Meat Queen - Now Open

Street sign outside the business

  Last Tuesday I had the privilege of getting a sneak peak and serving as a taste-tester for the fast food restaurant Meat Queen.  For months I have been listening as Maria Sol detailed all the progress-from designing the logo, to finding the perfect location, to buying all the equipment, to specifying the exact recipe for each sauce.  On Tuesday I saw a glimpse of the fruit of all her labor in the three months since she graduated from the Quito business training course.  Here are some pictures from the visit, and I ask for your prayers over Maria Sol, her family, and her employees as they start this restaurant, which had its Grand Opening on Saturday.  It's amazing to see the results of all her hard work, and I look forward to sharing more of her story soon once I visit the restaurant now that it's open for business.

Training in Las Mercedes (Take 3)

Las Mercedes Training Class - ready for the next step

The thing about working with businesses is that if you do your job well, you're never finished.  The whole line about "working yourself out of a job" never applies.  I could write a great story about how the last of 3 training visits to Las Mercedes was completed (finished) two weeks ago, but the truth is that I'm thinking more about the 8 business plans that those training participants already sent, the visit another participant is going to make to Quito next week to work with us directly on his plan, and the 7 or more other people who are calling Edwin at least once a week with questions about details of what they learned in the business training class.  So I can tell a little about the training, but the important thing is what comes next.

Working on conference planning a couple years back, I ran in the question of what follow up means.  For a conference, the responsibility is next to nothing.  Each participant decides herself what to do with her learnings.  However, as an organization that focuses on business development, we make it our business to follow up with participants to help them put what they learned into practice.  As a caveat, we still have much to learn ourselves and in practice, follow up is difficult.  However, that is exactly what we are doing with the training group in Las Mercedes.

Working on activities in groups

During the last training session, the participants divided up into groups according to the sector they work in--pig farming, dairy farming, mechanics, and commerce--and they have been working together to write down their plans for their businesses.  Since Las Mercedes is so far from where we are based in Quito (a 45 minute flight and then a 3 hour drive), the ability of participants to reinforce the ideas of the training for each other is essential.

At the same time, the wonders of email allow them to send their business plans, and in the next trip to Las Mercedes in April, Edwin and a board member will be able to visit their businesses and talk through their plans to help them form realistic goals and continue improving their businesses and farms.

And after that, there will definitely be more follow up work.  More questions, more decisions to consult on.  The truth is that unless a business fails, there are always new challenges and opportunities to consider, and as long as a business owner wants to consult with us in making decisions, we have a job to do.  And that's a good thing.

Putting down Roots

Two weeks ago, I took a step of independence and moved to an apartment that I'm sharing with a friend in the area of Cumbaya where I previously lived with an Ecuadorian family.  I am very grateful for the 8 months I spent with my host family, but I felt it was time to have my "own" place and a space to which I can invite friends on my own schedule.  This step comes after a bigger one that I am in the process of formalizing--the decision to stay an additional year in Ecuador.

Needless to say, I've come to love this country, with its unpredictable climate, neighbors who blast cumbia music at 1am, buses that race each other up and down mountains, and all the other endearing factors that make Ecuador what it is.  At the same time, staying another year is exciting because it means putting down roots and investing in this place that I have come to call home.  Living in the college atmosphere for 4 years, I lived a somewhat transient lifestyle.  Each year (and sometimes each semester), I lived in a different location, and my activities and involvement changed every 3-4 months.  With such a lifestyle, it is easy to disconnect from where one lives--not getting to know neighbors, not taking the time to enjoy the scenery, and not investing in relationships that might end in 3 months.  Living in Ecuador for an additional 12 months means learning more about the other endearing aspects of this country.  It means building on relationships and investing in the lives of others.  And it means that I can dig deeper into my work with Partners Worldwide and our local affiliate, Partners for Christian Development-Ecuador.

With a new apartment, I have goals and plans.  I look forward to getting to know our neighbors (and possibly teaching them some English...which they have already requested =).  I look forward to hosting friends for dinner or to watch a movie to reciprocate the hospitality with which they have blessed me.  And I look forward to planting a garden--we have the perfect space for it.

And with an extra year in Ecuador, I also have goals and plans.  I hope that each additional business training we give will have a stronger underlying base of biblical principles.  I look forward to visiting businesses more often and helping businesspeople follow through with their plans to create businesses that truly glorify God.  And I look forward to helping our Ecuadorian and North American business leaders build stronger connections to continue this work long after I am gone.

So there are some of my plans to put down roots and grow here.  It's not an immediate process, and like moving to an apartment, it takes some time.  On that topic, here are some pictures from the moving process.  I promise the apartment is more organized now, but I like to show the disorder--it reminds me that our work is still ongoing....

My bedroom

The dining/living room

More boxes in the living room

The kitchen

Training in Las Mercedes (Take 2)

My coworker, Edwin, was back in Las Mercedes for the second of three business training trips, and here are some pictures and stories to the stories from the January trip.

Rice fields in Las Mercedes

 To give some background on Las Mercedes, this community is located in the coastal region of Ecuador.  Unlike the mountainous Quito, which has very mild, almost constantly spring weather, Las Mercedes has a tropical climate with distinct rainy and dry seasons and higher temperatures.  Since Ecuador is currently in the rainy season, a farming community like Las Mercedes adjusts by planting rice to take advantage of the weather.  They also keep some corn and vegetables year round, and some farmers even have cocoa growing on their land.  With hard rains recently, the rivers are swollen.  One farmer told Edwin that his pastures are on the other side of the river from his house and farm.  Since he has several cows, this means that the animals must swim across the river each morning and evening for milking.  When asked, the farmer proudly stated that he had never lost a cow to that river.

Cows are not the only animals that are raised in Las Mercedes.  Edwin visited a young girl who raises chickens to pay for her education.  Since she was in high school, she has cared for the chickens with minimal assistance from her parents.  Not only is she gaining a great education, but she is learning responsibility and a strong work ethic as well.

Leonel is another hard worker from Las Mercedes, and he has also learned how to adapt to different environments.  For seven years he worked as an executive chauffer in Guayaquil, earning top dollar for his line of work.  When the business failed, he lost his job and was unable to find another in the large coastal city.  Moving back to the land of his birth, Leonel, his wife, and two children returned to agriculture to create a livelihood.  Leonel now raises pigs and dairy cows while also growing cocoa and oranges.

These are just a few of the many stories of those who are part of the Las Mercedes community.  Together they raise crops and animals that will feed the rest of their country, and they live, work, and learn together from week to week.  During the recent training visit, the 20 participants worked on homework and activities together, but also taught each other important lessons in other ways.  Half of the group arrived late on the first day, so as a “punishment” they had to stay late and create a skit to entertain the rest of the group.  To ensure that everyone understood the lesson on customer attention, the group rounded up some items from the room, divided into groups, and exhibited the extremes of excellent and horrible customer service.  Needless to say, everyone arrived punctually the next day and knew exactly what excellent customer service entails.