El Ocotal, Nicaragua, near Matagalpa
El Ocotal is a small village of 250 people in the mountains of Matagalpa, Nicaragua (map). For the two and a half years of my Peace Corps service El Ocotal was my home, a place of great beauty and great hardship. Life there is tied to the land; when it rains too much beans and corn are washed down the mountainside and when it doesn’t rain enough seeds shrivel and die in the increasingly dust like soil. Even when the harvest is good it’s hard to get ahead.

Ivy Blackmore, a Peace Corp volunteer
My experience began at the end August of 2007 when I walked out of the air-conditioned airport and into the sweltering heat, dust and noise of Managua. I was accompanied by 22 other fellow trainees and an oozing infection in the socket of a removed wisdom tooth. The next three days were a whirl wind of staff introductions, vaccinations, and naive discussions on diversity. We were then loaded into vans and driven north to the city of Esteli, where we met our host families, and began three months of training.

Ivy's Host and Extended Family
My host and extended family were unique. There were no men running the household and my host mother and three sisters had college educations. I soon realized that most rural women’s lives were very unlike this. With limited opportunity they feel forced to accept a life lived out within the confines of a mud hut, cooking over unvented wood fires that fill the small dark space with smoke, unable to save the money required to have access to medical care or schooling for themselves and their children. Later, while living in El Ocotal, I would go back to visit my host family to take a short break from the demands of living among such a disadvantage group of people.

Peace Corps Training - Site Assignment
After weeks of Spanish language class, technical training in agriculture extension, cross-cultural studies, and one evacuation to Managua due to a hurricane, our training culminated in site assignments and a small write up about the village where I was going to be spending the next two years of my life. Included was a list of the leaders and contacts, people I would come to know intimately, sharing their personal and public struggles for day to day survival.

Mario Aguilar - Ivy's Community Counterpart
When he walked into the conference room I knew he was mine, this man had to be my community counterpart. A battered white cowboy hat crowned his weathered face and his red shirt and black pants, clean and ironed, were much worn. Though a staunch Sandinista, hence the red and black, Mario Aguilar does his best to make sure development projects assigned to El Ocotal reach all needy community members regardless of political party, a huge problem in other villages.

After our brief meeting and discussion of the communities needs, I found myself swept onto a revamped school bus for the two and a half hour trip from Esteli to Matagalpa. Mario was concerned about our late start but we made it in time to catch the last bus up the mountain. Of course, there was just enough time for Mario to play the slot machine. With only five passengers, and some doubt as to whether it was actually going to leave, I tried to organize in my mind how we might be able to walk seven miles up the mountain with 50 pounds of Peace Corps books, but the engine suddenly rumbled to a start. We passed through Apante, a nature reserve, and then wound our way through huge stands of oaks covered in Spanish moss, pine groves, cacti, and little swampy lagoons. At one point the bus did not have enough steam to make it up one of the steeper inclines and started sliding backwards, the result of a wash out caused by 2 weeks of constant rain. We backed up, put on chains and we were good to go except for a truck coming from the opposite direction. It was a tight squeeze. After forty-five minutes we hopped out at the cemetery stop and paid our 24 cords ($1.10). Mario picked up my 50 pound sack of books as if it was a feather pillow and we continued climbing, on foot, through pine and oaks groves, at one point looking back to see the city of Matagalpa far below.

In spite of the heavy burden Mario maintained a face of quiet determination. I would see this face many times as I came to know these people and their daily struggle for survival. It is a face that has few options but to press forward on a path established by its predecessors, farming increasingly infertile soil at higher cost and diminishing yield. Never quite losing hope despite great odds, this face continues planting peppers though it might not rain and makes tortillas with the last corn believing that tomorrow a way will be found to feed the family. It was this face that motivated me to go beyond what was expected. I saw hope and desire and decided I needed to do everything I could to help improve lives.

Projects Ivy facilitated
Through out my two years and three months as a member of the El Ocotal community, I facilitated projects from soil conservation and community micro banks to making chicken coops and introducing an improved model of cooking stove. In addition, I taught weaving to kids, youth, women, and anyone else who stopped by my home with a curious mind. I maintained a strong working relationship with the men of the village but decided to focus my energies on strengthening and improving the position of the women and the family unit. The overarching goals of my work were to help families lessen their dependence on planting and harvesting and for the women to gain financial independence, achieving not just food security but livelihood security.

Two Projects in More Detail: Community Micro Bank
The two most successful projects of my service were the two that I had the most reservations about starting, primarily because they were projects that no other organization had ever tried to start in the village. The first was a community micro bank with 28 women who had voluntarily decided to be part of a chicken coop project. Money for this project was obtained through a small project assistance grant funded by the United States Agency for International Development (USAID). However, once the project was implemented the women had no internal structure that would encourage saving to help ensure the sustainability of the project.

During our three month training my fellow trainees and I received extensive instruction on the formation of community micro banks, designed to provide the structure and security so direly lacking in many villages. All money saved and interest gained remains in the community with the management of funds given to a directive selected by the group forming the bank. The physical aspect, a wooden box held by the elected treasurer, has three different locks. The keys to the locks are held by the three remaining members of the directive, the coordinator, the secretary, and the vocal. This limits access to the money in the bank to when all four members of the directive are together during monthly or bimonthly meetings, or when an emergency loan is needed. The entire group generally meets once or twice per month, each member depositing the amount of money they feel they can. All money saved is recorded on a paper that each member carries and one master paper kept inside the wooden box. The 11 month cycle of saving and loaning begins in January and ends the first week of December. The money is then divided among the members according to how much they saved and each receives a portion of the interest gained from loans. Money is spent in any way the member wishes, perhaps to buy a piglet to fatten and sell or to fix the leaking zinc roof of the house.

Based on various problems facing the community, especially the woman, I felt that a community bank could provide very positive solutions. Farmers in the village make close to $1.50 a day and the women have no personal income aside from what their husbands might give them. Yet when I proposed the idea there was initial reserve. Saving money every month? And together? A majority of the women had been organized in the past with a different NGO giving access to credit, but money borrowed had not been repaid; so there was mistrust among the group members.

After explaining, on three different occasions, how the bank should function and how it could benefit each woman and her family, they decided to give it a try. The twenty-eight women started saving five Cordoba’s a month, roughly the equivalent of twenty-five cents. I had been hoping for more but realized we would have to start with what they thought they could save, hopefully increasing the amount over time.

By December 10th, the date fixed to close the bank and distribute savings, there were eight hundred Cordoba’s, the equivalent of forty dollars. As they each received their one dollar and forty cents, from six months of savings, they expressed the sentiment that one dollar and forty cents was a small amount and they thought they could do better.

And they did. The following January they started again, with the same directive but different rules. As a group they set the minimum saved each meeting at fifty cents, double the amount of the previous year, and agreed to meet twice a month, not once. They also started to loan money to group members at ten percent interest and with a guarantee. Loaning money was something they had been completely against, but as they continued to meet and work together trust and a sense of comradeship began to increase. After eleven months, the women had collectively saved over five hundred dollars and had earned close to one hundred dollars in interest. One loan transported a member of the bank to the regional hospital for treatment of a severe case of kidney stones. Another member borrowed money to help cover the cost of a hernia operation for her son. Another loan bought bean seed for the approaching planting season helping the family increase their income. Clear rules and expectations rendered possible what had seemed impossible. At first fears that fellow associates would not comply with regulations held them all back. With my guidance and mediation they slowly came to trust one another and to realize that their commonalities were greater than their differences. The women’s experience in community banking also helped show them the extent of their capability, an eight fold increase in savings and the ability to meet both emergency and income development needs.

Second Projects in More Detail: Rug Weaving Enterprise
he second successful and on going project is a rug weaving enterprise that began with 14 women from the community bank whom I taught to weave rugs using old clothes. I had just completed a little over a year of my service and the community bank was functioning relatively well. The women were saving but there was not quite the amount of income generation I had hoped would come from the chicken coop project. I had been teaching a group of youth belt and bracelet making but the initial interest had waned and there was still a huge pile of yarn. There was also a crudely made 2ft wide 2 harness wooden loom in my living room that was not getting much use. It had been donated by a local NGO called UNAG but it was clunky and impractical for anything wider then belts.

Carol Blackmore, Ivy's Mom brings Weaving Expertise
My mom, a rug weaver in Chapel Hill, NC, came down to visit in late January, to make sure I was still alive and to see what my life was like. In her short visit she was struck by the contrast between the disparity of the situation and the ingenuity of the people, especially the children. She left with many thoughts and soon sent an email proposing to deliver a sturdy loom to the village and to teach the women how to weave rugs. I asked the women from the community bank if any of them would be interested in gaining a new skill that could possibly lead to a business. 14 hands were cautiously raised and, on my next trip to town, I responded to Moms email with a yes.

In June of last year, my mother made another trip to Nicaragua and with financial help from the Triangle Weavers Guild of North Carolina, brought a 2 harness Union Loom to El Ocotal. Due to some shipping complications, one third of the loom did not arrive until a couple days before she was scheduled to fly back to the US. With one day to spare, the loom was assembled in my living room. The speed of assembly was due, in large part, to a group of small boys who would routinely come to my house in the afternoons to play and draw. With very basic instructions and guidance they put the loom together, even though they had never seen anything like it. With the loom assembled and warped, Mom made a few samples before it was time to go. I was left with the task of organization and instruction.

Weaving Classes and the Beginning of FABMRON
In July 2009 I began giving classes almost every afternoon, 2 women per week, for a complete cycle of seven weeks. In the first cycle they learned the basics of cutting the old clothes to make the cloth strips used to weave. Each woman wove one small rug for personal use. In the second cycle I focused on teaching the details of warping, winding the correct amount of warp, and fixing broken strings. Again, each woman made a small rug for personal use. Now with over 9 months of experience the women are producing 20”x 30”rugs and 12” x 12” market bags and have their own group name, FABMRON or the Futuras Artesanles Blackmore de Mujeres Rurales Organizado en Nicaragua ( Future Blackmore Artisans of Rural Women Organized in Nicaragua). FABMRON rugs and bags can now be found at artisan shops in the cities of Granada and San Ramon, Nicaragua and we are looking for ways to continue expansion. One rug, at $20, nearly quadruples the daily family income and lessens dependence on traditional and now limited agricultural production of the region. Proceeds from rugs sales are used to provide for currently unaffordable healthcare, school fees, glasses, and basic tools.

Open Houses to Present and Promote the Project
Now back in the US I have held two open houses in my community in North Carolina to present and promote the project as well as sell the rugs and bags. To date, almost $900 in sales has been generated by these events. The open houses have also connected people in the US with specific Nicaraguan women and their families. I provide a short biography and photo of each weaver to the buyer and often send photos of the smiling buyer holding his or her new rug to the weavers who have remarked on how this exchange has helped them feel like citizens of the world.

Benefits beyond New Source of Income
Rug weaving has also given the women a new means of social interaction and feelings of solidarity. When I first arrived in El Ocotal the women hardly ever interacted socially even though some of them lived only 20 yards apart. They spent the majority of their day preparing meals of corn tortillas and beans, washing clothes, and cleaning up around the house. Weaving has allowed the women to come together in a constructive and empowering way. One of the weavers, Argentina Castro, commented that she feels “happy with what we have learned because we are working to obtain our own business and our own money to buy what we need for our homes.” Another weaver, Trinidad Castro expressed “Our goals are to learn more with more practice in the loom, to maintain our organizational conviction and unity in the group.” Aura Orozco wrote similar feelings in a letter to my mother, about the sense of unity weaving has helped to create stating “when she (Ivy) told me that I had to prepare clothes that I now was not using because you wanted to teach a beautiful work, I said in my mind, how is this work? Now I am seeing the great results we have received… for to be a woman and a wife, you have known how to understand and consider like a woman as well, which we all are.” During warping sessions the women joke and laugh, something I rarely saw up to that point. The women also enjoy the time to talk to one another about problems and issues they are facing and they confidently leave their homes several hours a day knowing that they are working to improve their families’ lives.

Peace Corps Service comes to an End - Project lives on with Quiet Detrmination!
On March 4th, 2010, my Peace Corps service came to a close but the community micro banks and weaving enterprise continue. Bank members now have established rules and new self confidence which enables them to solve internal conflicts. The weaving group was recently given a second Union Loom by the Art League School of Alexandria, VA which will allow them to increase production to meet increasing demand. The group is also saving a portion of every sale in a special fund earmarked for construction of a small workshop structure of their own. Though it was a difficult good bye I left knowing that the majority of the families now had the knowledge and skills to pursue a different path, one that stretches the imagination and allows for a future unlike the lives of their parents. The face of quiet determination still exists but there is a light in its eye. It has a new energy, enthusiasm, and gender and no longer just looks at how to avoid the next rock in the path but how to smooth out the entire journey.

Moving the loom	New home for the loom
Warping the loom	Weaving a rug
A happy helper	A new weaver
A proud group	The story continues.... FABMRON has its own web site...http://www.fabmron.org/