How does it feel to sit on the street the entire day in that scorching sun and dust all around? What are the thoughts which float in the mind of a street vendor? How frequent do customers come to purchase? Doesn’t the vendor gets conscious anxious if there are no customers?
These are just some of the questions which I always had [still have] when I used to see a street vendor on roadside. Eager and curious I was to experience their life at roadside and get answers to some of my questions.
A friend of mine who was good friends with a fruit vendor who sits on the Govandi Station road [Mumbai] introduced me to him and shared that I would like to sit with him for a day.
“Koi college ka project hai kya?” [Is it some project] he asked.
Surprised he seemed as no one ever came to him asking for this. Nevertheless he agreed quickly. I asked him his timing and promised that I will be back tomorrow at the time he sets up his stuff in the morning. The idea was to sit beside him the entire day, assist him but not interrupt his daily routine.
Next morning I kept one water bottle, diary, pen and a scarf in my bag. Excited I was to try this. I reached at 10 a.m. while he was putting the fruits into baskets.
His name is Ajay. Ajay bhaiya is from Uttar Pradesh. He came to Mumbai few days back to earn money. Right now he has replaced his brother as he has gone to village for a month. Once he returns, he will have to start something on his own.
Our day started. For almost an hour, I was observing his activities. The way he weighs fruits, puts them into polythene bag, convinces customers that the he has best quality fruits, handles bargaining etc. I requested him to teach me how to weigh fruits, tell the selling price and also the minimum price on which we can sell. He was very happy to share with me. May be he felt like a teacher for first time and was happy when he realized that he also has something to share. Meanwhile, the near-by vendors were watching us with curious eyes.
“Madam, koi project hai kya? Koi research kar rahe ho kya?” one of them asked.
“Nahi Bhaiya, bus ese hi. Ye janna chahti hoo ki kesa lagta road side fruit bechte hue.” After sometime, I requested Ajay bhaiya that I will take care of his shop and he can relax. He agreed. He turned the basket upside down and sat some meters away. I felt as if I was the owner of the shop now. And the normal business began, customer started coming and I started selling. While giving fruits in polythene bag, an idea clicked me of selling fruits in paper bag.
Few days back a friend of mine taught me how to make a paper bag with newspaper in less than one minute without using glue or any other material. I explained bhaiya demerits of polythene bag and the merits of paper bag in a simple language and requested him if we can sell fruits in paper bag with a promise that he will be making half of the paper bags. His eagerness to learn was really commendable. Slowly, while making paper bags we got surrounded by other street vendors who put their stall of vada pav, pani puri and one rickshaw wala, all curious to learn it. Some of them tried making it. The smile on their face after making their first bag was a treat to watch.
We started offering fruits in our paper bag. I also started noting down our sales with two purpose in head. Firstly to know the buying frequency of customer and secondly to see how many paper bags are we able to offer.We got mixed response. Some were indifferent towards the use of paper bag, people on bike asked for plastic bag so that they can hang it on the handle and others took a minute to appreciate our effort and blessed us. Overall, we were happy with our effort and felt as if we are a team working on some mission.
The afternoon was quiet. The number of customers dropped to a large extent. Ajay bhaiya says this happens daily. From 12 p.m. to 2 p.m., majority of the people purchased Bananas for their lunch. From 3 p.m. to 5 p.m. we hardly had any customer. Now that was the time for our lunch. He and his friend who sells water melon on ‘thela’ shared with me their lunch box. The near-by vendors offered me vada pav, tea and other eatable stuff. After having our lunch, we started chatting while making more paper bags.
“Where do you stay bhaiya?”
“I share a room near Govandi station which has around 10-12 people, all from my village.”
“What is the rent of your room?”
“500 per person except electricity and WiFi”
“Don’t you think too many people stay with you?”
“Nai didi, this way we save our money on stay so that we can send more to our home. Some fights do happen but you see it is fun also as daily we cook and eat together.”
Afternoon gave us sufficient time for our conversation. There were moments of silence too when I did nothing but watched the vehicles and people on road. I saw it as a process wherein when free if I go back to my place or got engrossed into phone, it would have left the experience incomplete somewhere. Meanwhile, bhaiya was also sitting either silently or talking to his friends. Our highest selling point was at 5:36 p.m., when a lady purchased 1 kg Apples worth Rs. 140 that too in a paper bag [without bargaining, yaee!]. I shared with him English names of fruits and basic etiquette of interacting with customers. He took everything in a good spirit. Meanwhile, other bhaiya who puts cart of pani puri (gol-gappa) behind us comes and asked me if I can assist him tomorrow evening for selling pani-puri. I said yes with a big smile. He also insisted me to have lunch from his shop. How could I say no to this sweet gesture?
Next day had its own excitement. Vendors became good friends. They would ask me to have water, tea, vada-pav, fruits at regular intervals. Two days made me realize how they have their own ecosystem for work, food and to support each other. Almost 40% sale on each day we did in paper bags. In the evening I assisted pani-puri wala and it took me long time just to learn how they function. Their speed is unbeatable. With one hand they make puri and with other they handle money and do calculations in head. Given the time I had, he taught me his technique of making puri. After few hours of observing and assisting, I felt like an achievement when I was able to make one plate of dahi-puri to a customer.
Hey…it felt like such a nice and learning experience by only reading it so I can imagine how much you must have enjoyed and learned. 🙂 🙂
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It was a great experience. Indeed.
Thank you Shruti!:)
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Nancy 😀 You are awesome
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😀 Thank you so much! 🙂
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Dude this is amazing !!! I really commend your gesture and drive for such endeavors…wish you loads of luck and success !! 🙂
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Thanks dude! 😀 Thanks for your appreciation Best wishes to you too. 🙂
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Classic Nancy! 🙂 Briilliant post and a fun read. Sounds like a great experience, stepping into those shoes. Keep writing!
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Thanks Aru.
Sure will do 🙂
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You just do what you wish to. Thats the best thing one can have 🙂 Great description !!
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I wish I can do what I want in future too. 🙂
Thank you 🙂
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It’s awesome, commendable, respect
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Thank you Kannu 🙂 I respect you for the respect you hold for me 🙂
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Nancy..It felt like I was experiencing it all sitting there beside you..
Very good effort and a tremendous thought..
Good Luck for future 🙂
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While writing even I didn’t know I can make a reader feel like this.
🙂
Thank you do much 🙂
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proud of you girl….
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Thank you Gau 😀
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This is great Nancy…people like you leave a long lasting impression..keep writing..!! All the best for future endeavours..:)
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Aneeshaaa! 😀
So happy that you read and took efforts to comment. Thank you for your words yar 🙂
Best wishes to you too.
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Great work and gesture of learning and sharing from the common people who make a big difference in our everyday lives and yet most often go unnoticed. Keep up the good work. One thing that you can work on is to get these people to take up the habit of reading inspirational books during slack periods in the day. Hopefully that will propel these ordinary people to have extraordinary thoughts that they could share. Then probably they would write interesting blogs too. Nancy – stay with your awesomeness. God bless you.
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Firstly, thank you for your blessings Hasmukh! 🙂
This was one of those blogs which I shared almost word by word with you.
Your thought is appreciable but there is a reality bite here as I can’t put stats here but people dont know even to read or write properly. So may be few more basics are required to reach upto that level.
Meanwhile, in the free time paper bags can be made 😉
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Hi,
You have done something which I often do!
It is a remarkable experience and get etched in your memory for forever.
I dont have such an awesome writing skills to narrate things in this perfect manner.
Though, I have project in mind of creating a series of daily life experience of these small job like
gurads, drivers, cleaner, sales guys, cobbler, junior artist, waiter, postman, officeboy, wardboy, beggar, contract labour, farmer, govt hospitals doctor, traffic police, etc etc.
The project would include their experience of education, marriage, festival celebration, kids education, old parents health and meaning of happiness for them etc.
If this interest you then we can connect for some more discussion.
Keep up the good work.
Cheers
Ritesh
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Hey Ritesh!
Glad to know that you do such things often. It would be lovely to connect with you for more discussion and know your experience too.
Will drop a mail.
Thank you
🙂
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Nancy ❤
Proud of you.
That`s a real human act. I love the way you made your mind to do the entire thing without having any second thoughts. This society needs people like you (us), who are ready to do everything for betterment of others and nature.
I also think that this is one of the best experiences of life you have by far, the fruit seller would cherish this learning and will be grateful to you.
I am so happy with this effort. Lets do something big someday together. 🙂
Good Luck and lots of blessings.
-Amish
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Amish ❤
Yes it is one of the best experiences so far. I am so glad you took out time to read. And fruit seller was very happy. Based on experience I can say that the fact that he had someone to talk and listen was great for him.
I so wish to meet you. Sometime in Indore or Delhi or may be Himachal? 😉
Best wishes to you too.
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Awesome work Nancy….
It was fun reading your blog!
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Thank you so much Ananya 🙂
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Hey Nancy,
Really wonderful article..This really encouraged me to go out and witness their life..But one thing that I want to ask is that were the vendors happy with their job.. I mean can you please elaborate upon what problems the vendors faced during the day??
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Thanks for reading and appreciating the article. 🙂
Coming to your problems I would say the answer is not yes or no but somewhere in between. And it can’t be generalized for all the vendors again. When i asked this question the normal reply is ‘humare paas aur option hi kya hai? hum pade likhe to hai nahi to jo kaam milta hai woi karlete hai.” But again we cant count that they are always unhappy. It is a grey area and influenced by a lot of factors again.
Problems which I could see and got from conversation were: fear of municipality coming and then they need to shift everything, whether too hot at times the umbrella they have fails to protect them, no constant source of water or rather cool water too.
Also they are free in patches during day where may be they want to do something but dont know what.
I hope this answers your concern. Let me know if you want more details, will be happy to discuss over mail or phone.
🙂
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That was an excellent move, Nancy. Dr MS Pillai [for whom I have deep respect] who is the Director of Sadhana Centre for Management and Leadership Development, Pune, once had a very involved conversation with his student. During the conversation he suggested to the student that he should do boot polish at a railways station and earn Rs 50 in a day – it would teach him a lot of unforgettable lessons. It did! Someday please meet this very unusual man Dr Pillai and have a chat about your experience.
Frankly experience has no value – absolutely no value. What matters is how we process it and what we learn out of it. Unless you reflect what it did to you, this initiative will not be complete. Please do it. And also share it. It will add to the richness of this narrative.
You did mention to me about your grandfather. What made you take this step of meeting the vendor?
You made a good beginning, now keep going, Cheers!
Vivek
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Thank you sir for your comments.
The questions with which I start my blog made me take this step. 🙂
Even I would like to meet Mr. Pillai now and would definitely share my experience with him. I will take his contact details from you. Also, thanks for your suggestion, the idea was to add more of reflection but when started, missed some. Will keep in mind from next time.
Thanks again
🙂
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Brilliant simply brilliant
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Thank you Kartik!
A comment from you came as a pleasant surprise 😉
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This is awesome. One thing is just to have a thought to experience the daily routine of a vendor. But at the same sharing your thoughts and small, smart skills to help them improving their work is really appreciable.
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Thanks Arpit for your comment! As I shared with you, it was in the flow that things happened. Both of us, bhaiya and me were with each with zero expectations 🙂
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Nancy, Respect 🙂 🙂
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Honoured. Thank you Deeksha 🙂
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Nancy, you got a new fan for your blog! Truly inspiring and different! Good work!
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Thank you so much Hardik! 🙂
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paper bag to seekhna padega, next time u r in Pune or we in Mumbai!
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Done boss! 🙂
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Great gesture and effort. I am sure you enjoyed it as much as we did reading this lovely post…
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It was an enriching experience. Thank you Sunith for reading 🙂
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🙂
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