-old daughter, a cousin, two international exchange students, five students from Canmore Collegiate High School and a student from Our Lady of the Snows Catholic Academy.
Desoto had heard about this place in Jiquilillo, Nicaragua called Monty’s Surf Camp, where visitors can go on vacation and also volunteer.
Don (Monty) Montgomery, a Canadian, is co-owner of Monty’s Beach Lodge and Surf Camp. The destination’s slogan is: Stay, play, change the world; with a focus on volunteering to give back to local communities while visiting.
“Monty asked if we’d be interested in building a house, and we needed to raise $5,000 U.S., so we fund raised,” Desoto said.
Fundraising is going toward the building of 30 homes in the area through the work of other non-governmental organizations (NGOs) and the Nicaraguan government.
“The reason they’re building houses is because the water level is rising and it’s wiping out areas where people are living and they realized they needed to raise and build on a grander scale,” Desoto said.
To the group’s disappointment, they couldn’t physically start building the house yet, but were able to meet up with others there who had spent several years bringing school uniforms to local children.
“They’ve found if they can’t afford school uniforms they stop going to school,” Desoto said. “We went to three different schools and delivered uniforms. The teachers come out and hug you and kiss you and the kids are really lovely and seeing these high school boys sorting through shoes and trying them on little girls, it was really fantastic.”
Along with delivering uniforms, the students also helped sort 20,000 pairs of shoes with another organization called Operation Nicaragua.
“They deal with firefighting and police equipment, and they delivered shoes to the police department, delivered shoes to the schools and fed 300 people living at one of the local garbage dump sites,” Desoto said.
“Going to the garbage dump was pretty unbelievable. There’s actually a documentary movie called Gringos in the Garbage that was filmed at this dump. It’s about two guys that wanted to do something to help and the only way they thought they could help was to actually live there for awhile. So they lived on the dump like the locals do for two full weeks and made a documentary about it.”
The group also helped at a local orphanage by working in its garden.
“The orphanage only gets so much funding from the government, so to meet their financial needs they run a little farm, and also make cheese and sell it,” Desoto said. “It’s a lot of work for them to keep up, so it’s a regular occurrence for people from Monty’s to go up there and shovel manure and weed the garden.
“They also send kids to university, so they see these kids right through. These kids actually come back, help at the orphanage and help fund them with scholarships to go to school.”
Hard work and witnessing poverty firsthand is not considered a vacation by first world standards, but meeting fellow Canadians and taking part in helping a local community made for an unforgettable and rewarding experience.
“We still felt like we were on vacation, we still had so much fun doing things with and for the community,” Desoto said. “Monty has built a pop bottle school (built out of actual pop bottles) in the community, he’s used two shipping containers to build community centres and hired a teacher, teaching English every day of the week to kids and then later in the afternoon to mothers out of the community centre, which we visited.”
Another positive is that Johnny Desoto and his friends were able to use the experience to add to their school volunteer hours. In order to graduate, they need volunteer hours, which they accumulated by fundraising leading up to the trip.
“One of the highlights for Johnny was they also run a turtle hatchery and we were able to release baby turtles. I can’t tell you how many times Johnny yelled to me, ‘This is the best day of my life.’ We were able to swim in and follow these baby turtles – it was amazing,” Desoto said.
“We were also on this incredible beach for surfing with a great learning break. The kids really got to know the locals because when the waves were really good, the locals came out and those kids could surf and some were just on plywood. Another local took them fishing and spent time with us because he wanted to learn English – he was trying to teach me Spanish and I was trying to teach him English.
“Everyone came away impressed with how happy they are, what a happy culture they have with so little and how they really do enjoy life – they’re hard workers. I think everyone felt that they wanted to do more and felt that it just wasn’t enough, but at the same time we did feel we made an impact.”
The Desoto family and members of the trip wish to thank local businesses that helped in raising funds. Large donations and help with venues and fundraising initiatives came from the Highland Games, JK Bakery, Rusticana, the Kitchen Boutique, Canmore Bottle Depot, Safeway and many individual donations from community members, which raised $1,600 towards the experience.
