We need your help! Plus you get a great deal on some great organic apparel!

As most of you know, we have been working for years to develop a vertically integrated production chain for organic and fair trade cotton apparel. In 2009, our entire production chain from crop to consumer received Fair Labor certification, making it the first of its kind in the world! As part of this effort, we are busy reviving Nicaragua’s cotton industry – using a special organic cottonseed that was developed in Nicaragua. The farmers are very happy with their yields, and the future of this project holds much promise.

However, we have run into a hurdle and are asking you to help us overcome it.

Our longtime supporter of the program, Maggie’s Organics, has produced their first 12,000 garments using this cotton. Unexpectedly, some of the clothing contained small bits of polypropylene, most likely from the bags in which the cotton was harvested. Polypropylene is an entirely safe chemical to use in textiles; it is very frequently included in fabric blends for thermal shirts and underwear. In this case, the polypro shows up because it did not take the natural dye applied to Maggie's garments, resulting in small spots of color distributed around the dresses and tanks in this batch.

As a result Maggie's Organics has 150 each of White Knit Dresses and White Tanks which contain tiny flecks of color – most under ¼” in length.

Maggie’s is offering these to CDCA supporters at their cost + a flat freight charge of $10.00!

Described below, these garments are beautifully made, high quality organic apparel with the exception of the small flecks.

Sleeveless White Dresses ($10.00 each): These 100% certified fair labor organic cotton dresses are made of a double knit fabric, which provides a great body and stretch. The double knit dress is a heavier fabric than a t-shirt, yet light enough to be comfortable on those warmer days. This dress is perfect for warm, summer days or for wearing to the office with your favorite jacket. Size S - XL

White Tanks ($4.80 each): This white tank is made with 95% certified fair labor organic cotton and 5% spandex. The cut of the tank is both comfortable and versatile, with wide reinforced straps and a slight scoop neck. This tank is great for layering or worn on its own for more casual activities. Size X - XXL

Please email us at jhc@jhc-cdca.org to order your fair labor organic cotton dresses and tanks now! We ask that you purchase a minimum of 10 pieces, any combination of sizes and styles. US addresses only.

Fishing? Giving, Teaching, or Growing?

Give a man a fish and you feed him for a day; teach a man to fish and you feed him for a lifetime….Chinese proverb…BUT what if this man or woman does not live near bodies of water with fish? Or if she does what if the lake is polluted with heavy minerals like mercury? Then what?

Our volunteer, Jason Kwalick , has a solution! Aqua culture! Raising your own fish to eat, but it goes further…he recycles the water and feeds vegetable plants with the fish wastes and in turn the plants and gravel clean the water.

It is so exciting to me that sometimes I’m not very clear. Let me back up…Jason has a deep love for aqua culture…he helped raise two kois that sold for $10,000 and $13,000 each…wow! Right after coming here as a volunteer, he talked to Mike about starting a demonstration tank on our finca, but we are having serious cash flow problems. Jason’s solution was to pay for it himself and set up a smaller version.

He bought a 200 gallon tank and dug a big hole and placed it there. He then cut two 50 gallon tanks in half and built a platform to the left of the tank and raised the smaller tanks above the fish tank. He installed a small electrical pump (can be done with a hand pump).

In the 50 gallon tanks he put in gravel to filter the water and planted some tomatoes, peppers and melons to remove the ammonia and wastes from the water… the plants flourish on these wastes. The pump is timed to periodically suck the water out and up to water the plants and gravity pulls the water back to the fish. The water dropping back in also aerates the water so the fish can breathe.

He even bought fish, which was harder than we thought…sleuthing a source for baby fish. We have about 75 fish!

When the fish are big enough, they are farmed and eaten. Fish are a high source of protein. As we show this to other farmers and they become interested…Jason can help set up their fish farms. El Porvenir is interested.

This is very exciting and – I guess – I will have to learn to clean fish!

Teach a cooperative how to raise their own fish and the cooperative can eat and grow more vegetables as well…....my version of a Jason Kwalick proverb.

-Kathleen

Why is Maria hungry?

A dear friend of mine sent me a book, Boundaries…I guess to help me set some in my own life. On page 40 these doctors/authors quoted Proverbs and stated:

Hunger is a consequence of laziness

Drs. Cloud and Townsend obviously do not know many in the Third World. They do not know that 49% of Nicarguans live on less than $1/day and are hungry or that more than three quarters of the population live on less that $2/day and are also hungry.

How can authors...who quote one scripture after another claiming to free Christians of their boundary issues... say something which is in direct contrast to the good news that Jesus preached to the poor? Or in contrast to the passage if you've seen someone hungry and you do not feed that hungry one then you do not feed me...Jesus.

This ignorance points to the boundaries these authors have placed around themselves. The walls to protect themselves that they actually THINK of writing “hunger is a consequence of laziness”! The Nicaraguan people are some of the most hard-working people in the world and the hungriest.

Maria gets up before the sun rises, stokes the cook stove and puts the beans on to cook. She sweeps dirt floor of the house. The baby wakes and she nurses the baby. She and her four children gather what they can from the street that might be usable. She then irons the four uniforms heating the iron on the fire.. After being up and working for over an hour, she begins scrubbing them down in the pila (a wash basin). Her husband comes home from working as a guard all night, seven days a week for about $75/month. He is tired and hungry.

Maria puts some leftover rice from last night’s meal on the table and the few jocotes they harvested from their tree. All eat…and all are hungry still. Children go off to school. Husband collapses in the hammock strung in the wee, hot backroom of the tiny house.

Maria cleans up. She scrubs his uniform and a few other clothes on the washboard of the pila and hangs them on barb wire to dry. She then goes out and walks the neighborhood selling a few tomatoes she grew. With what money she has left of her husband's wage and from what she has sold she buys a 1/4^th cup of oil, 1 cup of rice, and 1 cup of sugar for the drink and to give them calories.

She comes home in time to take down the dry uniform, iron it for work that night, cook the rice and she found four oranges in the trash that she can make refresco with. The children return and they eat…saving some for the father who will rise later so he can be awake at his security job. After cleaning again…always stoking the fire with twigs she scrubs the four school uniforms so they will be ready for school.

During the day she has swept her dirt floor and dirt yard eight times. She and the children have hauled buckets of water seven times for cleaning, washing, bathing, cooking, and drinking. She has managed her children, helped with their homework (if she can), helped her husband eat and get ready. Chased other animals out of her yard to protect her few tomato plants. All in temperatures averaging 95°! As the temperatures drop she pulls out a few tortillas she managed to trade with a neighbor…a tiny bit of rice…a few beans. They eat…they soon go to bed…hungry.

Maria is not lazy…Maria is oppressed. Would the author of Proverbs had said that to the Israelites when they were in bondage in Eygpt?

The most filled people in the world are the laziest…they let money make their money. They would not know how to cook beans on a open fire, or go house to house to sell tomatoes for pennies.

Hunger is NOT a consequence of laziest…at least not for the majority of this earth’s popluation. It is the consequence of oppression. Remember that when people spout unreasonable platitudes….for Maria’s sake.
-Kathleen

Semana Santa

Nicaragua’s government has closed down for Semana Santa…or Holy Week (the week that started yesterday with Palm Sunday and runs through Easter Sunday). All schools are closed, including the medical schools. And the vast majority of businesses will run through Wednesday mid-day and then close for the rest of the week.

It reminds me of the Fourth of July when I was a kid growing up in a rural community where almost all our neighbors worked in mills and the mills closed down so everyone went on vacation mostly to the beach….which is what most with jobs do here.

It is also as hot! Semana Santa is known for its heat. Spring started a little more than a week ago for you in the north. Flowers will start blooming and leaves will have that fresh, baby green color where the light shines through…life begins again.

Passover also starts this week. Nicaragua is more like Passover. It is dry here...dusty…hot….and everything here appears dead.

Much of Nicaragua is Catholic. Viernes Santo or Holy Friday is the day most remembered…the execution of Jesus by the Romans. Twelve steps of the cross are enacted over and over in barrios across the country. Easter is celebrated by some but the day of suffering is what is most remembered.

Nicaraguans understand suffering. With almost half the country living on less than $1.00/day and three-quarters on less than $2.00/day…suffering is a part of their minute-by-minute existence. What they dream of…what they hope for is freedom. They work like slaves to stay alive and if they were set free to determine their own destiny that would be…that would be…well, a miracle!

They understand the suffering and death of Jesus so much more than the hope of Easter. They know pain. They know hunger, thirst, violence….and death. Sometimes - I think – for them it is almost too much to hope for Easter amidst the suffering and death…too much to hope for life amidst the dust, heat, and air filled with burnt particles as brush fires start.

BUT the understanding of BOTH religious events is freedom to experience

• The chains of slaves breaking.
• The chains of death being undone.
• The hope that good will win out.
• The hope that right will conquer wrong.
• The hope that the poor and oppressed will see their day of justice

Part VI: Taking off the glasses to see the kingdom of God among us

When are we going to see justice in the world? When are we going to see the sick cared for and the hungry fed? When will we live in a perfect world? The answer: Now.

Howard Zinn once wrote: “the future is an infinite succession of presents, and to live now as we think human beings should live, in defiance of all that is bad around us, is itself a marvelous victory.” Or, as Jesus said more succinctly, “the Kingdom of God is among you.”

The message both Howard and Jesus left us with is this: Quit waiting for the world to be perfect, open your eyes and live it. As you live it, you’ll begin to see it. You’ll see it where you see justice…where you see families farming in harmony with the land…where you see women achieving a better future for their families…where you see people getting the health care they need…you’ll see it where you see children going to school and everyone getting enough food to eat.

The Divine tells us to care for the poor, and we will be taken care of. This is our kingdom…not the Other. The Other, where one-third of all Nicaraguan children under the age of five are chronically malnourished, is not a kingdom of justice…the Other, where fewer than one in five Nicaraguan workers receive at least minimum wage and basic benefits, is not a kingdom of compassion. The Other, where one in five Nicaraguans has been forced to leave the country to find work, is not a kingdom of freedom. The Other won’t look out for us. In the Other, brothers and sisters don’t care for one another.

But in the Divine’s family, we are all brothers and sisters…really. You, and me and Nelson Mandela and George W. Bush and your next door neighbor and the driver who keeps cutting you off in traffic are all brothers and sisters. If we truly believe that, and treat each other as such, and care for each other as brothers and sisters, that is the kingdom of God among us…that is a marvelous victory.

Those living in desperate poverty in Nicaragua and around the world can’t afford to wait for justice…if they wait to be liberated, their families will starve. They can’t afford for their vision of a perfect world to be distant, they must live that vision. And if we want to change the world, we must live that vision as well.

Living out our vision requires of us above all else Hope. For so many Nicaraguans, hope is all they have. A belief that things can and will change.

Ramona and Petronila were both unemployed with families to support, but of an age in Nicaragua where women are no longer considered useful, and aren’t given work. Ramona and Petronila had no other option than to live their vision. They chose to join with the Genesis spinning cooperative in hope…working together for a better future…working for no pay. In the beginning, their families told them they were crazy to work and not get paid…their neighbors laughed at them each morning as they headed out to work, armed only with their Hope. But Ramona and Petronila were not deterred. As Howard Zinn tells us, “To be hopeful in bad times is not just foolishly romantic. It is based on the fact that human history is a history not only of cruelty but also of compassion, sacrifice, courage, kindness.”

The hope and courage and sacrifice of these women is contagious. After three years of hard work, the Genesis co-op’s building is nearly finished. Now when co-op members Pablo and María and Gloria lose sight of their goal, it is their families who give them hope…pushing them out the door to work and saying, “You can’t give up now, Mama, your dream is becoming reality.” It is the dreams that sustain us particularly in these tough times… hope. And it is hope that many Nicaraguans carry in their hearts and the dream of possibilities.

In order to have the world we want, we must begin by living it, and trusting that we will begin to see it all around us. “If we see only the worst, it destroys our capacity to do something,” wrote Howard Zinn. “If we remember…where people have behaved magnificently, this gives us the energy to act, and at least the possibility of sending this spinning top of a world in a different direction.” – Becca