Neide Ambrosio, known as Pretinha (centre in the left hand photo above) coordinates a group of disadvantaged women from cooperatives in Rio de Janeiro and São Paulo. She teaches these communities the traditional crochet techniques used in making these unique ecological handicrafts.
Because of Pretinha's work, such women are now able to make a living from such work, take pride in their occupation and support their families. A percentage of the sales they are able to generate goes to a day care centre for disadvantaged kids in Rio de Janeiro.
Says Pretinha, “I am very happy to be able to help other people getting a better life. I am also very glad that I can help the environment by using again all these cans.”
"I’ll tell you a bit about my story...
I am originally from São Paolo, and when I retired I moved to Rio de Janeiro because my husband is a singer, and Rio offers better career opportunities for artists. At the time, 12 years ago, my husband was very busy because he wanted to further his career as musician in Rio. It wasn't easy - I spent all my time alone. I was bored and feeling useless, money was a real problem. I was unhappy and I didn't have any friends.
One day I went walking all over Rio looking for an original present to give to a sick friend and I came upon a street market where I saw a woman making belts using recycled materials. I fell in love with that belt and I started talking with the woman. I confided how difficult it was for me to adapt to Rio, I was bored after retiring from a job in the University of Sao Paulo, my husbund was persuing his music and I didn't know what to do to ocupy my time and we were strugling financially. She felt compassion for me. She said that she would teach me how to crochet and use recycled objects, so that this could became a hobby for me.
The day after she came to my house and I started my first crochet class. And this is how it all began!
I decided to use soda pop ring pulls because I was always amazed with the amount of soft drinks and beer thrown in the rubbish, Brazilian people consume a lot of canned drinks, and in the beaches all over Brazil you can find thousands of soda pop cans. I started going to the beach collecting soda pops cans.
These days there are a lot of ‘catadores’ (‘pickers’) on the beaches picking the cans and fortunately this generates employment and our beaches are always clean.
My creativity started to boom and I went to show and sell my products on the beaches of Rio every day.
As the demand for my products increased, I was in a position to offer work to many young girls from very disadvantaged communities in Rio and Sao Paulo. They are unemployed and spent her time in the streets being vulnerable to “bad people”. I decided to teach them how to crochet and how to create pieces with soda pops ring pulls. Now I share my work with 22 girls!
I also teach in schools and other communities so they can become independent and creative with their own designs, selling their own designs. I believe the sun shines for everyone so I'm am very happy to be able to help other people getting a better life. I also I am very glad that I can help the environment by using recycled items".
