There is an elementary school in San Juan, the closest town - on the other side of the mountain. It's about a 50 minute walk from the village where we were living. The kids leave around 6am to walk over the mountain to get to school on time. They are given breakfast and lunch (as an incentive for parents to send their kids to school and to help the kids get good nourishment) provided by the government. So, each mother with kids in the school is on a rotation to fix the food in the morning and afternoon. Esperanza, 16yrs old, goes in place of her mother, and invited us when it was her turn to cook. So, we got up really early, (She told us she's be by our house to get us at 5am and we would hike over and start cooking. She got there right before six. They don't have clocks and just go by the sun!) and walked with her and her sister Claudia, 9yrs/3rd grade.
This is Esperanza. Her family was our closest neighbors in the village. We couldn't see their house, but we could see their gate for their driveway. She is the oldest of 4. Aurelio is 14, Lupita is 12 and Claudia is 9. She's the only one still in school. Esperanza is ready for marriage - she knows how to sew, cook, and take care of kids. Lupita is learning how to sew and cook. Esperanza's teaching her a lot.
Two women work at the school at a time. They slave over a wood stove. Most of the day is taken up with making tortillas. There are 30 students plus 2 teachers and 2 kitchen workers. That's a lot of tortillas! Whatever is leftover, the kitchen workers take home for their troubles.
Some of the kids from the village we lived in stayed around after lunch while the kitchen was cleaned up so that we could all walk home together. They taught us some Guarijio words and were delighted with the digital camera. They loved seeing the screen on the back while framing a picture & after each picture was taken, everyone had to see the picture before we could take another one. Usually the people are very shy around cameras, so this was a great opportunity to get some pictures while they were enjoying it.
Sofia, 9yrs/3rd grade, in blue is a sweet, but extremely shy girl. Claudia in the green is Esperanza's youngest sister.
This is the front of the 2nd, 3rd, & 4th grade classroom. 
This is the back of the above classroom. The other classroom is for 1st, 5th, & 6th grades. Each room as exactly 15 students. One of the teachers drives 50 minutes in the morning and afternoon on her quad (4 wheeler) to get to & from school. 
And then after everything was cleaned up and put away, we all walked home together.
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