Dozens of Chinese men were getting off a bus and heading into a pair of squat two-story buildings at the end of the road. Oliveira assumed the outsiders had some type of meeting and would soon be on their way. She'd been inside the structures, painted dark green, and knew they weren't nearly big enough to house them all. But one day turned to the next, and soon Oliveira realized her new neighbors - 56 itinerant Chinese laborers, none of whom spoke any Portuguese - were here to stay.
This town of around 21,000 inhabitants and known as the rose capital of the world is located in the Pedro Moncayo canton, in the province of Pichincha in Ecuador, and sits 37 miles north of Quito at an altitude of 9,400 feet. Beginning in the 1980s, the area's economy has hinged on the production of roses, thanks to its altitude, temperate climate and sunlight for up to 12 hours a day.
Over the past 25 years, the ways we talk about, or think about, the restaurant industry have changed profoundly. Restaurants are no longer settings, inoffensive backgrounds to important conversations or meetings or dates. They are attractions in their own right. Being "into restaurants" became its own hobby. Devout fans tracked chefs as they jumped from kitchen to kitchen like a basketball nerd following player trades. They clocked which dishes were referential like a book critic plucking allusions out of contemporary novels. Chefs were rock stars.
In January, Repórter Brasil visited multiple coffee farms in Antioquia, Colombia, that carried either Rainforest Alliance or Fairtrade certifications, finding troubling results.