50 Women: Book Two

By Jessica Buchleitner

50 Women, Book Two is the second book in a two book anthology series of personal stories of strength and perseverance told by 50 different women from 30 countries. In these individual stories, the women discuss their unique experiences overcoming obstacles concerning political, cultural and societal issues, armed conflict, gender based

• Language: English
• Publisher: Nikita Publishing
• Release date: Nov 24, 2015
• ISBN: 9780990337539

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Praise for 50 Women, Book Two

Inspiring tales of women who’ve surmounted incredible odds.

Julia Scheeres,

New York Times bestselling author of

Jesus Land: A Memoir and A Thousand Lives:

The Untold Story of Hope, Deception, and Survival at Jonestown

While no one woman or one story will represent an entire experience, each woman’s story is an important piece of our shared experience. This project seeks to add often-unheard nuance to our shared experience, and to uplift each woman and her story, and all of us, in the process.

Araceli Campos,

president, City of Los Angeles Commission

on the Status of Women

History has hushed the voices of women. Here, those voices roar into nourishing stories that benefit us all.

Cameron Conaway,

2015 fellow, International Reporting Project (Thailand),

2015 grantee, Pulitzer Center on Crisis Reporting (India),

author of Malaria, Poems, and

former executive editor of The Good Men Project

"50 Women, Book One was so compelling and important in helping us begin to understand the lives of so many women all over the world from the Middle East, Africa, and other regions. With the publication of 50 Women, Book Two, Jessica Buchleitner continues to provide fascinating and intimate portraits of individual women’s lives, including their barriers and successes. The storytelling is not only very insightful and rich, it also provides critically important commentary about the diverse lives, cultures, and statuses of women from the Americas and Europe. I applaud Jessica’s work on 50 Women, Book One and 50 Women, Book Two and have shared Book One with young women and girls who will become future leaders in the world. I am happy there is a Book Two and that these stories continue to move and inspire."

Liz Abzug,

professor, Barnard College, Columbia University and

founder/CEO, Bella Abzug Leadership Institute

"50 Women, Book Two makes clear that there is no doubt about the strength of women of all ages. All of us will be inspired by these accounts and be assured we should seize the moment as well as the years and decades on the horizon to hit the ground running."

Rita Henley Jensen,

founder and editor in chief, Women’s eNews

"This book gives voice to the complex and deeply moving experiences of a range of women. Across countries, cultures, and classes, the stories in this volume offer gut-wrenching insights into the often vicious politics of gender in contemporary societies. Yet, they also offer a vision of courage and compassion. 50 Women, Book Two is, ultimately, about the strength it takes to be a survivor."

Meenakshi Gigi Durham,

author of The Lolita Effect and

professor, University of Iowa

These writings take you to the battlefields that women face each day because of discrimination and the constant mutilation of their rights and dignity. After reading these stories no one could say this isn’t happening. Everyone needs to acknowledge there is a lot more to do. Men and women need to stand against violence in any form. Peace will come faster if each person stands up for what is right. Silence is not an option anymore. Let’s fight with activism by calling out injustices everywhere.

Ada Alvarez,

founder and president of Stop the Silence Foundation and

director of Women Committee in the Senate of Puerto Rico

"50 Women, Book Two is a powerful example of pro-voice—supporting women as they tell their own story in their own words. Let’s listen closely, with open minds, and promise to give our support and respect."

Aspen Baker,

founder/executive director of Exhale and

author of Pro-Voice: How to Keep Listening

When the World Wants a Fight

"50 Women, Book Two brings forth powerful stories of how and why it is imperative that women tell their stories. Through this work, women in our global community unite in a common goal of shared compassion, storytelling, and ownership of their own dreams, destinies, and fates. There is nothing more important than the ability to have your own voice and tell your own story."

Dr. Raye Mitchell,

CEO/chief enthusiast for Women & Girls and

founder, WomenLeadForward.com

"50 Women, Book Two is a compelling collection of life stories honoring the unique struggles and triumphs that make up each woman’s life. The power of honoring each life as a part of a collection of life stories is that it also serves to normalize and de-exceptionalize the suffering and struggles that come into life through trauma, economic hardship, disease, and war. Buchleitner’s collection of stories softens the heart, opens the mind to reveal the systematic hardships facing women, and provides encouragement to the reader about the resilience of the human spirit."

Cecilia Lipp,

executive director,

International Action Network for Gender Equity and Law

"The 50 Women anthology series is a fascinating read! Documenting women’s stories from around the world, this book provides insight into the challenges women face across cultures, and also inspires us with stories demonstrating women’s strength, courage, and fortitude in their struggles to overcome harrowing obstacles. How wonderful to hear the voices of so many powerful women."

Diane Tober, PhD,

medical anthropologist

"It is crucial that we give underrepresented women a platform to tell their stories. The 50 Women anthology series ensures that their histories are preserved and their legacies inspire future generations."

Amy Aquilino,

distribution manager, Women Make Movies

"The 50 Women anthology series is an inspiring, insightful, and empowering read. The compelling narratives in this collection are woven together with words that capture hearts and minds. This book is filled with many role models from different countries, and for me, it sparks reflection about my own life experiences and places my own struggles in the global context of women’s lives. This powerful anthology helps us to envision socially positive changes from a paradigm of love."

Elahe Amani,

women’s human rights and gender equality advocate,

university lecturer, journalist, and

chair of Global Circle for Women’s Intercultural Network

"50 Women, Book One begged for 50 Women, Book Two. Rarely does a series extend storytelling power to so many women at home and abroad. Their voices walk us up a ladder each narrative climbs. I dare men to read, if only every woman’s last paragraph of advice. Together we hunger for a 50 Women, Book Three."

Bronwyn Kay Galloway, JD/MA,

United Nations Association San Francisco Women’s Committee

These are the stories of fifty brave women who have seen it all, from the horrors of war, poverty, and domestic violence to the challenges of giving life and surviving against all odds. Jessica Buchleitner delivers these testimonies in a compelling and engaging narrative. Through this recollection, you can’t help but to feel inspired and humbled, for all the hardships in the world are nothing compared to the strength of a woman who believes in herself.

Cynthia Arvide,

freelance journalist, Mexico

If we do not know that there are captives, how can they be set free? Jennifer’s story is a timely and important alert that physical and psychological torture of our youth takes place under the guise of therapy in so-called troubled teen programs across the world. Telling stories like hers is neither easy nor comfortable, but she does so with grace, vulnerability, and conviction that hers is a story that must be heard.

Kate Logan,

director and producer of Kidnapped for Christ

"50 Women, Book Two is a must-read! The courage and passion shared by these women grabs you and shakes you. Mona’s story is especially important as Lyme disease is an epidemic around the world and impacts the health of millions. As Mona’s account shows, it can take years to get a diagnosis, then to get the treatment to heal and recover in addition to find resources too many do not have to succeed. Awareness is key to getting help as Lyme is the great imitator. Be like Mona and all the women of 50 Women, Book Two and never give up!"

Mara Williams,

RN, MSN, ANP-BC, author of

Nature’s Dirty Needle: What You Need to Know About

Chronic Lyme Disease and How to Get the Help To Feel Better

and director of Inanna House Treatment Center

50 Women

Book Two

Compiled By

Jessica Buchleitner

50 Women, Book Two

First Edition

Copyright © 2015 by Jessica Buchleitner

All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reproduced or transmitted in any form or by any means without written permission of the author.

Compiled by Jessica Buchleitner

Editors: Nancee Adams-Taylor and Patricia McKenna

Cover design by Vanessa Maynard

Map illustrations by Jessica Buchleitner

Layout by Jera Publishing

ISBN: 978-0-9903375-2-2 (print)

978-0-9903375-3-9 (eBook)

LCCN: 2014910300

Published by:

Nikita Publishing 

Alameda, California USA

Please visit www.50womenproject.org

Contents

Introduction

Acknowledgments

Dedication

South America

Monica

Argentina

Silvia

Peru

Maria Josina

Brazil

Amparo

Colombia

Central America and Mexico

Anonimo

Mexico

Geraldine

El Salvador

Rosalba

Mexico

Sara

Mexico

Carmen

Guatemala

Enma

El Salvador

Reina

El Salvador

North America

Jennifer

United States

Siobhan

United States

Dana

United States

Antoinette

United States

Michelle

United States

Annie

United States

Anne Helen

United States

Mona

United States

Claudia

United States

A. Alwyn Carrier

United States

Cristhal

United States

Western Europe

Julia

Germany

Christina

Spain

Introduction

The culmination of a six-year journey of playing hunter-gatherer with women’s stories now sits on my laptop in black-and-white text documents that are currently being shuffled back and forth between an editor and myself with all edits neatly tracked.

Her changes are tracked in green and mine in red. Each time one of us makes a deletion, an addition, or a comment, an ants marching line appears, leading to a box on the right side of the page. Every keystroke, thought, and action is neatly documented in a chronology of date-stamped multicolored boxes. They are recordings of the development of the final book in the 50 Women anthology series, all saved minute by minute, without one action failing to be accurately accounted for.

Why don’t our tumultuous lives follow such a pattern? Why is there not some outside source chronicling every fluctuation, our life milestones, and the very events that mold and shape our consciousness so future generations can read about our brightest days, our darkest hours, and how we evolved? We try to make our experiences live forever by taking photographs, writing in journals, keeping scrapbooks, listening to songs, and guarding special possessions. Humans are natural preservationists.

Yet, there remain too many untold stories hanging in the air. As if the wind, an elusive phenomenon, carries them above our heads where they invisibly float like lost souls suspended in the ether of waiting: of joy, of birth, of change, of loss, of hope, of sorrow, of strength.

One question I have asked continuously through compiling the 50 Women anthology series— through publishing 50 Women, Book One and still as I complete 50 Women, Book Two—Why am I doing this?

I sought out these women in order to record human experiences from some of the most trying world events in the last several decades. The power of narrative is unparalleled. A statistic is forgettable. It’s never going to move you the way a human experience can.

In other cases, I decided to compile this because sometimes I fear the world is dying, hemorrhaging. Because people just aren’t patient anymore and too many of them stay broken. Because we watch movies with guns and explosions, yet no one knows what’s going on in Kabul or Mogadishu.

Because even the slightest accomplishment is a certain victory over those who have tried to execute you.

Because I, too, had untold secrets sitting as a lump in my throat, and perhaps if other women told me theirs I could finally swallow my own.

Because when I started to compile the 50 Women series, I didn’t know how to work my digital voice recorder, how to be open, or how to speak, really.

Through the numerous rereads of each of these stories present in 50 Women, Book One and Book Two, my head flooded with the memories I generated in collecting them:

I remember the baby I saw in the renowned San Francisco Women’s Building crawling hurriedly on the floor outside a multipurpose classroom. He tugged at my pants and I picked him up in my arms. He bounced his tiny fist off of my shoulder, and I wondered if I would ever be good enough to be a mother.

I remember the Afghan weddings where I danced—the tribal drums of music melting me into the floor as I swayed my arms like willow branches to their rhythm. With that dance, I believed I could live forever.

I remember the gleam in the mahogany eyes of one of my many Afghan sisters when we went to the beach and waded to our knees as the frigid water stung our veins and icy waves broke so fiercely we lost all sensation in our feet. It was the first time she ever saw the ocean.

I remember the African dinner I shared with Jean Claude and Neema and its filling simplicity of pasty white rice and vegetables covered in a red sauce. We ate with our hands and the sauce dripped on the sleeve of my shirt. I felt the heat of the food on my fingertips, as though it was a living, beating heart.

I remember the foreign spicy tastes of Zara’s Malaysian food with its coconut hues and cardamom—a meal over which we would open up to each other, leading to hours of tears, laughter, and memories of her pet monkey. Talking to Zara was like being in the warm sun after taking a swim in a freezing ocean.

I remember my first meeting with the women of Mujeres Unidas y Activas in San Francisco, how my words delayed as I spoke to them through a translator, and how I watched the expressions on their faces change and their eyes flicker as she spoke, explaining to them all the specifics of the project. We went around the table and each one of them finished her sentence with, I have struggled, but I am strong…

I remember the evening spent with Maria Josina and how her entire extended family came and went during the three hours, at times joining us, crowding around her as she sat in the center of the room, and erupting into unabashed laughter at her stories which many of them were hearing for the first time.

I remember meeting Li Jing at the Amnesty International general meeting in 2011. She was a small, slightly woman from China with an aggressive demeanor and a personality that leaked from her core, like the yoke from a smashed egg. She had a box of photos, similar to the old family picture boxes that my mother has. The lid was torn and the rose imprint faded from the number of oily hands that had handled it. I leafed through nearly one hundred photographs, gawking at image after image—a visual exhibition of unspeakable brutality.

She told me she had collected these pictures from survivors of illegal torture interrogations performed by the Chinese government. She said she shows them to anyone and everyone she meets, so maybe they will end up on the news. She clutched the tattered box tight against her chest as she spoke.

She wanted me to take the box of photos home so I could show everyone I knew. I stared up at the chandelier and at the marble in the hotel lobby where we sat. What would I do with that box? How could I readily take something that had become her life’s work? How was it that we were having that conversation in such a posh setting, with seas of suited Amnesty members floating about? Does summer come for everyone?

I politely declined the box.

There was nothing dignifying in those pictures. Only unraveled souls. A quiet, yet ruthless end to forgotten lives.

These were the human interaction parts of compiling both 50 Women books. Then comes the structured, the logical, the mundane—the editing. When I have had to trim the stories or remove certain sections, I feel as though I have lost a part of me. This is not melodrama; this is the phenomenon that occurs when you truly fall in love with something you have done and with the people who are part of it. You fear that shortening a story will detract from the understanding of its message. You worry that all of its raving authenticity will fail to be communicated and drown in the white noise of smothering reality.

After all, the greatest injustice that exists in this world is silence.

Silence pounds too heavy on the heart.

But in order to be heard, you must also be vulnerable. To that, I have to say to all of the women in 50 Women, Book One and Book Two: Thank you for opening up places in my heart I didn’t ever know existed. For taking down all of the walls I had so carefully erected around myself one by one until I was very raw and crumbled. But also, thank you for showing me how to truly live without fear. Through your stories of survival, I realize that the only regret we have is all we didn’t do, all we didn’t say, all we failed to express our gratitude for and all the good people in our lives we overlook.

Those of you who tomorrow are still alive, why are you so afraid to be vulnerable?

Jessica Buchleitner

San Francisco, CA

2015

Very little grows on jagged rock.

Be ground. Be crumbled,

so wildflowers will come up

where you are.

You have been stony for too many years.

Try something different. Surrender.

—Rumi

Acknowledgments

First and foremost, I want to thank all the women in this second book in the series of 50 Women for their courage—their courage to be unconquerable, to remain unbroken by circumstances that obliterate so many others, and to relive painful memories and experiences when telling me their stories. I am humbled. You have all completely turned me inside out. Thank you.

Thank you to my two editors who helped this book make sense: Patricia McKenna and Nancee Adams-Taylor.

A big nod goes to Vanessa Maynard for giving 50 Women, Book Two a beautiful cover/face.

To Mujeres Unidas y Activas for fighting tirelessly to ensure immigrant women have equal rights, fair wages, and opportunities to improve their lives. It was a pleasure working with your community.

To Women’s Intercultural Network for their ongoing support and for being my window to the United Nations. A person learns much about the state of the world when they are face-to-face with matters of international relations. All of these experiences have been good lessons for me.

To Paul Voglewede, who served as a Spanish translator for six interviews, muchas gracias.

For all the situations I have encountered and subsequent humbling lessons I have learned in compiling this series over the last six years, thank you to the Universe, God, Allah, Jehovah, or whatever it is that you call the Alpha and the Omega. Thank you, Thank you, Thank you.

Dedication

This book, like 50 Women, Book One, is also dedicated to the mad, the perpetrated, the forgotten, the seemingly beaten, the discriminated, the strong of heart, the fierce yet weary souls, the victimized and the 50 warriors of light (my heart and soul embodied).

May all you reading these stories have the strength to choose life.

To Dana Davies Coffin, whom we lost before she was able to see 50 Women, Book Two in its final form. Dana, your legacy and experiences live on in these pages.

50 Women

Views expressed in 50 Women, Book Two are solely those of the participants and do not reflect the personal views, beliefs or opinions of the author. This book contains graphic descriptions of violent acts and very sensitive topics. Reader discretion is advised.

South America

Monica

Argentina

In Monica’s early childhood, her mother, Adriana Urman, was an assistant to one of the revolutionary leaders in Argentina during the 1976–1981 dictatorship and de facto presidency of Jorge Rafael Videla. An estimated 13,000 to 30,000 people went missing during the revolution that resulted from Videla’s reign, and most of them were under forty years of age. Monica’s life began in exile as she was forced to flee Argentina due to her mother’s political ties with the revolution. Her experiences in exile have ultimately become her current life mission.

Although my mother, Adriana Urman, passed away fourteen years ago, she is still a huge part of who I am. It has taken me years to come to terms with some of the decisions that she had to make when I was very young, but now I understand them and feel I have a better grasp of who she was as my mother and as a woman.

My mother was a hero; she was a warrior. Although she was born into a privileged life, she dedicated her youth to fighting against the Videla dictatorship for the people of Argentina. Her involvement with revolutionary leaders led to an exiled childhood for me, but after all the struggles we experienced, I realize it was my mother who made me the woman I am today.

Adriana’s Activism

During my mother’s student years, there were many changes occurring in Argentina. When she became an activist, she worked against a military junta that went back to the days of Juan Perón.

As the president of Argentina, Juan Perón was very famous and adored by many people; yet, to others, he was despised and viewed as a dictator. You may be familiar with him and his second wife, Eva Perón, from the popular musical Evita. You may have seen Madonna on the big screen singing Don’t Cry for Me Argentina, a great musical rendition and a pretty inaccurate portrayal of what was going on at the time in Argentina. As first lady of Argentina, Eva was well known for her work dedicated to the women’s movement, labor rights, and the poor. She passed away in 1952 from cancer and has since become a legend in Argentina. After her passing, Juan Perón married Isabel Martínez, who served as his vice president.

Perón passed away in 1974 and was succeeded by Isabel, who immediately became the president. After her removal from office in 1976 by a coup d’état that led to the formation of the military junta, Jorge Rafael Videla became the de facto president of Argentina from 1976 to 1981. Many would agree that his reign was a dictatorship because of all of the human rights violations in those times. I have heard estimates that up to 30,000 people were subjected to forced disappearance and most likely killed; many were illegally detained and tortured, and others went into exile, like me and my mother.

The government had a public relations machine operating at that time to cover up their abuses to the global community. I remember being just seven years old when they hosted the World Cup in Argentina in 1978 and going to one of the most posh coffee shops, Café La Biela, in a neighborhood called Recoleta, named after the cemetery where Perón is buried. As a seven-year-old, I was hoisted onto a table to jump up and down after we won against Holland because the slogan was He who doesn’t jump is a Dutchman. It was a huge celebration all around town; yet blocks away, people were being tortured and held in military camps. The United Nations and the organizations fighting to stop this knew about these military camps and still allowed Argentina to host the World Cup. It was practically brainwashing as a form of public relations, as if they were trying to show how supposedly wonderful everything was and that nothing terrible was happening.

Given all of the turmoil, I cannot believe my mother took part in the revolution. She was always a silver-spoon girl. My mother was studying nursing and finance when she was slowly pulled into the huge segment of the population that raised their heads and stood up against the dictatorship. It was a typical story—the silver spoon girl fighting against the dictator for the people. Quote, unquote.

My mother married my father within six months of having met him, though they divorced when I was two and a half years old. I think she married quickly because she wanted to get out of her parents’ house, away from her controlling mother, and on to a more independent lifestyle.

She was in her early twenties when she initially became politically involved. My mother was an extremely smart woman who could not tolerate injustice. Her passion led to her role as the personal assistant of one of the revolutionary leaders in Argentina during the dictatorship of Videla. Eventually her work led the government to blacklist her, as well as many of the prominent activists during that time. She was very heavily involved in politics when she became pregnant with me in 1971.

She was part of a militant revolutionary group, but they were not a military operation because they did not use arms. They worked underground to distribute information in the form of pamphlets and flyers about the revolution. Perhaps it does not sound dangerous, but anyone caught with those items would disappear. The dictatorship would kidnap them, and they would never be seen or heard from again; people were thrown alive from helicopters into deep waters—imagine that. My mother worked directly alongside some people who vanished so she was always looking over her shoulder. When my mother was seven or eight months pregnant with me, she was carrying a suitcase full of pamphlets. The handle on the suitcase broke when she tried to put it into a taxi, and a very kind police officer stopped to help her lift it up. The police officer asked her what she was carrying, and she invented a story about moving out of her parents’ home and told him books were inside. If that suitcase had broken open, she would have been, as we say in Spanish, chupada or sucked—an expression that was used when a civilian was sucked into the system and disappeared. She would have probably been tortured and killed. I would have been born, but they would have given me away to one of the families in the military. It would have been a treat for them to get a baby girl with green eyes and curly hair.

It has taken me a lifetime of contemplation to ask myself if I would have been that brave. Would I be able to do what she did in that space and time? To me, she has always been supermom, superhuman, superintelligent, and supergiving. She gave me everything I needed, with all the burden of raising me resting on her shoulders. At the same time, she was so naïve. I even went through a period where I thought all the things she did were just plain stupid!

Consider being twenty-three years old, pregnant, carrying a suitcase full of revolution brochures and having a police officer almost see what was inside. How naïve and crazy is that? Now I realize that she is amazing. Even after we had to flee Argentina when I was seven years old, how strong of a woman she was to have left with a young daughter to care for on her own.

In fact, we found out two weeks after we left Argentina that the apartment we had lived in had been broken into and raided. There was only about a fourteen-day window from the moment we left to the time when they tracked her as somebody of importance to suck into the system. We barely made it out of the country and were lucky that we did. If we had stayed, I never would have seen my mother again.

There were also personality traits that my mother took away from her days as a revolutionary assistant. Growing up and eventually going back to Argentina, I never understood her insane aversion to being late. If I was five minutes late coming home, I would catch hell. Finally, in a teenage rage I asked and got my answer: she explained her ingrained terror existed because back in the day, if you missed a meeting with one of your colleagues, it meant that you were dead or something happened to you. If you were arrested under these circumstances, you would probably not hold out too long before you told the police who you were meeting and where you were meeting them and they would also be arrested. It was very serious. When you were late or did not show up, the activists would have to leave and go to another place without you. They could not risk being caught.

It puzzled me that this still affected her fifteen years later. It was such a life on the edge that some of the behaviors developed as a revolutionary stayed with her for life. I would compare this to a war veteran who spends years dodging sniper bullets, only to return home and find himself glancing over every rooftop that he passes.

Life in Exile

The details of my mother telling me we had to leave Argentina are foggy, but two memories are clear: I remember sitting in a café with her and hearing the words we need to leave. I never understood why at the time because I was only a little girl. I don’t think my mother had all of the details of where we were going that day; I just think she knew that we could not stay in Argentina because it was too dangerous given her political background. The second memory is of me sorting through my collection of pens and markers. I could only take a few. I still have the yellow one with the flower-like head. I’ve carried it around from country to country for over thirty-six years. I will show it to my almost three-year-old daughter some day when