Sara a young lawyer seated at the table with executives from Cerro de Pasco mining corporation.

This International Women’s Day, I would like to honour and praise our mother Sara Vera. She brought me into this world, raised me, taught me the importance of values, and placed the bar high as a role model to me and to so many others. A trailblazer in every way, Sara, a woman of colour from working-class origins, became a lawyer at a time when most lawyers in Peru were men who belonged to families exclusively from the wealthiest districts of Lima.

Our mother’s name was Sara Sánchez Palacios when she was born into this world in Cajamarca, Peru on September 6. I can never remember the year, since as a good son I always remember my mom’s birthday but conveniently forget her age. Her mother was a fair-skinned woman–a daughter of a landowner of Spanish descent. Her father was in sharp contrast to her: a Runa Simi speaking man of Indigenous roots from Apurimac. That her parents fell in love and even met, despite the blatant racial discrimination of the time, is a testament to love. Therefore, the mere fact that Sara was born is proof that in the end, love conquers all.

Perhaps due to her diverse background, Sara was a person who could easily talk with and befriend anyone regardless of their roots or social standing. For example, my mother would tell me that when she studied law at the University of San Marcos in Lima, that her classmates were deeply divided by socioeconomic status and political beliefs. These very turbulent times were marked by the 1954 coup of democratically elected Guatemalan President Jacobo Árbenz, who tried to enact agrarian land reform in his country. As a result, Latin American universities were extremely polarized. Peaceful student protests followed by paramilitary repression were a daily occurrence in San Marcos. Despite these strong divisions, Sara was always trying to find ways to bring her colleagues together and find common bonds between them. One of her finest accomplishments as a student was how she convinced her wealthy classmates of the social committee to choose a more affordable and inclusive club for their graduation party, instead of the exclusive club in Lima that they had originally selected.

She had a manner of convincing people to do the right thing that I have never seen to this day. My mom could return anything she purchased in any store without a receipt–even past the return date. As a good lawyer, she knew that there were written rules and unwritten rules. And often fairness was an unwritten rule.

One day while driving here in Canada, a police officer stopped her since she was driving without her plate stickers. When the officer asked where the stickers where, Sara replied, “oh, my husband forgot to place them. Could you please place them for me?” I have an image of this police officer with a Support our Troops bumper sticker, kneeling on a busy road in Scarborough in the middle of the harsh Canadian winter to place the plate stickers on my mom’s car. If she could convince this officer to be kind, just imagine how much kindness she could bring out in other people.

Her doctoral thesis in San Marcos was on agrarian peasant land reform, which shows that despite having grown up in urban Lima, the capital of Peru, she never forgot that her ancestors came from the Andes mountains. No los negamos. “We don’t deny them,” she would tell me. It was her way of saying, don’t forget where you came from and stay true to your roots. Years later I would learn that my grandfather, in order to avoid discrimination, changed his surname from Sánchez Aycho to Sánchez Valenzuela (i.e., he replaced Aycho, his mother’s indigenous family name, for the Spanish sounding Valenzuela).

For those that only met Sara the past 10 years, how I wish you had met her before she developed Alzheimer’s. She was the most alert driver I ever knew, and when she saw an opening, she would take it. Yet, she was always very safe. She was also an incredible multitasker. She would help her fellow Peruvians, who had immigrated to Canada, to settle into their new homes while encouraging them to stay faithful to their origins. She also taught Spanish at several community colleges, she was an amazing tennis player, and she would cook such incredible meals that my childhood felt like growing up in the kitchen of a Michelin rated restaurant.

Despite Alzheimer’s, mom would still impress us with her clever sense of humour and the way she looked at the world with a lens of fairness and justice. While I became an engineer like my dad, I often wished that I had become a lawyer just like my mom. This passion drove me to study public policy and take construction law courses later in my career.

Our dear mother, Sara Vera Sánchez, passed away last year in the early hours of June 3rd, 2023, a beautiful spring day full of hope, just like her.

Sara, you are an inspiration to me, and to so many people. And though you have left the physical world, your love, kindness, wisdom, spirit, and life lessons will always be with us for generations to come.

Tupananchiskama, which in Runa Simi–the language of your father–means “until life brings us together again” is what we want to say to you.

_{Sara loved tennis and had the grace of a dancer.}