Gracias and La Campa, Honduras

I’m sitting on the terrace of Hotel Guancascos looking down at the town of Gracias, Lempira.  I’m sipping an icy cold licuado sandia (watermelon blended with ice in a tall glass).  The setting sun is turning the hills a dusky pink and sends intermittent flashes of gold off the white stucco of the church (as though someone was sending a secret message in morse code).   Its hot, dry and dusty.  I’m filthy, sweaty, tired and (after two watermelon juices still) trying to scrape the fine white road dust off my teeth.  I am reflecting on my good fortune and I feel very happy.  Very tired and very happy.  

For example, I consider myself very fortunate to have Allan as my travel companion and that we hatched up this road trip plan at the last minute (avoiding what I’m now sure would have been 12 very uncomfortable hours on buses).  I am one lucky girl that Ford produced a truck such as the Ranger Diesel Turbo, that kicks arse on the most crappy roads imaginable (and that the good folks at Econo Car Rental in Tegus tactfully steered me away from trying so save $20 a day with an Economy Class Kia Piconto – very lucky).  But what’s really making me deeply happy right now is the absolutely gorgeous Lenca pottery that I saw in La Campa late this afternoon.  And the thought that tomorrow morning I can go back and choose a whole lot of the lovely stuff for LALA.

Who are the Lenca (you may be asking yourself)?  They are an indigenous people  of Central America, thought to have inhabited southwestern Honduras and eastern El Salvador for at least 3,000 years. Across the regions of Lenca occupation, Lenca pottery has always been very distinguishable. Handcrafted by Lenca women, it is considered an ethnic marking of their culture.  Traditional Lenca pottery crafted by skilled artisans can still be found in the town of Gracias (where I am staying) and most notably in the small village of La Campa (about 18 kms from Gracia on an extremely rough dirt road). 

This beautiful and remote location, which all things considered is difficult and expensive to get to, has rewarded our efforts with an abundance of beautiful red clay pottery.  To my dusty tired eyes it was a bit overwhelming and too much to take in at the late hour we arrived.  The impression I have now back at the hotel is the simple perfection of form coupled with strength and practicality could be why the design of this pottery and the method of producing it remained unchanged for thousands of years.  Tomorrow morning I will return, refreshed, to watch the Lenca craftswomen at work before selecting my pieces.  I plan to buy as much as I can carry so I don’t have to make this trip again for a good long while (despite the stunning scenery).  I will do my best to document everything.

For now though, I can barely keep my eyes open and as soon as I have my last sip of (delightfully bitter) hot chocolate I am off to bed, dreams of red pottery running through my head.  Good night to you all xx

P.S. A Few Notes on Travel to Gracias

Gracias is in a pretty remote part of Honduras.  I knew that from the get go.  However it feels a whole lot more remote now after actually managing to get here.   Not counting the (thoroughly enjoyable) hour spent over a late breakfast in the lovely Spanish-colonial town of Comayagua, the 300km journey between Tegucigalpa took us 7 hours driving.  The road quality deteriorated rapidly about 40kms outside of Tegus and at one time, just as we left the town of La Esperanza, it disappeared completely leaving us driving in bewildered circles through treacherous rocky terrain trying to pick up the unpaved trail again.   We have traversed mountain ranges and forded rivers.   Gracias a dios for the Ford Ranger with its 4-wheel drive, off-road suspension and turbo diesel engine. 

It is possible to travel from Tegucigalpa to Gracias by bus….. apparently.  There were many stretches of road where we marveled to be getting through and I imagine a bus would have greater difficulty.  The deterioration of the road, in addition to the increasing number of hitchhikers, as we approached Gracias made me think the bus route may not particularly well serviced at the moment.  But I have spoken to people who have done it in the past and they say it is slow but possible.   You can take "Bus Carolina" from Tegucigalpa to La Esperanza. There you switch buses for direct service to Gracias.  Between Gracias and La Campa there should be chicken buses running approx 5 times per day.  There is no fixed schedule.  Total travel time from La Campa to Tegus is approx 10 hours.  For my purposed, there is an alternate route from San Pedro Sula through Santa Rosa de Copan and seems much better serviced.  I plan to come from this direction next time.

Once in Gracias I can highly recommend Hotel Guancascos.  The rooms are lovely (very clean!) as is the restaurant on the terrace high up overlooking the town.  The cost of a single room for single occupation is approx. $20 per night.   The free wifi is very fast and quite reliable.  

we LOVE the Ford Ranger.  

Touches of yellow in Parque Cental, Comayagua

Touches of yellow in Parque Cental, Comayagua

Touches of yellow in Parque Cental, Comayagua

Touches of yellow in Parque Cental, Comayagua

Leaving La Esperanza. No signs - we were a bit lost at this point.

High moutain plains surrounding Gracias

Road to La Campa

Church in La Campa

Fording a small river going in to La Campa

View from the terrace at Hotel Guancascos Gracias

Tegucigalpa and Valle de Ángeles (Honduras)

I’m predicting my blog postings will be a slightly slapdash affair while I’m on the road – so many  vivid experiences in a single day it’s a struggle to find the story and put it together in a concise and cohesive way.    I’m exhausted but want to get this posted before going to bed as it was a great day and tomorrow promises to be even better.

Here I am in the Honduran capital of Tegucigalpa (or Tegus). My good friend Allan met me the airport.  We hadn’t seen each other since he returned to live in Tegus last April so we had a lot to catch up on over coffee.  Long story short, the opportunity for a road trip quickly materialized.  Is there anything better than a spontaneous road trip with a good mate? 

Allan will join me on the first leg of the trip to Departamento Lempira in western Honduras, which not only makes the trip more fun but saves me a long and difficult bus journey.  With that agreed, we rented a car and quickly completed my Teguc to-do list (thanks to Allan's local knowledge and vast network of friends) way ahead of schedule.   With a free afternoon and a rental car at our disposal I suggested a spontaneous trip out to Valley de Ángeles, an artist community in the low mountains outside of Tegus and a place I had long wanted to visit.    In this beautiful Spanish-colonial town set up high in the cool air of the cloud forest I feel like we came across a hidden treasure.  Amazing hand carved mahogany and cedar wood chests with detailed jungle, village and underwater scenes.  We were able to track down the artist, Edmundo Deras, in his workshop and he has promised to have my order ready for the LALA opening.  I’m thrilled with my new discovery.

We will set out early tomorrow morning to the town of Gracias and then find our way to the small village of La Campa – home of the Lenca people.  So for now, Good Night!  

CM Airlines flies between Roatan and Tegucigalpa twice a day.  It's a 50 minute flight.

The roads into Gracias and La Campa are pretty rough so we've rented a 4x4

I couldn't resist a photo of this sign which seems to be asking people not to leave litter, especially not their old pig heads.

An example of Edmundo Deras' beautiful hand-carvings

Now for the fun stuff

Early tomorrow morning I fly to the Honduran capital, Tegucigalpa, from where I will depart on the first LALA buying trip.   I feel very excited and (more than) a little bit nervous.  I am thinking with anticipation about the fabulous places I love so much to visit and the beautiful things I will see there.  I am worried about what could possibly go wrong, particularly my first attempts at managing Central American shipping logistics and customs.  It helps that I know well the route – I am returning to familiar places and in some will even have friends to meet me.  I feel well prepared by the product knowledge I have collected on my earlier “research” trips but suddenly feel sure I should be carrying a more detailed, less intuitive plan for what I will buy and how much.  I will try not to let these anxious thoughts dominate my experience.  I will trust my gut and learn as I go – taking a lesson from each of my (no doubt plentiful) mistakes.

Except for the flight from Roatan to Tegucigalpa (or Teguz as “we” locals call it ;-) I will be travelling by bus.  My itinerary will take me from the Caribbean Sea to mountain plateaus above 7,000 feet, crossing both jungle and desert in between.  I estimate it will take 10-14 days but I'm not ruling out unscheduled deteurs if something interesting comes up!   It’s going to be an amazing trip.  I promise to post pictures and stories along the way.  Next stop Teguz.  Bye!

Am I talking to much?

Back in the late 90´s, when I was still a consultant with PWC, I worked on a project for BellSouth down in Atlanta, Georgia.  It was the beginning of the e-commerce boom.  The success of online retailers such as Amazon.com had other major corporations scrambling to adopt internet-based business solutions.   We were implementing for BellSouth an eProcurement platform.  BellSouth Online Buying (or B.O.B as it came affectionately to be known) was an internet platform that would empower BellSouth employees to buy goods and services online using point-and-click electronic catalogs containing BellSouth negotiated pricing.  This was cutting edge stuff (at the time) and the business benefit forecast was dramatic.  We talked about BOB in tones of breathless anticipation – as if he was a childhood friend who had become incredibly famous and wealthy and we were thrilled just by the association.   The software provider, CommerceOne, was on fire with stock prices going through the roof and the two C1 consultants in our midst both became on-paper millionaires in the first month of the project.  Those were heady days.  We thought we were witnessing the second coming of Microsoft and were so busy checking (live!) stock quotes on our Palm Pilots that there were days when very little project work got done at all.

If the hype and buzz at BellSouth HQ was big, it was nothing compared to what was going on in the industry.   It seemed like every other week we were in Las Vegas to attend a software launch or industry convention.  These events were ridiculously lavish and packed with software engineers riding the wave of their quasi-celebrity.    Interspersed with performances by “Blue Man Group” and “Cirque du Soleil”, key note speakers elucidated on the e-commerce revolution.   Dressed in pleated khaki Dockers and golf shirts with corporate logo these tech-geeks-turned-billionaire entrepreneurs approached the speaker’s podium by jogging down the centre isle of the auditorium.  Accompanied by loud music (invariably “Eye of the Tiger” or “I Believe I Can Fly”)  and pivoting laser beams, they would high-five audience members before suddenly appearing 50 times larger than life on giant flat screens behind the stage to begin the benediction. 

PWC rode the wave for all it was worth.  Worked up a brilliant communications package and took it on the road.  Sell, sell, sell!   Look at what we did for BellSouth!! Only meanwhile back at BellSouth….. a change in strategic direction (more focus on competitive strength through core business – imagine that!) resulted in BOB being eighty-sixed before it was even fully deployed.  Very shortly after that, in the (northern hemisphere) spring of 2000, the so-called dot-com bubble burst and it was all over.  eCommerce stock prices plummeted, projects were put “on hold” and headhunters stopped calling.  No one wanted to know about eBusiness portals and the people who built them.  It was a depressing and uniquely humiliating come-down because despite the excessive spending and all that hype, there was very little in the way of actual results (positive or otherwise).  Despite the validity of the concept (which would be proven true about 10 years later) very few of the early implementations got off the ground (the why’s and wherefores of that make an interesting story for another time).  It was a case of massively premature self-promotion.

This morning, sometime around 4am (why is it always 4am?), I woke with the memory of BellSouth and BOB running around in my head and wondered why.  Then I made the connection my sub-conscious had already prepared for me.  Could it be that I am making the same mistake with LALA? Did I learn nothing from my experiences with CommerceOne and the mini-disc?!   Why am I blogging and creating logos and creating Facebook pages before LALA even exists?!  I haven’t even done anything yet – what if it FAILS!!!  And then I ate some chocolate and went back to sleep. 

Yes I am prematurely self-promoting and that’s OK with me.  Because, for me, the process of setting up LALA is as important, if not more so, than the end result.  And whether or not LALA is a success of a failure from a business perspective I want to remember every step of this process and I want to share it with you (whether you like it or not!). And that I guess is our communications strategy.    So please, check out our Facebook page at “Latin American Lifestyle and Art – LALA” and bloody-well “like” it J

Creating the LALA Corporation

For the last two and a half years I’ve been living and working in Honduras on a (mostly valid) tourist visa.   Technically speaking you could say this is a mis-use of said visa which is intended for travellers (i.e. tourists) to come into the country for a period of up to 90 days, marvel the sights, spend lot of money and then depart (kindly paying the $US35 exit tax on the way out).   

I am really not the type of person to flagrantly flout immigration law.  I lived for 6 years in the US and 8 years in Switzerland and at no time were my papers in disarray.  Illegal immigration was a hot topic in both these countries with frequent government campaigns to oust the pesky (mostly) Central American, Eastern European or African laborer stealing jobs, inciting crime and generally thumbing their noses at the cultural conventions held dear by the country’s rightful citizens.  When I considered them at all (usually when in the market for a new house keeper) I guess I saw illegal immigrant workers as pretty desperate individuals for whom living a kind of shadowy sub-existence in a foreign country was infinitely preferable to whatever horrors or misery they had left behind in their own.  I never imagined I would become one myself.

But yep, here I am, an illegal alien in Honduras.  Working, without papers, for cash paid under the table.  No health benefits, pension plan or employment rights.   And I’m not alone.  There are quite a few of us here.  Desperate escapees from the first world who couldn’t take any more the torture of consistent employment, 401K’s, car insurance and 24/7 shopping malls.  We came seeking a better life in which there is no requirement to wear shoes, EVER.   We work as dive instructors, waiters, bartenders and resort activity directors.  We cluster together in bars sharing black-market know-how such as how to renew the 90-day tourist visa without actually leaving the country.  In a bizarre reversal of the classic border crossing scene (desperate Mexican entering the US on foot under a barrage of spotlights and bullets) we run the gauntlet trying to leave Honduras sometimes with a tourist visa that’s more than 2 years out of date. 

Fortunately (for us) the Honduran Government treats the situation somewhat more benignly than the US and nearly every infringement of immigration law can be remedied by a payment of some kind (some legit, some not so much).  Both the Honduran officials and Honduran citizens are (for the most part) accepting of the illegal worker situation and recognize the benefits it brings to the local economy.  We (the illegal immigrants) work in tourist facing roles and understand the service expectations of the North American and European traveller and have the skills (language and otherwise) to satisfy them.  Hopefully this results in a positive service experience for the visitor who comes back the following year, bringing their friends.  Nearly always we are working side-by-side with Hondurans so there is an informal transfer of knowledge and skills which contribute to a local population being overall better equipped to serve the ever-growing tourism sector.  Meanwhile we (the illegals) get to stay living and working in paradise.  It’s beneficial to both sides and to my knowledge frictions rarely occur.   

However idyllic I have found this arrangement, it’s all about to change.  Starting LALA means I have to go legit and form a Honduran corporation.  It is (perhaps unsurprisingly) pretty easy to go from tourist to Honduran business owner as long as you have the right people to guide you and about $US 5,000.  I have hired an attorney (a very nice man who makes me feel in good hands despite or because of somehow reminding me of Joe Pesci) who has the incorporation process well underway and an accountant/business manager who will obtain the necessary business permits and tax registrations on my behalf.  The whole process should take about 4-6 week to complete.  The company will be a limited liability corporation in which I hold 98% of the shares and a Honduran citizen (someone from the firm of my attorney) holds 2%.   I pony up 25,000 lempiras (about $US1,250) in operating capital, pay for the business permits and…. that’s about it really.  I start to be a tax payer again.   No doubt there will be some to and fro with the Municipal but it all seems pretty straight forward.

With that task in hand I can move my attention to other items on the project plan.  Tomorrow I will work on the interior design of the gallery in preparation for meeting with my builder, Orville Miller, on Friday.  Also I need to prepare for leaving on my big buying trip this weekend.  Then the fun starts – shopping!  Stay tuned……

Oh PS.  Check out my logo.  What do you think?

Choosing the LALA Location

Location Location Location

Latin American Lifestyle and Art (LALA) needs a location and as they say in the real estate world  - location is everything! 

Finding the perfect location for a new business could (and maybe should) be a lengthy process starting with the careful definition of requirements and then viewing property after property exhaustively until (with a sigh of relief) finally finding that perfect space in the perfect neighborhood or (with a sigh of resignation) settling for satisfaction of just your high value needs.  I am happy to report LALA has a home already however the search process was absolutely nothing like that.  The location feels very right and came to me so easily for the first time in my life I’m going to put it down to serendipity and just go with it (intuition don’t fail me now).   

The LALA location will be (drum roll please):

 “Mission Gate”, West Bay, Roatan, Bay Islands, Honduras.

A small but beautiful space in the lobby of a luxury condo development, LALA will be full of light and is in an awesome location.  Garry, my good mate and Roatan restaurateur, is opening a new restaurant in the same complex and he suggested I take a look at it.  So I looked and I thought it perfect.  I met with the owner who agreed to my proposal.  I signed the lease just days ago and as of March 1^st, it’s all mine. Too easy!  I went yesterday to check out the new space with Orville Miller (friend and builder-extrodinaire) to start planning for the interior build.   I am very excited and more than a little bit nervous.  It makes it all seem very real.   

That’s the short story.  If you are wondering why I would open a business in Honduras in the first place, then please read on.  If you want to see some pictures of the new location just scroll to the bottom of the page.  Cheers!

Why Roatan?

I’ve lived on Roatan for two and a half years (on and off) so the idea of setting up a business here is not as arbitrary as it may seem.   I know the island pretty well by now: the ebbs and flows of the tourist season, the full-on tourist tsunami of cruise-ship days, the mysterious workings of the Municipal administration.  I have friends here, several of whom are seasoned business owners and are unfailing in their support and willingness to help.   And in terms of geography it makes a lot of sense.  LALA has always been about art from the region of Latin America and proximity to the artists and product sources should allow me to be involved in both the buying and selling side of the business.

Why West Bay?

There is, I believe (hope!) a great opportunity for the LALA concept in West Bay.  West Bay beach is arguably the most beautiful on the island (picture a postcard-perfect sweep of white sand fringed by coconut palms which curve gracefully toward the brilliant aquamarine water) and contains the highest density of luxury resorts on the island.    In addition to the resort guests there are plenty of day-visitors (from the cruise ships and other villages) and a very nice community of permanent residents.  The West Bay guest is well-serviced and has little need to leave the village.  Resort hotels and private condos claim every inch of beach frontage, most with their own restaurants, bars and dive shops.  Vendors walk the beach hawking every vacation activity and trinket imaginable including glass-bottom boat tours, parasailing, banana-boat rides, jet skiing, paddle boarding, snorkeling, SNUBA, massage, hair braiding, zip-lining, coconuts, jewelry, ice-cream, jade carvings, conch shells and other local crafts.   A small mall about 5 minutes’ walk from the beach offers a coffee shop/wine bar, gift shops, DVD rental, and deli.  It’s really got everything a vacationer could want.  Except….. an art gallery.  LALA will bring to West Bay a high-end selection of Central American art and artesian products with the intent also of providing information on Central American culture.  I hope it will be the thing they've all been missing ;-)

Mission Gate condo development

Exterior shot of my new space for LALA

Beautiful West Bay Beach

Guess what?! I'm opening an art gallery in Honduras!

I recently realized I count among my friends an inordinate number of people doing extraordinary things.  All around me they are turning their backs on the corporate jobs that largely defined their 20’s and early 30’s for more creative and independent pursuits.  They’re creating personal transformations, taking risks (sometimes huge), quietly building new skills, and finally pulling back the curtains to reveal great big, shiny new and hugely enviable accomplishments.

Within my closest circle of friends I count a banker turned gastronomist; a network administrator turned restaurateur; a novice restorer of Victorian homes; a comms expert who opened a fabulous shop of fabulous things; a PR specialist who opened, in quick succession, his own firm and hotter-than-hot Zuerich nightclub; a nuclear power technician turned boat owner/captain; at least three women who have opened their own consulting practices (independently of each other); and a fabulous couple in Auckland who have opened their own purpose-built day care centre.  A few degrees of separation more and you can throw in a fashion designer, writer of published fiction, composer and all who fairly recently dissed the corporate paycheck and the grind that brings it in.

It seems I have, unwittingly over the years, been collecting for friends a matching set of super-creative, brave, determined visionaries. And I feel their steroidal accomplishments and self-confident, grown-up behaviors are making me look bad – particularly the low-key, no-fuss way in which they are being delivered.   In comparison I ditched my respectable corporate career with quite a bit of fanfare only to spend the last 3 years paddling around (let’s be honest, a little bit aimlessly) in the Caribbean.   Have my half-arsed attempts to postcard a sense of industry and purpose been convincing? I don’t know, but there’s a reason I haven’t updated my LinkedIn profile to include “Scuba Instructor” or “Bartender”.

A recent overland trip from Mexico to Honduras (where I have lived for the last 2 years) provided plenty of time for thinking and despite my internal disquiet (“what am I going to do for the rest of my life?”) was enjoyable and satisfying in every way.  I was doing two things I love best - traveling unfamiliar terrain and experiencing its culture through the craft markets and artist workshops.  I was, as always, assessing everything I saw as potential fit for my imaginary gallery and justifying every purchase as a “sample” in case I might actually get the nerve to open a real one.    I’ve been carrying this dream around in my head for years and have hundreds of mental business plans.  I even developed a brand and logo several years back.  I’ve been talking about it for so long I don’t think anyone, including myself, was taking it very seriously anymore.  The “samples” get given as gifts or put in storage and my friends make jokes about how my business model is not really working as long as I am only buying art, not selling it.  

At some point during the 10 hour bus ride from Antigua to San Pedro Sula I arrived at the (ridiculously simple) realization that if I don’t actually try this I’m going to be shopping for samples and creating mental business plans for the rest of my life.   Wishfully imagining (but never experiencing) the satisfaction of sharing my discoveries with other people in an art gallery of my own creation. 

And so, I am opening an art gallery in Honduras.  On the Caribbean island of Roatan to be precise.  I’m not saying that Dad can stop losing sleep over the state of my finances but I’m going to give it my best shot and I don’t think I will have any regrets.  I hope it will be challenging and fun and that I get to go to work with passion for what I am doing.  Maybe I’ll even update my LinkedIn profile – “Layle Stanton, Gallery Owner (2013 – 20??).

Thanks to all my extraordinary friends for being such an inspiration.

Latin American Lifestyle and Art (LALA) is about to become a reality.  Wish me luck – here I go!