Woman and coffee: The same world

With citric notes, bitter or sweet, a bit strong and toned, that's the coffee; like a woman.

After a cup of coffee, there are many stories that in the world are yet to be recognized. The coffee growing woman; a housewife, a planter, a collector, a barista and a businesswoman. Day by day she offers her hands, her mind and her heart to the world of coffee. Today these letters are raised in female power, in the scent of that cup of coffee that we enjoy daily and in the mountains of my Colombian countryside.

Mrs. Betty Campo Fernández

Being like Betty Campo, it's not easy. It is admirable everything that this woman achieves in her life and in the lives of others. Caucana Woman (from the department of Cauca, Colombia) who came to Pijao a few years ago with her family in search of the life she enjoys today.

The world of special coffee welcomed her with great pleasure for 4 years when her father Mr. Leo Campo began this great work and passion shared with his whole family.

Betty and her mother are the support of Villa Gloria farm where 7 hectares of coffee are harvested among Guamos, Bananas and Fruit trees. Every day Betty alternates the kitchen work with other tasks in the field ranging from feeding pigs and chickens, washing and hanging clothes, moving the “elba” coffee, organizing, cleaning and welcoming with the warmth of the firewood and her helpful hands to her family and every visitor and worker on the farm. Two days a week, she walks for an hour and a half along Pijao to get to her class about coffee processes. There is always a future in her mind that enjoys as much as she does it today. She is a curious and active woman and a future coffee entrepreneur.

Her hands sustain a whole family and several workers, her firm and determined mind prepares the future and strengthens the family economy and her heart heats home with the "music" of her wood stove. She is the best example for her two daughters and for the feminine power she represents. The housewife of the farm.

Mrs. Martha Cecilia Santa Cruz

As long as she can remember, she was walking among bushes and mountains with the smell of coffee; in her free time she cut wood, hacked with the machete and supported other tasks on the farm where she lived with her parents as assistants; labors that nourished her being and her love for the countryside that forged her peasant identity and traced her life and future.

Doña Martha works in the field collecting coffee. She is a strong woman who "equals" her strength with that of other co-workers, who are mostly men. She does it with honor and with the knowledge that she is doing well, having a job that she enjoys and gives her the sustenance for her children. She notes that she should choose the reddest grains of the plant without dropping the unripe beans onto the floor to avoid attracting the borer. While doing so, she thinks about her children, what are they doing? , she asks. Today, Doña Martha would like to leave early, she is tired and that is why sometimes she feels that she wants to stop working, but she has a family to respond to and that is enough reason, to wake up again tomorrow and represent the feminine power among the coffee plantations. The collector.

Maribel Raigoso Tello

"Raised within the nectar of the essence of our land" this is how this woman introduces herself. She was born and grew in an area of Pijao municipality among an authentic family coffee, between gatherings to the notes of her father's tiple who was her first example of humility, patience and transparency. From her mother she inherited entrepreneurship (what in this land we call "berraquera") and the purpose of recognizing that rough diamond that each home has: the woman.

She always liked the countryside and she learned to work coffee from her father, she studied a special coffee technology and she loved it more every single day and she was proud among their coffee plantations. She applied the techniques studied in the process of the farm that manages, from the seed, transplant and harvest. Her first golden dream was fulfilled.countryside and she learned to work coffee from her father, she studied a special coffee technology and she loved it more every single day and she was proud among their coffee plantations. She applied the techniques studied in the process of the farm that manages, from the seed, transplant and harvest. Her first golden dream was fulfilled.

Maribel, curious, enterprising and inspiring. Today, she is part of a shared dream, where she reaped her work in supporting and recognizing the work of women in the municipality of Pijao. And along with other allies and other 11 women make up Paisaje, Café y Mujer, a coffee shop or Business Center as she says; where women enter the world of coffee through the sale of grain, prepared coffee and handicrafts, support 12 families, color a village with their "berraquera" and inspire future generations, like her three children who also empowered her life around the world of coffee as her mother does.The entrepreneur

Gloria Patricia Bueno

A youth association of her school was the seed of this passion. It all started in harmony with her curiosity to learn something new. Gloria undertakes a journey between sowing, sprouts, harvesting, washing, roasting and the final product every day. Barismo has taught her to value the work of each coffee process and therefore feels and faces the great responsibility that she has when representing before a cup, all the work of many peasants.

As a woman, she believes that she makes this work more than serving a drink, that's why she is curious to learn, innovate and train other people in the coffee world.

She says that coffee has life and is very sensitive, absorbs and perceives everything that is around it; that's why she always tries to have the best disposition to make the best coffee in the world, and shows the great work of each character that took part in its creation. The barista.

The woman; she, who does not stay with the first answer, to which a single crop is not enough, she who gathers the best moments as the best mature and strong grains, to always improve them, and thus shape, a good home, excellent children, the best businesses and other beings.

And now, about to have a coffee, how many women do you think are behind that cup? I hope that the next café will be a reason for reflection, dedicated to Doña Betty, Martha, Maribel and Gloria and every woman who silently stars in the world of coffee.

Written by: LaurAcostaJ