Learning Tour 2010: Peru and Colombia

After a good night sleep to adjust to the high altitude we were off to visit Florintino in Pisac, located in the Sacred Valley.  Florintino lived his whole life in Pisac and was orphaned as a child.  By the age of 6 he had shown an interest in ceramics and by the age of 10 he was entering exhibitions with his pottery work.  Today he showed us around his workshop where he and his family, including wife and five of his eight children, live and work.

Florentino

Florentino & family

We visited other breath taking sites in the Sacred Valley throughout our day, including Ollantaytambo.   In the evening we visited Qollque Wasi, the workshop of Juan Cardenes Flores.  His wife and son met us and showed us how to make some silver earrings.  Unfortunately, this family has been severly effected by the decrease in tourism due to the mudslides at Machu Picchu.  Juan has been doing silver jewellery work for 24 years and was excited to share his craft with us.

Today we took a 6am flight to Cuzco the capital city of the Inca Empire.  This city sits 3,625m above sea level which meant that we all had to have a quick cup of Coca tea and rest at the hotel for a few hours.  After a light lunch we had brief overview of the archaelogical history in the area, visiting 5 major Inca ruins.  This was a wonderful start to our time in Cuzco and gave us a taste of what was to come.

We started the day with a visit to Julian Garcia- a musical instrument producer. When Manos Amigas met Julian he was being cared for by his uncle who had taught him the art of crafting instruments . Manos Amigas had been working with the uncle but discovered during a surprise visit that he was exploiting Julian and the other workers. They immediately stopped working with the uncle and gave Julian an order to get him started on his own.

With that order Julian was able to move to a small room where he lived and worked for 6 years. Now he owns his own land where he lives with his wife and 8 year old daughter.  He purchased the land for $8,000 US dollars. He has built his house and workshop with plywood and the next step will be building with bricks.

Four people work with Julian. We met  Ishmael and Israel, both are studying to be electricians. We also met Carlos who demonstrated how they craft a pan flute out of bamboo sticks.

Julie from our Lethbridge store showed Julian a photo of a customer purchasing one of his instruments and he was thrilled. At the end of the visit, Julian thanked us for coming

and hoped we liked his workshop.

Daily life

Making Pachamanca

Pachamanca

Chirimoya fruit

We were met by Grazia Testa a representative from Pachamama the tourism branch of CIAP.  CIAP is the Peruvian Artisans Interegional Headquarters and was founded in 1992.  CIAP is made up of 350 families in which 700 artisans earn direct profit and 2,300 people benefit indirectly.

CIAP includes COOPAC, the financial entity, PACHAMAMA that promotes alternative and sustainable tourism, and INTERCRAFTS that deals with the exportation of the artisans products.

We visited three artisan groups, the one that really touched our hearts was the life of Julia Castro, a textile weaver.  She and her husband support four family members at home.  Her mother has dementia, her son is paralyzed, her sister-in-law is mute and her 13yr daughter Talita supports her in the business.  Julia escapes her depression by teaching other women in the community of Nana Chaclacayo.  These women are not only helping each other financially but also emotionally.  There is communal dinner on Sundays where all the women contribute to the meal, cutting down costs and allowing for socialization among the women.

In the textile industry the artisan lives are just about survivial, their only hope is just to keep on working.  We all bought textiles – bags, wallets, purses- to the value of 800 sole which is the equivalent of one months salary.

Pravina & Kristen

Our day began early in the morning with the beautiful sounds of the church bells ringing through the square in Chulucanas. The weather was very different from the night before when we arrived, today it was overcast and cooler, which was a relief for many.

After breakfast we headed to the workshop of Jose who has been working closely with Allpa for many years and is known for his best practices and good quality control.  Jose is well known in his community and was given Entrepreneur of the Year award in 2007 for his expansion of his business and employment of artisans in the community.

Next we went to visit our final pottery workshop run by Alex.  He has worked with Allpa since 2005 and takes on more of the custom and/or difficult designs requested by customers.

Quickly we were off again to catch our plane back to Lima, but couldn’t stop without our wonderful guide Louis buying us some plantain chips to enjoy for our journey back home.

It was great to be back at our “home”, the Bay View Hotel, after our quick visit in Chulucanas.  We had a wonderful visit with the artisans and even managed to squeak in some time to add some pottery to our suitcases.

Learning Tour Peru: Monday April 26th
Monday morning revealed the first effects of traveling in foreign lands. There were a few casualties but nothing that stopped us all from being ready to venture out into Lima’s rush hour traffic. As Bev nervously fretted about catching our flight to Piura, Luis made sure we had just enough time to visit our first artisan producer group Laban.

rooftop view from Laban worksop

This workshop is located in the biggest district outside the city centre of Lima- San Juan De Lurijancho. Here there are almost 500,000 people and the majority of jewellery makers live in this region.
We met the family of Fermin Vilcapoma, his wife Madeline, his sister Marie Ellena, brother David, and another co-worker Cathy with her dog Blackie the Schnauzer. We climbed the spiral staircase to the second floor and learned that the silver jewellery is comprised of 95% pure silver with 5% copper to give the pieces strength. Then we went to the top floor where Marie Elena was using files to smooth the edges of what was to become a ring. We met Cathy who had worked with them for 16 years and she was completing the finishing stages by polishing crosses. His wife Madeline was working on quality control.

Marie Elena

We learned at their busiest time they have 25 workers but right now they have 9 including his siblings who don‘t have enough work at their own shops. The opportunity to have this work is important because minimum wage is 550 soles per month which is just enough to live in a shanty town on the mountainside with no running water or electricity.

After saying goodbye to Fermin and his family we rushed as much as you can through heavy Lima traffic to the airport to take an hour and ten minute  flight to Piura,, 793kms north of Lima. Jorge Calle Sosa (a famous Chulucanas family name) met us at Piura airport. Jorge is a business administration student and has worked with ALLPA for 6 years. We drove for one hour through landscape that transitioned from dry desert to lush and humid Chulucanas a community of 65,000, well known for its pottery and mangoes. We were stopped in the streets by a funeral procession led by children in school uniforms followed by many adults. Luis from ALLPA’s comment “must be someone of importance”. After this very sombre moment life resumed to its full chaotic noisy pace immediately!
We arrived at the home and workshop of  Maria and Amable Durand Alama, “ceramistas”. Two of their three children, Diego , Renzo, were also there to meet us, (their daughter Angie was away in Piura at college studying business administration).

Amable and Maria

They led us through their home through their workshop and to the back garden where they proudly showed  us their kiln. The total size of their property is 500sq metres and they grow their own vegetables such as beans, beets and papayas and guinea pigs. Through orders from ten Thousand Villages US and Canada  Maria and Amable have been able to expand their business to include new designs and develop their own skills in this area and keep them current in today’s marketplace.
Maria while taking care of her children also spends 8 hours a day burnishing the ceramics while the clay is still wet to produce the glossy finish. She uses very smooth sea-rocks of various sizes to achieve this
affect. In 8 hours she can burnish 2 sets of nativity sets of 7 pieces each. The ceramic pieces then go back into the kiln for the final firing.

When asked what they liked making the best Amable told us his favourites were the nativity sets and the sculptures because they allowed them to best use their creativity. Maria told us that she has been working with ceramics for 12 years and although at the beginning she confessed to breaking a few pieces in her learning process, she is now sufficiently skilled to train young women in this craft.
Maria’s parting message after our 2 hour visit with them was “keep giving us orders so we can always keep working”.

Diego, (youngest son of Amable & Maria)

We all came away feeling we had met a truly inspiring and hard working family and with an even stronger conviction for the difference that our partnership makes.

Tomorrow we will meet with two more artisan producers. Tonight its an early night for us as we are all melting fast in the heat of Chulucana!

Dianne & Maria

Yaninna and Mario from Manos Amigas

This is the new building of the Assembly of God Penticostal
Church, they are still in construction and are in need of a
roof.  Children from the outlying slums gather here every
Sunday morning for breakfast.

Volunteer Sunday School teachers gather here at 6am to
prepare the breakfast (oatmeal and bread). Four groups of
children come to the church, the others 14 groups have their
meals delivered by the teachers (they live in the outlying
districts of Lima) there 350 children who participate in
the program. This is often their healthiest meal of the
week.

Contrast is everywhere, here the slums are in plain
view behind the Presidential Palace in downtown Lima

The parents of many of these children are employed
however their low salaries (minimum wage is 550 soles
or $125 US/month) is not enough to afford basic
necessities. There are three main levels of poverty, low,
medium and high. The Manos Amigas food program
visits children from all levels.
The program has been in existance for 20 years.
Manos Amigas gives 20% of their craft sales to this
program, Ten Thousand Villages is one of thier oldest and
largest customers.

The children greeted us with warm smiles and songs

Today has been a long day with an evening full of much reflection,
discussion and sharing.  We find ourselves
motivated and feel that the mission of Ten Thousand Villages
and the principles of Fair Trade are more important
than ever.

We are excited to see what tomorrow brings!

~Alicia & Nicky
(It’s 12:20 right now and we’re very sleeeepy see you
all in the morning)