Finca Project

New Promo Video

2007-09-13T16:02:00.000-07:00

Sorry we haven't been blogging lately. Alot has happened in the past few months. Check out our new promo video. We are proud of it.

La Inauguracíon

2007-03-07T14:08:00.000-08:00

This last Sunday, we had the opening celebration of our new community nursery. Over 100 people came from all over the Aguabuena area to see what we were up to and participate in our naming ceremony. We had good food, a beautiful day, and a disco dance party to end the night.

At first, we were worried that no one would show up. We go to so many meetings where only 3 people show up when 4 are needed to make it official. It is part of the "si Dios quiere" (if God wants/wills it) culture. When we invited people, almost everyone said, "si Dios quiere". Which usually is a "suavetico" way of saying "probably not". But apparently God wanted people to come. Over 100 people came, some walked for hours to get to the part.

The idea behind our nursery is to make it a community run project. We had a special naming ceremony to help create this sense of community. Everyone wrote down an idea of a name for the nursery, and we voted by applause on the best name. It is now Vivero Pueblos Unidos (Nursery of United Villages).

The party was a great success. It feels good to know that the community supports our project. Sometimes we wonder what people think of us in town. This goes to show that at least the hundred or so people that came to our party support our project.

Protesting CAFTA 2/26

2007-02-28T10:10:00.000-08:00

TLC = Tratado Libre Comercio = Free Trade Agreement

Sunday night at 1:00 am we boarded a bus sponsored by the National University (FEUNA) and Rice Growers Union to take us to the biggest Costa Rican protest against CAFTA (Central American Free Trade Agreement). The bus ride took 9 hours to get to San Jose. Our bus had a strobe light that illuminated the overgrown road as we picked up groups of people along the way. We tried to sleep, but it was hard.

This was the biggest protest yet in Costa Rica (and possibly Central America) against a free trade agreement with the United States. Costa Rica is still the only country in the pact that has not ratified the free trade agreement. This summer we will be putting more energy (with help of our interns) to explain exactly what is at stake in this free trade agreement. But until then, we want the world to know that Costa Rica has not ratified the treaty and that the majority of Costa Ricans are against the agreement.

Check out our video blog to see some raw (unedited) footage of the protest. We will be putting more effort into editing and writing about the developments here, but we want to get the word out now about what is happening.

The Panamanian Desert

2007-02-19T13:34:00.000-08:00

Last week, while we were working on the nursery, Harold told me this story about a desert in Panama.

Once upon a time, there was a very large farm in the mountains of central Panama. One day, a worker went to the farm in search of work. He asked the patron if he could work the fields. The patron told him that there was no work on the farm; they could not afford to hire more workers. But, everyday, the worker came back asking to work on the farm. Finally, the patron consented and let the worker work the fields. “Mira que valiente!”. He was the hardest worker the patron had ever seen. After the first day of work, the patron praised the worker for his hard work and offered to pay him handsomely. The worker refused the payment, saying that God had sent him to work the fields for free. This greatly angered the patron. The patron said that if the worker didn’t accept the money, then he would have to leave. The patron did not want to start an uproar with the rest of the workers. The hardworking man refused the payment and said if the patron did not let him work the fields for free he would curse the farm. “Largate!” said that patron. So the worker cursed the farm, turning it into a desert that would grow and grow until all of Panama was consumed. The next year the farm dried up. All of the crops died. Since then, the farm has turned into a desert. It is now known as the Panamanian desert. Every year it grows a few meters. One day Panama will turn into a desert.

I asked Harold if he believed the story. He said “tal vez si, tal vez no.” One day we are going to go to the desert. Harold has never seen one before.

The Farmers Market - La Feria

2007-02-07T13:02:00.000-08:00

While we were back in the States during Christmas, a farmers' market started in Copabuena. It had seemed like a dream of Umberto Zuniga's that was never going to take flight. When we first moved to Copabuena, I was shocked that there wasn't a market where vegetables could be sold locally. The vegetables were either sold to the big vegetable vendors or given (regalados) amongst friends. This was something that I couldn't understand. Why buy tomatoes that come from San Jose, when your neighbor grows them and sells them to San Jose?

When I was in Oakland last December, we had a meeting with Rod Fujita at Environmental Defense. We talked a little about the economics of Copabuena - a town that depends heavily on the international coffee market. He explained very eloquently exactly why there hadn't been a farmers market in Copabuena. In a town like Copabuena, agriculture serves two purposes - one to bring income via the international market (coffee, or major vegetable prduction); and two, for personal and family sustainability (food to eat). For many community members it seems like a perversion of this division to bring a market between friends and family (ie the farmers' market). It is a precious thing that they can exist outside of a market place.

So I was surprised when we returned to find the farmers' market had started. It is very small. It is going very slowly. There are no signs for the market. Most of the buying is between the producers. But it is a start. Our intern, Sofia, is doing a project investigating how the community is responding to the market and how it can be more productive.

We are selling fruit tree seedlings - papayas for 100 colones (0.20 US$), avocado and cacao for 150 colones. We are selling the trees at low cost as a way to reach out to the community. Farmers that are dedicated to reforestation can sign up for our program to receive free seedings.

While the farmers' market is very small, I believe that it is important. This town has suffered severely from the drop in coffee prices and can no longer depend solely on international markets to create sustainability. It is time for change.....and it is exciting to watch it happen.

Check out our interns' blogs to see what they are up to www.fincainterns.blogspot.com.

Pura Vida
Eliot

Back to Coton

2007-02-05T07:31:00.000-08:00

Last week, we headed up to Las Alturas de Coton to scope out what seeds were dropping in the rainforest. We woke up before sunrise, piling into our truck. There were six of us in the reforestation crew – Harold and Wilson (our local employees), Lara and Sofia (our interns), Brendan and I.

Going to Coton is always an exciting event – like going to a antiquated mountain kingdom. When we first rolled into town, it had even more the feeling of a ghost town. More people have left since the last time we were there. We parked in the shade next to the tractors and guards. It always takes a while for the guards to warm up to me. I feel like they are testing me. Even though they know who I am, it takes a couple of hours before they finally break their silence and shout, “Rompecama”, my nick name (The Bed-Breaker) because last year the bed I was sleeping on in the workers quarters had broken beneath me at 3 in the morning waking up the whole town. After shouting “Rompecama”, I respond with my anticipated response of “Pichaso” which does not translate into English very politely. Then we were friends again.

I needed to find Clemente, the old man who tends to their reforestation nursery to tell me what seeds were in season. The guards sent someone on horseback to find him up in the mountains. After a little while, Clemente came hobbling down the road to meet us. In his thick mountain accent he asked me, “Busca semillas?” (Are you looking for seeds?). I nodded. “No hay.” We had come to early in the season. The seeds are still waiting for a few more weeks of the dry season before they want to fall. I had a feeling before we came that this might be the case. The end of January is the beginning of seed harvesting season in Coto Brus.

We went up to the rainforest anyways. We found a few seeds. Some “aguacaticos” (little mountain avocados) and some palms. We also found a “Sabanera”, a large non-poisonous snake. We hiked in the forest for a few hours and then headed for a swimming hole in the Rio Coton. Harold and Wilson said they had never swam in water so cold and fresh. By 1:00 we all really needed some coffee.

We went back to town, and I asked some guards if there was anyone in town who could make us coffee. Dona Elisa, who usually cooks me meals and makes coffee, had taken the day off to go to San Vito. The guards consulted each other and agreed that “cuesta mucho para encontrar café aca” (it takes a lot to find coffee around here). The problem is that there is no one in the town. After about half an hour, we finally found a sympathetic woman who made us some coffee and food.

We are heading back to Coton next month. We plan on making it a monthly seed-collecting journey.

Pura Vida
Eliot

Buying a Car

2007-01-22T12:26:00.000-08:00

We are back in Costa Rica to start the new year. We have an awesome intern, Sofia, who flew down with me (Eliot) a week and a half ago. It is warm and sunny and great to be back down here.

The first item on our agenda was to buy a car. Brendan met us in San Jose and we started first thing in the morning looking for a car. We had tried to get the Mendez family to help us find a friend of the family that knew about cars. But that all seemed to fall through. So we jumped into a sympathetic looking taxi and asked the driver to take us to some used car dealers.

I hate dealing with cars, dealers, and mechanics because I really don't know much about cars not to mention I am not fluent in car talk (in English much less in Spanish). As we were driving I did my best not to let the driver aware of my ignorance while at the same time probing him for the right vocabulary words and bureaucratic regulations involved in buying a car. It took us about 3 hours driving around the suburbs of San Jose until we found the car we were looking for. I asked the driver to take us to Cartago (a suburb of San Jose). The taxi driver wasn't sure that there would be any cars there. I told him there has to be because its called Car-tago. I was right.

One thing that I have realized being from the United States is that the US has some of the cheapest cars in the world. Costa Rica has an extremely high import tax on cars. Originally our idea had been to drive a car down here from the US, but we were warned that it isn't worth it after all the taxes you will have to pay. So we decided to buy it here.

The car we ended up getting is a 1988 Toyota 4 Runner. Its pretty awesome. After negotiating we ended up getting it for about $4000 although we had to pay a lawyer a little bit more to get the papers filed. The Mendez family thought we would never be able to buy a car in only 2 days. But we did. We drove strait to Aguabuena after we bought the car. It took about 6 hours and we didn't get in till around midnight.

We promise to write more blogs than we have been. We are also starting Finca Video Blog 1. 0. So keep checking in. It should be fun.

The sunset as we drove over Cierro de la Muerte.
Hasta Pronto
Eliot

Butterfly Breeding

2007-01-07T15:57:00.000-08:00

I went to Monteverde to check out the rainforest reserve and I stumbled upon a mariposario (butterfly garden) where I received a quick lesson in butterfly breeding. I thought the reproduction process would be complicated, but with a little chat with a specialist (the woman pictured above) I realized that it is fairly simple. She taught me about the most important aspects of butterfly breeding - from when the eggs are first laid, to the growing larva, to the forming pupa, and finally to the emerging adult. As we talked, it took me back to the third grade when I first learned about the amazing life cycle of the Monarch butterfly. This woman (whose name, I am embarrassed to say, I have forgotten) never went to school to study; she is a self-taught expert and has been working with these creatures for over 25 years. I asked her if she had an email address in case I had any questions in the future. She looked confused, then chuckled and gave me her home phone number.

She told me "Primero..." (first), after choosing a species, you must know what plant the caterpillar of that species eats. This is the plant where the mother will lay its eggs to ensure that her babies have a sufficient food supply after birth. The temperature must be higher than 76 degrees F (around 80 F is optimum). This is especially critical when the caterpillar decides to build its chrysalis. When the caterpillar is full-grown, it makes a silk pad on the leaf where it attaches itself in preparation for the chrysalis. Inside the chrysalis nothing new is created; instead, the wings, legs, and other parts of the butterfly are formed through the modification of already existing parts of the larva. When the butterfly emerges, it must find a new source of food because it has developed a proboscis (a long tube-like mouth) and is unable to consume solid food. For the adult butterfly, the flower and nectar are the sources of its nutrition.

I followed up this conversation with a visit to the library at the National Museum in order to research specific species. There I took notes and dreamed of the design of Finca Project's butterfly breeding house. We will work with the local high school students to create breeding houses at the high school as well as on our farm.

Butterflies play a vital role in the pollination of many tropical rainforest plants. Some plants and butterflies have developed co-dependent relationships. If one specific species of butterfly were to die, the plant that it pollinated would quickly follow its fate.

Today butterflies.......tomorrow bees!

So long from the Finca,
Brendan

Year in Review

2006-12-28T10:43:00.000-08:00

This was the first year of Finca Project. We have accomplished a lot, and we want to thank all of you who helped make this year such a success through your generous donations, hard work, and creative ideas. I just want to take this blog to review what has been going on.

2006

January
-Eliot and Brendan return from Egypt .
-Eliot, Brendan and Jeff have a two-day long brainstorming session in Santa Cruz with help from some of our parents to strategize how this next year would work.
-We had a fundraising party in Austin raising $1,800 two days before Brendan and Eliot flew down to Costa Rica. Wow, have we come a long way from that party when we could only speak vaguely about what we planned on doing!

Eliot and Brendan at the Fundraiser in Austin last January.

February
-Started reconstruction of our farmhouse.
-Worked with a CAN intern, Nicole, on her project of methane-biogas conversion to electricity.
-Aided Dr Catherine Lindell to net and tag migratory birds.

The house before....

March
-Finished farmhouse reconstruction and moved onto the farm.
-Took first trip to rainforest (Las Alturas) to collect seeds, collecting over 10,000.
-Met with the coffee cooperative, CoopePueblos, to plan our first joint reforestation project.
-Brendan flew back to the US.

After... (Those are boxers drying not Tibetan prayer flags.)

This is the rainforest where we collect our seeds.

April
-Started our seedling nursery.
-Jeff and Robin's baby girl, Ayla, is born.
-Eliot visits Nicaraguan coffee farmers with members of CoopePueblos to learn about the differences between Nicaragua and Costa Rica.

A School in La Corona Nicaragua.

The beginnings of our nursery.

May
-Our first volunteers, Mikael Dooha and Takashi Iwahashi, live and work with us.
-We take second trip to Las Alturas to collect more seeds.
-Expand our seedling nursery.

Eliot takes the volunteers on a tour of our farm.

June
-Eliot returns to US.
-We hire our neighbor, Harold, to continue collecting seeds and expanding the nursery.

Our neighbor Harlod, and his family. In the next year we plan to hire Harold full-time, if we have enough funding.

July
-Eliot returns to Costa Rica.
-Starts English classes with Peace Corps volunteers, Jacob and Trina.
-Starts collecting oak seeds (acorns) for the nursery.
-Begins organic vegetable garden.
-Works with Evergreen intern, Natasha, on charcoal composting methods.

Eliot teaching English.

August
-Eliot is invited to judge an English competition at the local high school.
-Brendan returns to Costa Rica, Eliot to the US.
-Brendan continues English Classes.
-Works with Santa Cruz intern, Dan, on earthworm compost.
-Brendan begins reforestation projects at local elementary school.

Brendan planting trees with the local elementary school.

Dan conducting research on our seedlings.

September
-Brendan visits Panama to learn about Panamanian reforestation projects.
-Eliot returns to Costa Rica.
-We start working with the local high school, the Association of Development, and CoopePueblos to create an ecological student group - "Jovenes Ecologicos".
-Continue with English classes.
-Planted over 300 trees at Aguabuena High School.

Students brainstorming the steps involved
in a reforestation project.

October
-We take "Jovenes Ecologicos" on many field trips.
-Met with the Association of Development, CoopePueblos, and some governmental agencies to solidly our first reforestation project along the Rio Salto.
-Expanded English classes
-Eliot and Brendan return to US for Finca Tour 2006.

Field trip to the Rio Salto.

November
-Eliot guests lectures at a few high schools in Austin.
-Brendan screens Birdsong and Coffee (a documentary) in Illinois.
-We networked with universities to create internship programs, Princeton asks us to reserve two spots for their students every year.

December
-Finca Tour 2006 raises over $5000.
-We screened Birdsong and Coffee in Austin with the help Bob and Burgess of the Travis Audubon Society to a very receptive crowd.
-Brendan returns to Costa Rica.

Brendan at our Berkeley Fundraiser on December 2nd.

Next year.....

We are starting our High School Cultural Exchange Program where students from around the world will work together on our reforestation project in the Rio Salto. Between January and March (the dry season), we will be planning the project, working with high school students, college interns and community members to strategize around the difficulties we face. We will begin planting in May. Stay tuned for more....we are going to start a Video Blog to keep you more entertained.

Muchas gracias a todos.

A word on organics (gone bananas)

2006-11-07T19:59:00.001-08:00

I am back in Austin getting ready for our holiday fundraisers. Today was a beautiful day and I rode my bike around town. I stopped by the Bicycle Sports Shop and while I was waiting for my bike to be fixed I went to check out their smoothie stand. I noticed a sign that said "Everything is Organic (excluding the bananas)". I thought it was kind of weird, so I asked the woman working the blender why they don't have organic bananas.

She replied, "The skin is so thick, it doesn't really matter."

She is referring to the idea that since the skin is thick, pesticides wont penetrate to the fruit, therefore the fruit is rendered harmless.

This idea really bothers me. The organic movement should not just be a privilege of wealthy north americans to decide how much pesticides they will introduce to their digestive system. It is about the health of our planet, our water supply, the health of farmers and their families, and the longevity and sustainability of agricultural land and ecosystems. Usually I argue against the corporatizing of Organics because it is becoming virtually meaningless, but today I found myself arguing for Organics.

I told her that I grow organic bananas and not only is it not very hard, but organic bananas aren't very expensive. (As opposed to organic tomatoes). I tried to convince her that a pesticide-soaked banana peel sitting in the fridge is just as "bad" as a non-organic strawberry. I tried to explain to her that in banana-growing countries, there are pesticides that have been out-lawed since the 1960s in the US. I really dislike this puritanical idea that organics is about our own choice of what we put in our body not about what we dump into our earth ecosystem.

The US has created foreign policy on bananas. We have gone to war over bananas. We have installed military dictators who have started genocidal regimes over bananas. We cant just shrug them of "because they have thick skin".

No a TLC - Protesting in the Lowlands

2006-10-25T17:57:00.000-07:00

Yesterday we drove down the mountain to the low lands to march in protest against TLC (Tratado Libre Comercial), known in the US as CAFTA (Central American Free Trade Agreement). For the last two days there has been a nation-wide strike of students, farmers, and governmental employees. Costa Rica is the last of the Central American countries and Dominican Republic to ratify the treaty. Ironically, it was the first to push for it.

Julietta, Jenny, Leslie, Brendan, and I all crammed into to Jenny’s little sedan to drive down the bumpy road to Ciudad Neilly and over to Rio Claro where the marchers from Neilly and Golfito were to converge. It was foggy on top of the mountain, but as we dropped below the clouds, we saw the coastal plains open up and caught a glimpse or two of the ocean. Leslie is an intern from Nebraska. She had never been down to the lowlands. As we were driving down the mountain, I started to explain to her the irony of going to a strike against free trade in what used to be a United Fruit Company town. Now the area is all palm-oil plantations; now mostly privately owned by small-scale farmers after La Frutera disbanded.

As we rolled into Neilly, the marchers were gearing up to march to Rio Claro via the Panamericana. We ended up at the front of the line, along with the rice farmers’ union and all their tractors. It was hot. We pushed to the front of the line mostly to get some air flowing. We ended up ahead of the protest waiting with the ICE (Costa Rica’s government-run energy and telecommunications company) for the rice farmers and university students to meet them.

This is what we have learned is at stake in TLC (pronounced TAY EL-AY SAY):

The idea is to create a free-trade zone in Central American and the Dominican Republic.

TELECOMMUNICATIONS
This would lead to the privatization of many governmental agencies such as ICE. Talking to a representative from ICE, he told me that the fear is that the prices would skyrocket as there is would be no governmental subsidies. The “northamerican” idea would be that once the market was “liberated”, competition would lower the prices (maybe not as low as ICE), but to what is a “reasonable” market value. The problem I mentioned to the representative with ICE is that they are backlogged, flooded with work. Many people in our neighborhood have been soliciting phone lines for months. He thinks that free trade is not the answer because the people of Costa Rica are too poor to afford the increase in price.

WEAPONS
It would bring jobs to Costa Rican including weapons manufacturing plants. Many Costa Ricans feel that this goes against the peaceful culture of a country that abolished its army in 1948. The current president, Oscar Arias, was also president during the 80s and won the Nobel Peace Prize for negotiating between the US-backed Nicaraguan Contra (Counterrevolutionary) army and the socialist Sandanista Party. Oscar Arias (as well as Costa Rica) is considered the diplomat of Central America. Currently he is aiding in negotiations in Colombia between the FLN (Frente de Liberacion Nacional – a U.S.-labeled terrorist organization) and the Colombian government. Many Costa Ricans are now calling him a hypocrite for supporting a treaty that would bring a weapons manufacturing plant to the country.

AGRICULTURE
Another major fear of TLC is the entrance of agricultural corporate giants such as Monsanto. This would increase the price of seeds and fertilizers. It might require local farmers to adhere strictly to Monsanto’s regulations and recommendations. There is also the fear of the introduction of genetically-modified plants and the contamination of the local genetic pool especially in the production of corn. The rice farmers repeatedly said throughout the protest, “Diga no a arroz gringo” (Say no to Gringo Rice).

Costa Rica is the only country in the agreement that hasn’t ratified the treaty. It is almost inevitable that they will within the next few weeks.

Eliot’s Beliefs about TLC

I believe that Free Trade is a beautiful philosophy created a long time ago in a country far away (England I’m pretty sure). Opening free markets does and has helped many people in this world. But the enforcement of it has also brought many wars, genocides, and other horrible atrocities (Vietnam, Guatemala, Chile, Iraq…). With the advances of technology (like the internet especially) free trade is inevitable. For example, you can buy coffee over the internet directly from farmers here in Aguabuena. That is Free Trade in its essence. And currently it verges on illegal, because it is just sliding under the scope of governmental export taxes. In this way opening up free markets DOES help.

BUT, it is hard for a small country to benefit from a free trade agreement with huge countries with trillions of dollars waiting to pour into the country via socially irresponsible corporations such as Monsanto. I don’t say NO to TLC, I say HOW can make it fair, environmentally and socially? This is the task of 21st century. I hope it turns out better than the last one.

The protest ended up blocking the Panamerican Highway.

Jenny put a sign in the back of her car to protest.

Field Trip #2

2006-10-19T15:25:00.000-07:00

This last weekend we took the Jovenes Ecologicos on a grewling 15 km hike up to the top of Las Brumas mountains to gain a better sense of the region and to pick trash that had been dumped in the forest. We woke up early and hiked up and up. We passed this huge Ceiba tree, as we climbed to the top of the ridge. The weather surprisingly held up, and even though it was foggy on top of the mountain, the clouds cleared for a second so we could see the ocean.

We talked alot about rainforest ecology, teaching the names of trees and how a forest works. We drank from a clean spring on top of the mountain. Many of the kids were surprised that clean water even existed. We picked up trash that had been dumped next to a quarry on top of the mountain. The kids were really into it and took initiative to figure out how to lift the trash out of the steep ditch it was in.

The trip lasted 8 hours, and by the time we got back to Copabuena everyone was ready to fall asleep. The kids are excited for the next field trip. They said they are going to miss us when we go home next week.

Harvest Time

2006-10-17T14:37:00.000-07:00

The coffee berries are getting ripe, but the Cooperative still doesnt have a functional beneficio. The beneficio is supposed to start processing the coffee next week, but there is still a lot of coffee to be processed in the mean time.

Coffee has to be processed within 24 hours of harvesting. This makes coffee a difficult crop to deal with as it adds a great deal of transportation costs. Every day the ripe beans have to picked and taken to the local beneficio (processing plant). The beneficio washes and removes the skins of the beans so they can be dried and stored for roasting at a later date.

Since the Coopabuena beneficio closed down two years ago, the new cooperative (Coopepueblos) has been without a beneficio, taking the raw berries to be processed by the nearest beneficio in Sabalito (13 km away). This added alot of costs to last years harvest. This year UCSC researchers, Karen Holl and Rebecca Cole, loaned the cooperative $6000 of the $10,000 needed to buy a micro-beneficio. It arrived a few weeks ago, and the cooperative has been hard at work getting it ready for this years harvest. It should be up and running by next week.

Este beneficio es puro columbiano!

Rainy season is here

2006-10-16T16:03:00.000-07:00

Up until yesterday, it seemed like the rainy season would never come. This is our first rainy season to spend down here, so we dont know what it is like. It is supposed to start at the beginning of October and last until December, but for the last two weeks it has hardly rained at all (only like every other day). All the farmers we talk to mention how dry it has been. Flor said it has been dry because of El Niño.

But yesterday it RAINED. The day started beautiful and sunny, but by noon it was sprinkling and by 1 it was pouring. Brendan and I were working on our plan for next year, typing on the computer, shouting over the pounding rain on the tin roof. At one point, we looked out the front door, and the bridge to our farm was flooded. We were stuck on our farm. This was the first flood that had reached over the bridge. We ran outside taking pictures. It was cold. The flood almost got to our seedlings, but they were safe luckily.

Right now it is raining again and the sky is a very strange orange. I think the rainy season has finally come.

Treking up the Rio Salto

2006-10-09T15:49:00.000-07:00

On Friday, Eliot and I met with Jovenes Ecologicos to explore the Cuenca del Rio Salto (River Salto watershed). This ecological youth group was created to introduce youth to environmental issues through local field trips, eco-activities and group discussions. This was our first outing with the high schoolers and it was a great success. We treked 5 kilometers up stream, ending up at the 20 meter waterfall which feeds the river. It was a suprise to me that the majority of the kids had never seen this waterfall, or a monkey for that matter. At the waterfall we had a discussion about the importance of a forested watershed and how it filters and protects the water resource.

We then hiked up above the waterfall to have lunch under a shelter. We talked to the kids in English so they could practice their skills. We talked about this upcoming year, planning for our High School Cultural Exchange Program. They were excited to share experiences like this trip to the waterfall with kids from the US. When we asked them what else they would like to do...they came up with some crazy ideas like tug-of-wars in the mud and karaoke comptetions. I think next year will be a lot of fun.

Jovenes Ecologicos

2006-10-02T15:47:00.000-07:00

Part of our new responsibility in the “Grupo Ambiente Saludable”, is creating a group of high school students called “Jovenes Ecologicos” (Ecological Youth). We are going to be facilitating projects that these students want to carry out to improve the environment. We will give them the power choose what kind of ecological projects they want to do, and we will be there to help them. The big idea of this “Ambiente Saludable” movement is to attract tourists to Aguabuea if the community can gain the “Bandera Azul” (Blue Flag) certification. The region of Coto Brus is one of the least popular destinations for tourists in Costa Rica, but this is probably going to change soon.

Today, we interviewed 23 “Jovenes Ecologicos” to pick 15 tourists guides that we will train to encourage ecological literacy. It was hard to choose. The students ranged from 8th-10th grade. We judged them on their use of English, their enthusiasm, and their knowledge of the area. Some of the students speak very well, and it was easy to pick them. Some of them were shy and quiet, and it was hard to figure out if they were just terrified by the inquisition-like questioning we inflicted upon them. We were a panel of judges (Eliot, Brendan, Jacob, Trina), and the students (one by one) sat across from our panel in an otherwise empty class room while we drilled them. We asked them: 1) Tell us about yourself. 2) Why do you want to be a guide? 3)What is your favorite place in Aguabuena?

After eating lunch in the cafeteria (beans, rice, eggs, cheese, salad, and a tortilla), we met with the principal and the secretary to announce the winners. All the potential guides were waiting outside the office for the announcement. We had a mix up between a girl named Adriana and one named Andreina. We had to retest them. Even though Andreina had a higher grade average, we chose Adriana. We were given all of the students grades and GPAs, although I made it clear to the principal that that was not a deciding fact for us.

Tomorrow we have our first meeting with the elected Guides.

Ambiente Saludable

2006-09-27T12:40:00.000-07:00

On Monday, we attended a meeting of Associacion Desarrollo Aguabuena (Association of Development) over making Aguanbuena “un Districto Ecologio”. These Ecological Districts are a certification for communities as a way to attract tourists. The meeting was the first of a series where we elected councils to address certain needs of the community. The needs were as far ranging as an ATM machine for the town to protection of watersheds. We were elected to the “Ambiente Saludable” (Healthy Environment) council to head the Reforestation committee.

We will be working with Carlos, the president of the Association; as well as Walter, manager of CoopePueblos; a representative from AYA, the national water company; the entire local police force, and our Peace Corps friends, Jacob and Trina. Our goals are to protect watersheds, create reforestation projects, and create trash clean-up and recycling programs.

It’s an awesome feeling of how we are becoming more connected to the community here. This was the first meeting we attended where they addressed our project, “Finca Proyecto”, during the meeting. Carlos and Walter were really excited to work with us, and we were patting each other on the back saying “Ambiente Saludable” as if it were some secret society or fraternity that we are now apart of.

The first official “Ambiente Saludable” meeting is next Tuesday, at 3pm.

el murciélago

2006-09-18T12:25:00.000-07:00

Since we moved in to the house,
we have not been alone. We have had a bat, un murciélago, that has been living in the back room (the bat room). He has pooped (or guanoed) all over the bat room and walls throughout the house. It has been a constant struggle, cleaning up bat guano, fearing the flapping over our heads as we fall asleep, and the possiblility that he could be a chupesangre (blood sucker). Last Friday, we caught him.

I (Eliot) was in the living room. It had just gotten dark. The front door was open. Suddenly the bat flew through the front door, in to the house, straight to the back room. I shouted to Brendan. The bat was flying like crazy, bumping in to the walls. It flew into the bathroom. I grabbed a towel and threw it at Brendan.

"What do you want me to do with this?"

"Catch him."

Brendan threw the towel on top of the bat. And that was that. We caught the bat.

Since we moved in to the house, we have tried so many things to get rid of the bat like hanging garlic from the ceilings. Supposedly bats hate garlic and the color red. Everyone in town told us we should poison it or just find someway to kill it. We didn´t want to kill it though. We had never thought of catching it.

So we decided to build a house for it. We feed it platanos and it hangs from two coffee branches (upsidedown of course). We dont know what we are going to do with it. We have thought about letting it go somewhere, but they say that "the bat comes back...the very next day". For right now, its our pet. Although it kinda freaks me out.

Pura Vida
Eliot

Environmental Responsibility

2006-09-14T14:35:00.000-07:00

A few days ago I visited the elememtry school in Agua Buena to talk with the students about environmental responsibility. Our friends Jacob and Trina (who work with the Peace Coprs) invited Eliot and I to participate in the values program they have been teaching in the schools. Among the values were responsibility. Since Eliot had to return to the US for a bit, I gave a talk about the importance of environmental stewardship. The kids were excited and had a real interest in learning more. Most of the kids have already been exposed to more environmental education than elementry students in the States.

Once the discussion was over, I split the kids into groups, and we went outside to plant trees in the back of the school. The kids were energized as the older students (6th graders) helped the younger students (1st graders) clear a spot and dig the hole. We planted 6 trees in total. Some of the kids put rocks incircling the trees to protect them. They even realized that the most important part of reforesting is protecting the tree from being cut down or harmed. It was really touching to see them caring for the trees. And to top it off, the kids who finished first went around the school yard and collected all the basura (garbage) they could find.

Many school sites in the surrounding community have land in need of reforestation. We have talked with several principals (directores)about supplying saplings and planting trees with the kids. These meetings have led us to consider schools as another area where we would like to focus our reforestation efforts. It you think about it, there are lots of similarities between an erroding riverbank and a barren schoolyard. In one instatnce you have nutrient-rich top soil being washed away, increased flooding, and degrading water quality. On the other hand you have kids learning in a place that does not refelct a healthy environment which increases the chance of environmental irresponsibility and ultimatly the quailty of education. Yes it may be cheezy, but i believe that the kids of today are the topsoil of tomorrow. We all must restore the quailty of environmetal education throughout the world while simultaneously restoring our ecosystems.

An insightful trip to Pamama

2006-09-06T08:52:00.000-07:00

I just returned from an amazing trip to Panama. Dan and I visited Panama City for three days. We took the midnight bus from David and arrived in Panama City early in the morning, just in time to see a "Panamax" cargo ship cruz through the locks at Mira Flores. This is the name given to ships that are built to the maximum width and length of the canal. There is little clearance on either side of the boat. The canal opperates 24 hrs a day, 365 days a year non-stop. The experience enabled me to better imaginge the amount of consumption that exists in the global North, especially the United States of America. On top of this, the Panamanian government has a "Master Plan" to increase the size of the canal, to detour competition from springing up, among other things.

While the canal was grand, it was less helpful than the Biblioteca (library) at the Smithsonian Tropical Research Institute. Here I found three floors of books, many of which contained insightful information. I could have spent all day in the building; but they closed at noon, and we still had much of the city to see. We also visited the Jardín Botánico de Gamboa (Botanical Garden) where we met the Chief of Environmental Education, who later invited us to stay at his apartment for the rest of our time in Panama City.

We left the city and headed toward the highlands. From David we went north toward Boquete, a romantic mountain town with coffee-coverd slopes, lies at the base of Volcan Baru. Here we visited a well-maintained garden, where I collected seed of species that would attract butterflies and bees. This town is known for thier abundence of flowers amongst the coffee trees. Boquete was a nice break from the heat of the lowlands.

Returning back to Agua Buena, Dan is preparing for his deparute back to the states and I am waiting on Eliot's arrival.

From the farm,
Pura Vida
Brendan

Caca De Vaca

2006-08-30T14:59:00.000-07:00

Yesterday, Dan (our intern) and I went up to the "company" farm on the north side of our finca. Sometimes Eliot and I would find ourselves here to watch the sunset or view the valley to the south, but this time it was for other reasons. As Dan and I climbed to the top of the farm, we crossed over the barbed wire into the pasture. We were surounded by vacas (cows), and...well, we had come to collect their feces. As we passed up cow pie after cow pie, Dan exclaimed, "why are we passing up all these piles? you sure are picky about your cow shit." He was right, I was in search of the freshest cow shit I could find. When I found the piles still warm from the metabolic processes recently incurred upon it, I exclaimed "we got freshies", and we proceeded to scoop, bag and move on. We were collecting caca for our biodigestor, which contains excriment of various animals and captures the methane that is released when the organic compounds breakdown. This is a low-tech system that has been in practice for centuries. As the gas accumulates in the plastic bag above the tank, it becomes pressurised and is piped to the outdoor kitchen. Here it is connected to the stove and we are able to cook for hours.
The only problem with our system is that we dont have enough excrement for the system to properly function. After we collected two coffee sacks worth of caca de vaca we proceded to drag the oozing bags home and fill the intake tube to the biodigester. In about 1 hour we collected 50 pounds of cow feces, and we accomplished the mission without angering the bulls.

Kids excited about Reforestation

2006-08-26T10:13:00.000-07:00

One day Eliot met some of the local kids at the elementary school and invited them down to the finca to show them our seedling nursery. A month later the kids showed up wondering why we weren't at the farm that morning. I reminded them that that we had invited them a month ago, and things do happen sometimes. Since then the kids have become really excited about trees, and come over almost daily wanting to help us. Sometimes they even teach us a thing or two. When Greivin (10 yrs old) shows up with his brothers Luigi (7) and Jhonny (12..and thats how he spells his name), they almost always bring seeds. Some seeds are endangered species that we havent even found yet.

Being around the kids has reminded me of how, as we get older, we become estranged from our fundamental connection to mother earth. Showing the kids how tamarinds sprout or talking about the monkies and snakes that we've seen genuinely excites them. The excitement is contagious.

I believe that the youth still posses an inherent connection to the environment, born with a love for their environment, instead of a need to dominate it. If we can harbor and develop this passion among children, we are that much closer to reparing what our forefathers have squandered. Cheers to the YOUTH!!!

Pura Vida
Brendan

Learning from the Masters: Farmers teach us how to make and mix suelo

2006-08-25T09:54:00.000-07:00

The pictures below illustrate the process of mixing soil practiced by many local farmers. This soil recipe has traditionally been used for small coffee trees. This specific method was tought to us by our neighbor, Harold. This is what we use for our seedlings.

Step 1
Start with a base of 1 part topsoil from the farm, then from into a flat-top mound

Step 2
Add a thin layer of cascara de arroz (rice husks)untill it totally covers the topsoil

Step 3
Add a thin layter of Cal (Calcium) in the same manor as step 2

Step 4
Add 1 part brosa de café (composted coffee husks), and crumble by hand

Step 5
Repeat step 2 and 3

Step 6
Mix, making sure the moist brosa de cafe is fully broken down

Step 7
Fill the bags, give it the ol´ pound and shake to ensure a well-filled bag

Step 8
Transplant the seedling

This method has been practiced for generations and has ensured the health and nutrient demands of millions of coffee seedlings, (while they wait in the shade to be planted).

Time to Plant... More Questions Sprout

2006-08-21T10:32:00.000-07:00

La Cunicula (the name for the weird weather period in July and August) is over and its time to plant. We have 120 Nogales (Black Walnut) bagged-up, ready for distribution. William Mendez (pictured here) came by this morning to pick up his order for 33. ¿Que vale? After numerous reminders that we are providing a free service to the community, he still asks me how much they cost. He was happy once again to hear that they were free. Tomorrow I’m going over to help William put them in the ground. We will be reforesting the riparian (river ecosystem) hillside on the south part of his farm. These fast growing species will grow tall and extend their roots into the bank of the river, helping to combat erosion, while the leafy canopy will provide shade protecting the soil from too much sun exposure.

On Wednesday I will deliver another 30 Nogales to Roberto Jiménez, who has part of his land under restoration. A farmer with decades of experience, Roberto said he really loves the Nogales. He told me yesterday that the majority of trees that were planted for reforestation have died because they were so little when they were planted. He was happy to hear that our Nogales are 2-3 feet high and well established. The roots are actually breaking through the bottom of the bag. Roberto asked me if I could help plant the trees because he is still recovering from his kidney stone operation. "Por supuesto", of course, I told him.

Since Finca Project has begun distribution, everyone has been asking how much the saplings cost. After reminding people that they are free, they began "selling" like hotcakes. I paused to think about the consequences of our project. We obviously want to get as many trees out into the community as we can, BUT it wont do much (long-term) good to give away trees to farmers who are going to cut them down in 5 or 10 years when they have some sort of economic value. We also don’t want to undercut local nursery business by dissolving the market for hardwood, fruit, and shade trees. The closest substantial nursery is in San Vito, which is half an hour away, and I´m sure there are smaller ones all around. This calls for market research. As for creating incentives to alleviate pressures to cut down trees, well, that’s gonna be tough to figure out. Some things are out of our control, and finding community-level solutions to problems caused by global economic structures will take creativity, ingenuity, and commited community interest. For now, we will begin to formalize the distribution process by enrolling farmers in our micro-reforestation projects, which involves a meeting to review guidelines for participation. This will, at least, ensure understanding of our project and reinforce the specific beneficial details of micro-reforestation in general.

So long from the Farm,
Pura Vida
Brendan

A New Intern: Worms and Trees

2006-08-07T12:31:00.000-07:00

We have a new intern from UC Santa Cruz. Daniel Farber is doing an experiment on the use of worm compost as a fertilizer on our tree seedlings.

Daniel is doing his experiment on our manzanas de agua, Syzygium malaccense. This is a common fruit tree with shallow roots. This tree has value to our reforestation project because it helps protect water sheds by holding the water level high, and it provides an edible fruit to local farmers.

Daniel is using 100 seedlings for his experiment. For his control, he has put half of them in bags with a standard mixture used in coffee nurseries of dirt, rice husks, brosa (coffee husks), and calcium. The other 50 seedlings were placed in a bag with half of this mixture and half worm compost from Humberto Nuñigas worm farm.

Daniel measures the trunk and the leaf span every week. He will be measuring for a total of 7 weeks. This information will be valuable to us as we expand our own worm compost production and seedling nursery. Humberto Zuñiga promises us that worm compost is the best abono (fertilizer) there is.

Back to High School

2006-08-03T14:01:00.000-07:00

Today I went back to high school. I was invited as a judge of the 5th Annual Aguabuena Bilingual High School English Festival. Actually I was invited as a member of the "jury". We had to score students on speeches and songs. We had our own panel, each with a bottle of water and a handmade souvenir to remind us of this special day.

I should have known better than to show up on time. I met Jacob, one of the two Peace Corps volunteers, on the road heading down to the high school. His wife, Trina (the other volunteer), was sick. For a long time it looked like we would be the only "jurors". We ended up waiting for over a hour for the teachers to set up all the microphones, speakers, computers, and projectors. I was surprised at what technology the high school has here. Many of the students used Power Point to give their speaches.

The two students that won the speech contest both used Power Point. One was a girl in the third cycle (10th grade, although there is no 12th grade here). She gave her speech on health food vs fat foods. (maybe fast foods). She spoke mostly of McDonalds, which I found strange since the nearest McDonalds is 4 hours away in Panama. The other student that won for the fourth cycle (11th grade) gave his speech on the history of vampires. I really liked it. There was also a singing contest but only two girls competed. And there was supposed to be a drama show, but the students never showed up.

There only ended up being 3 of us jurors. The other one was an exchange student from Australia. It was hard to pick the winners. In the end, the three of us went up on the stage, and I announced the winners on the microphone. Everyone applauded, and I felt like a rock star.

Then we ate lunch with the principal and all the English teachers. We talked about our project. The teachers were very excited to work with us. It looks like next year we are going to have alot of support from the high school here for our reforestation projects. As we left the school, I found a nogal tree that had just seeded. I collected a bunch of seeds and walked home. It was still sunny at 12:30.

Problems Finding a Market

2006-07-28T10:48:00.000-07:00

Yesterday was the first day of our first orange harvest, cosecha de naranjas. We have probably, I have never counted them, but probably over 100 orange trees. Most of them are on top of the hill that is our farm and have been taken over by 7 years of neglect, returning it to some sort of jungle - an orange jungle with bananas and plantains and coffee that pop out at you as you liberate them with your machete from intrusive vines and trees that turn into vines (or vines that turn into trees). I don’t really know what to do with our oranges. We have so many. I pick them while they are still a little green. There are tons of bugs, fungi, squirrels, birds, and poachers that will get them if I wait too long. I made orange juice yesterday. It was awesome. We have this metal pump-looking citrus juicer, that isn’t very efficient for high quantity juicing, but I made enough to give the Mendez family a big bottle of it.

They asked me if I am going to sell oranges. Tal vez, I said. Maybe I will sell it to Victor, William and Flor´s son-in-law. He is a verdurero who sells vegetables down in the low lands and on the Panamanian border in Ciudad Neilly, Paso Canoas, Laurel, La Cuesta, etc (all formerly United Fruit Company towns). He buys most of his vegetables and fruit from Cartago and Alajuela, the major large-scale agricultural centers of Costa Rica just outside of San Jose. These vegetables travel 8 hours on a truck to get here up in the mountains, where then Victor pays a high price, loads them up in his truck, and he drives 1-3 hours down the mountain to sell thm. Oddly, most of the vegetables he buys from San Jose are grown here as well, and he could buy them from the farmers here for much cheaper. So why doesn’t he just buy them from the local farmers? or why don’t the local farmers just sell locally anyways? why would I have to sell my oranges some where at least 1 hour away?

The people here are accustomed to this reliance on the large-scale producers because there is consistency. Ok, that makes sense. So the small scale farmers who live in this region can sell to some verdureros, but at prices half as much as the verdureros will pay the Cartageros. The farmers here just sell there products as a minimal supplement to the corporate-run agriculture of San Jose. So everytime I have this conversation with local farmers, I get sorta upset in my gringo-seeking-freer-fair-trade and I say so then why don’t we just start our own market here in Aguabuena…. We can sell our oranges. We can show off our seedlings and motivate people about reforestation. It would be beautiful. But then Julie tells me that the people here wouldn’t like it. They are too accustomed to going to house to house for what they want. Calos Porras for milk, William Mendez for chayote or cilantro, etc. But then Humberto Zuñiga and his association ASOCOPRODE (Association de Productores) are very excited about the idea of a feria, kinda like a local farmers market. Anyways I am pushing for the feria, we will see what happens. And most likely things are going to change when TLC (tratado de libre commercio), the Costa Rican side of CAFTA is ratified, although most people here think that this future looks grim.

A Day in the Life...

2006-07-20T13:12:00.000-07:00

.....of a reforestero

Because I frequently am asked, "So Eliot, what exactly do you do down there?" or "What is a typical day like on the farm?", I decided to give a schedule of what I did yesterday....all days being more or less similar. (Although yesterday seemed like a long day)

Wednesday, July 19th

7:00 Woke up. Made coffee. Ate breakfast - granola, yogurt, and papaya. Read for one hour.

8:00 Washed my clothes by hand and hung them up to dry. It was deceivingly sunny.

8:30 Tended the worm farm. Watered the worms. Checked the compost. Checked on the trees. Realized that I had run out of bags to transplant trees into. Became worried that the trees needed to be transplanted soon. Relaxed because I realized once again that they are trees, and they want to live. Found some hardwoods had sprouted that I was worried never would. Became happy. Checked on the vegetable garden. Wondered why some kale leaves look like they were cut in half. Was it a bug or a falling guava? I had to fill up our biodigestor with more water. It smelled surprisingly bad.

10:00 Started to cloud up. Was worried it would rain as hard as it did the day before when I was stuck in Aguabuena because the road to Coopabuena had flooded over. A UCSC student came by, sortof lost (as usual), and asked if I could help with with his research project. We brainstormed. He decided he would research different fertilizing methods used on our seedlings.

10:20 Told the student that I had to take a shower and he should just sit there and think about his project. Showered. Dressed. Took my clothes that were not dry and hung them up in the garage.

10:30 Walked with UCSC student to my neighbors, Harold, to ask him to explain to Daniel (the student) what kind of fertilizer is usually used on coffee seedlings. Just dirt, rice husks, and calcium.

10:45 Walked with UCSC student to Coope Pueblos office for an HTML lesson given in gringo spanish by a student from Evergreen. Walked instead of rode my bike because I had left my bike in the office the day before because of the flood.

11:15 HTML lesson. Learned about tables "Mesas".

12:30 Checked email. Ate fried chicken for lunch at the fried chicken place next to the office. (I hardly ever eat out but I was starving).

1:00 Rode bike back to Mendez house to meet with Becky, Ian, and Julie to talk about restructuring the CAN internship program. Talked forever. Drank coffee. Came up with idea that I will lead a seminar every week for students. Started raining very hard.

4:00 Went to Ferreteria (hard ware store) to ask about bags for the trees. They didnt have both the sizes I needed.

4:30 Went home. Ate dinner early - beans, rice, salad, spinach quiche.

5:30 Headed back to Aguabuena to start English class.

6:00 Helped Peace Corps teach "curso de ingles" to 50 students aged 8-50. The 12 year old boys were better behaved and made paper hats instead of airplanes this time.

8:30 Went to Robertos Bar with the Peace Corps volunteers. Had two Imperials. I dont drink very often but English class is rough.

9:30 Rode bike home in the rain.

10:00 Fell asleep.

Ashes and Trees

2006-07-18T13:12:00.000-07:00

A couple of weeks ago I got a very strange request. I was asked if a tree could be planted on our farm with the ashes of a dead man named Deane Adams.

The woman who asked me was Arlene. She had come to Aguabuena as a prize "vacation" from a Starbucks raffle. The group of winners, sponsored by Starbucks and Earthwatch, came to aid Dr Karen Holl´s reforestation study in our region of Coto Brus. Arlene along with two other women, Jessie and Samantha, were staying at the Mendez house just up the hill from our farm. I spent alot of evenings with them. And one day, Arlene asked if she could find a resting place for Deane´s ashes on the finca.

Arlene had traveled all the way from Arkansas carrying Deane´s ashes. Arlene never knew Deane. She was asked by his wife, a new co-worker, if she would carry some ashes down to Costa Rica and plant a tree with them. Deane´s dying wish was for part of his ashes to be planted every year with a tree. Since Arlene was going to aid a reforestation project, it seemed to make sense. At first I was worried that Deane might not be a good guy. I dont want the ashes of a bad guy haunting the farm, but then I realized anyone who asks to be planted with a tree when they die cant be too bad. When I die I want to be burried in the ground without a coffin, just a pillow, and a tree planted on top of me. Probably an avocado.

We procrastinated until the last day they were in Aguabuena. Right before the bus came the 4 of us - Arlene, Samantha, Jessie, and I hurried to the finca to plant the tree. Arlene asked Karen Holl if she would donate a tree to Deane and the Finca Project. The tree we planted is a Mayo.

Mayo, Vochysia guatemalensis is a light hardwood canopy tree found throughtout Central America especially here, in the Coto Brus area. This tree produces very beautiful yellow flowers between April and June.

So far the ashes seemed to have made good fertilizer and the tree is growing strong.

A poem for my mom

2006-07-14T11:37:00.000-07:00

Today at 9:30 Costa Rican time
When you were in the doctor’s office
Waiting to receive you chemo
I planted a tree for you.
I don’t know what kind of tree it is.
It is from the Guanacaste.
It is funny looking.
Its trunk is thinner at the bottom
Than it is at the top.
But despite this counterintuitiveness
It is a strong tree.

I told you I would be in an orange tree
Meditating for you
At 9:30
But I know that doctors are always late
So I waited until 9:41.
And the orange tree wasn’t as comfortable
As I thought it would be.
So I walked past the orange orchard
To the cattle pasture above my farm
And sat under a poro tree
And meditated with the cows
Overlooking the emerald valley
That pours over the mountains
Falling to the sea below

This is where I was
When you received your chemo.
I figured you would be closing your eyes.
I wanted to take you out of the doctors office
And up to a mountain top
Like the time I dragged you up
To Lake of the Angels.
I tried to summon up all of my strength
And the strength of the land around me
To send you my love
I remembered how hard it was for you
To make it to Lake of the Angels

When I was walking back down to the house
I had to machete my way through
Invasive vines and weeds
That were choking the orange trees
And obscuring the trail.
I passed the tree I planted for you
And imagined it in 50 years
A giant

William Mendez

2006-07-13T13:39:00.000-07:00

The first time William Mendez saw snow was when he stepped out of the airport in Montreal, Canada into a blizzard. This was his first and only time to sneak into the US, mojado (wet, aka illegal...think "wetback"). Although this was more like sneaking in helado (icy).

The coyote had arranged everything for this group of men from Aguabuena, Costa Rica. They were all friends, brothers, fathers, sons. They were to fly to Montreal, claim refugee status, get their bags from baggage claim, walk outside, and the coyote would be there waiting for them with a van.

This group of Costa Rican refugees had a plan to obtain refugee status. They were all going to claim that they were homosexuals being persecuted in the homophobic atmosphere of Costa Rica. (If the thought of "Costa Rican refugees" hasnt already struck a strange note in your mind, it should be known that Costa Rica is probably the most socially liberal countries of all of Latin America.) No one remembers whose idea this was exactly. Now most of them are back here, the coyote owns a bar and sometimes the refugees all meet to reminisce. William was the only one who didnt want to claim his false sexuality. He claimed that he had many enemies in Costa Rica who were out to get him. They were all granted refugee status in Canada.

They all came out of the airport with papers in their hands and waited for the pickup. They were dropped off an hour walk from the border. They crossed in the middle of the night, through a blizzard, not knowing how to walk on snow (or that it was even possible). They walked for 2-3 hours across the border and into New York. Magically, there was a bus the coyote had arranged waiting for them in the middle of nowhere. They drove all day to New Jersey.

William´s son is still in New Jersey. He works as a landscaper. He has a wife and two kids. He loves the US. He has been there for over 5 years now, so he is awaiting the new law that he hopes will give him amnesty. William worked for 9 months mostly at a car wash during the summer. William is back here in Aguabuena. He still wears his tee-shirt from the New Jersey (pronounced New Yersee)car wash. I asked him if he was scared when he crossed the border in the blizzard. He said he had never been so scared in his life, but he was with friends and his son. He complains that New Yersee is too cold in the winter and then too hot in the summer. He had never felt a climate that hot, not even in the low lands of Costa Rica.

I want to tell his story because I think it is appropriate right now. When I was home last month, I got in an argument with one of my best friends about immigration and the new laws, walls, and prisons. My friend told me that foreigners need to respect the laws we have. I know all the arguments about the immigrants who have tons of babies, eat up wellfare, dont pay taxes, and steal our jobs. But living in Costa Rica, I see that there are no jobs here. The people here watch Hollywood movies and North American TV shows. They are innundated with "American" culture. There is not one person in this town that does not think about going to the US to work, for many it is their only dream.

I think that considering the history of the US involvement in Latin American politics and economics, we are responsible for the dreams we invoke in these people. Everyday I talk with teenagers here, and try to convince them not to go to the US. But how can I convince them that their dream is not what it seems? I have the privilege to travel and see the world, why shouldnt they? Yesterday I was talking to my neighbor and good friend Harold, he looked at me strait in the eye and asked "if you were me, would you go??". I though about it for a while. I had to say yes.

¿The World is Flat?

2006-07-03T13:19:00.000-07:00

I have decided to start a Book Review section of my blog. This is my fisrt entry.

I just finished reading Thomas Friedman´s book. At first I was resistant to his school-boyish eagerness, bragging about the wonders of Free Trade and Technology. But by the end, I found his argument convincing. I do not share all of his ideas, but, like I said, I found it convincing.

Friedman´s thesis is that, since 1492, the world has become "flatter" through globalization, technology, and the liberation of markets. His idea of "flatness" is a "leveling of the playing field" where individuals can compete and gain power in a more open market. He traces this thread through the technology boom of the late 90´s, outsourcing of jobs, and the rise of India, China, Al-Queda, and Osama bin Laden.

Friedman likes to categorize and number things. There are the "Ten Flatteners", "Globaliation 1.0, 2.0, 3.0", the "5 anti-globalist forces", etc. What caught me off guard was that he placed me along with other "serious, well-meaning environmentalists" in the fifth anti-globalist force group he calls the "how-we-globalize" group. While he has "a lot of respect and sympathy for this group", he believes that we have drowned out or have been pushed to the periphery by anarchist WTO protestors and the other four anti-globalist forces. Well, Mr Friedman, as a spokesman for the "how-we-globalize" group, let´s talk about how we do it. Let´s start with coffee.

While the world ushered in "Globalization 3.0" at the turn of the millenium, and the world was becoming flatter, our community of Aguabuena was completely crushed by the global coffee market. Around the time that oil prices starting going up, skyscrapers going down, the price of coffee bottomed out to the lowest in history. What Friedman does not write about, is the how the flattening of the world affects the environment. Now the price of coffee has gone back up, but the farmers here are fed up with the volatility of the market. They are flattening their farms, cutting down their coffee and shade trees to raise cattle. In the past 4 years, over 50% of coffee farms in our area of Costa Rica have turned to cattle ranching. Cattle ranching is one of the most degrading land-use practices in moist tropical ecosystems. It destroys biodiversity, washes away nutrient-rich top soil, and contaminates water supplies.

Where I think we can take Friedman´s ideas further is to see how the small-scale farmer responds to this "flattening" of the market. I do not consider my self an "anti-globalist", but I am very concerned in "how we globalize". Coope Pueblos, the coffee cooperative here, uses the the "flattening" tools of the internet to create a direct market with consumers in the US. I think this is an awesome accomplishment, but I also think that we must be weary at the speed that technology advances us when it is at the expense of our ecosystems.

How a Rainforest Grows

2006-06-28T13:34:00.000-07:00

I flew back to Costa Rica this last Friday. I experienced some of the worst (or best?) turbulence I have ever felt flying over a Honduran thunderstorm. I was stuck with a middle seat, but it turned out not to be too bad. To my left (the aisle) was a 15 year old boy named Chris from Albaquerque. He was traveling with his grandma on summer vacation. To my right (window) was a law student named Greg from Univ of Washington. He was coming to Costa Rica to study international human rights law for the summer. The three of us talked the entire trip. It was the best conversation I have ever had on a plane. By the end of the trip, everyone around me asked for a Finca Project brochure. (Apparently I talk loudly.)

Now I am back down south in Aguabuena. There is a new group of students here and an Earthwatch expedition. I had the chance to listen in on Dr Karen Holl´s lecture to the Earthwatch group about reforestation and rainforest ecology. Taking from some of what she lectured, I wanted to give a little explination of how a rainforest grows and why reforestation is so important...

HOW A RAINFOREST REGENERATES (NATURALLY)

When a forest is cut down (by humans or naturally by storms, avalanches, mudslides, etc..) there are generally two ways it can grow back. One is through seeds and the other is through roots and stems that resprout. Most trees need to start from seed.

Many temperate (non-tropical) forests have seeds that are buried very deep in the soil. They can "hibernate" for up to hundreds of years and then one day resprout. This rarely happens in a tropical rainforest. In the tropics the seeds generally need to be fresh.

Up to 80% of tropical rainforest trees rely on animals of some kind to spread their seeds. Some seeds even require that they pass through the digestive system of certain animals before being able to sprout. Many of the seeds are eaten by birds and then pooped out in a different place later. An average troop of monkeys will disperse 50,000 seeds per week. Other animals will actually plant the seeds, by hording them and burying them, like the dung beetle and some small rodents. Again, some of these trees will only sprout if they are buried by a certain animals.

For this to happen though, there has to be an available resource of trees, seeds, and animals...So what happens when these structures are absent?

WITH A LITTLE HELP FROM SOME FRIENDS

In Aguabuena, over 80% of the original forest has been cut down in the last 50 years. There are only a few stands of forest left, most have no monkies and only a few rodents. A bird has little interest to hang out in an open field long enough to poop some valuable seeds. Therefore there is little infrastructure in place for the forest to regenerate on its own.

That is why it needs a little help from its friends (us). We need to provide some genetics (seeds) and some structure (trees) to jumpstart the natural regeneration. Dr Karen Holl and Rebecca Cole are researching what the minimum structure needed to start this process looks like. There are over 1900 species of trees in Costa Rica. The idea is you dont have to plant every single species. If you have the structure in place, the seeds will come. If you plant them, more will come.

Rainforest and Cancer

2006-06-20T09:31:00.000-07:00

I havent written a blog in a while because some unexpected things have happened since my last blog. I found out my mom has breast cancer. I flew home (to Texas) immediately and hired our friend, Harold, to take care of the farm and the seedlings while I was gone.

I have been in Texas for two weeks now, and I am going back down to Costa Rica this Friday. I have mostly been taking care of my mom, having deep talks with her about what breast cancer means and how we can fight it together. Ultimately, I think it has been a great experience. I had been on the farm for myself for the past 3 months because Brendan was taking care of his dad who also has cancer. The world is crazy. Now we are both battling cancer and trying to save the rainforest. This has really jumpstarted an idea we had already had of exploring medicinal rainforest plants. When I go back down, I am going to start doing alot more research. My mom has started a really good blog chronicling her battle against cancer, www.poetry-courage-cancer.blogspot.com

The other day I dragged my parents up Enchanted Rock to watch the sunset. At first my mom wanted to give up, but we kept saying, "just to the next rock". We made it. It was beautiful, and not too hot for Texas.

While I have been home in Austin, I have also had some good meetings with people and organizations. Let me give a little brief summary:

-Soup Peddler. Now we are linked up with the Soup Peddler. For those of you in Austin who buy soup from the Peddler, you can ask that 5% of your order goes to the Finca Project. You can order soup from www.souppeddler.com.

-The Wildthings. I had a meeting with this group of teenage girl environmentalists from Westlake High School in Austin. They are going to be one of our first students of our Cultural Exchange Program. Every year they raise money to go on a trip to help save the environment. This last year they went to Big Sur to help remove invasive plants. We had a great meeting at Wildwood cafe. They were very excited. It made me really happy to see young people (even younger than us) motivated to do good and excited for change. We are still looking for more high schools and groups of students to join our project.

-Audubon Society. I had another meeting at Mother's restaurant with my mom's friend, Burgess, and his good buddy, Bob. Bob is in the process of creating the Latin American committee of the Travis Audubon Society. He is very interested in issues concerning shade-grown and bird-friendly coffee. We had a great meeting and are looking forward to working with each other. Surprisingly, he brought me a copy of the documentary, Bird Song and Coffee: A Wake Up Call, a film about Aguabuena and the coffee crisis. It was an amazing coincindence. He was really excited about this documentary about our community "starring" all of my friends down there. I had gone to the first screening of the film in Aguabuena which had brought many of the farmers down there to tears.

Friday, I am heading back down to the finca. My short return to the United States has been really motivating. I have reports that over 50 of our seedlings have been transplanted to bags. I can't wait to go see how they are doing.

Paz y amor
Eliot

Sprouting

2006-05-30T12:59:00.000-07:00

PLACE

On the last day of the world

I would want to plant a tree

what for

not for the fruit

the tree that bears the fruit

is not the one that was planted

I want the tree that stands

in the earth for the first time

with the sun already

going down

and the water touching its roots

in the earth full of the dead

and the clouds passing

one by one

over its leaves

This is a poem my mom sent me by M.S. Merwin who was recently descibed by the New York Times as a "Poet of Their Own". He won the Pulitzer Prize in 1971. He and his wife live in a remote part of Hawaii where they are restoring an abandonned pineapple farm. I thought the poem was fitting because....

our first seeds have sprouted!!

The first seeds to sprout were the "marías" or Calophyllum brasiliense (I have also read they are called the Brasilian Beautyleaf). I was concerned that we were going to have trouble with these seeds because the condition of the seeds was not great, and they typically do not like to be stored for as long as we stored them. But at least 50 of them sprouted just this week. Marias are a very common canopy tree throughout Costa Rica. They are of a medium hardness whose wood is used for furniture, firewood, and sometimes in construction.

maría

The second group of trees to sprout were the "nogales" or Juglans neotropica or Central Amrerican Black Walnut. I just read that these are actually not the same as the North American Black Walnut, which I had assumed. However, these are not native to this region of Costa Rica, but have been brought here from Nicaragua. Now they are becoming very popular because they grow very rapidly. The more I start to look around, the more I see them. Many are planted in agroforestry systems and sometimes for shade for coffee.

nogal

The system we are using to germinate our seeds is based after the methods used in this region to germinate coffee seeds. We begin by dumping the seeds in a shaded seed bed and cover them with banana leaves. Once they reach 20cm or so, we then translant them into a plastic bag with richer soil. We keep the bags in a shaded area for at least 6 months and then transplant them to their final resting place. This week we are moving these seedlings into plastic bags, and we plan on transplanting them next April when the rainy season begins again.

Other seeds I have sprouting on the farm right now are Avocados (Haas), Tamarindos, various palms, and hopefully cacao. Ironically people claim that neither avocaodos, tamarindos, nor cacao will produce fruit here because it is too cold. However, every year people claim it is getting hotter, which I believe, so this is sortof a test for climate change. And if they dont fruit, thats fine, because they are all pretty trees.

Semillas Semillas Semillas

2006-05-24T15:03:00.000-07:00

I just came back from another seed collecting mission in the isolated mountain kingdom of Las Alturas de Cotón. If you havent read my previous blogs about it, you should to understand the wierd politics and history of this company town turned sustainable ¿utopian? society.

This trip, I had two Panamanian Indian guides, Carlos and Javier. We took an old Toyota Landcruiser up the dirt roads to the boundary of Amistad International Park. We hiked up past the old dillapidated biological research station, up the trail to Cerro Chai.

Cerro Chai

The Biological Research Center (Las Alturas)

The seeds we collected were Chicarrás, Quiuras, and Jira Colorados. Chicarrás and Jira Colorados are both very large canopy trees with extremely valuable timber. I believe that it is now illegal to harvest these woods because of the threat of extinction. The Quiras are a smaller tree (still quite large) that produce a tomato like fruit that is eaten by birds and other small animals.

Chicarrá

Big Trees

While we were in the rainforest it started pouring. There was nothing to do but get wet and cold. We were nearing 5000 feet, so it gets cold. I tried to ask Javier what group of indiginous people he is a part of. He laughed. "Somos Indios." He told me. I said I know, but what kind. Like in the US we have Cherokees, Navajo, etc. There used to be Aztecs, Mayans, and Incans. He said the Aztecs are from Mexico, we are from Panama. Cristopher Colombus came over and called us "Indios" so we are "Indios". You know like "Indigenes". I asked him which he preferred, he looked at me like I was rediculus, "Indios" he said.

Javier is 17. He came from the Bocas Del Torro region of Panama. Indios can pass freely from Panama to Costa Rica without a passport. Many come as seasonal workers to work with coffee or to towns like Las Alturas (if there are towns like this anywhere else). Javier didnt finish high school. He didnt like the options that that type of education would lead to. When he was in Davíd, he found an advertisement to work in Las Alturas. Now he is a sort of apprentice to their reforestation project.

Reforestation Nursery at Las Alturas

Javier asked me if I was married. I said I was too young still, people in the States dont get married till theyre older. He asked me when I plan on getting married. I said, probably when Im in my 30s. He said that if people wait that long here, everyone will think that they are gay. He is only 17, and people give him a hard time for not being married yet. Most indios get married when they are 15. He doesnt want people to think he is gay. He needs to find a wife. He told me there is a guy in Las Alturas that isnt married and everyone says hes gay. The town doesnt have much to do but gossip.

Marcos Lobos

2006-05-17T14:49:00.000-07:00

Marcos Lobos sells popcorn and cotton candy at all the rodeos in Coto Brus. His wife makes tamales. Marcos rides an old, beat-up motorcycle and has a green helmet. Once I tried to say in Spanish that he is "quite a character", but I made the mistake of calling him a cartoon character (characatura instead of personaje). My mistake was more approriate. His gray hair is alost completley white. He is a small man with a big belly. He smokes cigarettes, and shouts instead of talking. Marcos owns the farm next to us. He doesnt live there; he lives in town.

Today it started raining at 12:23 pm. As soon as it started, I heard the familiar shout/grunt announcing someones presence at the door. I should have realized it was Marcos. Marcos talks fast, and if you dont understand him, instead of slowing down, he just shouts louder. He wanted a break from the rain. We sat on the front porch. I made coffee, and we sat there for an hour and a half playing dominoes. He knew how to play, but I tought him the California way of making points in multiples of 5. He caught on fast. I was surprised at how fast he could count. I still won all the games though.

After playing for a while, we started talking about reforestation. If you havent read or dont remember, Marcos is the man who cut down our one old growth tree. I dont know if it was a joke, or maybe I misunderstood him, but he told me if I wanted to cut down any of his trees because they were too ugly, I could. I didnt really understand. He shouted it at me again. Maybe it was a way of making ammends for what he did, an eye for an eye a tree for a tree. I told him the only thing I was worried about was a poró tree that is close to falling on our house. He told me I could cut it down. Thanks Marcos.

We kept talking. He liked the idea that we would be rich one day after he died when we harvested the trees we planted. I started to explain that we arent going to harvest them, that we are trying to grow trees to help the environment of the region and the world. I explained the importance of tropical rainforests. He said he understood. But he was concerned about how to make money. He told me he thinks the cooperative is going to fail here, he has no faith in it. He sells popcorn and cotton candy. He said he maid $400 at the last rodeo. That is alot of money here. His rents his farm out to other farmers. The rest of it he lets go to weeds. He wants to sell it. He is asking way too much.

I am starting to like him. Julietta asked me if we smoked "la pipa de paz". "Tal vez," I said, Maybe. When he got up to go, I asked him if he minds riding his motorcylce in the rain. He said he has been doing it his entire life.

Pictures and more "characaturas" to come.

-Eliot

¿Fair Trade?

2006-05-04T13:35:00.000-07:00

by Eliot Logan-Hines

Alot of consumers in the United States are becoming familiar with "Fair Trade", hoping to bring about a change in the treatment and payment to workers and farmers in "Third World" countries, by cutting out middlemen and establishing standards and regulations. "Fair Trade" is not an international standard, therfore to be certified in England requires a different beaurocracy than being certified in the US. This is taken from FairTradeUSA´s website, http://www.transfairusa.org/:

The principal criteria of Fair Trade certification are:

-Fair prices for farmers and decent working and living conditions for workers
-Direct trade with farmers, bypassing middlemen
-Free association of workers and co-ops, with structures for democratic decision-making
-Access to capital
-Sustainable agricultural practices including restricted use of agrochemicals

I want to give a brief overview of my visit to a certified "Organic-Fair Trade" coffee farm and cooperative in Nicaragua, and an explination for my disillusionment with any idea of "fairness".

I visited a coffee growing community in the mountains above Matagalpa, Nicaragua. The "cooperative" that processes and markets the coffee of these group of farmers is called Cecocaphen RL. It is not "fair" to look at this organization and current state of business without knowledge of the last 30 years of Nicaraguan history (or, really, 500) Please read my blog, A brief history of Nicaragua, to get a slight picture of the current problem.

Coming from a coffee-growing community in Costa Rica, with two of its natives, we all couldn't believe how poor these Nicaraguan farmers were in comparison. All of the houses have dirt floors. The village is wired with electricity but there are frequent black outs and brown outs. There is no tap water, only well water that needs to be filtered. The bathrooms were only outhouses, no porcelin thrones like Nicaragua´s "Rica" neighbor. No one owns a car or motorcycle, hardly any have bikes. But amid all this poverty, they grow "Organic Fair Trade" coffee.

Whereas in Aguabuena, where high pressured tap water poors out of (relatively) hot showers, and teenagers ride their dirt bikes up and down the main street every night complaining of boredom, only to go home and watch dvds and listen to reagetón on their big sound systems, in this now seemingly rich town in the country, Aguabuena, the farmers are "too poor" to be certified Organic ni Fair Trade.

A typical house in La Corona, Nicaragua.

The two Costa Rican natives, Julietta and Walter, on the streets of Matagalpa.

¿What is going on?

Cecocaphen (Matagalpa, Nicaragua) vs Coope Publos (Aguabuena, Costa Rica)

Cecocaphen is a second (or maybe third) level cooperative. I dont know how many middlemen end up being between the producer and the consumer (there were still too many to count). It pools coffee from the entire northern area of Nicaragua, comprised of thousands of small-scale farmers. Each of these smaller communities forms a smaller cooperative, that pools together to another regional cooperative, that then pools to the large Sol Cafe processing plant. The coffee is marketed by Cecocaphen to US and European importers. The coffee is shipped by boat from one of Nicaragua´s two ports as green beans. The office of Cecocaphen is a very pretty building up on a hill overlooking the city of Matagalpa. They have air conditioning, a full pot of coffee in the waiting room, skylights, and beautiful gardens.

Coope Pueblos, in our town of Aguabuena, Costa Rica is a small cooperative. There are about fifty coffee farmers that are members of this cooperative and pool their coffee together. It is then processed and roasted in a neighboring community, by a neighboring cooperative (I will write a history of the tragedies that have befallen these cooperative later). It is then marketed by a non-profit (CAN) based out of Santa Cruz, CA, and shipped straight to the doorstep of the consumer in the US or Canada. The office of Coope Pueblos is a modest building with its share of problems. The office is currently also an internet café and is in the process of being certified to sell coffee and espresso drinks.

It is hard to really know which farmers gets paid better. Being Fair-Trade, Organic certified, the Nicaraguan farmers should receive $1.41/lb ($US, everything is in US$). That is the going rate, even Starbucks´. In Aguabuena, farmers sell 100 pounds for $100. So it seems like the Nicaraguan´s got the better deal, but wait. The Costa Ricans (by Costa Rica, I only mean farmers of Coope Pueblos) sell theirs as whole berries with the red skin and everything. The Nicaraguans (and by this, I mean Cecocaphenés) do the first stage of processing the coffee, removing the berries skin, at home. This requires more work and more labor. These "mini beneficios" are found in almost every farmer´s farm. They then dry the beans, thus loosing water and weight to sell them for $1.41. So, I dont know which farmer´s get a better deal. But I can tell you that the Nicaraguans have dirt floors.

But then again, this isn´t Cecocaphen´s fault. The government of Nicaragua is beyond broke. The current ex president is under house arrest for embezzling the entire countries GDP and international aide, while running the country out of his luxurious home; not to mention, the history of economic manipulations by Uncle Sam. A cooperative like Coope Pueblos could never exist in Nicaragua. The Costa Rican government gives major economic help to "Cooperatives". Cooperatives can qualify for low interest loans and tax breaks, but in Nicaragua, nothing. So what does it mean to be a Cooperative in Nicaragua?

They have a democratic structure. Each mini cooperative has an elected representative that sits on the board of the regional cooperative which has an elected representative that sits on the board of Cecocaphen. In Nicaragua, to survive at all as a business you have to sell out to the big guys. You can´t function as a little town cooperative, you have to have play the major leagues. The image I will never forget after touring the processing plant, was coming back to the main office where we were given a lesson on aromas and flavors by the official taster/quality control of Cecocaphen. He was a little man with a moustache who slurped the coffee very loudly, swished it around in his mouth, wrinkled his nose, and spit it out in the trash can. He spoke of the hints of movie-theater-popcorn-butter and apricots. All I could think was that the women working the assembly line probably had no idea what either of those two things smelled like.

Tasting with Cecocaphen. Josh Mills with the dirty tee shirt is tasting coffee, the taster is in the background with his apron and moustache, Alfredo, a young coffee farmer, is in the foreground.

These women are sorting through coffee beans as part of Cecocaphen´s high quality standards. There are seventy women in this room. They work 8 hours a day with a 1 hour break. They get paid $3/day. This is Fair Trade.

And then we come back to Aguabuena, a now seemingly small and middle-class cooperative, where Walter ships out each weeks shipment of coffee. There are only a few people that work at the processing plant. Everyone here has free time to talk, even the coffee roaster while he is roasting up the French Roast. He jokes that only Estadounidenses like French Roast. The cooperative here doesnt have enough money to buy its fair trade certification. Most of the cooperatives here only sell within Costa Rica so there seems to be no rush. CAN is trying to help, maybe in time.

I don´t know whats fair. Cecocaphen doesn´t seem fair. But then again, I have no idea what the conditions are like in Vietnam and Brasil where the cheapest coffee is produced. Maybe this is fair. I don´t want to turn people away from Fair Trade. I think it is an important step. Maybe more important than anything is the change in the awareness of the consumer. We need to know what we are buying and where our $$ goes. But, if you want my opinion, I think you should buy from here, Coope Pueblos. I see the coffee get shipped out each week to each individual consumer. I know the people packing it. It feels like the fairest of the options.

If you want to order coffee from Coope Pueblos, go to http://www.communityagroecology.net/cart/

A little tour of the farm

2006-04-28T10:56:00.000-07:00

I finally got a hold of a camera, so I took some pictures of the farm and Aguabuena, so hold on to your hats, and we´ll take a little walk around.

WELCOME TO AGUABUENA

Aguabuena and Coopabuena are a ten minute walk away from each other seperated by the Rio Salto. This hill (which is a mountain if you look at it from the ocean on the other side) rises above Coopabuena to an altitude of over 4000 feet. Santa Cecilia and Santa Teresa are two villages higher up the mountain, Santa Teresa being at the top.

To the north and east of here are the volcanic Talamanca mountains that you can barely make out behind the clouds. These mountains are much higher, rising from 7-1200 ft. This is the home of the nearly inpenetrable cloud forests of Parque Amistad shared by both Panama and Costa Rica. The mountains in this picture are in Panama.

Now to our farm.

If you follow this road down long enough you will make it to our farm.

The Reforestation Nursery (still under progress)

This week I began the germination of our first seeds. I planted over 6000 seeds. The two seed beds down in the background are the beginnings of our seedling nursery. These two beds contain two different species of trees.

1. maria
Marias are a common canopy tree of this region. The wood is of medium hardness and considered very valuable for furniture making among other things. Because of this, many have been cut down in this region. These trees grow relatively fast. In this seedbed, I planted 1200 seeds. I cover them with banana leaves to protect the seedlings from excessive sun and as an attempt to stop too many weeds from growing.

2. nogal

Nogales are a Nicaraguan black walnut. They are not indeginous to this part of Costa Rica. They grow very fast. They are becoming increasingly popular among the campesinos here because the grow so fast. Since we our goal is to use only indeginous trees for our reforestation projects, we have some reservations about this tree, so I am only germinating 300 seeds. These are in the bed next to the marias.

3. danto

Dantos are an endangered tropical hardwood. The wood is extremely hard and is excellent wood for construction because of its extreme durablitiy although it is difficult to cut through. Many people in this region dont know of these trees, or have forgotten about them because of their scarcity. These trees prefer to grow above 1000 meters in riverbeds. Thus, they make a nearly perfect tree for our project. The only drawback of this tree is that it grows very slowly because the wood is so dense. In this picture I have 4-5000 seeds soaking in water before I plant them in the ground.

After these seeds sprout, I will put each in its own separte bag to grow for at least another 5 months. We plan on begining the transplantation project in a year, next April or May. Next month, I am going to return to Las Alturas de Coton to collect different species.

THE WORM FARM

Thomas, our friend from Michigan, is a worm farmer that sells his products in famers markets in the US. He taught us how to cultivate worms. This is the system:

Compost goes in each basket, and as the worms eat their favorites, their poop becomes excellent fertilizer. They slowly move up to the fresher bins, leaving behind enriched compost. We keep the environment wet for them, and the excess water drips down and we collect this worm juice "jugo de lombrisas".

This stuff is extremely potent.

MORE PHOTOS....

This area of the garage serves a double function as a carpentry table (built by Josh Mills) and a resting place to read, drink coffee and swing in the hammock.

Im going to end the picture show with this picture out our back window.

More to come
Eliot

A Brief History of Nicaragua

2006-04-24T12:26:00.000-07:00

La Independencia
In 1821, Nicaragua gained its independence from Spain along with the rest of its Central American neighobrs. The majority of the 1800s, Nicaragua was characterized by large land owners and an increasing US interest in transportation systems and fruit production. By the 1920s the US marines were playing the role of the Nicaraguan National Guard to protect US business interests. In 1936, the US withdrew its military presence as President Somoza was elected to power. Somoza set up a corrupt military dictatorship that would last over 40 years.

La Revolucion
In 1979, the Sandanista revolution finally ended the Somoza regime. The FSLN (Frente Sandinista de Liberación Nacional) initiated an agrarian reform, dividing up land from large land owners and giving it or selling it for extremely low prices to poor farmers. Like the story of many countries during this time, the United States would not tollerate this threat to international business, particularly to the large land owning American corperations like the United Fruit Company.

La Guerra
The Reagan administartion began a covert opperation that has become known as the Iran-Contra affair. The administration secretely sold arms to Iran to fight the Iran-Iraq war, and, with the money made on the sell of the guns, funded a right wing counter-revolutionary army (the Contras) to bring down the Sandanista regime. To Nicaraguans, this was known as La Guerra. The World Court finally ruled that this was against against international law. President Reagan publically refused to admit any knowledge of the affair, and then two weeks later made an address admitting his mistakes. Everyone indicted in the affair was eventually pardonned by the Bush Administration. The Contra army (trained by the School of the Americas) was designed to use terroristic tactics to force the public to elect a government that would be more economically favorable to the United States. It succeeded. After two years of starvation, the people of Nicaragua "elected" a government that promoted the neoliberal ideals of the Reagan-Bush-Bush adminitstrations.

With this background, it was an amazing experience to live up in the mountains above Matagalpa with farmers who had lived through these atrocities. When I asked them, they shared with me the horrors of two years of near starvation, standing in lines all day to maybe receive a scoop of rice or beans. Luckily, these were farmers who could mostly sustain themselves with their crops, but many still went hungry. They told me that the fighting never made it to their communities. Many of the boys would leave to fight in the lowlands near Managua, but most of them stayed up in the mountains to wait it out. I found it amazing that they were so hospitable to me, an American, whose government had funded this war.

More on Nicaragua to come.......

Isla Ometepe

2006-04-16T19:50:00.000-07:00

Easter is called Semana Santa in Latin America, and the entire week before Easter is a huge celebration. It is almost impossible to travel during this time because every bus is packed-full of relatives visiting relatives, and buses stop running thursday-monday. In the mad rush to find a boat to the island I had to convince some Nicaraguan soldiers that I was on the list of chosen people to enter the boat they guarded behind chain link fences. The entire beachfront of San Jorge that sits on the western shore of Lago Nicaragua was packed with beer, big speakers, parades, and food vendors. Magically we made it on the boat.

The island is the largest lake island in the world, and the lake has some of the most unique biodiversity. Since it is so close to the sea, many fish swam upriver including bull sharks. Over the years they have adapted to the fresh water, agua dulce, and have become unique species. The sharks have sadly almost disappeared now due to overfishing. The island is home to two volcanoes, Volcan Concepcion (still active) and Volcan Madera (not active).

My friend Josh and I came with Yelena and Joey from CAN (Community Agroecology Network in Aguabuena). We came to visit the Bainbridge-Ometepe Sister Islands Association. The org. is dedicated to aiding the island through various programs including buying and marketing the coffe from the cooperative to consumers in Washington, bringing internet services to the island, and creating an "escuela libre" for students of all ages. Thanks to the hospitatlity of its project managers, Peter and Devon, we had an amazing visit.

The coffe cooperative was hit hard by the difficult political climate of Nicaragua and world coffee market. Like the story of so many coffee towns, it used to be a thriving community but through political corruption and lowering coffee prices, it became a ghost town, now begining to be "revived" by tourism. After the 1990 elections that brought Nicaragua back to the path of neoliberal economics (if you dont know the story of the Iran-Contra affair, I suggest learning about it), the coffee cooperative was forced/coerced by the government (or the United States, World Bank, and/or IMF....) to take big loans that nearly threw them into abyssmal debt. You can check out the cooperative and buy coffee from them through www.coop-cdc.com.

It is very interesting to see the differences between Nicaragua and Costa Rica. Climatically, Lago Nicaragua is drier than Coto Brus, the home of our finca, and much hotter. Culturally, Nicaraguans seem to have more pride, more of a sense of nationality probably due to their more turbulant history of revolutions and civil wars. And economically Nicaragua is a much poorer country.

We are heading up to Matagalpa to visit the coffee cooperative up there. Matagalpa is a sister community of Coopabuena as CAN (Community Agroecology Network) works with both communities. We are going to meet up with Julietta and Walter from Coope Pueblos. It should be interesting. I will keep yall posted.

Paz y amor
Eliot

There is a war going on

2006-03-24T12:49:00.000-08:00

Yesterday, I saw smoke above the finca close to where our spring is. I ran up to see what was happening. Across the creek, on Marcos´land, there was a big fire. He was burning an entire hillside including the branches of the tree we sadly lost months ago. It was a horrible sight, muy feo. I felt like I was looking at a ravaged battlefield.

And after I thought about it, it is a war. The war that is going on is an economic war, a war between poverty and the environment. Marcos is using slash and burn methods to plant corn. It is fairly common practice around here. The price of coffee fell so low a few years ago that it has created a certain bitterness in some of the farmers. For people like Marcos, the land is here solely to extract resources from, and he is angry at it for letting him down with coffee. Next came cattle, until there was no more pasture grass left, and now all there is is to burn it and plant corn. You can see it in the way he swings his machete, and even in the way he walks.

Maybe this sounds hyperbolic, but if you could see (i dont have a camara) the sight where our over-grown, almost forest of a farm rises above this burnt land, you would understand what I mean. It is a war. I was so upset last night, I had a hard time sleeping. I cant blame Marcos though. The problem is so much bigger. It is the coffee market, the coffee coroporations. It is even bigger than that. It is our entire economic system. When Marcos looks at the land he sees money, whether its a tree, or a charred piece of land to plant corn. And by Marcos, I dont just mean Marcos.

I felt hopeless and helpless. We came here to try to help to change this problem. When I was dreaming of moving here, I never actually saw the problem face to face. I never had to deal with it. But as I run up and down our farm to check the level of our spring, and I am confronted with this huge fire that threatens to burn me and all of our land, I realize that I have to face it. And its scary.

But then there are farmers like Umberto and Roberto who are having a meeting here in a few minutes with their group of organic committed farmers. And they are trying to change the ways here. They were hit hard by the coffee crash too, but they value more than money. They value the life and longevity of the land. It is inspring to be with them. And when I see Marcos, I have to restrain myself. I invite him over for coffee and I try to cultivate a friendship. And I realize that this is why we came here, and its going to be hard work.

-Eliot

Reforestation Project #2

2006-03-20T11:22:00.000-08:00

Yesterday, I went exploring with William Mendez down on his creek bed to talk about reforestation. The creek that his property sits atop is the same creek that passes by our finca. He explained to me that the coffee cooperative used to use this creek as a waste drainage for the water used to rid the coffee beans of their cascaras (skins). The coffee cooperative has since gone out of buisness due to the devasting economic impact of the recent crisis in the coffee market. The creek is still very polluted. We have decided to make this our second reforestation project. Between our farm and his, there are two farms that we need to gain the support of their owners. I think that it will be fairly easy to convince them. The beauty of reforesting water ways is that hardly any one is using the land for farming or ranching, and the benefits of erosion and pollution control are hard to pass up. I gotta go catch the bus.

Paz
Eliot

The Seeds

2006-03-16T13:07:00.000-08:00

Las Alturas de Cotón is an old logging/coffee village at the foot of the volcanic Talamanca mountains. The town is at 1300 meters, so the air is crip and cool at night. It is not a tourist town. You have to have permission to enter. It is owned by an Estadounidense (gringo). When my bus entered the last gate there were only three of us left on the bus: the bus driver, his girlfriend, and me.

The town is very strange. There are 140 people that live there, most of whom are indigenous. Their electricity comes from a gasoline powered generator that only gives power from 5pm till 9pm. The land is adjacent to the Parque Amistad which is the largest protected area in Central America. The land that the town sits on is the largest privately owned forest in Costa Rica. The owner, Addison Fischer, is trying to make the town as sustainable as possible. They have a large reforestation project, planting 60,000 trees a year. He strongly prohibits any minerals or vegetation leaving the town, so the economy of the town solely relies on his aid, paying the 140 workers every month. The town has the feel of a tropical kingdom from some time long passed. Like I said, this town is strange.

We were first introduced to the town by Kathrin Lindell, the avian ecologist, whom we helped with the Earthwatch expedition. We met Fernando, the caretaker, who then invited us to come back this week to learn how they collect their seeds for their reforestation project. Since Brendan has gone back to the US, I went alone.

While I was there, there happened to be a woman´s workshop on building cob (clay, sand, and hay) houses. The class was being taught by Becky Bee, whose book we ironically bought right before we moved down here. I felt slightly akward because they were trying to have a completely isolated womens workshop, and I felt that I kept intruding. But they were all very nice women who were very interested in our project. They invited me to dinner everynight, and it was nice to have some gringas to talk to.

Yesterday morning, I woke up early had coffee and breakfast, and headed out at 8 with my crew of reforesteros. There were 4 of us: Roberto, the driver; Clemente, the tree expert; Carlos, his assistant, and me. They are all very campesino, so it was a challenge to communicate with them. They asked me how to say bad words in English, but there favorite thing to say was ¨beans and rice¨, which for some reason cracked them up. The first seeds we collected were Dantos. I thought we would have to walk through jungle to find them, but they were all on the road. We collected "un pichaso de semillas" (a shitload of seeds). The seeds of the Dantos are like big grapes, they taste sweet. Danto is a tropical hardwood that grows at higher eleveations. Apparently the wood is worth alot. We also collected Nogales (Nicaraguan black walnut) and Marías (another valuable tree for lumber).

I felt very lucky to be able to go there. It really is an incredible place. And I am so excited that we finally have our first seeds (probably over 1000). We will begin germinating them in May and then they will be ready to plant in 6-10 months. We already have our first reforestation project. We are going to be working with the coffee cooperative here, Coope Pueblos, to recuperate the Rio Salto, one of the main rivers in Aguabuena. As soon as I got back, I had a meeting with Walter from Coope Pueblos and Roberto Jiménez. They were very excited. They truly appreciated our efforts to help. It almost brought a tear to their eyes when they started talking about the changes that are taking place in "la mente de la gente". They feel that one of the most important aspects of the project is changing the consiousness of the people.

More later, I gotta go

Paz y amor
Eliot

Battling the Bats....and other difficulties

2006-03-08T09:40:00.000-08:00

We finally moved into the farmhouse! But of course ther are some problems......

THE BATS
There is a bat that lives in our house. It poops from the same rafter every night, in the same spot of one of the bedrooms. The first night we moved into our house we were scared to sleep in that room because we were told that it could make us sick, or more likely would suck our blood. So we sleep in the living room.

We were told to tie a red shirt to the spot where it shits and to surround the house with garlic because bats are scared of red and cant stand garlic. I thought maybe vampire and bat mythologies were getting mixed up, but we had to do something. It worked....sorta. The bat got confused at least. Instead of its favorite spot, the bat pooped on my bag. But I think that our psychological warfare is going to win in the end, altough you can still hear it batting it wings against the window when it gets trapped.

THE WATER
The other day we ran out of water. We had to jog our memory from physics classes about fluid dynamics, sipehns, and water pressure. Its hareder than we thought to rely on spring water for everything in the height of the dry season. We have to be extra mindfull on how we use it. And its DIRTY. We have to treat it to drink it. Eventually we are going to need a water filtration system.

THE FURNITURE
We have no furniture. Flor and William gave us a bench which is awesome. But we have no table or any other seats. We just use our matresses that sit in our living room because we are still scared of the bat. Today we are going to start building furninture. We will have pictures up soon.

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Anyways, Brendan is heading back to the States this weekend. Then I (Eliot) will be here all alone. We should have some pictures up when Brendan gets back.

Pura vida
Eliot and Brendan

The Birds

2006-02-27T11:34:00.000-08:00

This last Saturday, Brendan and I were lucky enough to be invited to join the biologist, Dr. Kathrine Lindell, to assist in an Earthwatch expedition looking for the presence of birds to assess the success of experimental restoration/reforestation plots created by Dr. Karen Holl.

We woke up at 4:30 so that we could be out in field by the time the sun rose when birds are most active. We set up nets to catch the birds to tag them for future studies. The site where we were working was one of the weaker plots that Kathrine was working with. We only caught seven birds in five hours. Kathrine´s hypothesis was that it was too windy in this one area for the trees to grow well.

Either way we were excited to see the birds we caught. In the end we only caught three species, a cherry tanager, a Tenessee warbler, and a snow-bellied hummingbird. We couldnt believe that the tiny little warbler had flown all the way from its nesting site in Alaska. I had always heard about migratory birds, but its a very different experience when you hold one in your hands.

Hopefully we will be able to post some pictures up soon, but the internet is very slow down here. We have to run to catch the bus. More to come.......

Paz y amor
Eliot and Brendan

The Begginings

2006-02-24T08:51:00.000-08:00

Brendan and I (Eliot) have been in Costa Rica for a month now and everything is coming along great. We have been staying at William and Flor´s house. Flor has been cooking us her wonderful meals. Its been great to be back with the family. Tomorrow our house will finally be ready to live in, although we still dont have any furniture or appliances.

OUR FIRST DAYS
When we first got here we were told that the roof our our house had been stolen, a window broken into, an old sink stolen, and a fire built in our living room. We werent too surprised. It was probably some teenagers that dont have much to do at night. We needed a new roof anyways, so the theives had only helped to get rid of the old one.

What we hadnt expected that first day that we walked down to our farm was that our one beloved old growth tree had been cut down by a neighbor to make a few thousand dollars for the lumber. It took us a second to realize what had happened. At first I kept thinking I saw the tree, but when we finally bushwacked our way to the spot where the old tree used to stand, it was just a stump.

Not only had our neighbor cut down the tree, but he had also fenced off the common spring we share with barb wire on our side of the creek that divides our properties. We were depressed. It greatly affected us. But at another level it reminded us of why we were here, to plant trees and help relieve the economic pressures that lead to deforesestation. Since that tree was cut, the spring that pours out from under its stump has dropped 50 percent. Trees are so important to maintain clean and healthy water systems.

The next day we were working on our roof, and our neighbor, Marcos (who had cut down tree), came up to us. We had never met before. He immediately began telling us very adimantly that our garage was built on the public road (calle publica). We remained very calm, trying to explain that the garage has been there for over fifteen years and that there was no where past our house that one could drive because it dead ends into a very steep hill just past our garage. We had to hold back from accusing him of cutting down our tree and fencing off the spring. We politely agreed to talk to someone from ¨la municipalidad¨ to settle the dispute.

The next week we met with a man from ¨la municipalidad¨ and Marcos. We agreed that while our garage is technically in the "calle publica", it is old enough to remain there as long as we were just reconstructing the house, not building a new foundation. We also agree that the spring is both of ours, the fence is to be in the middle of the creek. Marcos understood that the tree was ours but he claimed that the wind blew it down (hard to imagine).

Since then we have more or less made friends with Marcos. He has agreed to let us plant trees on his side of the fence to help restore the spring. That spring is now our only source of water. When we tried to get city water from AYA, they told us in a very confusing labyrinth of latino beaurocracy that we would have to buy new pipes for the entire neighborhood. It would have probably cost over 1000$U.S. So we just decided to use our spring.

So our house is almost ready to live in. We picked out tiles. We have new windows and doors. We are creating a biodigesting toilet that will capture the methane from our ceptic tank to power a stove for us to cook from. We have never heard of anyone doing this with human manure, so its a little bit of an experiment. We are excited to see how well it works. Since there are only two of us here right now, we will have to suppliment the ceptic tank by adding the manure from chickens, goats, and cows.

We have already made connections to start getting seeds for our reforestation nursery. Next month Brendan is going back to Oakland to make some more money, and I am going to go seed gathering. I already know it is going to be a great story, so youll have to keep tuned in.

This is a picture of the remnants of the tree we lost.

Paz y amor
Eliot and Brendan