We will go into the new project in a little more depth in another post, but for now we would like to talk about what we saw and learned when we visited some of our past projects. 

 

 

In 2006, Matthew Sullivan and myself took 10 students down to Nicaragua to help Agros plan the first of their villages in Matagalpa, named El Eden. This was our first abroad studio as instructors and our first partnership with Agros. As with many projects in developing nations, our information going in was a little bit sketchy, and we didn’t know exactly what to expect. 

 

 

It turned out that we had a great bunch of students and the project went smoothly…. Well, smoothly for a development project. We also had the good fortune to be working on a project right down the road from a beautiful ecolodge where we could stay. Since that trip, we have looked back on those accommodations fondly, as we tried to figure out how to keep the rats, rather than merely insects, out of our beds (tip... you can't).

 

When we arrived in El Eden the villagers had just arrived themselves and were living in ‘temporary housing’. In the States that might mean a hotel or something, in Nicaragua that meant four poles and three tarps or sheets of visqueen. Nothing like a little desperation to incentivize your work. We spent a month working with the new villagers to help them plan the transformation of a low-functioning coffee farm into their new village. We played games, drew and hiked for what felt like days. At the end of the trip, we had produced a masterplan to help the village grow over the next twenty years.