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Felicitas comes trekking up the hill, her manta woven of the brightest yarn, and her montera covered in sequins and flowers glistening in the sun. Confident, and with a broad smile she approaches me, reaches out her hand to take mine before I’m even aware she knows who I am....
Posed to EmpowerBy Elizabeth Salley, Marketing and Communications Intern “Okay, it´s time for affirmations! Find a partner!” Ginette Collin announces. The room becomes a flurry of movement as the artisans pair up and giggle. At first, some of the women are quiet, but within the next few minutes, the meeting...
Strange FruitFor one month, Awamaki was lucky enough to host 15 students from Lakeside High School in Seattle, Washington to come down and volunteer with us over the course of three weeks. A team of them were able to create some blog articles for us about various aspects of their...
A Fresh LookFor a week, Awamaki was host to six students from the World Leadership School in San Diego, California as they came down to volunteer with us. They were tasked with interviewing local women about their role as leaders in the community, and to write corresponding blog posts about...
New and ImprovedBy Gabriela Moncada, Marketing and Communications Intern When Awamaki began, our focus was on economic empowerment. Income in the hands of women, we believed, was the best way to enable them to lift their communities to prosperity. We still believe that, however; in the past few years, our...
4 Things I Learned in the Sacred ValleyBy Isabel Strebe, Marketing and Communications intern I write this sitting in a coffee shop back home in Minnesota, where the air temp is below zero and the roads are being dusted in snow. While I’ve only been home from Ollantaytambo for a...
“You’ll have to get out and walk from here the rest of the way,” our driver announced to the passengers on our small tour bus. Carrying all of our belongings for the weekend ahead, we began the near vertical hike up to the community of Huilloc Alto, tucked in a...
By Shannon Walsh, Sales intern When I first arrived in Ollantaytambo I thought, “What did I get myself into?” That feeling lasted for about two weeks as I adjusted to life in Ollanta. Instead of heading back to Boston for another semester at Northeastern University, I decided to head...
By Shannon Walsh, Sales Intern My trip to Machu Picchu started bright and early at five o’clock in the morning. As I walked down to the train station in Ollantaytambo with my sister and a friend who were visiting, the excitement really started to hit me. As we got on...
By Carolina Fowler, Marketing and Communications intern My summer as a Marketing and Communications intern for Awamaki bookmarks a shift, a paradigm of sorts, in my life. There is something that is so beautiful about being an outsider that is welcomed within a new place by others that you...
By Isabel Strebe, Marketing and Communications Intern On the final days of October, all of Ollantaytambo comes together for a weekend of music, dancing, and celebrating cultural pride in the town plaza. This year marked the 123rd anniversary of Ollanta’s official founding. As a unique town, both geographically and culturally,...
By Catherine Amy Jones, Marketing and Communication intern When I first told my family and friends that I was moving to Peru for ten weeks to live in the last living Inca city and near Machu Picchu, their reactions made me excited but quietly nervous. I knew Awamaki’s work empowering...
By Isabel Strebe, Marketing and Communications intern It’s been almost two months since I packed a bag and left my home in Minneapolis, Minnesota to spend four months in Ollantaytambo as an Awamaki volunteer. Needless to say, jumping into rural, small town Peru has been a huge adjustment in almost...
This month, an important piece of our vision for the future actually happened. How often can you say that!? For three years we have been telling you about our goal of graduating our cooperatives as independent businesses, and we developed the Awamaki Impact Model as a way to encourage the...
Alpacas are renowned for their soft fleece, but few people know the intimate details of alpaca fleece harvesting like Adam Riley, a professional alpaca shearer with eight years of experience in both the United States and Europe. He has spent half his life with alpacas, and volunteered with Awamaki this...
