$13,435
24 February 2008
I just wired $13,435 to Colombia. A few weeks ago, while researching a
story about online phishing, I received an
email from a wealthy businessman in Colombia. He is fleeing his country
and said that if I send him $13,435 now, he'll deposit $10 million in my bank
as soon as he gets to the United States. He sounded authentic to me so
I wired him some money. Soon I will be rich! I plan to hire out
all the farm work while I sit on the beach and drink Mai Tais.
Ok, that's not really true, I'm usually smart enough to avoid scams like
that. Actually, I have this complex plan to become a drug lord.
I'm starting by importing some illegal drugs from Colombia. My secret
plan is so brilliant that there's no way I can ever get caught. In
fact, I'm so confident that my scheme will work, I decided to write about it
on the Internet before the deal is even done.
Ok, that's not true either. The truth is, after a lot of research, I
finally figured out which coffee pulper I want. I'm getting the
Ecological Wet Mill 2200.
It's manufactured in Colombia and will be shipped to me in pieces. Unfortunately,
shipping heavy equipment from Colombia isn't quite as easy as sending a couple bags of
fresh 100% Kona coffee
through the mail. My new pulper won't arrive until April or May.
This will be our fourth pulper. We have a little tiny pulper
that came with the farm. It does a great job except it's slow and
tedious to work with. I purchased two other pulpers as a single unit
from our neighbors. They lived on a coffee farm but didn't actually do
any coffee farming. When I asked if they wanted to sell their old
pulper they said "Oh! That's what that thing is!"
I got a good deal on the neighbor's pulper but have since decided that
it's not the pulper for me. I could make it work but I process enough
coffee that in the long run, buying a fancy new pulper will be worth
it. So I spent several weeks visiting farm after farm and asking a
million questions about their pulpers. If possible I'd watch the
pulper in action and even help out when I could.
All that time spent studying other farmers' pulpers was worth it. Not
only did I figure out exactly what kind of pulper I want, I also gained
lots of good ideas. Talking to other farmers and getting a tour of their
farms is very helpful. Even when you think you know everything, it's
always possible to learn something new.
Most Kona coffee farmers are very friendly and cooperative. There's a
large demand for Kona coffee and a relatively tiny supply so we gain nothing
by competing with each other. I'd often stop by for a quick peek at a
farmer's pulper then end up spending several hours talking shop. Get
two coffee farmers together and we can go on forever about the cost of
equipment, problems with workers, invasive species, crop prices, uncooperative
tractors, bad weather and a zillion other coffee farm issues.
Everybody has a different way of approaching a problem. Watching other
farmers helps me figure out what I should do and what I shouldn't do.
For example, my barn is built on a hill but not a steep enough hill
that I can gravity feed the coffee all the way through the entire
pulping process. I was concerned about having to pump the raw cherry
but after talking to several other farmers I'm confident that, once I
get the pump situated correctly, I should be able to pump the cherry
without any major pump clogging problems.
Another example is clean-up time and water usage. I knew pulping was
time consuming and used a lot of water, what I didn't realize is how
much time and water the clean-up process can require. Now, when
figuring out how to install my new pulper, I will take extra care to
make sure I can clean it easily and efficiently without making a giant
wet mess everywhere. Bragging about pulping 30,000 pounds of cherry in
an hour is meaningless if it takes another hour to clean up afterwards.
I've seen pulpers that work great and pulpers that don't work so
great. I've seen super expensive equipment and cheap homemade
equipment. I've learned solutions to problems that I didn't know
were problems. I think I've also managed to present a few solutions and
help out my fellow Kona coffee farmers along the way.
I'm excited and anxious to receive my new pulper. I'm not ready for it
yet though, I still have to build a loading dock, work platform and all the
other stuff I'll need for the new pulper. It will be yet another very
busy "off season". Once I get everything installed and working, the
completed system should really help us crank out pound after pound of
delicious Kona coffee. So drink up! My
fellow coffee farmers and I don't do all this work for nothing!
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