Coffeelands

I have taught my computer and phone (and Blogger) to allow this word, because I use it frequently. As a geographer, my passion for all things coffee began with the land on which it is grown. When I use the word, my mind always goes to the people of the coffeelands I have had the privilege of visiting -- in Guatemala, Brazil, Puerto Rico, and especially Nicaragua. The coffeelands of  Jinotega and Matagalpa have become another home for me, and are the source of most of the coffee I brew at home.

Coffeelands is the name of a very important stop on our Coffee Week journey -- a cafe in Clinton, Massachusetts that embodies the things I value most about sustainable and ethical coffee. The shop was established five years ago as a project of the Polus Center, a social and economic development agency that does important work with communities facing severe challenges throughout the world. I learned of the organization -- whose CEO Michael Lundquist is a Bridgewater State graduate -- in 2008. Since that time, our Nicaragua travel courses have included visits to several Polus Center projects in which victims of land mines have participated in their own rehabilitation as individuals and as a community.

Polus opened the shop with the name Coffeelands World Gifts Espresso Cafe -- a name that captures all of its purposes, completely if somewhat awkwardly. The idea is that this cafe connects its customers to an entire world of coffee producers and other communities served by the Polus Center. It also sells artisanal  gifts produced in those communities worldwide. On Monday of Coffee Week, Polus Center COO Theresa Kane talked with our class about the work Polus Center does throughout the world, particularly its in coffee-producing areas. The organization is quite committed to drawing on local knowledge and values, so that dozens of projects operate throughout the world, with only five people employed directly by the organization.

Coffeelands continues to embody the most important message of the Polus Center:
People are More Alike than Different

This great map table puts the LANDS in
COFFEELANDS!

She described how the Coffeelands World Gifts Espresso Cafe was established to compliment and extend the world-wide work, operating as it does near the central-Massachusetts headquarters of the organization. This deep background on #coffeeweek Monday was excellent preparation for our visit on Tuesday, where we met Rhonda Messer, who had officially become the owner of the renamed Coffeelands only a few days before.

We had a nice discussion with Rhonda -- the new owner of the cafe who had been hoping to open a fair-trade cafe when she found that this one was going to be available. This transition is a win for Polus -- which needs to focus on other projects now that this is established -- for Rhonda, for the community, and of course for the farmers who can continue to supply excellent coffee and other products through Deans Beans and Equal Exchange (see student posts about our visits to these fair-trade leaders).

One highlight of the cafe for me is the mural by Massachusetts artist Greg Stone. It features people with whom the Polus Center has worked in many coffeelands around the world, including one barista I met at the original Ben Linder Cafe in Leon, Nicaragua. The mural provided us with a great way to review the geography of coffee, as it illustrates all of the major steps involved in moving coffee from the field to the cup -- along with the skilled workers who make that movement happen.

Seeing the mural is bittersweet, of course, because it is a reminder of what could have been accomplished at Bridgewater State University. When the university administration rejected a student-led proposal for a second Ben Linder Cafe on our campus, it offered to commission a similar mural in the Conant Science & Mathematics Center. Greg Stone and Polus Center officials visited the campus, and proposed a triptych mural, but unrelated artwork was installed in its place.

Hundreds of students, alumni and community members continue to hope for a cafe on our campus, and Coffeelands continues to inspire us. But for the visual impact of Greg Stone's work, it will be necessary -- and worthwhile -- to travel to Main Street in Clinton.