| This 47-year old is originally
from Maranhao state but for 8 years she worked as a cook during the gold
mining boom of the 1980's in Para state. She got leprosy as the hygiene
standards and the working conditions in the gold mines were terrible. In
2002 she was hired to work as cook in a farm in south Para. There was no
contract and she got paid 34 pounds / month to cook for a team of workers
clearing the fields. But she never received the full salary. For periods
of up to 5 months she would receive no money at all. If she would ask for
the money the "gato" would say that he had no money for her and
she always believed one day she would receive her money. She worked 7 days
/ week staying up to 4 months without a single day of break, being unable
to see her son who lives not so far from the farm. She lived in a poor wooden
hut inside the farm. She was the only woman in the hut shared with other
4 workers. There was no sanitation. The water she drank was the same she
used to wash. Inside the hut they stored the water for cooking and drinking
in plastic containers originally used for lubricating oil. They ate only
rice and beans unless one of the workers managed to hunt a wild animal or
to fish. For the last 60 days they didn't have any meat. Occasionally there
was no food in the morning for her to prepare and the workers would go to
work with empty stomachs. Raimunda once told the farmer that the workers
were shaking of hunger but he did nothing for them. There was no medical
support and she never had her skin condition checked while in that farm.
The Federal Police raided the farm and rescued the workers. The farmer was
forced to pay her 9.100 reais (1.820 pounds) of unpaid salaries.
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