Property

Property

Don't think it's going to work out. Simply too far; a good 20mins drive from the highway, past farms and through a very bumpy road (almost requiring a 4x4). Most people don't own a car in T&T, so there's a heavy reliance on (private) taxis. Problem is the taxis usually travel on main routes, picking up and dropping off clients on the way (up to 5 per car). Getting there would require a lot of hustling and convincing taxi drivers to go out of their way to reach this faraway place. Then the way back would be impossible (taxis don't wait).

So the offered location couldn't be used during the week for most people. Weekend would be more possible because schedules are more flexible... but the problem would remain: our dojo would be called the "Inaka dojo" (in Trini the "bush dojo"). We already have trouble attracting enough people in central areas, how are we going to attract enough people for classes there? Here are some options:

1- place is used as a "retreat" for weekend and special events
2- dojo is targeting the kids from the direct neighborhood (about 150 families, on average 2 kids per family, 5-16 years old)

To balance these options we have to consider the costs:
- property will be offered for free or sold at symbolic price (assuming proper proposal is made)
- building will cost between $100,000 and $200,000 TT (15k-30k USD)
- time spent managing the construction and maintenance of the property

On the positive side, no one will be interested on this land for a long while, so there's no rush to decide.

The NGO managing the housing project has other projects all around T&T. If provided with a proper proposal, they would be interested with a "community-based" dojo. But the question is, who would go there to teach?

Not sure what to do...