Field Research

Last Sunday was our first day off in La Merced.  After a week full of meetings, gathering information, and gaining more clarity on our project goals here, we took the opportunity to walk to our new friend, Marisella's, house for lunch and a tour of her family's finca.  The views from her family home were amazing, and it was a great opportunity to meet a Mercedeña, see her farm, and eat the most amazing home-cooked Colombian meal I’ve had thus far. 

         After thanking Marisella and her mother, we were ready to continue our hike up the mountain.  We climbed a bit higher until we reached El Tambor.  We got to the paragliding site and saw two huge parachutes in the air above us.  We sat and watched the paragliders for a while until they came back to the cliff for a landing.  One of the instructors greeted us and yelled, “Vamos! Quien esta listo?”  The four of us looked around at each other.  Nobody had come mentally prepared that day to jump off of the side of a mountain and be carelessly carried off by the wind…However, after some hesitation and some more time watching the paragliders take a second trip up in the air, I decided that I needed to do it.  I knew it was our day off, but I figured we were here for a project on tourism development and some field research still needed to be done. 

         I met Santiago, one of the instructors, and he told me that the wind needed to die a bit, but then he would be happy to take me out.  He was very nice and incredibly smart, and he is actually a perfect example of the challenge of youth retention in La Merced.  His family is from La Merced and his father actually owns the land where the paragliding site is.  He told me that he actually prefers La Merced to larger cities, like Manizales.  But there isn’t as much opportunity for him in the town.  He is currently going to school in Manizales to get his degree in civic engineering and build his career.  But in the meantime, he thoroughly enjoys his visits home, where he can take people paragliding.  I learned that he was only 19 years old.  This made me nervous at first, but then I figured that he had most of his life to look forward to still, and probably wasn’t particularly looking to end it this afternoon as he helped me learn how to fly. 

         After the wind calmed a bit, he began to help strap me into the parachute.  One of the other instructors gave me a helmet, which just seemed silly.  Even if I plummeted to the ground and landed on my head, how was this plastic helmet really going to save my life?  But I think it was more for psychological comfort rather than functionality.  Although I knew it was useless, I couldn’t help but feel safer once it was on my head. 

         The girls had their cameras ready to document my literal leap of faith.  But before I knew it, the parachute was up, and Santi was already strapped in behind me.  The wind began to pull us off of the side of the mountain, and before I knew it, my feet left the ground and my legs began to dangle in the air.  As I clung to the straps that held me into the harness, the enormous red parachute carried us through the air and away from the take off point.  As I looked down, I saw fields of coffee and plantains pass below my feet.  We got a bit further away, and the coffee turned into open pastures with tiny brown figures that could only be cows. All that was visible in the distance was never ending, rolling hills, white clouds, and the sun that was getting ready to set.  I was surprised at how calming the experience was despite the prospect of the terribly long fall back to the earth.  It was an incredible feeling to glide through the air.  I knew that I would want to write about the experience for my blog, but even as I sit here and try to describe it, I can’t find a way to give the actual flight any literary justice.

       

 I was so hypnotized by the view that about 20 minutes later, I was surprised to see how far away we had gotten from the launch site.  Santi yelled to tell me that we would be landing in a field that he was pointing to.  We came in pretty fast as we drew closer to the ground.  Santi told me to lift my legs and before I knew it, our fast glide slammed quickly to a halt.  I was quickly snapped back to reality.  My wings were gone and I was just sitting on my butt in the middle of a field of tall grass while some cows gnawed on their cud nearby. 

         I helped Santi pack the parachute away and we walked up a hill to the road and waited for a car to give us a ride back up the mountain.  I didn’t wake up that morning thinking I would get the chance to fly, but I guess that’s how life is here in La Merced.  It was easy to see why it was one of the town’s biggest tourist attractions. 

         One of the challenges for tourism development in La Merced is the lack of integration between sectors.  There is a very strong individualistic culture between businesses here, which is most likely due to residual distrust within the community.  One of the focuses of our project will be to foster more collaboration and collective action, in hopes that tourism can create opportunities for people like Santi, and spur economic growth for the whole community of La Merced.  We’ll probably have to revisit the paragliding one more time before we go though.  There is still more field research to be done…

Week 1 in La Merced

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Arriving in La Merced:

We left our hostel early Monday morning. After dropping off the first team of students in Supía, we headed for La Merced. From Supía, we drove up a windy road into the mountains. We kept getting higher and higher, and I wasn’t sure when we would finally see the town. We finally turned a corner and I could see the enormous church and the colorful buildings of La Merced nested in green trees on top of the mountain in front of us. I felt like we had discovered a secret that had been hidden away in the hills.

Before going into the town, we made a quick stop at El Tambor. This is the paragliding site in La Merced that is currently the major draw for the tourism industry there. We got to the edge of the cliff at El Tambor, and the view was unreal. The clouds and the green mountains were spectacular. 

 

From there, we went on to find our house. We are staying with Daniella, a graduate of the New School. She participated in the IFP in La Merced in 2012 and earned a grant that brought her back. She has been living in La Merced ever since. As we drove to her house, I began to understand more and more why she has never left. She has since established an income generating group of women who have started their own business, sewing and making clothes, as well as creating a community of support and personal development.

We arrived at her house, which is a traditional colonial house of La Merced. There are a few rooms surrounding an open courtyard area. In addition to the 5 of us and Daniela, there is another woman, Marisella, who lives there with her two children. Along with two more dogs, we have a full house! Andrea works there also and makes our delicious meals. The first morning, she asked us if we would like coffee or hot chocolate with breakfast. I asked if she had any tea. She repeated herself and asked if I wanted coffee or hot chocolate with my breakfast…I guess I drink coffee now. Everyone is so friendly and welcoming, it has not taken long to feel at home there.

After settling in, Daniela took us on a walk around town. As we walked around, I felt like I was going back in time. The structures are all vibrant with colors. Children are able to play in the narrow streets unattended. Bags of coffee are being dropped off at the local collective for export. People pass by on horses and greet you with smiling faces…we even saw a man on a motorcycle pass by as he led is donkey behind him on a rope. I asked if there was a good place to go running, and she took us to an amazing soccer field on the edge of one of the mountains…it has not been very hard for me to get up to this each morning.

My first morning in La Merced was surreal. Here I had been studying and researching this place since January, and all of a sudden, I woke up to the sound of horse hooves on the pavement, and ringing church bells outside. I walked through the narrow streets of the town lined with old colonial style buildings. On my way to the soccer field, I was greeted with smiling faces. After reaching the field and beginning my run, I looked around me, and I had to keep reminding myself that this was real life. The green sweeping landscape of the mountains is unlike anything I have ever seen before, and I am truly so fortunate to get to see it. Although I have been reading countless reports and doing research on La Merced this semester, my arrival in this town has given me a much deeper understanding of what life here really is. Its hard to believe that I place so beautiful could have such an ugly history of violence and distrust. The bad blood of past conflict that has stained this community is in stark contrast to the peaceful beauty of the mountains that surround it.

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La Merced Coffee:

We have already finished our first week of work in La Merced.  Within the short span of a few days, I have gained insight through many new experiences at every turn. My newfound knowledge in coffee production is beyond anything I could have imagined for myself. Our first day here, we were fortunate enough to meet Wilian. He is a local coffee producer who works with ASPROCAFEM, La Merced’s coffee collective center. He showed us around the distribution center and described the process of grading out the coffee. I learned that the ideal humidity for almendras, or coffee beans, is 12%, and that the larger healthy beans are separated out for specialty coffee export from La Merced. Meanwhile, café pasilla, or the defective beans, are graded out for lower quality sale. Generally, the café pasilla is what stays in La Merced and is consumed by local residents while the higher quality coffee is enjoyed elsewhere.

However, Wilian is working against this normality. He has begun to market and sell his high quality La Merced specialty coffee to a local cafeteria in town, and is looking to expand his brand. He was kind enough to invite us to his factory, where we learned about the drying, shelling, grading, roasting, and grinding process for his coffee. We were also able to meet his 81 year old father as he returned from a day of harvest at their coffee farm. It was an amazing opportunity to see the coffee process from fruit to grind. The smell of the beans roasting in the toaster overwhelmed the room as we sat around the table and separated out the defective beans in preparation for the next roast.

The visit to Wilian’s factory, and the conversations we had with him were incredibly enlightening. The pride and care that he puts into his work is clear. Although I have read countless articles regarding Colombia’s coffee industry prior to our arrival here, the experience of meeting and talking with him has put a face to the facts, and broadened my understanding of the industry. It was also encouraging to meet someone whose values were in line with our project objectives. The fact that he is trying to market a brand of La Merced coffee precisely follows the goals of our IFP. It creates a coffee identity for La Merced, and something else that this incredible town can be known for…not to mention it was absolutely the best cup of coffee I’ve ever had!

Wilian showing us the coffee beans drying on the roof

 

La Primera Semana en Colombia

As a part of my Masters degree, I was accepted into the International Field Program at the New School for the summer. I will be living and working in the rural town of La Merced in Colombia for the next 9 weeks. I am part of a team of 4 other New School students, as well as 1 student from the Universidad Autonóma de Manizales (UAM).

A Bit of Background:

After the coffee crisis in the 1990s, the La Merced government channeled a majority of its resources into agriculture, which has limited the economic growth of the area. La Merced is a town that has been particularly affected by conflict in the country and there is a large population of displaced people living in the town. There has been a significant loss in population and youth retention. In addition, the ongoing distrust and tension between residents that were born out of past conflict, has hindered community collaboration, and heavily contributed to the economic stagnation in the town.

For the past 3 years, teams of New School and UAM students have partnered with the municipality of La Merced to address the challenges of the town. In an effort to diversify the local economy and create a wider range of job opportunities, a Tourism Association was established last year. While the development of tourism could be a viable secondary industry for the town, the infrastructure and local capacity for this development is currently lacking. Since food is a central part of cultural tourism, there is a need for a stronger local food system, increased food security, and greater local food identity in La Merced. Despite the abundance and variety of locally grown food, food insecurity persists in the disempowered community of the town. Currently, farmers and purchasers are traveling long distances to Medellin and Manizales to buy and sell produce. Farmers lose profit through transportation costs and middlemen, and purchasers incur the costs of time and travel. The result is an inefficiency of local markets, lack of access to locally produced nutritious foods, and indicates a lack of trust and collaboration within La Merced’s food system.

 Project Description:

This summer, our project will focus on a deeper analysis of La Merced’s food system and agriculture. In addition, we will create more farmer and purchaser collaboration with the incorporation of post-conflict mediation strategies. Also, we hope to partner with agricultural extension agencies in the town to promote agroecological farming practices for sustainability. The long term objective of these tasks is the creation of a locally structured food system in La Merced which will keep more profit and value within the local economy of the town, as well as create a strong local food identity.

Week 1:

 I have been preparing for the trip for the entire semester and am so excited that the time has finally come! I arrived on May 30th and just finished my first week in Manizales, along with 9 other New School students. We’ve been staying at Kumanday Hostel, which has been great! Eating lots of delicious Colombian food (I love ajiaco!), and exploring the town of Manizales.

 

We got to meet our Colombian student counterparts this week. Julian is a Political Science student at UAM, and he will be joining our team in La Merced. In addition to meeting Julian and working on initial team building exercises and project design, I’ve been able to learn more about Colombia through a number of other trips this week:

A visit to the Caldas government offices with Team La Merced to meet with the Secretary of Agriculture

 A visit to Cenicafe to learn about coffee in Colombia

 A hike up a volcanic mountain

 We leave for La Merced tomorrow morning!  Hope to post an update again soon!

Hasta Luego!