Doña Josefina

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I came to Mexico City when I was about ten years old, six of us were orphaned in our home and that was when we were told that it would be better to come here. But we thought that Mexico was a little village and that we were going to work in the country. I came to find many buildings and many houses in the city. I wanted to build bonfires, I searched for fire to make tortillas and here you couldn't make a fire. Here they used a brazier with coal. So I had to get a brazier to make the tortillas*.

When I came here I used to dress as a "maría"** and I walked barefoot selling sweet and bitter limes in the street. Later I worked as a servant dressed as a "maría" and without speaking Spanish. I worked near Niño Perdido, by the San Juan de Letrán market. My bosses treated me well because when I didn't understand they repeated everything. I was about ten years old. It was around 1963 and I earned one peso per month and as I worked there for three months because I burnt myself with the stove, well I earned three pesos. I started to trade when I was fourteen and I bought myself rubber shoes and dresses.

Coming on fifteen I met my husband and I went with him, but I still wasn't fifteen. Once I was married I continued to sell pumpkin seeds and nuts in honey toffee, I sold things, I sold different things, until now that my brother helps me by selling pork crackling with lime.

*Tortillas, maize pancakes which are a staple of the Mexican diet.
**Derogatory name used to call women of Indian origin who live in Mexico City.

Story told by Josefina Flores Romualdo, native of San Felipe del Progreso, State of Mexico.
She lives in Mexico City.