Notes from previous campaigner:
January 2002
For the Folgers campaign, I have been collecting signitures, and placing information inside the 5 major grocery stores we have. We have not yet held a large action but most people I talked to showed support for a continued campaign. Our school cafe is switching to fair trade coffee and as soon as my family of activists come back from break we will really go after the customers. Also I am helping to start a resource center that will focus on Latino immigrants, many displaced by coffee prices. We will be selling Fair Trade coffee there. We got a letter from Elvia who sounds like it is really bad down there--I can only imagine. This is hitting me hard. I would so like to use our Aztlan Resource Center for events, and collecting and distributing funds for causes Elvia is fighting for and so many others. Thanks for everything, the campaign kicks ass.
October 2001
We hosted Elvia Alvarado during Global Exchange's Fair Trade Coffee Tour in October 2001. We become acquainted right way. Her interpreter Faline made all the difference in making her feel at home here. She also stayed whith two native Costa Rican Proffesors, and I think she really enjoyed that. For the event I had to have the front row sitting on the floor with blankets. It wasn't the best time for the school yet it was packed with folks who were kind of curious but did not have a complete understanding of why she was here. We made great Guatamalan fair trade coffee. On the stage sat Feline, translating, Elvia, and Bernardo clarifying questions on the coffee making process and on global economic interactions. She immediately just threw it all out there, the reality of the campasinas/os, her experiences in the struggles real clear, passionate. Then she very strenly and lovingly demands our engagement with questions, making people cry, laugh, chant, yell "down with the capitalist system, why are you all just sitting there?" I think she ingrained into peope a feeling that will last along time. She told it like it was so well with such feeling, such heart, as is rare in our academic culture. We recorded, just an unbeliveable speach, sending her with a copy. We took her up to Flagstaff and recorded that event with a camcorder but just had to give her the copy we made. Flagstaff was such a different, more conservative atmosphere. It was really sad actually to say good bye since we connected so well. We may even see her down in Hondorus sometime.
September 2001
Just getting started!
