Empowering Women in Rural Arequipa, Peru

In 2007, Deisy arrived in Arequipa with her younger sister. The girls were 19 and 11 at the time, and they’d left behind their parents and twelve siblings on their family’s small, isolated farm eight hours northwest of Cusco. They arrived in the city after days of travel by bus, with hopes of finishing their educations and finding jobs.

In the ten years since arriving in the city, Deisy has had to adjust her stride for a lifetime’s worth of hurdles. Now a single mother to four children, she remains committed to education; through HOOP, she currently participates in a government program for adults that helps them complete their primary and/or high school educations, as needed. Currently, Deisy is working toward her high school diploma: “I never thought that I would be able to finish school but it was always my biggest dream. Everyday I sit down to do my homework and even my children are saying, ‘Mom, have you done your homework yet? This year you will finish high school.’”

Deisy has been a part of HOOP since the very beginning. She comes to the school nearly every day and, in her own words: “My youngest two children were born at HOOP.”

She’s not a shy woman, but she takes her responsibilities as a mother very seriously and is often personally reserved. In workshops and meetings though, she is one of the more vocal women, always participating in medical campaigns and helping at community events. Her effort and energy are a source of inspiration to the community she has seen, and helped, grow since she joined HOOP, but for her it’s a very reciprocal relationship: “HOOP has helped me a lot in my personal development. I have learned many things in the workshops and courses and now I have a lot of friends.”

Deisy recently shared that her two daughters received school-wide awards for being the best English students in their classes. She’s pictured here holding one of her sons, a next-generation HOOPster who’s still too young to understand how his mother’s strength indisputably contributed to her daughters’ academic success, but HOOP can and does recognize this incredible woman’s resilience and determination. Above all, we are humbled to know we have been useful for her: “HOOP is an organization that helps all of us who really need it.”

Photos by: Anita Parewyck-Bonnarens for Photographers Without Borders