I AM NOT STEALING THE BLOG

This is a picture of Robert Hpeburn, the best looking guy we have on staff.

He is in Milwaukee at Alterra Coffee. The coffee special( see the bag ) is coffee from El Salvador, The Urrutia Family?....does Annabella know them.
Dad

Beach Week

Alright so it’s been one week from my last post, let's see how well I can remember what i have done. Haha. Thursday, I packaged coffee! It wasn't exactly the most fun in the world but I had the chance to really get the inside scoop of "life on the farm". I can't imagine doing that every day, and not just 9 to 5. It’s more like 6 to 8, insanity. You can see my in action in my picture below. Oh and don't let me forget...I noticed, from my PBi expertise, that they were using a black foil gusseted bag w/ valve. Annabella and I were talking and she is wants samples, so get on it guys! You can thank me later... Friday was supposed to be the day we went to the beach but thanks to Mother Nature aka hurricane Matthew our trip was postponed to Saturday afternoon. This was not horrible, but once we got there the weather was still pretty bad. It rained, no; it dumped for almost the whole night. Sunday was off and on rain but the sun was still shining and I was able to experience some of the beauty that everyone was ranting and raving about. I wish I could have had more time to spend there. Right when we arrived the weather wasn't too bad so a few of us decided to walk along the beach for a bit, aside from the sand and everything being so beautiful and postcard perfect, there were FOUR sea turtles laying eggs farther up on the beach. It was a miracle; they dig a deep hole that takes about thirty minutes and after lay between seventy to ninety eggs. It was amazing. Then she covers it up and waddles her way back into the ocean. I guess turtle eggs are a delicacy here or maybe in other places too but these people would come and AS SHE IS LAYING THEM, put them in a bucket to sell/eat! AHH! But don't worry...there were three men that took the eggs and brought them to a hatchery where they could raise and protect them. Out of the ninety eggs that they poop out they say hopefully, one to three will survive, sometimes zero. Crazy. I spent the rest of the time laying in a hammock reading and not using my brain what so ever. No translating, no nothing, just a book and my hammock. Glorious. We drove back on Sunday and the weather persisted to be complete shit, there is really no other way to put it. It rained so hard that there were accidents everywhere and some of the old mud walls along the sides of the roads had collapsed so it was long ride home. Overall, the beach was nice and I wish we could have stayed longer :(

I'm back at the farm now and tomorrow will start to measure the lettuce and start recording the information into an excel program so they can hopefully fix any problems before the lettuce matures and needs to be sent to its client. Gives me something more to do so I'm happy. The only problem is all the spiders :( there are everywhere and there so big. They say that they are more scared of you then you are of them but I seriously doubt that right now. I'll finish out the week here and then Friday we are going to the lake! Annabelle’s son, Juan Andres, whom also works on the coffee farm, has a house there. So we are going for a night there. The hurricane has passed and the rainy season was supposed to officially end today. So I’m crossing my fingers for some nice weather!

Oh and I forgot to include that is was Juan Andres's birthday last friday! Which the pictures at the very top are showing you. We all had lunch here at the farm in Annabella's house. Right we walked to my house and there, we had set up decorations, had the cake and the marachi band suprise him! It was really cute and fun. The cake was too die for!

Annabella and I

End of our little hurricane

Everyone watching w/ umbrellas

CRAB!

Laying the Eggs

LOOK DAD! IM WORKING!

Right outside my window by my house. Crazy rain.

Robert and Mark in the midwest

Robert and I are driving all over Nebraska, Kansas, Wisconsin(Milwaukee) and Illinois(Chicago) this week. We drove into a big storm outside Kansas City tonight, and I thought you would enjoy the shots.....tons of lightening etc.

Folks love coffee in this part of the country, but they drink a milder roast and they love flavors versus the darker west coast preference.

Love,
Dad

Uno Mas Foto

Dinner w/ Everyone!

NO INTERNET

Hola Amigos! I am so sorry that I haven't had a post up in awhile. I was in a town with no internet service and then the internet company was doing maintenance on the wireless so it cut in and out for a few days. But back in business now! Over the weekend we went to a really isolated town, called Camosaguya (sp?) There was a big festival and parade. The “town” was more or less a village. No banks, super markets, malls, or anything other than small shops and a small market. We stayed at a friend’s of Annabelle’s and their house was beautiful along with a gorgeous view, some of the pictures show you. The parade actually was like the ones that go through Bothell and ones I have seen before except for the people were displaying the origins of their ancestors. So the costumes were different and some really pretty. In the morning, I took a walk and drunk guys were passed out EVERYWHERE. Sad...but pretty funny. Some were trying to get up and they would stand up and basically fall right back over again, you can't help but to laugh! I walked to the Swiss Village, which was a neighborhood that was built by a man from Switzerland who married an El Salvadorian woman. He moved here and decided to build a neighborhood using the style of architecture from his country. It’s a beautiful neighborhood with high A top roofs, amazing gardens, just breathtaking. The culture is starting to grow on me more and more. My ears are starting to adapt to the language, so I hear more words than it just sounding like "jisufodjsfhudsfoeyjgkfdgijfdrsdfd". This country really takes your heart; the people are so welcoming and friendly. You never feel excluded. Aside from being dangerous…I can see why people would never want to leave.

Today, I’m back in Juyoua. For the next few weeks I have to start monitoring the crop growth in a few different plants. It’s more complicated than it seems living on a farm! It’s been raining like hell here which is preventing the lettuce to grow because there is less sunlight and too much rain drowns them. They have to cover the lettuce so they won’t drown which continues to restrict sun. The fertilizer that is used is getting pushed past the roots from excess rain so it’s not benefiting the plant at all. As Annabella told me, “Mother nature is a bitch and sometimes your best friend.” It’s true though, there whole business rests on weather.

This weekend I am going to get to see the coast. A friend has a house on the beach and I'm so excited to finally go. Everyone is telling me how beautiful the beach is and the water is great...hope there is no seaweed, NO ME GUSTA! I'll take lots of pictures!


P.S
The pizza hut here is a million times better than any pizza hut I have ever had in the states. It was shocking J we’re missing out.

don't touch hot things

Roasters are hot.....do not touch them....I learned this the hard way and I know Enlgish.

I think 30 minutes for a roast is too long....more like 12-16 minutes....ask the most patient man in the world.


Missed you on nice run in the soft rain tonight....lonely out there!

I think this picture is cool. I want to find the artist and buy it.
Love
Dad

P.S. the Phillies are in first place in the EAST. We still have 18  more games in the season, but things look good. I would love to make it to the World Series again!!!

Hola! It's the September 15th today which means it is Independence Day for Central America! I am going to a BBQ/party on a volcano today...sounds cool and all but I don’t know how I feel about being the ones right on the volcano (definitely no survival chance if that thing blows). I’m really excited to experience their Independence Day though and see how it’s different, have some fun! I'll post pictures and things about that tomorrow. Anyway (more about coffee..) learned about coffee roasting yesterday!!! It was pretty cool and almost burnt my hand off on the machine because I didn’t understand that they said the machine was hot, I thought he was just saying "it's hot" in general. Oh well, that's how I'm learning my Spanish! The picture shows you basically how it works, the "green" coffee is sucked through the pipe and put inside the roaster, it takes about 30 mins to roast and then is shot into a circular spinning thing (don’t know the name) to cool off. After its dumped into a bucket, then put into bags, then sent to the customer THEN into our cute little coffee mugs at home..or starbucks.

One more thing, I was just want to announce that my bad luck with cars has followed me all the way to El Salvador. Yesterday, a friend of Annabelle’s picked me from the farm to drive me back to San Salvador to spend the holiday with her and about an hour into the trip our car just stops. Mind you, we are in the middle of NO WHERE and had to wait almost three hours for someone to get us. FML.

Have a great day everyone J


This butterfly was stuck in my window.



most patient person in the world.

Right before the car broke down. Stunning sunset, this picture barley captures it.

Hanging out in the Bedroom

On top of the Plantation

Peeking through the Protective Wall

Barbed Wire Fence

Today was a whole new adventure. Annabella went back to San Salvador so I’m on my own here now. Which means no one speaks any English really and it’s pretty funny/ complicated to communicate but even though we can barley understand each other it’s still so much fun. I am learning so much Spanish and even after one day I can understand so much more then I knew yesterday. I can’t even explain it in words, language is such barricade to a relationship I have with these people yet everyone is still so sweet and wonderful. It’s almost as if since we can’t say everything on our mind or blurt things out, you just enjoy each other’s company more. I teach a little English everyday and learn a lot of Spanish. So, if my translation is correct, I learned a lot about the process of the coffee plant. Planta de café. They mix the fertilizer with water and the workers wear back packs that have these plastic containers, which hold the liquid fertilizer. They stab the ground with a long wand connected to the containers it into the ground so the tree can grow faster. They are constantly watching for grasshoppers that eat the leaves and stop the coffee bean from producing correctly, turns it yellow and brown. We drove to another plantation, maybe twenty mins from the house. There I saw the mountain and a lot of the farm. They measure the acres of the farm by manzanas. Which directly translates to apple but it’s the El Salvadorian way of describing measurements on the coffee farm. One manzana is about 7,000 square feet, an acre is like ten. In one manzana they have eleven smaller squares, there made up of these tall tree’s (couldn’t quiet catch the name) that block the wind in November through January. The wind gets very strong after the rainy season ( November through January), blows the coffee bean off the tree and less coffee is collected. I’m pretty tired today so I’m getting ready for bed. Ready for another chaotic day tomorrow. Adios.

This is the street market just two mins from where im staying. The church is behind it, we went to mass this morning which was packed of people. Fun fact, the church has a wood carving of jesus but its made out of a special wood that is black, its very detailed and there are only two in the world (the other one in Guatemala). You can take the stairs up to it and pray there, which they say miracles can happen. I went and asked for a miracle, i asked god to make spanish easier and people to talk slower...we'll see if it works. The market was really different, everyone is selling the same things for different prices, so its a big hunt. I'm excited to spend more time there on the weekends even though if you get within three feet of a stand the attack with you a million purses, prices and watch you intently. Makes things a little bit uncomfortable. We went to another town for lunch about twenty mins away, not sure the name though. I think it was called Alacta. It rained so hard that by the time we were done our meal the streets were absolutly flooded. Also, I went to the greenhouse today, it was huge! The view here is amazing, huge mountains and were up so high the fog, well there clouds that rest on the mountains. and there covered in all these different tree's. Most of them are coffee trees, they are covered in green, bean shaped things, which is the coffee. When it turns red is when they will pick it, that wont be until november or december ish. Ill probably be here for the whole process, which will be pretty cool to watch the whole process. Well im going to see how the packaging is done, so hope you all ejoyed! Buenas Noches amigas!

The Land of Beans, Rice and Coffee :)

 There has been alot of complications with the internet and the magicJack, which if it was working would be cool. Its really convinent but its a pain in the ass to set up a new line. I have a video I'm going to try and keep uploading of my condo, which is adorable. The weather is sticky and warm. Thunderstorms off and on like I said. If you ever get the chance to come down here, follow my dad's advice, "Judge by the heart not the skin". Some of the people are pretty...well interesting looking but there are very kind and welcoming. I stayed at Annabella's house last night, absolutly beautiful. The architecture here is so different from the american styled homes. Marble floors, HUGE doorways, open hallways and tons of plants and gorgeous flowers decorating the house. You would think it came out of a movie. Its sad though becuase there was a recent earthquake and there are now huge holes in her yard and master bedroom, they collapased becuase all the piping was cement and very old. The lifestyle is very different, there are people hired to do EVERYTHING for you. I woke up and breakast was made, bed made, another man took all my luggage to the car. I barley had to lift a finger. She has three maids that stay with her at the house, a gardner and a driver for her mother in law that stays there...I was shocked when she was telling me. Its only three hundred a month to keep all of them employed. (note to self, move here when you don't want to do anything and keep it cheap!) The city and everything is beautiful, so many tree's and crops covering everything. The food is to die for and like i said, no stomach problems. My condo is right next to where they weigh the trucks after they pick the coffee bean, then about thirty feet from that there is the drop off where all the coffee is dumped into this huge, orange, sifter, where its weighed again and the sticks, stones and crap gets pulled out of it. The workers get paid by the average weight of the trucks load and the weight of the coffee in the sifter. Its about one to two pounds of coffee per tree, also depending on the tree. So you do the math, these people work there ass's off to make enough not to work the rest of the year and only during the three to four month coffee season. Yeah...NO THANKS. Haha
Well, about to go to dinner. Miss and love you guys! Ill get some pictures up of the town and things tomorrow. I am going to mass at ten am. There is one giant church for the whole town, so that should be an experience. Buenas Noches!

DAY 0- NIGHT BEFORE DEPARTURE

Here's my first video for my blog! Just a short clip, kind of a test run so I get a feel for what im doing. All packed almost and ready to go. Nervous...but I AM going to a completly different country for three months..so i think nervous is healthy. Lots of sunscreen and bug repellent, good work boots-all the most importat items. Now just two plane rides away and my adventure begins! Whoo!

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