Your gift to Connecticut Quest for Peace (CT Quest) does more than provide emergency aid to needy Nicaraguans. It starts a relationship. When you enter the relationship you open yourself to the rich culture, friendship and spirituality of Nicaragua’s poor.

 

“The experience can be life-changing,” says CT Quest coordinator Randy Klein, “and we learn that relationships are most important.”

 

Programs strengthen Nicaraguan cultural traditions and extend community

 

Struggling to feed and clothe their families, most Nicaraguan parents can’t scrape together the few extra cordobas needed for music and art lessons, after-school tutoring or elder care services. You can. Become an extended family member to a Nicaraguan child, woman or elder with your gift to our: 

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• Inner city cultural center that trains young barrio artists and poets. In Nicaragua, artists and artisans are universally honored. Poetry is a national obsession: People of all ages read, memorize, recite and write poems and Ruben Dario and Ernesto Cardenal are cultural heroes. At Centro Culturale of Batahola Norte in Managua, the arts are cultivated and nurtured by a staff of gifted artist/teachers. Your donation to the Centro provides scholarships to children and adults in instrumental and vocal music, dance, theater and visual arts. Your gift also funds natural medicine, computer science, sewing, and culinary programs.

• Senior program that gives dignity and comfort to elderly Managuans. After a lifetime performing backbreaking labor, many elderly Nicaraguans face a bleak future of illness and poverty. In Managua, seniors are warmly welcomed at Casa Hogar Temporal de Los Abuelas y Abuelos, the House for Grandmothers and Grandfathers. Located in Barrio el Recreo, one of Mangua’s poorest neighborhoods, this day-program provides seniors with nutritious snacks, craft activities, books, a piano and—perhaps most importantly—warm companionship.

• Rape crisis counseling that helps women triumph over machismo culture. Recently an American donor generously outfitted a CT Quest community center with new computers and a playground and asked about the Center’s other pressing needs. He learned that the most urgent requirement is for a rape crisis counselor, a professional to help community women cope with the trauma of physical and sexual abuse—experienced by over 50% of all Nicaraguan women. Please sustain the initial gift started by CT Quest’s supporter.

• After-school tutoring to give struggling kids the boost they need to succeed. By age ten, 15% of all Nicaraguan children must work to help support their families. Often children attend school in the early morning and are on the job—in fields, mines, or marketplace—by mid-day. Many parents cannot read—more than 50% of all rural Nicaraguans are illiterate—and have little time to help their exhausted children with their homework. At CT Quest-funded Projeto Generando Vida in Managua, an after-school tutoring program provides library resources, computers and experienced tutors to help 70 students keep up with their studies. Working with kids in grades 1-6, tutors help students improve their math, Spanish and writing.

• Orphanage that shelters abandoned girls. Of Nicaragua’s 5 million citizens, half are under the age of nineteen. Driven by poverty, physical and sexual abuse, many children are abandoned—or flee violent homes—to live on the streets. At Hogar Alegria, “Home of Happiness” twenty-eight girls age 4-17 are given a welcoming home, solid education and job-training from Teresian Sisters, who founded the orphanage.

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​Support Nicaragua’s young artists and scholars

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