Risen Women
Amina used to walk with her head down. Not because she was shy, but because life had pressed her down for too long. She was married off at 17, had three children by 23, and worked every day selling fruits by the roadside in Kaduna.
Her husband had left her years ago. No explanation. No support. Just silence.
She almost gave up.
But one evening, while peeling oranges in her small wooden stall, she heard women talking nearby. They were laughing, talking about a free class in town a women’s training center that taught sewing, soap making, and how to run a small business.
Amina listened from a distance for days before gathering courage to ask about it.
She started attending the classes quietly. At first, she doubted herself. She didn’t finish secondary school. She thought she was “too old” to start something new. But the teacher, a young woman named Sarah, told her, “You’re not too old. You’re right on time.”
Within months, Amina had learned how to sew children’s clothes. She started with small items,caps, skirts, shirts,using a borrowed machine at the center. Then she began selling them to neighbors, who praised her work.
Slowly, she saved up enough to buy her own secondhand sewing machine.
Her stall, once only for fruits, now displayed neatly folded clothes made with colorful Ankara fabric. People started calling her “Mama Tailor.” Her children, once ashamed of their situation, now bragged, “My mother made this!”
One day, a young girl asked her, “Aunty, how did you learn to sew?”
Amina smiled and said, “I didn’t rise alone. Women helped me.”
Now, she teaches two young women at her stall after market hours. She shares what she learned, not just about sewing,but about standing up, even after falling hard.
Moral: A risen woman is not one who never struggled,but one who refused to stay down. And when she rises, she lifts others with her.