As we left Tamshiyacu on our boat bound for the Tahuayo River, I settled onto my life preserver cushion to buffer my bony butt on the metal seat, ate my breakfast and started reading a book picked up from a Little Library at home. We stopped at Buena Vista a few hours later to register my visit as a foreigner to the Tamshiyacu Tahuayo Regional Conservation Area at the sleepy police station.
We arrived at Chino just before noon. I appreciated Marianela carried my backpack to the village since I was still healing from my fall. We first went to Estelita’s house who has been an artisan leader since my first visit to Chino in 2008. She and her husband are also successful entrepreneurs who invested earnings from selling crafts to create a “bodega” (general store) in their home. This business allowed them to expand their house and build a home in Tamshiyacu to care for Estelita’s aging father.
We then went on to the house where artisans sell crafts to visiting tourists. It was great to see a document registering their association’s logo and name Manos Amazonicas. Three posters showed different stages of harvesting and processing chambira palm leaves. I carefully perused crafts artisans displayed on their tables and bought a dozen crafts to sell in the U.S.
I explained at our meeting that I only chose a few baskets because most of theirs had too many colors and patterns for the taste of our customers. I was interested to hear their visiting tourists prefer these wild combinations. I placed an order for several dozen woven pots and coasters with four simple color combinations and shared the amount of social rebate funds available to them to support health, education and/or conservation needs in their community.
I was most happy to hear they wanted to resume attending our bird ornament workshops. Half of them have made some birds based on what they learned five years ago, but they were eager to improve the quality of these woven animals they could sell to their visitors and have secure sales to us.
I was very careful descending the slippery wooden staircase to our boat in the rain so I wouldn't fall and hurt my back again.
Andrea spent months working with this designer and four artisans to make dozens of colorful balsa wood birds and giant chambira butterflies. The birds included an egret, tiger heron, toucan, macaws and a kingfisher. When we stopped at the mall after visiting the aquarium, I loved seeing these creatures twirl around in a mild breeze.
I selected a few baskets laid out on benches and placed an order for elegant two-color models. Lindy reported good progress making lady bug ornaments and planned to attend our artisan facilitator training. We were happy the group looked forward to hosting a bird-making workshop in July with artisans from 3 Tahuayo communities.
When I started attending their annual meetings in different parts of the US, I knew I had found an important new tribe. Many of these enterprises were started by former Peace Corp volunteers, mission oriented people from churches and others like me who had had a life-changing experience meeting traditional artisans.
