I’ve been writing a lot about the work that I’ve been doing in India, but I really haven’t touched too much on the company that I work for or where it’s located. According to Hindus, Vayu is the Lord of the winds and deity of life. Min, of course, refers to something that is small. Minvayu then becomes the small wind god or small breath or small wind or however you want to translate it.
Minvayu is not so much of a company as a “insert word that makes sense here.” Rather than manufacturing, the focus of Minvayu is on training village mechanics to be able to build and maintain small wind turbines to provide power where there is little or no access to a reliable electrical grid. Most often, this energy goes to pumping water for irrigation and drinking. My work specifically involves a lot or R&D to determine how we can better serve the people of India.
Jorge (often called George by the non Spanish indigenous population), the owner of Minvayu, is actually one of only thirteen Ecuadorians currently living in India. Essentially, Jorge is a guy who likes bad jokes (aka. my jokes), enjoys meditating, teaches Tango, and doesn’t overthink things.
The Minvayu office (shown in the first picture) is located on Windarra Farm, along with a couple of guest houses and Jorge’s own accomodations. The farm itself is very large, and several different groups own different parts of the farm. On a good day, we might have power for half the day. This wouldn’t be so bad if our air conditioning (also known as a fan) continued to function without power. Since that doesn’t happen, we just bake instead. I’m not being sarcastic when I say that this might be my favorite office space of all time. Cube farms suck!
drschuess 