Rio Muchacho: behind the scene (part II)

Hola todos!

Here we are, gone again, after two weeks of digging, compost creating and plates washing.

Yesteraday we arrived in Mompiche, little fisherman town at 175 km of Canoa. We're already falling in love... we'll keep those news for later!

So... Rio Muchacho, part two!

It's hard to figure out where to start as there is many subjects to cover in order to be true to this uncommon experience. We have to warn you that this post will be analytic because as much as Rio Muchacho is a model, sometimes it is to follow, sometimes not. We will let you be the judge!

First: the projects.

1-The farm
The goal was always to be self-suficient but tourism, which always look to get bigger in that kind of business, made that dream impossible. Let's note that very few of the food eaten in the farm was from the farm. As we outlined it in the previous post, the compost system and the water-recycling system is remarquable. But, the lack of workforce combined to the development of other projects put agriculture in third place priority wise.

Most of the animals here serve as compost productors. It is very good but we wonder why the farm wasn't able to produce eggs nor milk during our stay.

We're taking lots of notes because eggs and milk, we love that!

Ecotourism frenzy:
20 tourists watching a scared sloth
in his official release in the jungle

2-Tourism

This aspect took over on farming. It makes sense. It is the breadmaker of the finca and main income for the environmental school. Unfortunately, many problems will come from that situation. Therefore, one of them is that, as exceptional and tasty as it it can be, food quantity was insufficient for the paying volunteers of the farm.
So, when tourist were coming over, everybody was pretty happy (as for food quantity)...unfortunately that also meant more dishes for the volunteers on duty!

3- The school
Few years ago, the organisation realized they wouldn't be able to educate adults from the community to sustainable agriculture. So the founders decided that the best way to educate and sensibilise the community would be through an environmental school. Things couldn't be better!

The school helps to educate children to the importance of land protection and also, to encourage them to stay in the countryside. This is in order to avoid rural exile and therefore, guarantees conscious successors. Teachers are qualified and the program is well structured. It's a private school but parents only need to pay 2$ per month, per family (no matter how many children they send). It is, surely, a nice alternative to local schools.

And children are really the hope for change!

Many volunteers in the farm agree to pay the fees, which can be considered quite high, knowing that most of it is going to the school.

Now let's talk about the people!

We divide them in 3 groups: the owners and founders, the employees and the volunteers.

The owners, Dario and Nicola, have been together for 25 years and in business for as long. She's neo-zealander and he's ecuatorian. They recently added two twins to their family, Florence and Rafi.

Nicola and Dario

They both work all the time, but not really on the project. We will talk about it later.

Pachuco

Also, there is the employees, Danilo, Roberto and Pachuco who are the strong-arms of the finca. Simon and Soa worked and really learned from them during their stay.

They've been working on the project for many years and are more than happy when volunteers come around. Pachuco and Danilo are also asking us to send them malagasy and quebec cousins! Real playboys those two...but with big hearts!

Awesome Pachuco's style

As for Roberto, he litterally talks with a potato in his mouth (more potatoes) but strangely manages to be understood!

And there is the wonderful Norita and Iciela helping in the kitchen. Three meals a day for groups of "vegeterians" ( no meat in the farm), without counting the unexpected tourists that pop randomly. Those ladies are working hard hard!

And when they're on their day off, they organise parties where we dance until 11am (yes yes!) and where we can eat local pigs in the middle of the night. It was Simon's first pig meal in over 10 years. We have to start to fit in and it's easier when we know the pig's name. Although Soa doesn't really agree.
You should also know that few months ago, 6 employees were working on the farm, counting the garden manager who left last year. Today, there is 3 employees per day. You can imagine how much work there is on the farm!

During our stay, five volunteers were working with us.
Christina left for Quito at the end of our first week after being there for 3 weeks. She's a real positive energy ball this one! Nothing seemed to dispirit that german girl-with-no-accent. Speaking english, french, spanish and german, Christina was our guide for the first week and we thank her so much!

And then there is Allie, another energetic girl from the United-States. Volunteering since a long time, she's handling most of the tasks in the finca. She's taking care of volunteers, tourists and is also working at the school.

And there is Gaby of course, that we didn't get to see much but when we saw her, she was always on top! Another long-term volunteer very implicated in the school and the children. Gaby also have a serious green-thumb for animals as she managed to convert the dangerous orange-cat into and adorable Chaton. 

There is also Andres, (another) german with a perfect spanish and loving soya beans! Andres recently got his residency here. Therefore, we got to know a lot about the visa process. Planning to build a finca in the Amazone, Andres knew exactly what he was looking for  at Rio Muchacho: to learn. A real bookworm, we barely saw him without a Rio Muchacho library book throughout our stay. But, sounds like the organization didn't quite fullfill his expecation as he left one week earlier. 

Finally, there is Franz. 19 years old and ready to live his new ecaudorian life for a year! We bet Franz is going to learn way  more than he bargained for through that special experience. It's his first trip, first farm, first sea of responsabilities. This young man has no idea how much he picked well his new host country. Standing along Pachuco and Danilo every day, we're very curious to see and witness his latina transformation! Good luck little brother!

The activities: 

Our day starts at 6h15 to feed the animals but mainly to feed the compost. Simon specially liked the chanchos (pigs). Meanwhile, Soa picked up a lot of cow and horse poo. She also left many times with a machete in the jungle to cut giant grass and be eaten by tics.

So much fun!

At 7h30, it's breakfast time, which normally consist of dry granola (no milk on the farm?! nope!), fruits and an ecuadorain pastry.

Break or dishes until 8h30.

Following that, we have a little meeting with or without the owner to know our agenda for the day.

Normally, this is made at the ecuadorian rhythm because it is hard to manage a business that big, that early, when the twins cried all night.

When Nicola and Dario are there, we sometimes have a 5 minutes class on permaculture. But mostly, Allie or Franz will have to go collect the informations with the owners, which need to be cross-checked with 5 others, and finally we just decide to go see the employees ourselves; because at the end, they are the one knowing what's need to be done.

More than once, we asked ourselves why we couldn't just go ask the employees as they are the one directly in contact with the project on the farm.

Everyday tasks vary a lot: making "beds" to plant vegetables, plant seeds, dig, plant, dig, plant, dig, make organic basket, help in the kitchen, dig holes to plant trees, plant trees, water 2800km of land, pick up poo to create compost...

Making bed with Roberto

dig compost, fill up compost bags, transport compost bags on a Montreal-Quito distance (p.s.: It is very important to learn how to properly do that: because contrary to public's belief, it's not true that compost makes your face softer, hair shinier or that it cleans the inside of your boots!),spray compost, clean fruit trees with a machete, remove bad herbs, etc.

We planted a Moringa (malagasy tree). It's a very rare and special tree that was named Soanandrianina!

And then, we have almuerzo ( lunch meal) and if we're lucky, we wash dishes for 20 tourists!

At 1h30, back to work. 

Long term volunteers get that time to supposedly work on their "personal project". But the lack of workforce, the lack of volunteers and the great quantity of daily tasks make it hard to focus on those projects.

Simon chasing chickens.

On wednesday afternoon, it's cultural day. During that time, we get to make chocolate, coffee, rings out of natural materials, etc.

BiciBomba!! Water pump on pedals!

Let's say that the Rio Muchacho formula is pretty interesting. A lot of time is dedicated to relaxing (when there is no dishes to wash) and to let the volunteers "recharge their batteries". This allowed us, contrary to Guantubamba, to enjoy a little bit more of that wonderful site created by Dario and Nicola throughout time.

Customs:

We want to make you a list of all ecuadorian customs that we love, but until then, here are a few we had the pleasure to discover at Rio Muchacho:

1) When you party in a Manabian community (people from Manabi's province), you start at 8pm: time when music starts blasting through the biggest speakers on the planet! Crescent street, St-Laurent street and Dagobert nightclub can go hide! But, only 2% of the guests will dare dancing. Which makes a lot of seated people, staying pretty silent and waiting for god's sign. Ironically, a big statue of Jesus in the corner of the dancefloor is watching the show and wondering why he forgot his earplugs.

But the messiah everyone is waiting for is not what we expected. Because at midnight top, a pig will be served as holy bread. After the meal, we start dancing with the 2% but we get tired fast. The party will end a little bit later, aroung 10 in the morning! Meanwhile, the music, technocumbia (think folkloric reggaeton) will never stop nor lower in intensity!

2) Bathroom decoration:

Here, our diplomas are hanged in the bathrooms! We then wonder: do ecuadorians do, like us, an automatic link between human "garbage" and sustainable accomplisment of the farm?

Exotic animals :

We already told you about the animals on the farm last week, but here are the one that were there before the farm. We admire them, we fear them, we love them.  

the Culebrero

Orange cat aka Chaton

You remember Alejandra?
No one could really tell if she's afemale,but we like to imagine her as a she. 

Taz-Taz the crazy pig, smiling for the camera!

Ginette

Bats getting crazy at sunrise.  

Killing-skull-skin-remover-wow-ouch caterpillar

So, that was our critical analisis of Rio Muchacho farm, the ups and downs. Although it might not entirely look like it, we loved our experience. Do we think volunteers should pay? Maybe not... mainly because we were expecting a well-structured organisation and that wasn't fully there!

But, we learned a lot from volunteers and employees as they were all qualified. It was a little bit disapointing not to get that information from Dario and Nicola as they are acclaimed professional in their field (tourism and permaculture).

But for obvious reasons and understandable as well, they have a lot on their plates! Unfortunately, there is a crying need for a manager in the organisation, but it doesn't seem as obvious for them.
We have a lot of faith in Allie, Franz and Gaby to fix all that!

In conclusion, we're coming out of our experience a little bit poorer but with a clearer direction of what we're looking in our project. It was, therefore, a good investment!