Welcome to the Jungle Baby!

        I spent last weekend visiting the nearby (but oh so far away!) jungle town of Quillabamba. To reach Quillabamba from Urubamba you can jump in any one of the many cars, buses, or llama-drawn carriages heading through the breathtaking (and probably life-taking) mountain pass that separates the Sacred Valley from the jungle of Peru.

        The time the journey takes depends on exactly how much you value your life: if you want you could grab life by the cajones and speed along the twisted, cloud covered, and cliff-hugging 161 km to Quillabamba and be there in four hours, but a more reasonable driver would do it in 5-6 hours.

I did consider that despite their disadvantages llama-drawn carriages don't have "brake issues".

        Did you see that photo up there? When you see the sort of sheer drops that await anyone who has the misfortune to take a turn just a bit too wide you wouldn't fault someone who opted for an eight hour tour.

        This nerve-racking, but beautiful road deposited me in Quillabamba on Friday the 16th in the late afternoon. With a bright blue sky above me and the ferocious sun beating down on me the city was really living up to its nickname as "the city of eternal summer". I was forced to make an ice-cream stop en route to my hostel.

But the heat felt oh-so-good.

        Now my reasons for visiting Quillabamba were purely exploratory. I really wanted to take a weekend away from Urubamba to simply relax and unwind a bit. So why not the jungle?

        .... OK fine. The truth of the matter was that I'd heard that Quillabamba was something of a major hub for coffee in Peru. For those of you that know me you'll know that I perked up more upon hearing this than a kid does at the sound of "free candy" (or a major CEO at the sound of "free cocaine"). This little bit of information sealed the deal for me: I was going to Quillabamba and I was going to visit a coffee plantation.

        With all the love that coffee gets from the Western world you'd imagine that there would be more interest in coffee farm tours. Vineyards give tours, right? Why not coffee? If people can sit for hours tasting different wines talking about the "beautiful bouquet" of this wine or the "hint of cinnamon and cheese" in that wine the least I can get is a basic tour of a coffee plantation. Right? Whatever the reason I did not meet a single person in Quillabamba or otherwise who knew of any coffee plantations who offered tours. Coffee fields mockingly studded the mountainsides all around the city yet no one could point me towards a farm? I found this rather strange.


        Generally in Peru, someone always "knows a guy". If you need your toaster fixed the butcher will tell you to visit his cousin down the road. If you're looking for a guide to show you around "that mountain over there" you can bet that the little kid sitting on the corner has an uncle or a friend of a friend of a friend who'll take you there. Hell, you could probably find someone who sells baby ocelots if you've got the money. It's just the way things work around here. But strangely enough asking about coffee plantation tours draw many blank-faced stares.

"Would you like the one of the left or the right, sir?"

        But determined as I was to see a coffee farm and learn the ins and outs of its production I did what I seem to do best: I went exploring.

        Without much more to go off than "I've heard there are lots of fields that way" I set off. I heard that on the way to the "Waterfalls of Mandor" roughly 20 minutes outside Quillabamba there were many coffee chankras (small family-owned fields). My plan was to get dropped off in Mandor and hike my way to the waterfalls hopefully coming across some family kind enough to show me their way of life. I was going to make a day out of this little adventure.

I better put on my badass sunglasses.

        I found a taxi to take me down the dirt road leading to Mandor where I would start my hike up to the waterfalls. He was kind enough to drop me off somewhere between "Where are we again?" and "Are you sure this is it?"

"Here? Really? If you say so."

        It wasn't long into my upward hike that I looked to my left and saw a small patch of paved ground covered in drying coffee beans. Where there's smoke, there's fire. I was close.

So close.

        Visions of inky dark expressos made from only hours old coffee grounds pushed me towards the farmhouse. I wasn't particularly worried. Confident in my Spanish and armed with my irresistible charm who could say no to this lovable gringo? Three bemused Peruvians, a man and two women, were outside the house. Few people and even fewer foreigners visit this part of Peru. To say that this particular family was not expecting visitors of my, um, complexion would be a fair guess.

        "Um hi. My name is Benjamin and I'm a volunteer in Urubamba." Damn, I sound like I'm selling something."Ah... These are your coffee chankras, right?"

        "That's right. They belonged to my parents and now they're mine" replied the man. 

        He said it with curiosity and a slight edge of distrust as if to say "what's it to you?". I flashed them all as big of a smile as I could manage and plowed on.

        "I'm only here because I wanted to ask you if I could see how you produce your coffee. I saw the drying beans from the road and I'm really curious about the whole process. I know that coffee comes from a red fruit, but from there to my cup in the morning it's all a mystery."

       They all visibly relaxed. A smile of realization spread across their faces as they saw that I was just a harmless traveler looking for a little tour. They welcomed me in and invited me to sit down. The man was kind and explained everything I wanted to know. He showed me the process from fruit to final product explaining how the fruits are harvested, sorted, de-shelled, cleaned, dried, and roasted. The family laughed often as I continually asked "Could you show me how you do that?" and "Can I see the tools you use for this?"

The red ones are ready to be picked. By hand, naturally.

A coffee pod "de-sheller". That's a scientific term.

A coffee bean roaster.

A hand cranked coffee bean grinder.

        The man happily showed me around his small farm. He proudly pointed to his large mango trees, his many lines of coca bushes, his banana groves, and his occasional cocoa and papaya plants. It was more more than I was expecting when I spotted the drying coffee beans from the road. In roughly one hectare of land this family of three was raising pretty much all of the essential cash crops of this region. I was loving it.

Walking among the coffee plants.

Coca leaves in the front. A cocoa pod in the background.

        I must've done something right because the family was kind enough to invite me to lunch there at the farm. I enjoyed chatting with them and the man opened up a bit a share some of his true feelings about export coffee prices and how much he makes on the kilo compared to what it sells for abroad.

       I left after lunch and tipped the family well. A couple hour tour and lunch was more than worth the tip I left them, but they seemed quite pleased and surprised to receive anything at all. They told me to come back and visit some day even if that day comes many years from now. Perhaps I will.

To be honest, they were probably just trying to set me up with their daughter.

        After my coffee farm adventure I continued up the hour long climb to the waterfalls. At the base of the hike I was told that it was a 20 minute walk. Halfway to the top I was told it's roughly 30 minutes in total and only once I could actually see the waterfall did I realize it was closer to an hour than anything else. Let that be a lesson Ben: those who have actually gone the distance are the best judges of the time. Now that I think about it that applies to a lot of things in life.

        The falls were lovely though. Well worth the hike. I spent some time admiring them before I set back. I wanted to reach Quillabamba before nightfall. The rest of my time in that jungle town was spent either sleeping, reading, or chatting with the hotel staff. There was a lot of sports to be watched. I even managed to catch the Wales V. France rugby match on Saturday. It's been a while since I saw one of those!

        It was exactly what the doctor ordered. Just a bit of down time to do my own thing and relax. Life continues to come along well here in Urubamba and I've adjusted well to independent living. While Peru may not be the U.S. of A. and Urubamba certainly isn't Madison the life lessons I've learned from living and traveling alone for the past two months will carry over well.

Hasta pronto amigos!

Introducing "Project Luz"

This picture is completely unrelated to this post, but I wanted to set a happy tone.

        This post will be considerably less heavy than the previous. You have my word on that. In fact, this post is something of a joy for me to write because it allows me to share with you my new project here at Kiya Survivors: Project Luz.


        It is a remarkably simple project which I hope can help improve the quality of life for some of the families here. The best part of it all is that it won't cost any of the families a dime and the cost on our end is very minimal.


        What is Project Luz? Project Luz is my hope to use cheap and locally available resources to build "solar bottle light bulbs" which can be installed in the roofs of homes. They are well suited for the sunny climate of Peru and they work particularly well for poor families who live in either semi- or total darkness due to a lack of windows or electricity. Kiya Survivors frequently works with this particular demographic.

        These "Solar Light Bulbs" are nothing more than empty coke-a-cola bottles which are filled with water and a touch of bleach and then fitted into a hole in the roof of the house. Once they are installed in the roof they refract the sun's rays and scatter them inside the house. They work, as I have seen and read, roughly as well as a 50 watt light-bulb. They require no maintenance and their estimated lifespan is between 3-5 years. They are, if I may say so myself, a textbook example of simple ideas making a world of a difference.


Total cost per light: roughly one US dollar.

One such bottle light.

        In reality, their construction is slightly more nuanced than simply taking a hacksaw to a roof and hoping for the best, however they are sufficiently simple to build that even your average idiot (such as myself) could manage to build and install one.

Tools needed for installation: a ladder and two boards. I said more "nuanced" not more complex.

        I can not take claim for the idea of these "Solar Bottle Lights". This idea was first publicized by the "Isang Litrong Liwanag" (A Liter of Light) Project and installed in poor neighborhoods in the Philippines. I remember reading a news article about them some time ago and I remember thinking that it was a very clever idea. But at the time I had no use for it.


        I was reminded of these solar bottle lights a few short weeks ago when I stood in the home of that very ill girl who I spoke about previously. Among many other things, the house was very dark inside. Even a few light bulbs would have made a world of a difference, but the house was without electricity and without windows. How we could bring a little light to the house without major renovations was the challenge we faced.


        This is where the idea for Project Luz first conceived. It was not the result of hours of concentrated problem solving or even some creative thought process, but it was more a spark of inspiration where, for whatever reason, the neurons in my brain fired in just the right sequence and my memory of these solar bottle lights was recalled.


        Regrettably that girl will never see us install one of these lights in her house, but the poetic beauty of it all is that out of that very dark situation an idea that has the power to brighten the lives of many was born.

        I am pleased to say that we have already installed three of these solar lights and that they are working even better than I could have hoped. Even at two weeks of age Project Luz is already helping two families. Next week we will install at least one more.

The children of the first home in which we installed two solar lights. They're holding some of the foodstuffs we regularly deliver to them: milk, oatmeal, and canned fish.

        In light of these recent developments with this project and as a result of me thoroughly enjoying my time here in Urubamba I have changed my travel plans. I planned on leaving Urubamba on the 18th of March and spending nearly a month in northern Peru, but I have decided my time would be better spent in this region. Therefore I have decided to spend an extra two weeks here at the Rainbow Center and I will not be leaving the highlands of Peru until the 11th of April. This doesn't really change anything for you all back back home, but there's the new plan!


        This does mean that I won't get a chance to see Mama Cocha, but I will get to see the Peruvian jungle, Lake Titicaca, and I'll get to take another two weeks of salsa dancing lessons. Dancing in size 46 (size 12) hiking boots does add an extra bit of a challenge.

Look at the shoes! The shoes!

        That's all for now. If you're reading this thinking "I could use some solar bottle lights!" then please direct your attention here. If you're reading this thinking "this whole Kiya Survivors thing sounds pretty cool" then direct your attention here.


Ciao!

A Harsh Reality: A Glimpse At Some of the Challenges We Face

        It has been an interesting and incredibly busy two weeks. Don't expect any apologies from me about not blogging because I've been anything but lazy. I'd like to warn everyone that this blog will contain some very real and possibly upsetting stories.

        I debated quite a bit with myself about exactly how much detail to share: on one hand this blog is primarily to entertain and keep everyone at home from worrying about me, but on the other hand perhaps an occasional dose of reality surrounding what I, Kiya Survivors, and their volunteers are actually facing here.

        On Wednesday, the 22nd of February, I went out on my first day of outreach here at the center. As the kids were on vacation from the 20th of February to the 2nd of March this day of outreach represented my first true day of volunteering.

        On outreach we do a variety of things. Everything from taking food to families to doing battle with red tape to help mothers receive child support payments is fair game. This particular Tuesday we began by taking one mother to a nearby city, Ollantaytambo, to begin the process of filing for child support. In true Peruvian fashion it took several hours as we shuttled back and forth between town-hall, the local governor's residence, and the house of the child's father collecting names, addresses, and filing papers. It needed to be done, but it couldn't have been done by the single mother. It was an exasperating process, but not everything we do is fun and games.

        After this several hour bureaucracy battle we headed out to visit the families of several disabled children who we had heard about but had not had a chance to visit. In essence we were surveying the situation and offering food and education to the children. But what we do can't be simple handouts: before we return with food and before we make arrangements for the children to come to the center we wanted to be sure that they were being treated well at home.

        Do they have their own clean bed? Are they being treated well, with love, and free from abuse? Was the father involved in the raising of the children and if not, did he support the family in any way? These were all things we needed to find out in our initial surveys of the families. Our fantastic social worker, Iris, made sure that the families knew that we genuinely cared about the welfare of the children and that certain things, such as having a disabled female sharing a bed with a male relative, were not OK. Once we were sure that the children were being properly cared for Iris assured the families that we would be back to help.

        Many times negligence or ignorance can lead to the poor care of a disabled child. Children with disabilities can be immensely more difficult to raise than your average child and at times people are simply unaware of the special needs of their children. Unfortunately, some families do have malicious intentions which go beyond simple negligence.

        I can't tell you which one explains the horrible situation that we found this girl in. She was likely between 14 to 17 years old, but it was difficult to tell. To say that it was a poor family would be something of an understatement. We found her laying on a foam mattress in a very dark one bedroom house. She was being taken care of by her grandmother's sister as her own mother had passed away many years ago. She was very ill. Naked from the waist down and laying on her foam mattress on the floor we knew she desperately needed assistance.

         When the aunt grandmother told us that the girl shared the bed with her uncle we made it very clear that this was absolutely not OK. She needed her own bed. We promised to return to help not only the girl, but also the aunt grandmother with food, house renovations, and cleaning. We, unfortunately, never got the chance to help the girl: we were told only a few days later that she had passed away. We nevertheless returned to the family's house a week later, as promised, to see what we might still do to help. 

The soot you see above the right-hand window came from the stove inside. Without a proper chimney much of the inside of the house was in a similar condition.

        Through conversations with the aunt grandmother, a neighbor, and a local shop owner we learned, too late, exactly how bad the girl's situation had been. The uncle with whom she "shared a bed" was an alcoholic and the girl was often seen wandering around unclothed searching for food. Presumable she was was not being fed enough. The neighbor claims to have seen her eating animal excrement and that the aunt grandmother was known to drink excessively.

        To recount this story brings up such a vile mix of emotions in me that I am having trouble typing this now. The English language, and any other language that I can think of, lacks the words to describe exactly how brutally frustration it was to hear all these horrendous details after the girl's death.

        The helpless rage and sadness we felt, and still feel, surrounding the whole situation can not be done justice by anything I write. No matter how many times I wrote and rewrote the above story I could not capture the entirety of the experience. Who can I be angry at? How can I vent my frustration? Is ignorance to blame? Is crippling poverty to blame? If only someone could tell me where to direct my fury perhaps I would not feel as vilely ill to my stomach as I did learning all this.

        This is why I am writing this all here: it is half catharsis and half a shot of reality. I know as you are reading this now you did not come on this blog to hear such terrible things, but nothing I am telling you is an exaggeration. Everything you are reading is reality. Situations like this exist and it does you, me, or anyone else no good to pretend they do not.

         This is the reality we are doing are best to change. It hurts to think that we can't save everyone, but it gives me hope to know we can save a few. From Fernando, Kiya Survivor's first rescued child, to Luis at Mama Cocha, Kiya has helped children in equally if not worse situations. They have also likely prevented many more similar situations by spreading awareness about the plight of disabled children in Peru. Awareness really is the path forward; A cultural change must be made. Providing education to an unfortunately uninformed population is one of the greatest facets of Kiya Survivors.

        Reality is harsh, but the more we open our eyes to it the more we can do to change it. Social progress is a messy thing, but your help does bring change.

        I will write no more today as nothing else I can say belongs under the same post as this one. I will only say that I am alive and despite this gut-wrenching story things are well for myself. Tomorrow all the children will return to the Rainbow Center for classes so I eagerly await that.

        Life must move on. We all need to move forward holding on to the lessons of the past without finding ourselves trapped in any one moment. We have much work to do and more more of life to live.