The last post on Monday has an audio clip that gives an overall view of what I learned while I was there, but I want to give you a little bit more as it's hard to put it all into such a short version so I'll start with the road trip...

In the morning of my visit with supplier Bug Zoo, Conway (owner of Bug Zoo) says we'll take a road trip to visit with the ladies that do the detail work on the clothes I import. We leave the office and just before we get into the "Bug" car, we meet up with a man named Stuart and he gets into the car with us and off we go. I felt like I needed to backtrack and figure out how Stuart ties into this road trip. So this audio clip is an interview with Stuart, he starts by explaining why he is there (I didn't get a chance to record me asking the question, so it will start with him explaining what he does.)

In a nutshell, he started his own company Tamarind about 3 years ago, working to empower women in the community. Basically he is the link between these women who are skilled in all different areas of the textile industry, whether its beading, embroidery, crocheting, etc... with retail manufacturing companies (like Bug Zoo). I learned much in this interview of the life there and saw it first hand on our drive as you see in the pictures. (The pic at the right shows the number of these types of homes are quite deep and it went on for miles.) Stuart explains that much of these women live in impoverished areas with 50% unemployment rate. Go ahead and click on the link to find out more about what his business is, how it works and why he started it...