ANCHOR - Hunchouen, Guatemala

Hunchouen is a collective of 550 small producers in the Tajumuco region of Huehuetenango which is considered the northwestern highlands of Guatemala. For every 30 kg bag of Hunchouen coffee bought, our importing partner Caribbean Goods contributes to an educational initiative, El Colegio, dedicated to educating the children of the coffee pickers, providing them with literacy skills and basic English language instruction.

Among the Mayans, the howler monkey god was a primary deity of art and music and a patron of the artisans, especially the scribes and sculptors.​ According to the sixteenth-century Popol Vuh creation myth, two brothers, Hunbatz and Hunchouen, were once talented dancers and artists. By nature, these two sons were wise, and their wisdom was great. All the arts were taught to Hunbatz and Hunchouén, the sons of Hun-Hunahpú. They were flautists, singers, shooters with blowguns, painters, sculptors, jewellers and silversmiths. ​The story goes that they climbed a tree; it grew up so tall that Hunbatz and Hunchouen could not get down. As they struggled in the branches, their loincloths came loose and turned into tails; they both became monkeys, one a spider monkey, the other a howler monkey.