Stone-ground wheat

Went up to see my women's group this morning…they decided that they wanted to write/dictate a letter to the church in the U.S. who might be donating some money to help with our pila project. They took this letter very seriously, and it took the better part of the morning for them to dictate it in Q'eqchi', Estella to translate it to Spanish, and me to write it down in Spanish and English. But the finished product is quite nice, actually. They also decided that each week at our meetings each woman would donate Q2 for the project. With so many women, I decided to develop a roster to keep track of who was showing up to our meetings and who was giving money. When I took out the roster yesterday, they were ALL about it. Immediately they began self-policing…"Well, Maria didn't come the last two week and hasn't brought her money either. Cross her off the list miss Ana!" It's good to see them taking their pila project so seriously, but I had to intervene and tell them that I would keep track of the list, and that when we get further into developing the project, I will consider eliminating some names from the list.

After the meeting I stuck around Estella's house so she could teach me how to stone-grind my wheat (I wanted to make whole-wheat flour to make bread with). Two or three of the women stayed back with me, and immediately realized that if they left it to me to grind the wheat, I'd probably be there until nightfall. So they took over, showing me the proper techniques, and laughing at how tired I got, and how quickly. Estella also had a hand-cranked grinder that we used as well (also completely exhausting to use), as had about 5 cups of freshly ground whole-wheat flour in under an hour. It amazes me how strong these women are. My bread turned out great…the fresh wheat definitely has a stronger flavor than store-bought flour in the States did. A bit nuttier, perhaps. It is, however, a complete pain in the ass to grind my own wheat. Guess I'll just have to get used to it.