I became involved in the cooperativa because my sister works as a promotora for Community2Community. Rosalinda Guillen invited me to a training, and I went. It lasted five months, and it was about principles and values, about our rights and what we can and can’t do. Now I’m both a worker and an owner here.
Ana Lopez inspects a tree seedling in a Tierra y Libertad orchard.
Until I was five, I lived on a farm in near Tlaxiaco, in Oaxaca. I grew up speaking Triqui, the language of my town. Then I left with my mother to work in Baja California picking tomatoes, chiles, and cucumbers. I was 8 or 9.
When I was 12, we went back to Oaxaca, and lived there another five years. That’s why I have experience working the land—from that time. I cut wood for fuel to make tortillas, and I had to carry water from far away because we didn’t have a faucet.
Then we came here, and I’ve been…
Read the full article originally published at civileats.com.