Shoebox success: Trip to Nicaragua emphasizes holiday philanthropy

By STACEY PALEVSKY, Courier Staff Writer

WATERLOO --- Five miles off the main road in Chinandega, Nicaragua, Dave Buck met a 102-year-old man who slept on a dirt floor in a small shelter made from flattened oil barrels.

The man's only Christmas wish was a wheelchair.

With that request in mind, Buck returned from his trip last week reluctant to begin his holiday shopping.

"The last thing I want to do is get out the credit card and buy a lot of stuff I don't need," Buck said.

Buck traveled to Nicaragua with a team of 14 people from the Cedar Valley, including seven members of the Waterloo Downtown Rotary Club.

The group's main purpose was to distribute supplies to impoverished Chinandega children. In the fall, 37 Cedar Valley organizations formed a partnership with the Rotary Club for the Shoebox Project, which filled 2,500 boxes with clothes, toys, pencils and soap.

"There are so many groups who have helped --- I feel really proud of what Americans have done in Nicaragua," Buck said.

Nicaragua is the second-poorest country in Central America. In Chinandega, a civil war and Hurricane Mitch left 2,000 people homeless, scavenging for food in the town dump.

The plight of Chinandega's people was first publicized in 1995 by the Rev. Marco Dessey, who initiated a revitalization, including the creation of schools and houses.

"You come home and you set your alarm and make coffee and pick up the phone, and it's such a huge contrast to the way they live," Rotary member Sheila Faust said. "Most people have never seen these things."

The trip marks the second year Faust and Buck traveled to Nicaragua.

Last year, Rotary member and Shoebox Project coordinators Buck and Steve Thorpe delivered 1,500 boxes to Chinandega.

They upped the ante by 1,000 when Nicaragua's first lady contacted Thorpe and asked if they would be able to bring additional boxes.

Besides the 2,500 boxes the team transported, it also brought 100 pounds of candy. Forming an assembly line in their hotel, they filled 800 bags with Starburst and Tootsie Rolls.

Thorpe said the trip reminded him people do have the power to make a difference. Thirty more homes had been built since their first trip.

"(The locals) are getting to the point where they can take care of themselves and are more self-sufficient," Thorpe said. "But they wouldn't have that opportunity without communities like Black Hawk County. ... But there's still so much that needs to be done."

Extensions of the Shoebox Project include providing diapers and blankets for young mothers and hundreds of notebooks and pencils for school-age children.

The team also will begin raising funds to send a wheelchair to the 102-year-old man.

"People would ask me, 'How was your trip? Did you have fun?'" Faust said. "That is the most difficult question to answer. It wasn't in any way a vacation, but it was far better than any vacation I've ever been on."