By Heather Farrell
The circle of plastic chairs filled the cool, dark living
room. We sat holding bowls of sopa de
gallina india, scooping up pieces of chicken, rice and beans with
ground-corn tortillas. Gilberto, Patrick and I were with a group from Uncommon
Grounds Coffee Roasters in Saugatuck, Mich., listening to Pastor Bernardo tell
about his coffee, his family, and how his quality of life has improved since
partnering with them and Unión MicroFinanza.
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| Bernardo and his sons. |
Before we went out to see Bernardo’s coffee plants and
processing equipment, the group shared photos of Michigan, the coffee shop and
roaster, and the large photo of Bernardo with his coffee that hangs in the
café. Bernardo laughed his unforgettable laugh: “I have more gray hairs now!”
Bernardo introduced his three youngest sons (his older
children were at school) and said his daughter, Noemi, wanted to be there, but
she was in classes at the bilingual school. Through customer tips that the
baristas receive, Uncommon Grounds sponsors Noemi to attend the Vida Abundante bilingual
school, where she is in second grade. Bernardo also shared about his life and
how it has changed over the past several years. He described how he spent his
entire adult life in debt, but that through working with UMF and Uncommon
Grounds, he finished last year’s harvest not only without debt for the first
time in his life, but also with money saved in a bank account. As we rose to
leave for his field, Bernardo asked to pray for the group and the coffee shop,
and he blessed the relationship they have established with the farmers whose
coffee they buy.
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| Bernardo shows his processing equipment and sorting techniques. |
This is when we see the result of our work at Unión
MicroFinanza – when coffee buyers can visit the home of the farmer who grew
their coffee, meet their family, eat a meal and drink coffee with them, walk
through their fields, and share stories about their lives. For these people
from Uncommon Grounds, they will not only be able to tell customers who grew
their coffee, they will also be able to describe from personal experience how
paying a farmer a just price can make a difference for his family and his
coffee.
They are also able to understand the obstacles the farmers
must overcome in pursuing a higher quality of life. Before visiting Bernardo,
we went to see Rigoberto Paz, whose coffee is also sold at Uncommon Grounds. We
rode up into the mountains to his 1500-meter-high field, which received the
double punch of damage from last year’s hailstorm and roya (coffee leaf rust), but
still managed to produce a small harvest of amazing coffee. The group stood
among the small, new plants that were growing from the roots of those damaged
by the hail and cut down, and saw the stark difference between a coffee plant
with roya and one without.
Returning to Rigo’s house, the group met his wife and one of
his sons. His son, who is deaf, brought out his detailed drawings and we
admired his immense talent for art. We gave Rigo a bag of coffee that he had
grown and Uncommon Grounds had roasted and brought with them from the U.S., and
we all gathered in his kitchen to brew and drink his coffee.
To round out a day visiting coffee farmers and their farms,
the group returned to UMF’s beneficio to process more coffee (they also
processed coffees the day before), and get their hands (and clothes) dirty with
the process of taking a coffee from just-picked-cherry to dried bean. As the
group returns to the U.S., we thank them for coming to La Unión to support
coffee farmers and their families.
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| Uncommon Grounds visits Rigoberto Paz (center) and his field. |
