Hands-On Learning

Day 4: Sunday, March 20, 2011

This was the day that we started our site visits.  We first went to Ecobambu.  This consisted of a group of ladies, with the recent addition of one man, who recycle paper to make new paper products.  It was really fascinating to hear how they got the business started by applying for and receiving a grant and a loan.  They took the time to learn how to make a craft.  It started out with bamboo, but they realized it wasn't profitable enough for them, so they made a transition to recycled paper.  They now have a system which makes beautiful paper that is used locally (some merchants by shopping bags from them) as well as for tourists.  Watching them make the paper was really a cool thing to see.

Next we went to Noe's farm.  We were supposed to go there to see him make soap, but we ended up getting a tour of the farm.  It's nothing like farms here, with nice neat rows of the same crop.  There were random coffee plants, coconut and banana trees scattered throughout the farm.  It seemed like it was just random forest area, but he knew exactly where everything was and had a purpose for it.  We watched the early stages of coffee beans and how to process sugar cane.  Then, of course, we did learn how to make soap and got to buy some.  It was interesting to me how he basically took his hobby of making soap and made it into a good secondary income, maintaining both that business and his farm.

After that, we went to another farm, Giovanni's.  Like Noe, the farm was one source of income, but he also had a business on the side:  microtourism.  Gionvanni's father owned a ton of land, and donated a lot of it to the Costa Rican government for preservation. There is this huge waterfall a couple kilometers away that was included in that donation.  But, Giovanni still owns all the land leading up to the waterfall, so they use that as a business.  There is this amazing hiking trail that goes to the waterfall, which you can then swim in.  I didn't swim for certain reasons, but it looked like it was incredibly fun, and I heard freezing.  We heard a lot from Giovanni about how development and increased tourism in Costa Rica has impacted his business and his life.  He talked about his future plans, and how he has had several offers to purchase his property from him.  I like hearing his perspective on personal development, like his son one day taking over, developing a web site, and expanding the business.


Day 5:  Monday, March 21, 2011

This was another site visit day.  The first place we went was a local coffee shop that is a member of COOCAFÉ, a coffee co-op in Costa Rica.  Their mission is to provide fair trade coffee so that Costa Rican coffee growers are able to be fairly treated and represented.  They did a little taste test of some of the coffee, which I wasn't really interested in trying.  But, I did share some amazing carrot cake with Heidi and Tyler, along with stealing other cake from other people.....  We basically learned about how the coop is organized and what goes into the coffee-making process.

After that we went to CASEM, which I believe stands for Cooperativa de las Artesenas de Santa Elena y Monteverde, or something like that.  Basically, it is a group of women, with three women, who make their own crafts and then sell them. They are self-sustaining, and can charge whatever they want. We learned about how they operate, the functions of different women within the coop, and some of the struggles they faced when trying to start it up (like resistance from their husbands).  There was a ton of cool stuff there, like those awesome snakes that Tyler, Lisa, and I have.  There was particularly cool jewelry and hammocks, but as cheap as I am, I didn't buy a ton there.  We did get to play with some kids outside, though, which was super fun, and tiring.

For the end of that day, we went to yet another farm for dinner.  We took a tour of the farm, which had more livestock, and saw how Don is able to make an impact by using his farm to support the community, creating a reservoir of collected rainwater for their usage.  Dinner was amazing.  I can't believe how much Doña cooked for 30 people.  It was a significant amount of food, and it was good.  The best part was probably the cheese.  There was just this huge block of cheese (pictured is us with some slices of said cheese).  That was pretty much the end of the day, and the end of the trip before we started doing our service.  Stay tuned for that!