Tag Archives: public health

Oaxaca Face Masks for the Good

Posted on Wednesday, June 3, 2020 | 4 comments

In the despair that has gripped the United States of America in the last week that peels away once more deep-seated and unresolved racial disparities and undue police force that plague us, I have found succor in focusing on The Oaxaca Mask Project. These times demand us to be proactive to make change for the good however we can, wherever we are living now and where we come from.

I am deeply grateful to all who have contributed and those who still plan to. We continue to welcome your support.

The Oaxaca Mask Project Phase II started May 23, 2020. Since then, we have raised $8,830 USD from 134 donors. Eight seamstresses are employed and have made 1,410 masks to date.

To contribute, click here:

By the end of this week, we will have given over 500 masks to the Teotitlan del Valle public health clinic operated by the village and underwritten their purchase of gallons of isopropyl alcohol, hand sanitizer and pulse oximeters (used in the detection of Covid 19). Thanks to Cristy Molina Martinez and Samuel Bautista Lazo for their help to get masks into the hands of village leaders and to connect me to Armando Gutierrez Martinez, a health committee member.

The village tells me they need a portable Welch-Allyn vital signs monitor to buy used/refurbished in the USA and ship to them. I’m seeking a $700 donor to help us buy this medical equipment to ship to Teotitlan del Valle. Contact me: norma.schafer@icloud.com

IMSS doctors and nurses with our masks

I’m also happy to report that Alvin Starkman from Oaxaca Mezcal Tours got 100 masks into the hands of doctors and nurses at the Oaxaca public hospital IMSS. They did not have sufficient PPE and they were required to purchase same at their own expense. These masks were made by Rocio Bastida Cruz in San Felipe del Agua.

Karen Nein, from Eldorado, NM, sent high quality 100% cotton fabric to Kalisa Wells in the Centro Historico who got this to Beatriz at Telarcito Lindo in El Tule, where she and her staff are sewing 200 masks to be at the ready for those who ask us.

In San Jeronimo Tlacochahuaya, Moises Garcia Guzman de Contreras, a Zapotec linguistic activist and head of the cultural center, gave 100 masks to their village health officials to distribute to market vendors and shoppers. They have asked for 150 more for taxi and bus drivers, and others.

Teotitlan del Valle president receives over 400 masks for villagers

Patrice Wynne, owner of Abrazos San Miguel, contributed enough cotton fabric of their design for us to sew 400 masks. The box will arrive in Teotitlan del Valle via DHL this week. We are grateful.

I’m talking with Bordados Xime, a family operated apron-making embroidery workshop in San Miguel del Valle, just outside of Tlacolula, to sew masks for their village. I am guiding them on design and we will compensate them for what they make, of course!

Armando Sosa, a doll maker in San Pablo Villa de Mitla, continues to make masks for us, too. This gives him and his sister much needed income during this time of economic stress.

Kari Klippen-Sierra is getting masks to community service organizations through the Episcopal Church, and has given masks to Alan Goodin to distribute in Santiago Ixtaltepec, where he lives. Alan is helping a family who lost everything in the Abastos Market fire, too. We are planning to designate the next 100 being made by Alfredo Hernandez Orozco in El Tule to Alan.

Beatriz at Telarcito Lindo marks mask pattern on Karen’s fabric

We will continue to work with Rachael Mamane, Food for All, and her connections with puente.org, an organization of organic farmers in the Oaxaca valley and Mixtec region.

It’s hard for me right now to think about when our textile tours will start up again. I hope, as our travels are curtailed, that you keep Oaxaca and Mexico travel with me in your dreams!

Stay healthy! Stay safe! Saludos, Norma and The Oaxaca Mask Project

4 Comments

Posted in Oaxaca Mexico art and culture

Tagged , , , , , , ,

Generosity Knows No Boundaries: Oaxaca Mask Project II

Posted on Thursday, May 28, 2020 | 6 comments

We put out the call on Monday, May 25, that we were starting Phase II of the Oaxaca Mask Project. On Tuesday, May 26, an article in Mexico News Daily featuring the project appeared, written by journalist Janet Blaser. Oaxaca blogger Shannon Pixley Sheppard, View From Casita Colibri, reposted our Monday cry for help.

You responded.

We send you our sincerest, most grateful thanks. Special thanks to Janet and Shannon!

Your generosity gives us the wherewithal to go into mask-making overdrive. Even more important now that the virus is spreading to the villages and more cases are identified.

100 masks went to Macuilxochitl, adjacent to Teotitlan de Valle

Donate Today: Please Share

We have cried this week. There were seven (7) funerals in Teotitlan del Valle, two on one day. There are cases diagnosed in neighboring villages and towns. For every published case diagnosed, the multiplier is eight (8) for the underrepresented numbers. If five (5) cases are known, the likely total is 40. The curve is no where in sight.

Mexico’s health care system is in disarray. Upon taking office, President AMLO (Lopez-Obrador) started dismantling the system to reorganize. There is little PPE and health care workers are taxed. The New York Times reports today that 25% of Mexico’s coronavirus cases are health care workers.

In all this, we are hopeful that the masks we offer FREE to people will mitigate the spread of disease in the Oaxaca valleys. Thank you for your generosity, your big heart and your gifts.

It takes a village to protect a village. You and I do this because we have a connection to people and place. We do this because we respect the creativity and hard work of Oaxaqueños. We understand. Thank you, again!

Since Monday, May 25, 2020:

  • 108 donors made gifts
  • $6,746 USD received
  • 1100 masks ordered
  • 4 distribution partnerships formed
  • 8 mask-makers employed
  • Expanded mask-making and distribution to San Miguel del Valle apron-making village
  • More to do!
Rocio Arecely Garcia Lopez, left, San Miguel del Valle, will sew masks for us

6 Comments

Posted in Oaxaca Mexico art and culture

Tagged , , , , , , , ,

Phase II, Oaxaca Mask Project, Starts Today

Posted on Monday, May 25, 2020 | 13 comments

COVID-19 cases are rising in Oaxaca and the villages. This week’s news reports closures at Abastos Market (Central de Abastos), the huge central food distribution center in Oaxaca city due to high rates of disease. People are testing positive in villages in the Tlacolula Valley. Concern is rising. Demand for face masks is stronger. We must continue to respond. Thousands are at risk. No time to sit back and take a break!

Donate Today: Please Share

If you gave earlier, please consider making another gift. If you haven’t yet given, now is the time. The need is still with us.

New Oaxaca Partnerships

We have formed distribution partnerships with:

  • Food for All A Oaxaca-based collective of farmers, chefs, drivers and citizens in Oaxaca, Mexico, providing market boxes from farm to table, founded by Rachael Mamane, James Beard-nominated chef.
  • Puente Works with food producers and micro-enterprises in vulnerable Oaxaca communities to maintain production and economic solidarity
  • Cafebre A Oaxaca city coffee bar that roasts and distributes artisanal beans from independent growers in the highlands
  • Mama Pacha Chocolate A small Oaxaca workshop that makes rich and nutritious chocolate without agrochemicals, promoting a fair economy for cacao bean growers

Each of these organizations will take our masks and distribute them to those in need. The partnership allows us to go deeper and wider with more urgency!

Urgency: We are out of masks in Teotitlan del Valle. People are coming to Cristy’s house to ask for masks. Please help!

Use a face mask in all public places

With help from Food for All‘s Rachael Mamane, our point person, we will be able to get more masks quickly into the hands of farmers, consumers, fruit and vegetable vendors, taxi fleets, and others.

You are key to this project’s continuing success. Right now, we have commitments to make 300 more masks this week and need to pay for them! We want to provide a steady source of face coverings for the near future.

Few have an income source in Oaxaca now and people cannot afford to buy masks. They can barely afford to buy food!

We also continue to work with Cristy Molina in Teotitlan del Valle, where she organizes seamstresses to make masks for us. These are the masks that we will give to Rachael for distribution. Cristy my essential partner who volunteers to protect her village and her neighbors.

Cristy gave our last 100 masks to Macuilxochitl villagers, where cases just diagnosed

Sewing Masks Provides Income

Our strategy has changed. We now want to focus on sending funds to Oaxaca seamstresses for mask-making. This provides an important source of income when all other work has evaporated. We are grateful for all the masks made by friends in the USA up to now. We found that the cost to ship to Oaxaca is better spent providing income to seamstresses there.

Sections of Central de Abastos Market closed for the next two weeks

To keep up-to-date with Oaxaca Covid-19 statistics, please use the Municipio de Oaxaca Facebook page. I am told, however, that actual data is lagging and cases may be as much as 20% higher than what is reported. Hospital beds are filled to capacity. This is what it takes to get people’s attention, unfortunately.

Cristy Molina designs public health messages to create awareness

Another key person whose help we value is Alvin Starkman, Mezcal Educational Tours, who says that masks are direly needed at Abastos — and he feels safe with his N95 and protective shield going there to distribute face coverings!

Alvin Starkman with N95 mask, protective shield and 6 ft. pole

13 Comments

Posted in Oaxaca Mexico art and culture

Tagged , , , , , , , ,

The Oaxaca Mask Project Report #7: Donate by May 15

Posted on Thursday, May 14, 2020 | 8 comments

Tomorrow, May 15, 2020, we are accepting last donations for the time being to make and distribute masks to Oaxaca and the villages. I’m taking a break until we see if there is more demand. Thanks to all who responded earlier this week to The Last Push post! Many of you made second and third gifts!

We still need several hundred dollars more to pay Oaxaca mask makers for orders in progress and complete mask shipments. Thank you for making a gift. Please use this link:

We started this project on April 15, 2020 — one month ago!

www.paypal.me/oaxacaculture

Alert: I just received a notice from Cristy Molina Martinez that the Oaxaca government has announced that they cannot accept any more COVID-19 patients at Oaxaca’s specialty hospital. They are at capacity!

Cristy Molina Martinez has been our right-hand person in Teotitlan del Valle. This morning she received a shipment of masks from Portland, Oregon, from Claudia Michel. Claudia made an in-kind donation to the project by purchasing and shipping masks at her personal expense.

Cristy Molina Martinez in traditional Teotitlan del Valle traje

Cristy will take masks to San Jeronimo Tlacochuhuaya where graphic artist Gabriela Morac will distribute them in her hometown. Some will go to San Pablo Villa de Mitla where doll maker Armando Sosa is redirecting sewing efforts to mask-making. He will use our masks as a pattern, and we will send him funds to also make masks to give out to villagers and taxi-drivers. .

Print by Gabriela Morac https://moracgabriela.wixsite.com/gabrielamorac

Gabriela closed her studio in downtown Oaxaca shortly after the invasion of COVID-19 and returned home, staying safe and selling online.

We have two other mask shipments in transit. Another 100 masks are going today to San Martin Tilcajete from Karen Nein to Taller Jacobo y Maria Angeles. The famed maker of alebrijes, ceramics and curator of a sustainable copal forest has a vast network of friends and relatives who are wearing our masks.

Karen Nein with masks for San Martin Tilcajete

Early this week, Alvin Starkman, Oaxaca Mezcal Educational Tours, took 60 more masks, made and donated by Rocio Bastida Cruz and Dave Crosley (contact them to order in Oaxaca), to villages where he has mezcal-making friends. Alvin says,  “I have been assisting distributing to several of the mezcal villages over the past few weeks. The good folks at Mezcal Vago (Judah Kuper & Dylan Sloan) have most recently agreed to distribute a bunch to the villages where their mezcal is produced, to the growers, jimadores, palenqueros and their families, especially those older / with pre-existing conditions, in Sola de Vega, Candelaria Yegolé, Miahuatlán and Tapanala. Thanks guys (and gals). Let’s keep ’em all safe.”

Yesterday, I shipped 100 masks made by Sam (Frances) Robbins from Columbus, Ohio, for Cristy to deliver along with fabric that Rosario Lazo will sew.

100 masks made by Sam Robbins

Jacki Cooper Gordon received 150 masks from us for EnVia Foundation to give to the women (and their families) in the villages who are recipients of their loans.

The Casa de Kids with Drew Vogt

The Episcopal Church in downtown Oaxaca has our masks, too. So does the health clinic in Huayapam thanks to Kari Klippen-Sierra and Rudy Sierra. Kari just told me she made contact with and gave 50 masks to Steve Friedman with Seeds of Hope in Zaachila, an organization that works with impoverished people who live in and around the dump there. She also gave 30 masks to Drew Vogt from Casa de Kids. They work with children, often orphaned, to help them get through school.

In Santa Maria El Tule, I am working with weaver Alfredo Hernandez Orozco who is making us 100 masks. They should be done by early next week. Then, we will figure out who needs them most, who will get them out to people, and will wear them!

Alfredo Hernandez Orozco Mask, handwoven
Alfredo Hernandez Orozco mask, interior — muy comodo!

As of today, we have contracted for, shipped and distributed almost 2,500 masks, and received almost $5,000 in funds. This does not include gifts of masks made by friends of the project which I will tally as in-kind gifts in my final report.

I want to do a special call-out to Kalisa Wells, who has been the central point person in Oaxaca Centro. She coordinated receiving and distributing masks made by Beatriz of Telarcito Lindo. Kalisa also connected me with Armando. She has a million (just kidding) of his dolls. She is a fan.

Kalisa Wells with Armando Sosa, Tlacolula Market

If we keep going, we will need to raise more money to fund the project. Cristy and I are assessing need and should know more in a couple of weeks. Everyone has been so generous. What is your will?

Handmade doll by Armando Sosa, San Pablo Villa de Mitla

During this intensive one-month project to get our Oaxaca friends protected from coronavirus, I have been gratified, ecstatic, overwhelmed, discouraged and tearful with the joy of so many people stepping forward to help. I have felt like a mask-jockey, juggling where to distribute masks available immediately to those who want and need them immediately, waiting for more to be ready and re-deployed.

Thank you for trusting me with your gifts to make this project happen. Thank you for your willingness to sew. Thank you for your effort to bring masks to people who will wear them. Thank you for trying to bring masks to the people when they reject the offer of help.

We can only do the best we can, one step at a time. For now, we will wrap this up …. unless someone else wants to step forward for a while!

Sending love from Command Central, Durham, North Carolina

Friends ask, When are you coming back to Oaxaca? My best answer is, I don’t know. As with most things these days, we are driven by the virus and much is to revealed and it is too soon to know. They say, no one vaccine will protect against the many iterations of this scourage. My intention is to continue to shelter-in-place, take walks, eat healthy, Zoom with friends and drink MEZCAL.

Abrazos fuertes.

8 Comments

Posted in Oaxaca Mexico art and culture

Tagged , , , , , , ,

The Oaxaca Mask Project Progress Report #4: Getting Masks to Villages

Posted on Tuesday, April 28, 2020 | 6 comments

Thanks to the 58 donors of The Oaxaca Mask Project, we are making and distributing masks beyond Oaxaca city, getting them into villages. Seamstresses we are working with have made or are in process of making 1550 masks. We have received $3,636 to date and all of these funds will be spent by Thursday this week.

To keep the project going, more support is needed.

Donate Here: www.paypal.me/oaxacaculture

We are keeping seamstresses employed and people safe with your gift.

Moreover, friends have made and donated 420 masks that I have shipped to Oaxaca via DHL. Some have also sent the finest cotton quilting fabric that can be sewn there, too. As 100% cloth resources are scarce in Oaxaca, this is an extra-special gift.

50 more masks coming from Sam (Frances) Robbins, Columbus, Ohio

Alvin Starkman, founder of Mezcal Educational Tours, has been a huge help. He has distributed 30 mask to Cuilapam de Guerrero, 20 to San Martin Tilcajete, 25 to Teotitlan del Valle, and 25 to San Marcos Tlapazola. He is also sending 25 masks to the interns at the IMSS Hospital #21 in León, Guanajuato, because they return to work May 1st with insufficient gear. 

Red clay pottery makers Gloria and Maria, San Marcos Tlapazola

Today, he is picking up another 100 masks from San Felipe del Agua maker Rocio Bastida, to distribute later this week to Santa Catarina Minas, San Baltazar Chichicapam, San Pablo Gúilá, San Dionisio Ocotepec and Santiago Matatlán.

Seamstress Ines Lopez Hernandez and her children, Tlacolula de Matamoros

Zapotrek owner Eric Ramirez Ramos is working with seamstress Inez in Talcolula de Matamoros; 100 masks are ready today for him to distribute and we have ordered 100 more. This work is a lifeline for her and her two children.

Gail Pellett, who lives in San Agustin Etla, Oaxaca, is working with a seamstress there to make and distribute 100 masks.

See the Teotitlan del Valle public health video or watch below.

In Teotitlan del Valle, on-the-ground organizer Cristy Molina Martinez gave 46 masks to the president of the Union of Moto-taxis to distribute to all the tuk-tuk drivers. Cristy and Luvia Lazo made a public health information video, and the village president participated in helping distribute masks at the Sunday public market.

Rosario Lazo, is sewing masks in Teotitlan del Valle
Zapotrek guide Rocio Buitron will help Eric distribute masks today

Yesterday, I ventured out with Jacob to the local DHL shipper. The shipment contained 150 masks made by Sam Robbins, Shuko Clouse of Mano del Sur, and Yumiko Wilson. I also included fabric Claudia Michel, and Susie Robison, owner of Cheerio Textiles. Later in the week, I will send fabric and masks made by Sam Robbins (who used to own a quilt shop), Hollie Taylor who makes Protest Pearls, and from Barbara Kuhns in Arizona.

Our DHL box to Oaxaca, Mexico
Shuko Clouse with a bundle of masks

Last week, I met Shuko Clouse, of Mano del Sur, halfway between her house in El Segundo and Jacob’s house in Huntington Beach. We found a leafy, unpopulated park in Long Beach and sat a safe six feet away from each other, talking over a Bento Box picnic lunch. She gave me 100 masks to ship off to Oaxaca that she and Yumiko made. We wanted to hug, but didn’t!

Yumiko Wilson wearing a mask she made for us

Thanks to everyone for your caring and support. Your help is providing jobs for people who sew, and health care safety for those who accept our gifts.

These are difficult times in Mexico, just as they are in the USA. There is both fear and disbelief. The Washington Post reports that Mexico is on the brink of economic collapse and pushing more people below the poverty line.

We are making a very small impact, and yet, we do the best we can with available resources. Everything we do will help someone stay healthy. Thank you.

6 Comments

Posted in Oaxaca Mexico art and culture

Tagged , , , , , ,