I was lucky enough to meet Ijja and several other women weavers when I helped collect material for the Virtual Souk web page. Ijja is a born comedian who kept us and her group of friends laughing for most of the afternoon (her frown in the photo is because of the bright sun). Her husband operates the village's electric generator which the local development group helped them install, the same group which helps the women market their rugs. Of their 5 children, three are in school, including a daughter in junior high, an age when many rural girls leave school. Ijja used her most recent rug profits to buy cement and windows to renovate her home. When asked what she wanted to do with future profits, she first said she would buy gold jewelry, which is a traditional way for women to save. But then she got more imaginative - she first suggested buying a truck to transport rugs produced in the village to the town of Taliouine where they are marketed, then decided that getting all the women bicycles would be more fun: then they could have a race on the way home!