Travail: Beyond Time

By Rosario Lopera

Many people who have met Rosario wonder why and how she came to the USA. Others heard many lies and bad things about her. She has kept quiet until years ago. She decided to write her book and tell everybody who she is.

It was not easy to write, and it has taken me so long to finish. Im not a writer, but I want to keep
my book the way I write. I lost my loved one, my fianc, while waiting in Florida to marry him. A month went by. When I didnt hear from him, I thought that he changed his mind about our wedding, but I was wrong.

He was a private pilot who had a tragic airplane accident while I was in Florida with a Spanish family.

Why was I in Florida? Because I was coming back from London where I did represent my country Bolivia in the Miss World 1963 contest.

My mother told me that she didnt want to tell me because she didnt know how I was going to react.

Well, read this book, and you will see how I reacted. It hasnt been easy to write this book because it has too many painful memories, but people dont know about it, and I get some nasty things sometimes because people dont know me. I hope this will help to understand me a little better. Thank God that because I was Miss Bolivia, the doors where open here and there, so I got my green card on my way to London.

I was glad to have a green card and come to the USA and be able to work as a secretary typist the third day I was here, and also I was lucky to know people from my country where to arrive to.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Xlibris US
• Release date: Jun 16, 2014
• ISBN: 9781499032741

Book preview

Copyright © 2014 by Rosario Lopera.

Library of Congress Control Number:      2014910498

ISBN:        Hardcover            978-1-4990-3273-4

                  Softcover             978-1-4990-3271-0

                  eBook                  978-1-4990-3274-1

All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reproduced or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic or mechanical, including photocopying, recording, or by any information storage and retrieval system, without permission in writing from the copyright owner.

Any people depicted in stock imagery provided by Thinkstock are models, and such images are being used for illustrative purposes only.

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Rev. date: 04/08/2015

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CONTENTS

Chapter 1 So Young

Chapter 2 Production Company

Chapter 3 Return To La Paz

Chapter 4 The Miss World Contest

Chapter 5 Heart Broken

Chapter 6 Beginning Life In New York

Chapter 7 Heartbroken Again!

Chapter 8 The Greatest Photographer

Chapter 9 My Baby Was Born

Chapter 10 Working In Long Island

Chapter 11 Breakdown

Chapter 12 Who Is Rosario L.?

PREFACE

Many people who have met Rosario wonder why and how she came to the USA. Others heard many lies and bad things about her. She has kept quiet until years ago. She decided to write her book and tell everybody who she is.

It was not easy to write, and it has taken me so long to finish. I’m not a writer, but I want to keep my book my way. I lost my loved one, my fiancé, while waiting in Florida to marry him. A month went by. When I didn’t hear from him, I thought that he changed his mind about our wedding, but I was wrong.

He was a private pilot who had a tragic airplane accident while I was in Florida with a Spanish family.

Why was I in Florida? Because I was coming back from London where I did represent my country Bolivia in the Miss World 1963 contest.

My mother told me that she didn’t want to tell me because she didn’t know how I was going to react.

Well, read this book, and you will see how I reacted. It hasn’t been easy to write this book because it has too many painful memories, but people don’t know about it, and I get some nasty things sometimes because people don’t know me. I hope this will help to understand me a little better. Thank God that because I was Miss Bolivia, the doors where open here and there, so I got my green card on my way to London.

I was glad to have a green card and come to the USA and be able to work as a secretary typist the third day I was here, and also I was lucky to know people from my country where to arrive to.

CHAPTER 1

So Young

I was born in Bolivia, South America. It was the forties, 1940s that is. As I grew, even though very small as I was, I could see it was a very beautiful country. Perhaps it was with the eyes of a child that I was taking things in because the country was quite problematic. People were never happy with whoever was running the country. The country was doing so well and then things turned bad for everyone. And on the other side of the world was World War II that was affecting the world. It affected everything.

But I saw life with the eyes of a child. I had just turned six years old. Life went on with playing and being with the family. It was just a regular child’s life. At least through my eyes it was, until the day something really big happened. My mother didn’t tell me or my brother, who was eight at the time. She took us to my grandmother’s house. I had no idea what was going on. I saw my grandmother wearing a black dress, and I saw people coming in and out of her house, but they kept me and my brother away from everybody.

Image%201.JPG

Family Portrait: Maj. Carlos Lopera, Amalia Sanchez de Lopera, Noemi Lopera, Carlos Lopera JR., and Rosario Lopera

A few days went by, and my mother took us back home. I still didn’t know what was happening. It made me wonder and quite nervous. The only one who knew what happened was my fourteen-year-old sister. She remembers everything, and as I understand, she was extremely angry. My father, the Major Carlos Lopera was assassinated. He was shot in the back on June 13, 1946. I believe he gave his life for my home country. But all I knew then was that he was gone.

Bolivia History

Crisis Phase (November 24, 1934–March 10, 1947): President Daniel Salamanca was deposed in a military coup on November 24, 1934, and Vice President Jose Luis Tejada Sorzano of the LP assumed the presidency on November 25, 1934. President Tejada Sorzano resigned after several days of unrest on May 17, 1936, and Colonel David Toro Ruilova was appointed as provisional president on May 19, 1936. President Toro Ruilova was deposed in a military coup led by Colonel German Busch Becerra on July 13, 1937, and Colonel Busch Becerra was appointed provisional president. The government banned the Communist Party of Bolivia (Partido Communista de Bolivia-PCB) in April 1938, and declared martial law on November 25, 1938. President Busch suspended the constitution and established a dictatorship on April 24, 1939. President Busch committed suicide on August 23, 1939. General Carlos Quintanilla assumed the presidency and restored the 1938 constitution. Enrique Penaranda was elected president on March 10, 1940, and he was inaugurated as president on April 15, 1940. President Penaranda was deposed in a military coup led by Lt. Colonel Gualberto Villarroel of the National Revolutionary Movement (Movimiento Nacionalista Revolucionario-MNR) on December 20, 1943. The US imposed diplomatic sanctions (diplomatic non-recognition) against the government of Major Villarroel on January 25, 1944. Major Villarroel was elected president in August 1944. Government troops suppressed a military rebellion in Oruro on November 18, 1944, and four individuals were executed for their involvement in the military rebellion on November 19, 1944. Five individuals, including General Demetrio Ramos, were executed by government soldiers near La Paz on November 20, 1944. President Villarroel declared a state-of-siege after several weeks of civil unrest on May 30, 1946. Government troops suppressed a military rebellion in La Paz on June 13, 1946, resulting in the deaths of five individuals. President Villarroel was killed during a rebellion led by the Popular Revolutionary Movement (PRM) on July 18–21, 1946, resulting in the deaths of 260 individuals. Nestor Gullen was appointed as provisional president of a revolutionary junta on July 22, 1946. Chile provided diplomatic assistance (diplomatic recognition) to the government of President Gullen on August 6, 1946. Argentina, Guatemala, Paraguay, and the US provided diplomatic assistance (diplomatic recognition) to the government of President Gullen on August 12, 1946. Britain and Nicaragua provided diplomatic assistance (diplomatic recognition) to the government of President Gullen on August 13, 1946. Some 1,000 individuals were killed in political violence in 1946. Enrique Hertzog of the Socialist Republican Union Party (Partido Union Republicana Socialista-PURS) was elected president on January 5, 1947. The Congress voted to approve the election of Enrique Hertzog as president on March 9, 1947 (since Enrique Hertzog won less than 50 percent of the popular vote). Enrique Hertzog was inaugurated as president on March 10, 1947. Some 1,500 individuals were killed during the crisis.

(Bolivia History,

University of Central Arkansas Website)

I don’t remember much about my father. I was so young. He traveled a lot performing his duties as a major. However, I do remember when I was about three or four, I used to get down from my crib early, almost every morning, and go to my parent’s bedroom and jump on their bed. We laughed at the excitement of a child. Another thing I cannot forget is seeing my father in his military uniform. WOW! He looked so sharp. He was handsome. He had green eyes, light complexion, and light brown hair. He stood so tall with the sharpness of the uniform as the buttons shined and sparkled.

My mother told me that my father was only fourteen years old when he wanted join the army. The army didn’t want a young boy to be in the army, but my father insisted that they did let him join the army. So the army agreed to have a young man join the ranks, but they gave my father tremendous duties to see if he could succeed. One of them was that my father didn’t know how to swim, so they got my father