Independence, organic coffee, art (5 days ago)

Independence Parade (Desfile)
photo by Vicente

Last week we celebrated Ecuador’s independence by attending a parade (desfile) on the Malecón, or main street, of San Cristóbal. Many of Vicente and my students marched or played in it, but the independence celebration is more of a big deal on the continent than in Galapagos, I was told by abuelita (see pics of independence parade and abuelita below).

This week a group of four volunteers and I hopped a taxi (which means riding in the back of a white pickup truck here) up to a local organic coffee plantation. Though we had stupidly forgotten to call ahead and were lost for about a half hour on the winding grounds (get it, coffee grounds?… sorry), we ended up finding a worker who was nice enough to show us around the whole place. When we found him, he was pumping water into a biogas filter, which had been about a five-year running experiment at the hacienda (plantation). Instead of using limited fossil fuels, they recycle waste into methane and use it for all of the same purposes as natural gas- cooking, you name it. Our guide took us through the grounds, pointing out the seedlings and explaining to us how to tell when the beans are ripe for harvest (they turn red). Wild avocado, orange, and banana trees occasionally lined the coffee plants, and I nabbed a freshly fallen avocado while Vicente snacked on an orange along the way. All of the processes at the plantation seemed painstakingly natural, from the picking to the drying to the composting of dried grounds, guava skins, and manure into soil (this was a lengthy 20 row process, in which we could see the progression of decomposition into tierra, which was then reused on the grounds). Galapagos coffee is mainly exported, and apparently has quite a reputation worldwide. Interestingly- well sadly- enough, most of the island drinks imported powdered coffee called Nescafé, made by Nestle, which we are 90% sure owns the Third World.

Another highlight of my week came when meandering through some of the tourist shops along the Malecón, the main drag here in town. Though I´d passed a sign proclaiming `Art Gallery´ more than two dozen times in my stay here, I finally decided one afternoon to stop in and see who was there and what sort of art they were selling to tourists. Well, I quickly made a friend, an older painter with four sons (one of whom is friends with our musician-friends-students, to whom we give private classes over breakfast) who has invited me to come hang out and draw or paint with him. He sometimes works on tourist boats, painting t-shirts of Galapagos flora and fauna and sometimes works in his taller, or studio, painting from memory and the occasional photograph. I’m hoping to take him up on his offer and realize that I’ve been missing drawing and painting here, even though I do the occasional sketch in my journal. I am also thinking about possibly starting the art class that I originally wanted to teach here… we shall see, though. Right now the English and yoga classes take a lot of my time, and of course, there’s also the pull of the waves and wanting to be outside exploring…