August 4 --What Happen today…

Raining. We had a meeting scheduled with Maurizio of Cafe Viejo in Puerto Viejo who is secretary on ReciCaribe’s board of directors to talk about planning an event to educate people in the area about recycling, pollution, over-consumption and to raise funds for the recycling association. The meeting got post-poned until next Tuesday, hopefully at the Biological Corridor building in Hone Creek. The event will most likely take place in September.

Speaking of recycling--the recycling truck did a pick up run yesterday! ReciCaribe has formed a new partnership with the Biological Corridor and they are managing the routes, the staff, the separation and sales of materials. The plan was to cover a lot of ground yesterday, as there hasn’t been service for a few weeks, the route went slowly and there’s always a learning curve, so give the guys on the truck a warm hello when they pass by!. It’s not an easy job but oh so necessary! (the Corridor is asking that folks sending in their recycling rinse out and smash their recyclables, thanks!)

We’re keeping busy helping to get the final supplies together for the reparations of the Volio bridge. It is nearly complete. We were able to use a generous donation that came from some fabulous folks at Global Exchange in order to buy the last of the supplies and pay three days of fair wage for guys working to make the bridge safe. I spoke to Jorge from Willie’s Tours in Cahuita. Jorge was very involved in getting supplies together to make sure the bridge is usable for the community and visitors to the community--we thank and congratulate Jorge and the folks at Willie’s tours for being so involved with helping their neighboring communities! Way to go! 
Another way to support the community of Volio is through ecotourism, go visit the waterfall, a great trip!

We’re also planning for the meeting scheduled for Saturday morning, 8 of August. Working with Ashley at the Botanical Garden in Black Beach, we’ve invited some local artist to come to a meeting to get a feel for if there is interest in forming a collective of Talamancan artists working with recycled materials. Getting together a budget for what costs might be involved to support such a group.
We are already selling some recycled art products here in ATEC’s shop, baskets made with bags from snack food, wallets from tetrabrick and soda bottles, ash trays from tin cans, candles from tuna cans. We’ll sell products from this new collective, but will also look for other shops interested in supporting not just local artists, but also conservation! Some day, we’ll even have an online store!

One of our receptionists, Tirza, is on vacation. Miss Tirza has many responsibilities here outside being a receptionist, so for the next two weeks I am (again like old times) trying to do her job as well as mine; paying bills, dealing with sales people, balancing accounting. Ooo we miss Miss Tirza!

We have a couple of new products at ATEC; CariBeans, organic locally roasted fair trade coffee--they have a shop over by the bus stop, they are going to sell some ATEC merchandise (our reusable grocery bags) and we are happy to support the good work they are doing in promoting local producers.

We’ve been selling the Organic Chocolate of ACOMUITA for quite some time, but they have spiced up their packaging and are rebranding the product as Tsirushka. Mmmmm Organic chocolate made by a women’s coop!

Bueno, that’s all for now, and it’s only 12:30!