Earning from the streets … Downtown youth tout benefits of hustling

Michael ‘Hello’ Curnaldy and Brendon Clarke are two of many Jamaicans who enjoy the freedom of not being ‘tied down’ by the formal working system.

Curnaldy, at 30 years old, has been selling patties and drinks in downtown Kingston for the past six years. Each day, he spends between $7,000 and $8,000 to buy goods.

“This is how I take care of my family, send my sons to school, and me and my babymother can live. Before this, I was doing construction work or any work that come up, but nothing like a permanent job, and this would be considered my permanent job,” Curnaldy shared with The Sunday Gleaner.

Curnaldy grew up in St Mary, and after attending Annotto Bay All-Age School. He said that his mother couldn’t afford to continue to send him and his siblings to school, so he took to the streets to make a living hustling. He now lives in Portmore and has three children, one of whom will start Wolmer’s Boys in September.

“If I am not doing this, then I don’t know what then, because if me work fi the Chiney, the Chiney a guh pay me $6,000 a week while this can give me $6,000 a day. It better me do me own hustling,” said Curnaldy.

FREEDOM AND FLEXIBILITY

His job also provides him with the flexibility and freedom that he desires.

“Me come out when me feel. If me get up tomorrow morning and me don’t feel to come out, me nuh come out. If me did have a boss, me would have to come out every morning. Matter of fact, me would have to come out on time, to, and me can’t come a work two day late or dem a guh fire me. With this, me can miss three weeks, and when me come back, me customers still here,” noted the father.

He has no issue with persons frowning on his job because it doesn’t fall into the formal job setting.

“I love doing this and no want work for nobody. It no make no sense you a order me around while me can do whatever me please in my job and come out whenever me please while bills still a pay and kids a get taken care of. You see what matter still is not where you work, but is how much you save. At the end of the year, me have to see how much money me earn so that next year me can double it,” said Curnaldy.

…Handcart a stepping stone for future business owner

Twenty-seven-year-old Brendon Clarke, although having seven subjects in the Caribbean Examination Council (CXC), uses his cart to transport goods in downtown Kingston.

His fees depend on the distance and the amount of goods being transported.

“It vary. It fluctuate. Memba say sometimes coffee, sometimes tea, so you are going to have a day when probably you make a $5,000, sometimes a six; it just depends. On half day like a Wednesday, you might make a four grand ($4,000),” said Clarke.

Not yet a father, he makes enough to take care of just himself.

“Me pencil it out before, in terms of bills, pardna, and savings. Me wouldn’t a do it if it never did a work out. This work out better for me, a million times more than if me did a work in a the wholesale back deh so. Because, one, you work at your own pace and, two, you get a chance to meet persons that can turn into clients. And probably what me work in a week in there, me work that it in two days out here,” he said.

Clarke grew up in Manchester but now lives in Kingston. His CXC subjects include mathematics and English. He graduated from Ardenne High School with four subjects and enrolled in evening classes for the others.

PEER PRESSURE

He showed The Sunday Gleaner his arm covered in tattoos, which he said was a result of peer pressure, limiting his chances of getting a job in the formal system.

“My mother did kind of migrate, so I end up following friends and wasn’t attending classes and stuff like that, so a peer pressure,” said Clarke.

He doesn’t believe he is wasting his time or talent by pushing a cart, however, he noted, “the cart is not something I’m going to do permanent, I have a plan and a goal in mind, this is a stepping stone, I want to own my own business.”

carlene.davis@gleanerjm.com