This third week spent with CraftHER in Kerala was one of those experiences you are grateful for when looking back on it weeks, months or years later. Grateful for the appreciation of home it gave you, grateful for the way you were pushed beyond your comfort zone, grateful for the story to tell your friends of how you survived a week on the edge of the Indian forest, fiercely battling spiders the size of your face, beetles the size of a phone and the constant sense something was on your back whilst omitting the screams, tears and fast retreats, tails tucked between legs. In all honesty I am mostly grateful to Erin whom I pushed into a bush in a hasty retreat from a golden orb weaver (a venomous variety if you get your information form Abi, which we did). Her infectious positivity alongside Maria’s incredible calm, Alba’s quiet support, Paris’s inspiring bravery, and Abi’s work ethic drove the team to enormous success in the presentation of our second consulting project, officially marking halfway through our LiA (I like to think I added something besides a deep fear of spiders). Between food poisoning, insect invasions, a mountain of tasks and a lack of internet one couldn’t call the week restful however certainly, thought provoking, memorable and  worthwhile.

One might wonder what brought us the strength to stay and besides the feeling that we were ridiculing ourselves in front of the awe inspiring and stoic forces of Asha and Preetha, the real reason was a good one. The Rural Centre (in which we were staying) is a vital pillar of the Self Employed Women’s Association (SEWA) and formed the crux of one of our outputs in which we had to make suggestions for improvements to make the centre hosting ready as well as market research and some starts at marketing. The other outputs involved social media marketing for two of SEWA’s other initiatives: Palliative Care and SEWA Livelihood.

Our first day on the ground we learnt about SEWA’s organisational structures and it’s incredible mission; bringing women from the informal sector (which forms 94% of India’s workforce) together in an effort to improve advocacy and livelihoods. Meeting some of these women from SEWA’s Reed Workers Federation on the second day really brought home the incredible work they do in helping provide resources and platforms for the community’s work, responding to their needs and keeping the craft alive and able to generate an income. Our third day was spent discovering the SEWA Livelihood shops and the women that run them, but importantly running the instagrams for both the SEWA Livelihood and the wider SEWA Kerala of which I was in charge. This particular day was memorable for a couple of reasons. The first was a slow burning success; when I took over and posted on the instagram on Wednesday the page stood at 56 views in the last 30 days, when I handed it back over to their team it stood at 4.6k. Mainly due to the combined success of tagging and reposting between the craft her and livelihood pages but a success nonetheless. Further than this though what marked me was the enthusiasm with which Nimisha took on the task of learning how to run the social media pages for SEWA. Wednesday was also memorable as the day the great food poisoning of CraftHER 2026 began. By Thursday Alba and I were wiped out whilst the others began feeling somewhat uncomfortable. As Friday rolled around Paris and Abi went down as the rest of us (Survivors and the more resistant among us) soldiered on to present our final outputs to SEWA and Nalini Nayak, an incredibly inspiring activist. Thankfully our presentation went down a treat and we spent two hours discussing the various issues, solutions and social medias we had consulted on.

An incredibly challenging week, in more ways than one, but we pushed ourselves beyond what we thought we were capable of, delivered outputs we were proud of, learnt from an amazing organisation and hopefully gave something useful back. I learnt that spiders hate strong smells, to always check above me in the bathroom, to not throw up in a sink but more importantly the power of the collective, the power of women, the power of a voice lifted up by many. And it is with this feeling of togetherness and community that I leave my week at SEWA Rural Centre, and I leave you with an excerpt from the blog I wrote as part of the outputs for SEWA.

“Over the past week, I have had the privilege of spending time with the women of SEWA Kerala—listening to their stories, visiting their workplaces, and witnessing the quiet yet remarkable ways they organise themselves. While each woman has her own journey, it is their collective strength that stands out. It is not simply a group of individuals working side by side; it is a community that uplifts, advocates, and creates change together.. […] After just one week, this is the lesson I will carry with me: real empowerment is not about standing alone. It is about recognising that our greatest strength lies in one another. The collective does more than amplify individual voices—it transforms lives, communities, and possibilities for the future.”