Chiapas 'Peace House' spreads solidarity S.F. center attracts volunteers to serve in southern Mexico from around the world By Kimberly Turner, CORRESPONDENT

SAN FRANCISCO — There is a 33-year-old computer nerd in this city who would rather move to an extremely poor Mexican nation and fix bicycles than stay in his cushy tech job. There's a 24-year-old peace worker in this town who grew weary of non-profit work and signed on to an international peace project. Who says Generations X and Y don't see beyond their own wants and desires? The computer nerd is Vann Miller — a software engineer who became Web master and secretary for the Chiapas Peace House Project. The peace worker is Yakira Teitel, another volunteer working with the Peace House, who found this calling on the Internet. The Peace House office in San Francisco is a center for solidarity work and education in San Cristobal de Las Casas, Chiapas, Mexico. The center attracts volunteers from all over the world, although several like Miller live in the Bay Area. Groups such as the Peace House became involved in Chiapas, the most southern state of Mexico, because of its long history of injustice and inequality, especially among the indigenous population. Centuries of displacement have led to an atmosphere of extreme poverty and tension. In 1994, a group of indigenous Mayans known as the Zapatistas declared war on the Mexican government demanding food, land, education and autonomy. Since then, the Mexican government and the Zapatistas have been engaged in low-intensity warfare. Peace House and other international groups workingthere seek to support the indigenous peoples' demands for justice, health and education. From February to August of last year, Miller spent most of his time in Chiapas working as "the computer guy" for the Peace House and Consejo de Organizaciones de Medicos y Parteras Indigenas Traditionales de Chiapas, an organization that promotes the use of traditional indigenous medicine. Some stay at the Peace House in Chiapas and lead workshops on topics ranging from local history to immigration rights. Others work in indigenous communities on organic farming and general education efforts or with partner organizations. Miller's journey to Chiapas almost didn't happen. He thought he had been turned down when he received no response to his application. It ended up in his junk mail folder. A friend in the organization suggested he apply for a board member position. Fortunately for Miller, he got the position a day before he flew to Mexico. "I thought it was a good opportunity to participate in a direct democracy movement," Miller said. "I've always been interested in economics and social science and was interested in finding a way to blend that with computer science. "My Spanish wasn't that good, so it took me a while before I had the confidence to speak the language," Miller said. "I left a little premature. I think my Spanish was getting much better toward the end." Miller now works for the Peace House's San Francisco office but hopes to return to Chiapas, where he was surprised by what he found. "I was expecting San Cristobal to be more rural — more like a Third World country," Miller said. "I was surprised to see so many Internet cafes, signs of modernity." Since the Zapatista uprising, San Cristobal has been flooded with tourists and activists. But Simon Walker, 30, who lived in Zapatista communities for a year, saw the poverty firsthand. He said some of these curious tourists do not bother to learn Spanish, or come to Chiapas wanting to meet Subcommandante Marcos, leader of the Zapatista army. Walker and Miller say there is a huge difference between what people think they know about the Zapatistas and reality. "There's no running water, you use outhouses, and the people are very poor," Walker said. "It's a little difficult to see." Walker spent his time repairing bicycles in Zapatista communities. Walker said he found working with Zapatista communities challenging. "The people are of Mayan decent, so Spanish isn't their first language either," Walker said. "And I didn't speak any Mayan languages." "The division of wealth (in San Cristobal) is very obvious," said Yakira Teitel, 24, another Peace House volunteer. "The indigenous people experience the most poverty and have shorter life spans." Teitel is from San Francisco and went to Chiapas after graduating from college in spring 2003. Disillusioned by nonprofit work in the United States, she sought other options. She found the Peace House organization on the Internet, became a volunteer and lived in Chiapas from March to May 2004. Since then, Teitel has been living in Chiapas off and on, returning to the United States last November. "I was really interested in the organizing models in Chiapas and wanted to bring those models back here," Teitel said. In Chiapas, Teitel spent most of her time working with Hermano Sol "Brother Sun," an organization focusing on improving the living conditions of farmers in indigenous communities in the Sierra Madre. Most of these communities are coffee growers but do not produce enough crops for self-sufficiency. Before Miller dropped everything to move to Chiapas, he was a University of California, Berkeley graduate and dot-comer working on mobile systems for Mblox. Why would someone living so comfortably want to move all the way to Mexico to live in a community struggling to survive? "I don't help people because I think I should, but because it's gratifying for me," Miller said. Walker's year in Chiapas not only gave him the opportunity to use his three years of Spanish education, but also time for self reflection. "I spent a lot of time looking at the privilege we have because we're white and middle class," Walker said. "Just a lot of time realizing how those dynamics play out." For Teitel, it is the perseverance and determination of the indigenous population in Chiapas that keeps her coming back year after year. "Despite the hardships and extreme poverty people live in, there is an undying commitment and hope that things will change."

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