Indigenous Bolivian women take up taekwondo against gender-based violence

A violent attack by would-be robbers steered Bolivian Lidia Mayta towards the martial art of taekwondo. Three years later, she helps train other Indigenous women to defend themselves against rampant gender-based violence in the South American country.

Mayta says she would have died if neighbours had not come out of their homes to scare off the assailants choking her outside her front door as they tried to steal her wallet.

After the attack, she pledged she would never feel so helpless again.

She joined a woman-only class at the Warmi Power taekwondo studio in Bolivia’s second city El Alto. Warmi means “woman” in the indigenous Quechua language.

Her enthusiasm was such that the founders soon asked her to join the training team, helping in particular to translate instructions into Aymara, another of Bolivia’s indigenous tongues.