“That environment is not for me and I just had to pack up and leave. I can’t have men talking to me anyhow and wanting to touch me and because I not allowing them is a problem. I know I need the money and I poor, but I not selling me self short fuh money,” she said.
A single parent mother of four—her youngest child being 18 years old—this 41-year-old woman thought she finally found a stable job when she gained employment in the interior with a company that has a contract with an international firm.
However, less than one month after she started working, she was forced to pack her bags and leave.
“I know I had to leave because it woulda get worse, those young boys have no order,” she told me shortly after she returned to the city.
“You know they have rules, which they don’t up keep. The workers know that they must get the bowls wash before they come to the kitchen, the bowls must come clean. The rule is when they come with the bowl nasty they must go and wash it or put the food just suh in the nasty bowl. They have a problem if you do so because they feel you must flex with them and wash the nasty bowl.
“Well nah me and you could see like dah was a problem how they start behaving but I didn’t care,” she continued.
“Before I went deh another cook use to wash them and she ain’t use to wash fuh all a dem and that use to create a problem and I say I not washing nobody bowl,” she said with some amount of anger.
“Then, is like they want me number. They don’t need my number. The next cook she does also deal with parts and so they have to call she, but I let dem know I don’t deal with no spare parts and they don’t have to call me. And that like bring another problem.
“They are young men, and they have no manners. The few grownup men you don’t have a problem with. But the youngsters have no manners. One, he said the place has no order and so he wants to come in the kitchen and talk to you as he likes and ask questions that he not suppose to ask you. The last day he come, and he was like, ‘Wah cook?’ So, I say food and he like peep through the hole in the wall and say, ‘Is me talking to you, wah cook?’ and I say food.
“Well he is to turn and say, ‘This place ain’t get no f-ing order I don’t know why you all going on so.’ Well you know I come to the kitchen door and I had to tell he me life gat order and where I come from gat order. I tell he my bag done pack and I don’t have to tell you I cuss he stinking because it was too much for me by then.”
I told her that maybe she could have reacted differently.
“No!” she almost shouted at me.
“You see, you don’t understand, you have to live in it to understand or maybe I not explaining it right to you, but it was too much,” she continued.
She was earning $100,000 a month but the hours were long.
“That is another thing. They want you to wake up like 5 am and you never going to bed until around 8 pm and during that time you can’t go back into your sleeping quarters. So, like is whole day you on you foot cooking for almost 30 men,” she said.
“And then even though they had set time for meals, men would come any time they want for their food. They was just out of order. I think if the boss dem put down they foot they would get it, but they don’t.
“I never communicate with them men that much. I was not that friendly and my facial expression alone they get the message. You see I know as soon as I smile or laugh with them is eyes pass and they would want to tell you anything and knock, knock you but not me.
“When I finally tell me boss dem I leaving they was not happy because even for the short time I was there, I know they know I was a good worker. But I tell them the men getting outta hand and I don’t want no problems.
“Even one of the boss telling me that they didn’t know I coulda handle me self so well in the kitchen and how they would put on something on me salary, but I tell them, the place don’t have order. I tell them I come to cook and not look for men and that is the problem,” she said.
Another issue she had was the fact that she had no day off.
“You done not getting any time off in the day and then is Sunday to Sunday you working. So, you see the salary was not good and the working hours was long, but it was really the behaviour of the men that did it. I really had some big plans for yearend even with the small salary but now it all gone,” she said sadly.
“But you know this was me second time trying me hand at cooking in the bush but there is no way I am going back into the interior, that is not for me. I already figure that kind of work is not for me, having to deal with them men who think all women in the bush is prostitute.
“Women will go into the bush to work and say they would hold out but men would come with gold and so they would do it for the money, but they don’t know how they destroying themselves. Even one a me boss tell me how he see better woman than me fall into it and how men does be fighting over them and all kind a thing. But not me, I say, not me.
“I don’t have a husband, I is a single parent and I woulda happy to hold on to the work because work hard to find but because them men not getting dem way it was a steady argument. I tell dem people does say I mad but me ain’t mad, it is just that my mouth lil hot. People are not going to talk to me anyhow and get away with it. I would give them a piece of me mind and no young boy would run into me and talk to me like if me and them is friend. If I giving you respect then give me the same respect,” she maintained.
I asked her what she plans to do now that she has no job.
“I will make out by the grace of God. He knows I am not lazy. I don’t have education, but I could cook good. But I couldn’t stay there. Something else would come up, I can feel it but not in the interior, I not going back. The first time it was rough I didn’t get even me salary and now this. But I thank God for life.
“But you will know, you will know how it shape up,” she said quietly as we parted ways.
We talk often and while she agreed for me to tell her experience she wanted her name left out. She is a strong sister who has been dealt many bad hands in this life but continues to persevere.
