WHO WE ARE

Luis Delgado Hurtado is President and Co-Founder of Yachay Wasi. His love and respect for his Inka ancestry and his concern for the new generations prompted him to share his views. He is a photographer, craftsman and an experienced guide who plans YW occasional cultural tours. From 1985, his photographs of his people and Inka places have been exhibited in USA, including the United Nations and the American Museum of Natural History in NYC. He conducts workshops with slides on his culture in educational institutions.

Born in Acopia in the Andes, near Qosqo (Cuzco), he is directly in charge of establishing the Centro Cultural Yachay Wasi, runasimi in this traditional village. He is implementing environmental projects such as Phase 1 (2008) of a Water and sanitation project "Recovery of the Circuit of Four Lakes" and the ongoing Campaign of planting a Million Native Trees in this area. Acopia and Lake Acopia are located in this Circuit.

Over the years, Luis has promoted the respect and protection of Indigenous Sacred Sites and Remains. This has laid him to funded invitations to speak at Meetings sponsored by the Convention on Biodiversity Secretariat such as the Culture and Biodiversity Conference (Montreal, June 2010) and the upcoming COP10 meeting (Nagoya, Japan, October 2010)

He has represented Yachay Wasi and his community at the UN Working Group on Indigenous Populations (Geneva 2000), the UN Working Group on the Draft Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples (Geneva 2001, 2002) and at the World Heritage Indigenous Peoples' Council of Experts (WHIPCOE) Workshop (Winnipeg, Canada 2001) at the funded invitation respectively of the Office of the High Commissioner for Human Rights and UNESCO World Heritage Centre in Paris. He is an Observer to the yearly sessions of the UN Permanent Forum on Indigenous Issues at UN Hqrs in NYC. He has coordinated Yachay Wasi two Encounters of Indigenous Communities in the High Andes June 2001 and November 2003, the April 2009 Conference "Sacred Sites: Biodiversity and Andean Spirituality" in Acopia, followed by the August 2010 similar conference in Raqchi. He was on the executive board of Directors of the International Training Center for Indigenous Peoples in Nuuk, Greenland from September 2002 thru 1 February 2006.

Marie-Danielle Samuel is Vice President and Co-Founder of Yachay Wasi. Born and raised in Paris, France, with a commercial art education, she was a designer in electrical engineering at Con Edison in NYC until her retirement in Nov. 2000. Her long involvement in parallel cultural voluntary work mostly at the NYC Bahá'í Center took on a new focus when meeting Luis Delgado Hurtado in 1985. Marie-Danielle Samuel is Main Representative for Yachay Wasi at the United Nations.

Eliane Lacroix-Hopson, retired from her profession in engineering, is a published writer and expert on United Nations issues who contributes her talent to Yachay Wasi newsletter. Her main topic is the Harmony of Science and Religion, one Bahá'í principle, and how it relates to Native American spirituality. She volunteered until 2000 as UN Representative for the International Romani Union; 11 million Roma around the world wrongly known as Gypsies. She is the mother of Marie-Danielle Samuel. She is the author of Yachay Wasi's first publication: Creation, Evolution and Eternity... (2001)