More than anyone else, Doña Justina made me feel welcome in Imi when I first arrived. She made sure I knew what was going on, she helped me keep busy or plug in to community activities, she fretted over me if I didn't look perfectly healthy, and she piled food in front of me whenever, in her opinion, I was looking thin (most of the time). Justina has ten kids of her own and four grandchildren; she made me feel like one of the family.

Justina is very sharp. She can't use a calculator because she's illiterate and doesn't read numbers, but she can do math faster than anyone else can punch buttons. She managed the community store for its first five, uniquely successful years, entirely in her head. She is as articulate as her brother, Don Claudio, but I think she's wiser, more subtle. Her ambition, and her willingness to simply tell other people what to do, has occasionally made me uncomfortable, but it's ambition for her family and her community: both owe her a lot of credit.

Ailín is Justina's youngest child.