The newest, biggest Yale Bulldog fan ever.

Bienvenido. Today the blog post is about my recent experiences with Jesús.

This week I attended a presentation about his work. This slide shows all of his employees. So you can see that by buying his work that he and his people make, you are supporting a lot of people, putting food on their table and helping their kids get an education. In Mexico, sometimes kids don't go to school because their parents don't have enough money to pay the tuition or pay for school uniforms.

Jesús, my client in my current volunteer program as a microbusiness consultant, had no formal education, "ni un año." He had friends who helped teach him things. He didn't learn the alphabet like a, b, c, d. The first letters he learned were J, E, S, U, S. Then his teacher said, put them together what does that say? That's how he learned to spell his name.

There were about 25 people in attendence

Outside, he had a table set up with un montón (a lot) of bracelets and necklaces. Each one has a special meaning that Jesús plans. He has spoken with the Shamans of his tribe and they have given him the right to produce these works. He says some of his competitors can't even tell you what the things mean and that means those people aren't legitimate

These are three of his employees who recently traveled from Jalisco to Monterrey to work with Jesús. They are dressed in the typical Huichol clothes with the bags, bracelets, and necklaces that they make to sell.

These are some of the bags

This is the biggest wall hanging that there is, I think it's 60 centimeters by 60 centimeters (which is about 2 feet by 2 feet) and this one will cost you about 27 000 pesos or about $2,000 dollars. But look at all the detail. Each aspect means something. I'm not really sure what though.

Getting everything set up. This day they had about 320 pesos in sales, which is good, but nothing compared to....

This is a picture of Jesús and me after the big event with the nice people from Yale. Earlier in the week, I had attended a discussion with three students who are volunteering in the microbusiness tutoring program and about 6 people from Yale who came to Monterrey during their Spring Break on a service trip. During the chat, we spoke about our projects and some of the challenges we are facing. The people from Yale were very interested in Jesús and invited us to an event their last night in Monterrey. It was a huge success, Jesús had $1,432 dollars (we accepted dollars and pesos, but this is the total sum with equivalents) in sales in one night. This represents about a year of normal sales for him. It was AMAZING!

These were some of the bracelets that people could buy. The flower represents Peyote which is an important part of the Huichol religion and culture. The price for the bracelets varies depending on the width and the type of beads. The price can range from 80 pesos (8 dollars) to more than 700 pesos (70 dollars).

The necklaces cost 2,300 pesos or about 230 dollars. One sold in the event

Here I am counting the beads to determine the width to find out the cost.

People were all over this table, 3 or 4 deep at times.

Making the sale

We started off with a lot more bracelets than we ended up with, which is good.

I'm helping this person to learn how to find out the price. You count the beads! I helped Jesús by taking money, telling people the prices, translating, and facilitating just about everything.

I am so happy it worked out so well

Jesús explaining the significance of the bracelet design.

Just helping out.

You can see the money in my cash register/hand

This night was a tremendous success. The nice people from Yale got one last cultural experience in Monterrey and learned about Jesús and his Huichol culture. And Jesús had the best one day sales in over 3 years. Not only did he earn $1,432 that night, he got to eat a buffet dinner in the fancy hotel. He packed his plate about three layers high with everything from rice, to tacos, to quesadillas, to chicken, to fish, to vegetables, he got it all. As I was walking past him with his towering plate of food (might have been the best dinner he'd had in a while) he said to me, "ya está" which basically means that's good or that's enough.

So as for this post, ya está

Para que conozca todo el mundo!

This post is all about the bracelets that Jesus makes so that the whole world can see them.

The price depends on the size and it can range from 60-400 pesos or 5-35 dollars.

These works are wall hangings and this is the smallest size there is. Each small detail represents something. Jesus designs each piece.

Volunteer Project

In the middle is Christian Salazar, who is the director of the Microbusiness consulting volunteer program at the Tec. On the right is my client, Jesus.

Jesus and I with some of his work on the table. That is a necklace you can see.

This necklace is a flower that is meant to be used as a gift to the most important women.

These go for 200-240 pesos or about $16-20 USD

The top one is representing Peyote

The bottom one is a bird

This is the second thickest bracelet which costs about $25 dollars. It represents or honors the God of Rain

This is the thickest bracelet that costs around $30. It has a deer head and the green diamonds are representing Peyote. They can be used as offerings for sacred places.

I have recently started my volunteer project and it's amazing. I didn't even know about the opportunity to volunteer as a consultant until I attended the new student orientation in January with CJ because when I arrived in June, they didn't have the same type of orientation. I got set up with a volunteer program called Tutoria Microempresarial, which means micro-business tutoring.

We went through training and I learned that by working with the small business person, we would help create a better business with higher sales and incomes and by doing that we would help the person improve the lives of themselves and their family. We would also be benefitting the community by creating better jobs. Most of the microempresarios (micro-business people) had not completed high school education and as a result did not have a wealth of business knowledge. That's where we came in (I keep saying we because I believe there are about 40 students at the Tec who are participating in this program), using our knowledge gained at the Tec to help the community only a few blocks away from the Tec but a world away from the expensive, private, well-respected Instituto Tecnologico y de Estudios Superiores de Monterrey.

My client, Jesus, is in his 60's and didn't graduate from high school. He is from the indigenous tribe Huichol that is primarily in the state of Jalisco, which is in the southern part of Mexico. He has 54 years of experience creating Huichol artisan handicrafts, but he prefers the term art. He and his team creates designs in sizes that range from 60 cm by 60 cm to 15 cm by 15 cm. They require an incredible amount of work because it is all bead work and every design represents something. Part of the value added by Jesus to his art is a card that he signs which explains every aspect of the work. Jesus also makes bracelets, necklaces, jaguar heads and masks out of small beads in intricate and beautiful designs that also have a meaning.

His website was created by another student volunteer about a year ago. On the site you can see Jesus and most of his art. I will be working on translating it to English at some point. Here is the link: http://www.quintopuntocardinal.com.mx/

It is interesting working with Jesus because we are both coming across a culture to meet in the middle. I am an American speaking my second language and he is Huichol speaking his second language as well. Neither of us are living in our home town. Believe it or not, we communicate quite well and I more than hold my own in communicating in Spanish.

As for our goals for my consulting role, we are trying to connect his products to another country or other countries. I am looking at artisan websites that will allow Jesus to sell his products to people all over the world. Also through a Rotary meeting, I met someone who knows someone, more details to come.

So far I have created a few deliverables for Jesus including a SWOT analysis (Strengths, Weaknesses, Opportunities, and Threats (or FODA in Spanish, Fortalezas, Oportunidades, Debilidades, y Amenazas)), an analysis of the four P (product, price, place, promotion or cuatro p in Spanish, producto, precio, plaza, y promocion, how convenient still 4 P), and a list of definitions of several business terms that he might not have ever heard of such as target markets and positioning.

Overall, I would say that this volunteer program has been a tremendous opportunity and a lot of fun. It is a challenge to try and figure out how I can help Jesus but I am working hard and being creative. It makes me so happy to be supporting the Rotary cause of Service Above Self even if I am just helping one person. I am so grateful and I feel so lucky to be here in Monterrey, so it's nice to give back.