Meeting with women at San Mateo

July 16 2008

Today was a beautiful day in Antigua. It was sunny and everybody was enjoying the pleasant hot weather. I met with the new business advisor (BA). I explained about our pilot program and our main goal. She now knows that our main goal is that our borrowers have success and that the credit and the business education components will help our clients guarantee their successes. Then we went to Lyz, our potential loan officer. We had a meeting with her and we explained in brief the whole program. Then we started to drive toward San Mateo. My little CRV was like a bus, we had to pick up several women who also were going to the general meeting at San Mateo community. We took 8 people in my car, and the car only has room for 5 people, so you could imagine how tight we were, but it was fun to see everybody hugging each other because there was not enough space inside the car.

San Mateo probably will be our community for FNG. We all were excited to meet all the women in the community. We did not have any idea how many women we would meet; but we had already been there last week and we knew that the whole town knew that we were coming today.

We started at 2:30 and we brought some snacks, so women and children ate during our meeting. Lyz, the community leader of San Mateo, introduced us. Lyz told me that everybody has been asking about the possibility of receiving a loan. Lyz had already had a meeting on Monday 14th with 36 women about business plans. Therefore, we expected a similar number. Everybody introduced herself and they told me how many kids they have. Oh my God! There was a woman who has 13 kids. The average number of kids in a family is 4. So we can understand how busy these women could be in their home.

There were 50 women and 29 kids, so the room was pretty full, but they were motivated and curious to know about the loans. Many women did not have an idea clearly what a credit or loan are. I dramatized what it means to receive credit or a loan.

We explained our idea of having loans with an education component and they seemed interested to know more about it. After that we did a brainstormed about possible ideas for business. The most common idea was animal husbandry (pig, chicken, calf, and cow), others businesses were food such us making tortillas or selling food. Other women want to sell flowers, handicrafts, clothing and vegetables. They were also a group of women who want to cultivate vegetables as well. Many women want to sell pigs, I helped them to realize that if all women want to sell pigs, it probably will be not be a good business because there could be too much competition. They were very concerned about the payments and I explained to them that they only receive a loan if they are going to put into a business. If they conduct the business well, the business is going to pay the loan back. After I explained this, they seemed to be releived. I told them “si tu no pones el dinero en el negocio, no podemos hacer negocio” They laughed about this expression, but they seemed to be more relax to know that their business is going to help them to pay back the loan. This look so obvious, however we have to be aware that when we work with this population, there are so many needs that they can use the money for everything but for the business at least.

I also explained the business advisors idea. They seemed also very amazed about this idea, and I could see on their faces that this idea of having a personal business advisor was absolutely a strange idea. They were surprised when I told them that they have to contribute for the payment for their business advisors. I also explained that they are going to pay for the 7% of the loan amount for business education, mentorship and vocational training. All women were interested in receiving a loan and these education components. Nelly.F (the new business advisor) and I will visit each family in the following week

We also explained that we are visiting other communities, and that we need to further evaluate the community and the members in order to proceed with the program. They understand that nothing has been promised to them, that we are just learning about the communities and about them.

I also have to tell you that all children were amazed with the car, and they were trying to see what is inside the car. It seems difficult to be there sometimes and my heart gets small and I feel the need to cry to see so much poverty around us… But I also feel that we need to show some kind of “prueba” (proof) that we can really break the cycle of poverty with some extra effort and help, but we can do it. I have done it and they could do it too, and we, Namaste, are here to facilitate this process…and how Kristin H. said “we are here to provide new opportunities”