Handpicked with Love

I visited my first coffee farm when I was 5 years old, near a small village called Aldea El Tablon, Villa Canales, 1,420 meters above sea level. It was a unique experience that marked my life and became a tradition for the next 10 years. My stepfather, Guillermo or "Willy"as we used to call him, retired from the military when his father passed away and decided to take care of the family business...COFFEE. 

I recall my first visit to be an adventure for me and my brother, an opportunity to be in the wild playing hide & seek or exploring in the mountains, but it quickly became a learning experience as my stepfather called us to come down and help.

November, the day would start at 6am, when the clouds were still climbing up the mountains and allowing the first rays of sunlight to touch the tip of the trees. Fermin, the foreman, was responsible of opening the farm gates and allowing locals to come in, people from all ages, entire families, walking carrying their plastic or wicker baskets, you could feel the excitement and joy, the long wait since the last harvest, which ended around February was finally over.

People used to gather in an open field, where Willy together with the foreman, standing on top of a pickup truck, instructed the villagers which sections of the farm were ready to be harvested, provide the traditional "brin" sacks to the head of each group and just like that, in the blink of an eye, everyone was walking uphill and starting the handpicking of the coffee cherries under the shade of avocado and cuje (guamo) trees.

Willy used to be a heavy soda drinker, he would buy cases of Cola and have them piled up next to his chair and table, together with food prepared by the ladies who lived in the farm. He would patiently await under the shade of the trees for the collectors to come one by one, carrying the sacks and hanging them on the scale.

My brother would sit next to Willy taking note of the weight and the name of the person who collected the coffee (they then used this to payout the workers and ensure they were getting money based on their collecting efforts). I would stare in awe seeing the experienced farm workers and would, to the best of my abilities, help them in the gathering process of the beautiful and sweet cherries, every now and then I would eat one and spit the bean out, little did I know I was throwing away the best of it.

The trucks would go back and forth and take the sacks uphill to the farm's warehouse and allow the rest of the staff to start the processing of the cherries.

Around 5pm and after an exhausting day, the men would improvise a soccer field, right where the day started and the pickup truck parked earlier in the day, kids running and playing while the women would be serving “arroz en leche”, “atol de elote” and tamales . Filled with pride and anxious to start another day.

The harvest season would take place between November and February, some times even into early March until the last coffee cherries matured.