Here & Back Again

So, it has been 7 months, over 40,000 miles and an additional 14 country stamps but I’m back. Can’t say this was a part of the plan but it’s nice to be back in the land of black sand, tortillas and traje, aka home. The infamous Allie Stote and I hit the ground here in Guatemala one week ago. And in the days that followed we criss-crossed this small funny shaped country by Tuc-tuc, Micro, Pullman, and Chicken bus. We visited Antigua and Operation Groundswell’s amazing partner As Green as it Gets. This coffee cooperative made up of Guatemalan campesinos and one very loveable, albeit pessimistic, ex-pat, continues to forge sustainable livelihoods for its members through creative agricultural practices and a variety of innovative development programs. We then travelled north to Xela where Quetzaltrekkers keeps on trucking ready and willing trekkers to the Guatemala’s highest volcanic and non- volcanic points while supporting some of the country’s most underprivileged children through the Escuela de la Calle (EDELAC) and El Hogar. This year, Quetzaltrekkers will help our crew get on tops of things and in return OGG will be establishing a scholarship fund for QT’ kids. Before skippin’ town we had to stop in a say “hola” to the equally amazing Escuela La Paz where OGG 2012 will be studying Spanish alongside an incredible group of indigenous women.  

1½ hours north of Xela near the small city of Colomba ex-guerilla fighters have traded their tools of war for tools of trade, the coffee trade that is. After arranging some sweet digs with the local coffee farmers and families of Santa Anita La Union, Allie and I turned back south eventually reaching the warm shores of Lago Atitlan and the open arms of San Juan la Laguna and Rupalaj Kistalin. This indigenous Tzitsujil community is increasingly turning its small artisanal and eco-industries into income generating tourist attractions while maintaining its rich cultural and linguistic heritage. But despite the temptations of this laid-back lakeside paradise we journeyed on. First south to Guate then east to Alta Verapaz and the tiny town of Tzibal. There OGG past and present will collide in a crazy construction project called La Cancha (The “Court”). This innovative community centre and basketball/soccer court features a water catching roof, composting toilettes, and organic garden (complete with 20lb radishes!). But after meetings with the COCODE (Development council), on-site coordinator, community teachers, and a night’s rest in a lawn chair we retraced our steps to Guate and the cozy casita of friends Luchy & Fam. And here we waited for OGG 2012 to begin… 

Campos & Coronas (Written for OG Guatemala's Blog post)

Antigua in the ominous shadow of Volcan Agua

Antigua, known to me as Guatemalan Disneyland, was once the country’s capital and remains a colonial jewel nestled between 3 of Guatemala’s most iconic and notorious volcano’s (Agua, Fuego, and Pacaya). After bursting out the doors of OGG’s first Chicken bus, sharing stories about its colours and characters, the group settled into Hostal Holistico, a cute little refuge in the city’s centre, where they would be staying for the next 3 nights. 


As the sun set, participants ventured out for the first time sin lideres to take in the sights, smells, and engage in a friendly but fiercely competitive scavenger hunt. A near dead heat was only broken by an epic dramatization involving Maximon/San Simon, a Ceiba tree, a Quetzal, and Picamas by Porschia, Ali, and Japleen. After a dining on tacos the group got to taste Antigua’s vida nocturna. But after a late night the participants had to be forced from there beds early to make the short trip to San Miguel Escobar, a small pueblo extending up the base of Volcan Agua. There our group connected with As Green As It Gets, an NGO & coffee cooperative devoted to innovative and sustainable agriculture. Its big bearded gringo jefe, Franklin, immediately escorted the group up the volcanic slope to a newly owned cuadra of land (25m x 25m) belonging to a 16 year old by the name of Julio. There the group spent the morning digging 250 holes, each destined to play host to a Bourbon Coffee plant for next 20 or so years. Labouring for hours with an asadón (a gigantic hoe) was not without its toils, I was quickly ordained “Nurse Ben” and the med-kit was just as quickly relieved of all its band-aids and med-tape for blister treatments. 

OGG & Camesino Freddy standing in their days labour.

In the afternoon, the group was allowed to choose between learning to make soaps, lotions, and lip balms with a local cosmetic initiative supported by AGAIG or sowing shoulder bags made out of discarded coffee burlap sacs. The following day the group returned to the coffee fields in the morning before being treated to Franklin’s “healthy” pessimism while discussing coffee-economics and the follies of "fair trade" over tasty T-bones and Guatemalan Churasco. BTW, I'll gladly take orders for "extra fancy" coffee (tops of the grading scale) straight from Freddy's fields.

Chelsea describes her experience with AGAIG and the community of San Miguel:

“There is an organization there called As Green As It Gets that helps to promote direct sales of coffee, instead of the regular importing or "fair trade" crap (that DOES NOT EXIST) of it.  So with the organization, we learned about the mini businesses that they have set up there, like making soap or lip balm or bags from natural sources.  Pretty cool stuff.  The girl who makes lip balm is 16 years old and is selling around 1 million things of it.  With her income from that last year, she bought concrete walls and toilets for her family.  But for the most part, when we were in San Miguel Escobar, we helped out with the coffee fields.  The first day we walked up a mountain (literally), and it took just under 3 hours to get to the top to dig holes to plant coffee seeds.  The amount of work that they put into their jobs is tremendous and it is so interesting to think that they do it by themselves or with their immediate family.  So that field was owned by a 16 year old named Julio, sooooo young.  Then the next day we went to a field which was only a 20 minute hike and weeded, which here is basically digging out the coffee trees.”

James adds:

“Walking what felt like 100 miles up a mountain carrying a huge shovel to a coffee plantation, then spending 2 hours digging holes for coffee trees, was probably the most physically demanding thing I have ever done. At least, that’s what I thought until the volcano ascent! This trip hasn’t just pushed me beyond my physical limits, but it has challenged my mental strength, too, as I struggle to decide what’s more important: people or profits. I’m a business student at the University of British Columbia. I thought my goal in life was to make money, but after meeting a coffee farmer who performs strenuous labor every day just to support his family, a woman who got shot because she wouldn’t forfeit her land to a mining company, and a cynical hippie who explained the follies of fair trade; I’m starting to change my mind.”

In the evening with sore hands and tired minds the whole group eagerly set out for one last night of debauchery in Disneyland before OGG’s departure the next day to Xela for a week of intensive Spanish, charlas, and treks.