Leading ladies

Thursday was the first meeting of a women's leadership committee my socio Juan Carlos and I are trying to form, and it was awesome. Starting with the women who already hold leadership positions on the boards of their local water-users associations (an institution that every farming community has to regulate water-sharing practices), we are bringing these women leaders together to further promote women's empowerment, gender equality, and train them in management skills. Needless to say I am extremely excited for this project, and am hoping that we'll be able to successfully continue to expand it to other communities. 

For this first meeting with the ladies of Condebamba (the district next to Cajabamba), I planned a session that involved a couple of ice-breaker games and then a discussion of leadership. The señoras were big fans of the get-to-know-you activity that involved eating three little candies each - Peruvians love their sweets! And I was pleasantly surprised by their eager participation in the leadership training. Even among a group of ladies where none had completed high school (and some much less), they had no trouble coming up with a great topic-poem about what leadership entails:

The second main activity was a discussion of the characteristics of good versus bad leaders. Everyone contributed, and towards the end a few of the ladies got us into a spirited discussion of machismo and how women need to take a stronger part in leading their communities. Hopefully this bodes well for more good sessions in the future!