Legend: A Saint and a Storm

The first American saint, Rose, was born in the city of Lima, Peru, and lived there her entire thirty-one years. An astonishing natural beauty, Rose went to great length to ruin her looks: rubbing pepper on her face to cause a blotchy complexion; dipping her smooth, soft hands into lime, and on one occasion, pushing a pin on her head. In addition, she deprived herself of food, drink and sleep on a regular basis and became a Dominican nun. When her parents were bankrupted for speculating in the mining business, Rose went to work sewing and labouring in the garden. She lived the latter part of her life as a recluse in a small hut in her garden, dying of an illness that was apparently caused by her severe mental and physical habits. She is often shown wearing a garland of roses on her head.
St Rose’s storm takes place in the Southern Hemisphere around 5 days before or after August 30th. According to legend, Rose and a group of followers tried to prevent some Dutch pirates from disenbarking at the city of Lima. People began to attribute the breaking of a storm just at that moment and the pirates' escape to Rosa's mystical powers and thus the legend began.
The legend became particularly strong in Argentina, especially in the area around the Río de la Plata, the province of Córdoba and the area of Cuyo. There is even a place called like her in the province of Mendoza.
Rose of Lima is the patron saint of South America and the Philippines and her feast day is on August 30th. Her real name was Isabel but, when she was a baby, a servant claimed to have seen her face transform into a rose so her name was changed "Rosa".