This morning, shortly after rolling out of bed, I got the amazing pleasure of helping a Rwandan genocide survivor reconcile with the very man who murdered her husband just over 15 years ago.  Then I was able to provide the funds for a farmer to purchase a specialty piece of equipment to transport his precious crop cargo to the processing center that I helped build.  To polish off what must seem like the perfect morning, I envisioned the children that would soon begin playing a soccer match on a field of green grass built on ground that only fifteen years ago ran red with the blood of innocent genocide victims.  It was an amazing morning, and yet my day had only just begun.

You undoubtably ask how on earth can a person do all of these things before breakfast?  The secret lies below the frothy surface of my morning’s Double Bohoro Bohoro Latte (with a touch of vanilla.)  “Bohoro Bohoro” – Translated it means “Slowly, Slowly.”  It is the phrase that a priest will use to describe how reconciliation between a Hutu and their Tutsi countrymen will happen, and it is the name on the bag of these roasted seeds of redemption from Land of a Thousand Hills Coffee that I hold in my hand.  I’ll let them tell their story.

The coffee beans in this bag traveled more than 8,000 miles just to make it into your cup. Each one was hand picked on a Rwandan farm, tenderly cared for along a journey down a bumpy dirt road on a coffee bicycle, and eventually traveled across the whitecaps of the Atlantic Ocean to make it to Roswell, Georgia, where they are roasted in small batches by an Artisan roaster for what will undoubtedly be one of the best cups of coffee you ever taste. But the geographic distance is not what makes this coffee amazing. The longitude and latitude, although exotic, are not where the miracle lies.

The true distance of these beans, the real journey, is that they traveled a road of forgiveness. These beans represent reconciliation. These beans represent grace and hope for a people torn apart by violence. In the same way you come together with friends over a cup of coffee, farmers torn apart by genocide in Rwanda are coming together in their coffee-growing community. Great healing is taking place. For Hutus and Tutsis, orphans and mothers, reconciliation is becoming 3D. Grace is alive.

And with these beans, with each bag, up to $3 travels back into the Rwandan economy providing a just, Living Wage for each farmer. That is the distance these beans traveled to make it here. From hurt to hope. From loss to life. From Rwanda to you.  (- from the bag label on my Bohoro Bohoro Espresso, Land of a Thousand Hills Coffee Company.  Written by John Acuff)

So… can your coffee do that?

Find out more and start your next morning differently at DrinkCoffeeDoGood.com