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Honduras 2010 COE, Day 3
8:30 AM
The day starts off with a briefing by our head judge Sherri Johns, things are going to be a bit unusual with congress showing up. I think this is a first for COE, having a national government congress show up and celebrate the coffee of their own country. A producer named Fabio, who has won past COE competitions, and this year won 3rd place at the SCAA for coffee of the year. He is being recognized and given award by his government. OK, enough for now, I need to go begin cupping the first set of cups today.
8:51 AM
I am at table 1 for session four of the first round. Cupping with me at this table is Tim Wendelboe from Norway, Tim Taylor from Chicago and Ruber Rivera from Honduras. The jury thus far has been very interactive, with people unafraid to wade right in and comment on what they think of the coffees; which makes for much more lively and interesting discussions. Alright, the coffee has had around 15 minutes in the cup, and is now ready for my spoon.
9:24 AM
Session 4 of round 1 is now complete. Now we discuss. On this table was one of my favourite coffees so far. Delicate and balanced black currant acidity, sweet, and balanced. There are indeed great coffees in Honduras.
11:08 AM
Just wrapping up the last discussion with the jury for round one. Every coffee that has an average score of 84 points or higher will move on to round two. Each coffee is then cupped again, and then on Friday we move on to the top ten coffees of the event. The pavilion behind me is loud and crowded. There are more soldiers with machine guns around us then I have ever seen before. The difference between the secret service (all black suits) and the guys down here, green fatigues and machine guns. If you are gun shy or at all nervous about guns, this is not the day to be at a COE competition.
I am predicting that we will cup 26 to 28 coffees tomorrow, out of the 39 that we started with. More on that as the official accountants crank through our scores and get the averages finalized.
4:25 PM
Well, we had a long session today, actually being part of the Honduran National Congress which met at the hotel here just outside of Marcala. While it was a momentous event for the local community, sitting through 2.5 hours of political speeches in Spanish was a bit slow. Nonetheless, it was a day where the Cup of Excellence program was recognized, and although they cancelled Susie’s power point presentation at the last minute, she did get to address the National Congress for five minutes. So hopefully the message she presented makes a difference in the lives of farmers here in Honduras.
I am learning much about the coffee industry here in Honduras, but if I learned anything in Ethiopia, I think I will save my critical blogging until I get home to Canada. So the rest of the day is left to relax, we are thinking of going into Marcala and buying some local food and cooking our own meal in Tracy Allan’s kitchenette. Time for some of our cooking.
As it turns out, we will be cupping 31 coffees tomorrow, so I was wrong by a bit in my previous prediction, so it will be a long day of cupping.
