Capomo: 15 March 2010

I was standing in the jungle under a towering old, gnarled and twisted, termite infested tree.  Jon was standing about 20 feet in front of me in a clearing.   We were twittering on about a subject of little importance as I admired the bark of the tree.  Suddenly, we heard the sound of cracking wood followed almost immediately by a crashing noise as a branch 40 feet above me broke free and started to fall.  I saw panic on Jon's face as he looked up at the falling branch and somehow, immediately reacted.  For someone as slow moving and uncoordinated as I general am, this was a miracle.

I ran for the clearing and reached it just as the branch fell on the ground behind me with a terrific crash, sending up a cloud of dust and termite droppings.  It was a lot of commotion for a branch so small - only about 10 feet long and 2 feet around.  Nonetheless, it was big enough to take out part of the fence line along the road.  My heart felt unmoored.  For a moment, I forgot to breathe.

I took stock of my situation.  The branch blocked the road behind me.  A chilling yet somehow oddly reassuring look of terror was painted on Jon's face.  I was loved and unharmed.  A potentially calamitous, completely arbitrary, totally fucked up disaster had been averted.  I'm sure the reality of my escape was much more earthbound than the scene that played out in my mind's eye, but for a split second I actually felt athletic.  It was exhilarating!

Had I not moved, I'm pretty sure the branch would have clipped the back of my head and sent me to the hospital if not the morgue.   I was lucky.  Luckier still, it was me under that tree and not one of the group of children we were waiting to meet on their school excursion.

Ironically, the branch fell from a Maya Nut tree, the subject of the field trip.  The children were coming to the forest to harvest the nuts as part of a project meant to educate them of the historical and potential future importance of Maya Nut to the region.

The nut is really the seed of a tree known through most of Mexico as capomo.  Capomo is one of the most common of the rainforest trees of Nayarit, and grows in abundance in the jungle surrounding San Pancho.  Each tree can reach a height of about 45 feet, and produces huge yields of a seed that was once a staple of the Meso-american diet.

Today, the trees are going extinct in many parts of their range.  The practice of clearing rain forests to make way for cornfields has decimated the once abundant stock of capomo trees, basically trading a wild and sustainable, highly nutritious food source for a cultivated crop that is expensive to grow, in both financial and ecological terms, and yields a product of relatively poor nutritional value.

Now a micro-enterprise movement is afoot throughout Central America and Mexico to reclaim capomo as a food source and educate people about its uses.  Here in San Pancho, our old Spanish teacher Rosa is leading a campaign to popularize capomo.  As part of her effort, Rosa organized this excursion of school children from La Escuela del Mundo, our alternative elementary school.

We're working with Rosa to help secure funding for a solar dryer, a mill, and a wood burning roaster.  Once we have equipment in place, we will begin processing capomo into flour and coffee (really a tea that tastes similar to coffee but is rich in tryptophan, the stuff that makes you sleepy when you eat a turkey dinner).  The flour can be used to make cookies, cakes, and bread, and can be mixed with harina to make masa for tortillas and tamales.

Here in Mexico, tamales and tortillas are dietary staples, so introducing calcium and protein-rich capomo as an ingredient may dramatically improve nutrition and overall health.  Capomo is also high in fiber and low in fat, and contains significant amounts of vitamin b and e, and folic acid.

In short, capomo could be the basis of a rainforest preservation and food security movement in Nayarit.  Even the leaves and branches are useful, providing a sustainable and eco-friendly source of high protein fodder for cattle.  Dairy cows fed on capomo actually produce more milk.  I'm sure you've guessed it from this journal entry, but I'll say it anyway:  I am officially capomo-crazy.

As the children excitedly collected capomo, picking hundreds of seeds off the forest floor, I was reminded of last September.  The long, hot summer was coming to a close.  It had been months since the last rush of tourists and the pueblo was in the grips of a dengue fever epidemic.  Hungry people were going about town begging to work for food.

I wondered, how is it possible that people are going hungry in the midst of so much abundance?  The jungle, the sea, the town itself abounds with food, yet here were people, too proud to accept hand outs, begging to work for a bag of beans, some rice, a can of tuna and some bread.  I became determined that I would use my time in Mexico to do what I can to address the problem of hunger.  No one, I thought, should suffer the indignity of having to turn to someone like me, a mere guest of the community, to beg for food.

I've been sitting on the idea since.  Funding a kitchen at the new community center was a step in the right direction.  Since then I've struggled to understand what the next step should be.  Here, now, and sooner than I'd imagined, is a glimmer of hope.