Guatemala was excellent, now finals

The trip to Guatemala was very successful and I feel great about the work I did. I took portraits of fair trade coffee farmers in four communities in western Guatemala over the week of Thanksgiving. The grassroots development organization Cafe Conciencia works with these communities to strengthen their coffee roasting projects, eco-tourism programs, basic infrastructure, and a variety of social programs. The photographs will be used to redesign the coffee packaging and the Cafe Conciencia website. With redesigned coffee packages, Cafe Conciencia will promote the community’s coffee in the United States and elsewhere. It is rare for farmers to control the entire production process, from planting the seeds to packaging the final product. They have unprecedented control over their production and in many cases earn better profits. These benefits improve the community’s opportunities for organizing around gender issues, better schooling, and political rights, among other things. I had a great time with the farmers and am thrilled to contribute to the project.

Even though I came back exhausted, it was well worth it. Now, I am in the thick of finals. Just two more weeks… My initial plans to go to India in January have fallen through due to complications with the translation. Seems that Adobe doesn’t have very good support for the Devanigari alphabet, which Nepali is written in. Lovely. We’ll get it worked out, and I’ll be in India in May.

Here are some pictures from Guatemala.