A gifted seamstress, Rosa typically traveled and taught embroidery and crafts to different girls within the villages of Tarija. Her lengthy treks carried her by the highlands of the Cordillera de Sama, assembly with girls and younger women.
Rosa’s educating journeys left her often away from her household, and the revenue from educating was irregular and unreliable. To make ends meet, she helped her sister promote bread within the streets. The times started early, mixing candy dough, baking, and carrying bundles of bread to the native markets.
Nonetheless Rosa dreamed of embroidery and the bread gross sales had been by no means sufficient. Her husband’s work offered meals and fundamental requirements, however her youngsters had been rising and hoped sooner or later to go to school.
“Dad and mom don’t need to inform their youngsters that there is no such thing as a cash to check, so I used to be praying to have a enterprise to earn extra money.”
By means of her church, Rosa joined a small group that met for prayer. The group additionally took classes in enterprise and studied the biblical parable of the skills.
“The educating of the 5 Skills inspired me as a result of expertise can imply not solely cash, [but] additionally the assets that we have now from the Lord… The vital factor is just not how a lot we have now. The vital [thing] is what we’re doing with what we have now.”
Rosa and her Group started to save lots of collectively, every member setting apart a couple of bolivianos every week. Rosa had tried to save lots of earlier than, however she was by no means capable of accumulate a lot. By means of her Group, nevertheless, Rosa gained entry to a rising financial savings pool and reasonably priced loans. She used her first mortgage to buy an embroidery machine.