every day of my life begins pretty much the same way with a cup of coffee beautiful delicious rich
tender sorry i just really like coffee and so when i found out that i'd be visiting a coffee farm
here in guatemala and learning a bit more about the process of how coffee's made i was excited
but you know what what i found on that day was something maybe even more important than coffee
let me explain
look at this place
oh yeah that is why my head hurts
anyway it's a new beginning it's day two so i'm gonna put some sunglasses on these sleepy
eyes and we're gonna go have an adventure and thankfully we're going to some place
that's very good for sleepy eyes we're going to coffee plantation it's going to be fun let's go
good
youtube
see as we left zone 10 and headed for the outskirts of the city i thought of
the driver's words about how other zones could be different and as i lifted my hung overhead
and watched the city float by i wondered to myself what adventures awaited us where we were going
so we just switched out of the shuttle van because uh we're gonna be going down a dirt road to this
coffee farm and we got these four by four vehicles and most people
are sitting inside but i decided uh why not partake in the famous guatemalan experience
of sitting or standing in the back of a truck whoa
something that is definitely not legal where i come from in canada but in guatemala you see
it all the time you'll sometimes see 10 or 12 workers two in the front 10 in the back
you get by however you can if you got somewhere to go you go
and right now i'm getting experience of uh
a face full of dust from this dusty road we're driving down
i didn't consider this when i chose this in the back
don't forget to hit subscribe if you appreciate me uh
swallowing a fistful of dust to make this video bienvenidos
well i missed breakfast but i got a meal of dust on that ride there that's very nice so
we are a coffee family and we are coffee farm too and i will be a coffee tour to you
sorry because my english is not very well but i will no problem
he's my sister his root and he is my mother emilio we i have uh 24 years he have hey 21. okay 12.
12. we got though very very very tall we began by taking a little tour of the property and it was
kind of like a coffee safari like we drove around in these vehicles we saw these different types of
coffee we learned a bit about the process of how it was actually going from the tree
to the roasters to the bags to wherever they ship them off to and we collect the coffee
when the coffee turn like this red like this color the coffee is a start to to being a red
and the all the coffee is red in december we collect in january to
march i just want to say thank you for all the endless hours of energy you've
given me over the years i never would have made it without you
i love you guys the coffee ninos as you put it brian again the coffee nino we love them
and after we had seen the different uh fields of like the endless coffee that
they were growing up there and just the size of this property like they had a fish pond
they had a second home that they were building for visitors to the property this place was huge after
all that we got to visit the family house and it was there in the reyes mendez family house that
i started to think okay this family like they're obviously rich you know this this must be like
an old money guatemalan family or something yeah not there's anything wrong with that
but i'm just saying like these guys they have this beautiful property this thriving business
uh their father by the way this guy is the mayor of this community that's why he's not in the video
he's he's literally the mayor of palencia this town in addition to running this household where
you know they have a thriving coffee business and all that um but yeah i was thinking to myself like
obviously this family has money they're doing something right but it was as we were entering
into the home we were about to have a lunch which shell's mom was cooking for us a homemade lunch
but before that he stopped by this old cabinet full of i don't know like dusty old tools
and he was saying to the group excuse me like there's one more thing i want to show you
and everyone was like just looking around this beautiful house like oh wow look at all this
stuff but cell was like no like please please everyone listen i have something to show you
and then he told the story of how these tools in this cabinet belong to his father
and there were the tools from his father's first carpenter job
where he worked as a carpenter for about a dollar a day
so they weren't a family they came from wealth they were family that came from humble beginnings
and worked their way up from there and his father keeps that cabinet in the living room
to remind himself and his family of where they came from my dad would walk with no shoes
my grandmother doesn't write and got in and doesn't read because he's very she's very poverty
but my dad work a lot wow you must be very proud to see what what has come well never forget right
yeah where'd you come wow and that to me was a very powerful moment it just shows you the power
of belief and the power of working together as a family you know every sunday salah was
saying they all sit together as a family and they go over their tasks for the week
what individual piece each of them is going to do what project they're going to work on
how they are going to move forward together it was after that that we sat down for lunch we
had a homemade meal cooked by salah's mother she made us a chicken soup with rice and vegetables
and these amazing fresh warm tortillas and of course we wash it all down with cups of coffee
but this isn't an ad for their coffee or anything like this isn't really about the coffee this is
about the family it's that sense of family that makes that coffee possible you know i jokingly
said at the beginning like you know family might be even more important than coffee well
in a sense it's the family that leads to the coffee it's the family that makes it all possible
and as we sat there at that table eating that homemade meal i felt like part of the family we
all did and i've had that experience over and over and over in guatemala almost everywhere
you go people want you to see the best in their country they want to welcome you to this land
they know that there's some negative perceptions about guatemala they know that sometimes the news
media doesn't treat latin america with the respect that it deserves treat it like a place that people
are trying to escape but one truth that always remains one truth i always come back to
whether i'm in mexico or guatemala or costa rica or any of these places is they have something that
is very beautiful in the way people treat each other like family and treat strangers like family
i have a friend in canada in canada both er here is in kodwa ottawa agua ottawa yeah it's a capital
canada ah yeah yeah yeah have you been to canada no no no no no i went you want to go yeah i went
what do you think about canada i i think it's a very good place and very good people too
yeah what's your garage that's how it is in guatemala you are constantly being reminded
that you are welcome here and the sad part is as our driver luis alluded to earlier
yes there is a danger like you you need to remember the family but you also need to
like be aware that uh crime statistics here are very high
there are some zones it's not recommended to go as a tourist as a foreigner but sometimes
that's all we think about sometimes we skip places like guatemala city because we only hear
about those we only hear about the crime and the violence and the people who got robbed and like we
we only focus on that but what's the other side of the coin what's the other side that we are missing
to me it's that sense of family and that beautiful connection you have with people who
see you visiting their city and want you to have a good experience want you to be part of the
family in whatever way they can sometimes it's a home-cooked meal sometimes it's just uh you know
a smile and a buenas tardes and uh like today like they just ask you like are you everything
good you know just just checking in making sure everything's okay sometimes it's the youtube
comments i get down below of all the people saying hey like if you need anything let me know
i'm you're in my city how can i help you uh here's a list of places you should visit
that's the guatemalan way and uh it's one of the reasons i'm really enjoying my time in this
country anyway that's all i got for today hope you've enjoyed this one let me know what family
means to you let me know if you have sensed what i've been talking about in this video
but yeah i got some really exciting stuff coming up we're going to lake atitlan one of the most
beautiful places i've been in my life that'll be coming up soon so uh definitely check out the
whole guatemala series if you want more insights and more images from this beautiful country
my coffee wet cold i talk too much but my heart is still warm thanks to family oh you see how i
connected the dots right at the end okay that was kind of corny wasn't it i should stop talking okay
everyone i'm dan from the new travel hope you enjoyed this one i'll see you next time peace
you