By Caleb Dorfman | Media & Development Coordinator
The sun comes up later in the community of Soccma because of its location in a steep Andean mountain valley. Though, by 5:30 AM, Bertha, who has lived in Soccma her entire life, has already begun her day. She starts by getting her two and a half year old daughter, Sheyla, ready for the day. She dresses her in warm layers and tops her off with a warm, fuzzy hat, common for the area’s children. Hilario, Bertha’s husband, has prepared breakfast of eggs and aguaymanto, a typical fruit of the Andes that is picked from the cactuses that grow in the area.
It all began one day in 2013. There is a general monthly assembly in Soccma, where everyone gets together to discuss matters of the community. Bertha had gone up the mountain with her sheep, but Hilario went to the assembly. This new organization called Ayni Wasi/Sacred Valley Health had come to speak and ask if anyone in the community wanted to be a community health worker with them. Hilario, thinking that she would be great with this kind of work, put his wife’s name in as someone who had interest in taking part. He then came home and told her all about it. At first, she didn’t quite understand what her role would be. Hilario explained that Ayni Wasi was looking for people to come to their office to learn basic health topics, which she would then come back to Soccma and teach her fellow community members.
Two days later, Ayni Wasi came back to Soccma to follow up with people who were interested in being a community health worker. Bertha, in her soft spoken but confident voice, told them she was interested.
Pretty soon, she was coming to trainings at the Ayni Wasi office in Ollantaytambo, and working as a promotora of health. She started out working as a promotora for the community of Raufka, however, after a few months, she switched to be a promotora in her own community of Soccma.
After a few years of being a promotora, Bertha decided that she wanted to be a docente, the community health worker who trains future generations of promotoras.
Having excelled at her position as a docente, Bertha was recently given a salaried position as a coordinator in the Ayni Wasi office in Ollantaytambo, which she comes to 3 days a week so as to still have time to work on her family’s chakra, or farm.
We are proud that Bertha took the opportunity to not only earn a salary in an office environment for the first time in her life, but also to be a leader within her community – someone people now look up to for advice and go to for help when their family members are sick or in need of medical attention.
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