Current Status

In June 2008 the staff of ProPeten travelled to southern Belize to begin a new collaboration with the Julian Cho Society and the Tumul K'in School of Learning to bring the radio program, Entre Dos Caminos, to southern Belize. The radio program will play in Q'eqchi' on Tumul K'in's new community radio station which, with help from UNESCO to purchase a more powerful antennae, will broadcast throughout the Toledo District. Because the first 25 episodes produced by MACHI-ProPeten were very specific to the context of the Guatemalan Peten, script writer Yadira Vanegas must adapt the episodes for southern Belize - including more recent colonial histories of Maya life in the area. During their visit, Yadira along with other members of the ProPeten team, interviewed community leaders and other individuals in different Q'eqchi' communities to help them decide how to approach subjects such as the value of cultural heritage to local people. The 15 new episodes to be produced this year, because they are more general in content, will not need to be specially adapted for Belize, and will be transmitted following the broadcast of the 2007 episodes. The Belizean adapted episodes should be ready for transmission in Fall 2008.

Children attending a MACHI workshop in Indian Creek village.