La Hustle

I have to admit that this prompt is a little bit weird and I was taken by surprise when I saw it. I’m in a very busy city right now and my environment is literally full of things to write about.

However, this caught my attention. It’s actually not something I just noticed today. I see this everyday and I figured this prompt is the best way to write about this.

This picture describes or represents the struggle to survive here. It’s no hidden secret the financial hardship Ghanaians have been subjected to the past 2 years due to worsening economic crisis.

The women here are selling under an shade provided by overheard road. They’re not there because they love it there, but because they probably either can’t afford to rent shops inside the big market itself or they just can’t find space in the market to rent at all.

As you can see, it’s extremely close to the road, so everyone passing by can see you there. But they don’t care - they can’t afford to.

The sad part is that their businesses are small scale start ups and in most cases, might not be able to provide them enough profit to be able to cater for themselves and their families. How much profit do you think the pan full of yam will return? Will that be enough for a standard meal for only one person talk less of an entire family?

This picture reminds me of when I was a kid. My mom and many other mothers who were traders used to go to markets in villages outside of my town. They’d leave early dawn every day and come home late nights. There were times when I’d only see her once in 2 days because she leaves home when I’m sleeping and comes home when I’m sleeping.

The trucks they used for transport were nothing short of risky. Faulty in ways beyond comprehension. Some of them had no functional brakes. Aside the trucks being a risk factor, the road networks were poor and dangerous. Robbers claimed that path as territory and terrorized traders frequently, robbed some, killed others, robbed and killed others.

A trader friend of mine who still does the traveling-to-another-town’s market type of trading told me a story recently about an encounter he had after which he swore to never do the cross-town trades ever again. He described how their truck almost capsized on a night that it poured heavily. In his narration, “They were sitting in the truck’s open back like chickens stranded on a poll on a rainy night and praying that God should be good to them and not let their car flip over.” He in particular promised that if God let him make it through that incident, that would be his last night on the back of that truck.

It’s a real struggle out here, but until the struggle is at your front door, the “the struggle is real” slogan you hear on the internet will be nothing but a slogan to you. You’ll read 100s of stories like this and you’ll think you understand what people are going through, but you actually don’t.