It’s a bright, golden-colored refuge that rests among the hectic streets of Guatemala City . A bus stop sits across the way, and hatchback cars and colorful buses whirl by on their way to outlying territories. Outside it’s noisy, dusty and fast-paced.

But inside the home is drastically different. It’s airy, open and calm. A plant-lined atrium greets guests upon entry; bedrooms line the walls with photos, stuffed animals and posters of celebrities; there’s a cozy living room with several couches and a TV; and fresh laundry flaps in the cool air outside an open kitchen.

Each girl has different story-abuse, gangs, drugs, abandonment, forced prostitution. But all have the same hope for their future-success. And for the first time in their lives, they finally have a fighting chance.

Buckner Orphan Care International opened the Tran-sitional Girl’s Home in January through a partnership with Guatemalan businesswoman Isabel de Bosch, owner of a popular food chain. The home seeks to provide a place for teenaged girls to prepare for their future after life in an orphanage, and allows each girl to go to private school and receive specialized tutoring.

Celeste, 18, is studying to be a lawyer. But when she was 15 years old, she turned herself over to a judge to be admitted to the government orphanages. It was her only hope to receive an education, she said.

So Celeste remained silent until the fateful day, Oct. 4, 2003-her brother’s birthday-when she fled her home after yet another unexplained episode of abuse.

“I learned really fast that the best thing to do was to be obedient,” she said. “I would help the staff by talking to the other girls and try to keep them from running away. Then, because I was doing well in school, I was eventually able to come here” to the transitional home.

Gaby, 14, loves to play soccer and draw. She hopes to teach or design cars one day. But when Gaby was only 6 years old, she contemplated suicide.

“My mom died when I was a year old,” she begins, explaining that since her father was placed in prison for her mother’s death, she and her siblings were shuffled from aunt to aunt most of her childhood.

When Gaby was 12 years old, she began drinking and dating a gang member. Then she ran away from home. When she returned four days later, her aunt decided to place her at Manchen.

Gaby started to perform better in school. She passed the fifth and sixth grade and anxiously waited to complete the seventh grade because her aunt promised that was when she would return for her.

From there, Buckner worked to place Gaby into the transitional home where she has “changed a lot,” said Ada Ramirez, Buckner follow-up staff member in Guatemala.

“Gaby has a very strong character, and in the beginning she was very aggressive with me. But she has calmed down. I guess she really just needed some attention,” she said.

This is cache, read story here