Have you seen the signs on the recycling boxes by the colectivo stop on the highway? They were made by the children of Hekab Be! We helped the Pueblo community and Akumal snorkel cooperatives to clean trash from the path between the highway and the beach, and have been painting wooden signs and setting up boxes to separate trash for recycling.
We’re busy cleaning up, not just along the beach road, but inside the library as well. Elizabeth is teaching classes on organic gardening, and the children have transformed plastic buckets into pretty pots to grow their own mini gardens. They also painted tree trunks with ‘cal’ (powdered white lime and water), and learned how the natural material repelled bugs that harm the trees.
As well as the children’s efforts, a group of adult volunteers have been busy cleaning the bodega and sorting and shelving our English fiction collection. We have slimmed down the collection on the shelves, but we have many books for sale at just ten pesos each.
One major triumph this month was receiving the official permit from the Tulum municipality giving us rights to the parking area directly outside the library. This had been a long time in the works, and Elizabeth deserves public recognition for finally making it happen. Thank you, Ely! Next up is installing a chain, cleaning the area, and clearly marking it as parking for Hekab Be use only. If you are coming to the library, we will have a small sign for you to display in your car so the police know you are visiting us and not on the beach! 🙂
Celebrating Carnival and the Organic Art Market!
The children celebrated carnival on Friday February 16th with costumes and dancing, and attendees at the Organic Art Market the next day enjoyed a repeat performance of some of the dances. Everyone was invited to join in, and we had a great time pretending to be cowboys and line-dancing along with the children. YeeHaw! It was a lot of fun, and good exercise! If you were at the sale and have photos or video of the sale, please post them on our facebook page. We’d love to see them. See the video of the kids dancing: https://wordpress.com/post/hekabbe.org/297
The Organic Art Market was such a success that we have decided to make it a regular event for the first Saturday of every month. This means that the next one is coming up on Saturday March 3rd from 10:00 a.m. to 3:00 p.m. In addition to unique art work and handmade products we will have organic produce, natural therapies such as ear-candling and chair massage, and delicious local food and drink. Booth space is filling up fast, so if you want to be part of it please message us through the Facebook page: www.facebook.com/Hekab
Selling handmade crafts at the market
Welcome Jocelyn and Mauro
We have two new volunteers who will be assisting Ely and Kaori each afternoon. Jocelyn and Mauro are both studying Hotel Administration in Tulum, and are coming to Hekab Be as part of their work-study and community outreach program. Mauro knows Hekab Be well, as he grew up in Akumal and came to classes at the library when he was a child. Jocelyn has experience working at a Mexican library, and so is going to help catalog our extensive book collection.
Please come by the library to visit us, and to see the ongoing changes. We are open to the entire Akumal community from 10:00 a.m. to 6:00 p.m. and welcome everyone to come in and get away from the heat and dust of the beach road. Volunteers are welcome to join in the afternoon classes or help with clean-up, and the office is always open with free Wi-Fi and a place to sit and relax.
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