We’ve had a good week and got all the surveys, in-depth interviews, and focus group discussions that we needed. The drama for me this week was meeting a woman who lives out in the farm fields so far away. After driving for 1 1⁄2 hours, we had to park the car and walk a couple of miles into her place because the road was so torn up. When we finally got there she told me that her husband was murdered a month ago. He was the sole provider for the family, so now she doesn’t know what she’s going to do. She works in her fields and sells the fruit in town; but it sells for basically nothing. Tears were streaming down her face as she told me all this. I felt so helpless and wanted to give her a hug and tell her everything would be ok. But I just sat there not knowing what to say cause everything is not ok. Her life sucks and it has eaten at me all day. Yeah I can send in my survey with her responses but she needs help right now. I just feel helpless thinking about her. The second photo below is her and her son.
Last night as we were leaving the little store where we held the focus group discussion, one of the ladies, Berta, brought out a beautifully knit wool sweater that she had made and gave it to me. I was so touched! She is very poor and gave me something that I’m sure would have taken her weeks or months to make. It’s a gorgeous, thick, white sweater made of sheep wool with very intricate patterns. And it is so warm! I’m so taken back at how generous the people are here. I thanked her again and again for the sweater. But for her it was like it wasn’t a big deal- like she gave things away like that all the time. All the other ladies in the group started chanting, “¡Póntela, Póntela!” So I put it on, and it fit great. I wore the sweater to church this morning and two or three members came up to me and said, “¡Que linda chompa que tienes!” (What a beautiful sweater you have!) The people here are amazingly generous.
Friday night we went to Murahuay where we organized a focus group discussion with 6 women. The focus group discussion’s purpose is to get the women to discuss in what months there is the greatest lack of food, sickness, migration, and income. We use five beans on a grid to indicate the greatest lack of food or sickness during that month and one bean indicating the least amount of sickness, etc. in that month. After all the beans are laid out, we analyze the relationships between the different categories. There are obvious correlations like the direct relationship between lack of food and income. But there have been other interesting correlations, for example between sickness and lack of food.
We did another focus group discussion last night in which we discussed who are the different groups in the community here in Tarma. We used beans as well to divide up the community. After all the beans were divided up, the groups ranged from extrema pobreza (extreme poverty) to los ricos (the wealthy). We talked about each group and what defined them with regards to health, social status, income, work, spirituality, and education. The most interesting part of the discussion for me was where the group of women saw their own status. They did not see themselves as extremely impoverished but rather just poor. I love being in charge of the focus groups because they are so much more interactive than just giving surveys one on one. And the women think that I’m funny for some reason (probably just funny looking with blue eyes and white skin).
