When Kathlen arrived every day at 9 am at the Farm store, in Ipanema, the first thing she did was hug everyone. Always excited, her customers called her a friend.
Establishing connections was easy for the 24-year-old woman who had worked at the high-end clothing brand in the south of Rio de Janeiro since she was 18. Black and four months pregnant, these bonds were forcibly broken this Tuesday afternoon (8), shot on the floor of the favela.
Kathlen de Oliveira Romeu was killed on her way to visit her family in Complexo do Lins, in Rio, where she was born and left just a month and a half ago precisely because of the fear of violence, after discovering her pregnancy.
Getting married was a dream, as she was working in the field she'd just graduated from. She recently used her knowledge of her as an interior designer to plan the baby's room, which would be called Zayo, the promised land in Hebrew symbology, or Maya, a name that suggests the purity of water or maternal love.
Translated by Kiratiana Freelon