"From the Association of Friends of Wine and Cheese of Lanzarote, we want to express our deep sorrow for the passing of Felisa Álvarez, Señá Felisa, a woman from Órzola, an artisan cheesemaker, and an example of a generation of women who, with their silent and constant work, contributed to keeping the culture of the land and livestock of Lanzarote alive.
Felisa, originally from Guatiza and linked for a good part of her life to Órzola, dedicated decades to a craft she learned from her mother-in-law and passed on to her children: the artisanal production of goat cheese. For years, getting up early and getting to work was a way of life for her. She didn't understand schedules or days off: there was cheese to make, goats to attend to, and a tradition to maintain.
Her story is also the story of so many rural women in Lanzarote. Women who worked in the fields, took care of their families, and sustained the domestic economy in difficult times, when life demanded effort, sacrifice, and an enormous capacity to get by.
Felisa didn't need grand speeches to explain what that life meant. She expressed it with the simplicity that characterized her. Her cheese was the fruit of labor, but also of knowledge passed down from generation to generation. That seemingly simple way of doing things held a cultural heritage that is not written in books, but in the hands of those who learned and practiced it throughout their lives.
From our Association, we want to especially recognize that contribution. Because defending the wine, cheese, agriculture, and livestock of Lanzarote also means honoring the people who made it possible for these traditions to reach us.
Felisa belonged to a generation that knew a very different Lanzarote. An island where travel was done on foot, where the land set the rhythm of life, and where contact between families and neighbors had a special value. She herself recalled that, when she was young, she used to walk from Órzola to Guatiza to visit her family, even when she was eight months pregnant.
Today, we lose a woman who made her work a way of preserving the memory of her land.
We are left with her cheese, but above all, we are left with her example.
The example of a hardworking, tenacious woman deeply connected to the rural world; of a cheesemaker who turned a family tradition into a hallmark of Órzola; and of a woman who knew how to pass on to her children knowledge and a way of understanding work that are part of our rural heritage.
From the Association of Friends of Wine and Cheese of Lanzarote, which I have the honor of presiding over, we want to convey our affection and solidarity to her children, Mingo Marco and Rosa Delia s, as well as to the rest of her family, and accompany them in these moments of grief for the loss of a woman who left a deep mark on those who knew her.
May she rest in peace, Señá Felisa.
And may her memory remain forever linked to Órzola, to her goats, to her cheeses, and to that rural Lanzarote that she helped to preserve.
Thank you for so much, Felisa".
Mario Pérez Hernández
President of the Association of Friends of Wine and Cheese of Lanzarote
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