Member-only story
The Sweating Hawker Mindset
I wish you can read this slowly and let it sink!
It’s 1 PM. You are in a Lagos traffic gridlock. The AC in the car is ice cold. You look out through the tinted glass, it looks melting hot outside. You spot a man.
He looks 30-ish. You could see the sweat running down his stressed face. He is carrying a bowl of sachet water on his head and chasing after a moving car on top speed.
The driver of the car tosses a naira note at the man. He stops running and tries to pick it up but nearly gets hit by a car.
Are you seeing this in your head? Good!
He picks the money, your car begins to drive past the hawker and you see the money he had picked from the floor as he adds it to the bundle he is holding.
You could see it — what he had picked up was TWENTY NAIRA. He chased down a car, and nearly got hit for less than $1?
You shrug.
I watched this happen one day (and I’m sure you’ve seen it yourself or maybe something similar), and it hit me — that there was someone somewhere in the world who’s the same age as I am who would look at the things I do to make money and look at me EXACTLY the same way you’d look at this hawker.
