Geovanni Leiva: Roasting Romance Back into Coffee

About this Episode

Geovanni Leiva missed his family and his village, and then, after a visit five years ago, while flying back to Arkansas, he came up with an idea. “It was probably the worst three hours of my life because I would feel so defeated,” Leiva said. “And I would feel so helpless. … Why me? Why, out of all these people, I get to do this? Over one of those trips, I’m reading a magazine, and I have my little napkin for my Sprite, and I see a Chinese proverb in a magazine that says, if you give a man a fish, you will feed him for a day, but if you teach him how to fish, you will feed him for a lifetime. And I realized that exactly had happened to me. I had been given that opportunity. I had been given that chance to-- not only I was fed for one day, but I was actually given that opportunity. I realized, that’s exactly what I gotta do in my village. What if? And it started with that. Why if, why not? Why do I not bring their coffee, they grow coffee already. That’s what’s they’ve been doing for 60-plus years, ever since I’ve known them. What if I can get their coffee in the hands of my friends and family in the states? And then all of a sudden, I bridge the two, and while bridging the two, we break poverty? I was like, that’s it.”

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