Katie Tower with UNESCO's Machu Picchu and Wayna Picchu behind her

On the Flight Centre Travel Blog we like to take you Off the Beaten Path and this blog post certainly does that. Katie Tower guest blogs her travels to South America and how Threads of Peru is creating positive change by helping the women of Peru earn a sustainable income, and support their families, through their incredible art of textiles and weavings.

Hundreds of thousands of people flock to Peru to visit the UNESCO World Heritage site Machu Picchu each year. My trip to Peru wasn’t centered around the breath-taking landmark, but I did hike up the famous mountain and it’s bigger (but younger) brother mountain, Huayna Picchu (or more well known as ‘Wayna Picchu’). How could I not?

While there are many awesome tourist destinations in Peru, my trip had a focus: helping people. The group I traveled with (Project Peru) had a design–centered approach to helping others that wasn’t about swooping in and solving all of the world’s problems with our money. Our approach was (and remains) designing by doing. By going to Peru we gained insight into how we would go on to help the Indigenous Weavers (predominately women) in – what grew from one to three – Andean villages. Yes, we had a specific group in mind before heading to Chaullacocha, Rumira Sandormayo, and Chupani, but we hadn’t pinpointed exactly what it was we could do to help them – or how we should do it. The trip taught us all of that and more.

Just one example of the various types of bathroom facilities you will find in Peru.

My time in Peru was riddled with life experiences I will never forget – from sleeping in an Andean valley a three-hour hike from the road, to seeing stray dogs fighting in the streets of Urubamba. Of course, the most hilarious and memorable stories are always the most embarrassing.

As one might assume, the washroom facilities in South America differ depending on your location, and in Peru can even differ drastically from building to building. On our way to the peninsula, as the sun was setting and my depth perception was at its worst, I unfolded myself from the van in my flip flops (first mistake) to use the washroom. Our tour guide had convinced a store owner to let us use his facilities for one Peruvian Sole each (about $.30). Long story short: said facilities were really just a hole in the ground and because there was no lighting I ended up sticking my bare foot in whatever was surrounding the “toilet” area. It was mushy and wet to say the least and I would never attempt an outdoor washroom situation without full footwear again!

A side by side comparison of textiles made with synthetic dyes and threads (on the left) and natural dyes and threads (on the right).

As it turned out, I would have many more opportunities to use outdoor facilities. We visited multiple villages, tourist areas, ruins, and cities on our trip. Doing so helped us better understand the weaving traditions in Peru; how they relate to the tourist industry and how they might better relate to an online audience. Factory-made wools and textiles were all you could get at most of the tourist markets, which lead us to believe that the hand spun wools and hand woven textiles were to be cherished even more and could become a valued piece of art in the North American or European market.

We also had a chance to meet with the women who shear, dye, spin and weave in the three villages. The talented, selfless, and lovely women we spoke with (via Spanish and Quechua translators) had stories to tell that we could relate to: they want the best for their families and they are proud of what they do. It only made sense that they get the chance to make a living doing it.

The Project Peru Group standing at the bottom of the ancient Incan terraces of Moray, Peru.

This is when we knew we had something in Threads of Peru.

Our website is now the portal for any First World citizen to learn about the laborious craft, while simultaneously supporting the communities we learned so much about on our trip. By buying directly from the weavers – cutting out the middleman – we can maintain a manageable but sustainable income for each woman.

I can safely say that I learned so much more through attempting to affect positive change in Peru than a simple pilgrimage to Machu Picchu could have ever taught.

Aguas Calientes, Peru is highlighted on the Flight Centre travel map.

The Flight Centre Travel Blog looks forward to having other Threads of Peru team members join us for future blog posts and updates.

Categories: Off The Beaten Path

This entry was posted on Monday, October 26th, 2009 at 2:16 pm and is filed under Off The Beaten Path. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.