“I really did think that when I get this new job things would get so much better. But is like the more money you get is more things getting worse. Sometimes I don’t even want go to the supermarket anymore because is like a headache thinking what to buy and what I can’t buy.
“Before, you know, you go with $30,000 and I would get things to last me for at least two weeks. But now $30,000 like it not even lasting for a week.”
These are the words of a 35-year-old single mother of three who found a new job that pays her double the salary she made at her old job. I have known her for years and decided just to speak to her about the rising cost of living we are all facing in Guyana and worldwide.
“I used to say I would not think about it, you know, because it is like you going mad or something. But you have to talk about it because that is all on your mind at times,” she told me when I asked how she was managing.
“I would just get pay and I done thinking about how the next salary I get would spend because the one in me hand can’t take care of everything I have to do. I really thought things woulda get better for me and me children when I get the new work. But is like I don’t know how I could get more money and don’t have enough to buy just food at times,” she continued.
“I not even thinking about buying anything else like clothes and shoes and so and we don’t go nowhere. Is just work and school and still sometimes I don’t even have money to go to work and send them children to school. That is how hard it is. Sometimes when I get time off, you know, I think about carrying them just for a little walk or something but I have no money.
“But through it all I does still thank God because me children always want to go school and them never complain about what they don’t have. And I does get help with lil clothes and so. But it is just sometimes I does feel real bad because too much time we don’t even have enough to eat. I does mek sure the bill and so pay because if we don’t pay rent then we don’t have nowhere to live and so when all the bills pay hardly anything lef to buy food.
“I even stop going to the market because I can’t afford to buy anything there anymore. I just cook peas, chowmein and whatever else I could pick up here and there. When you buy the greens it so expensive and it still not enough for all of us so the market is a no-no for me.”
And now that the new school year is about to start I asked how she would manage.
“Well I just stay thanks to the government for the cash grant. I done write them list and as soon as I get that money I going and buy everything for school. Well at least what the money could buy. So I just happy because I don’t know what woulda happen because honestly I don’t have the money. Rent, light bill, water bill and internet have to pay and then food have to buy so nothing lef. When I say nothing, I mean nothing,” she answered.
Come Tuesday the Ministry of Education will commence the distribution of cash grants of $30,000 to every school child whether they attend public or private schools.
“I guess we still have to say that the government doing something because I sure plenty people like me couldn’t buy nothing for them children to go to school. So we have to be grateful, I suppose. At least they would get school clothes and books but nuff days they would not get anything proper to eat because we can’t afford to buy food. And don’t talk about the passage to reach to school,” she noted.
“But I done say if it is the last thing I do, all three of me children going to school. All a them is girls and I want them to become something in this life. They not doing bad. I can’t afford to send them to lessons and so, but they never fail so I think they would make it. That is all I pray for.
“And you know I want to say something to people who would sometimes bash we single mothers. I does see what they does say on Facebook and so and that is why sometimes we don’t want put we self out there. I does work hard and I don’t beg nobody for anything. Well, I does have to ask me family when I don’t have food, but I work hard. And all of me children is one person. I was married and everything and like everybody else I thought it woulda work out. But what can I say? It didn’t and I end up being a single mother.
“Now I not saying women who have children for more than one man is like bad woman or anything but I just want people to understand because sometimes they can be really unfair to single mothers when you see some of the things they saying about single mothers. You would see them adding up if you have so much children is so much money you getting from the cash grant and how them woman with nuff children guh spend wild. Is like we just want take the money and do we own thing with it. But we is mothers and we wish for our children, just like other people, we wish for betterment for them,” the mother told me, sounding angry at one point.
As we sat and continued to talk for a while I heard the longing in this sister’s voice for a better and easier life.
“I don’t complain because that is not me style. But all the days of my life I punish. From a child, I didn’t get to finish school and some days we had nothing to eat. I marry young and it was punishment again. So me losing me husband was no big thing because honestly sometimes I does feel we even deh little better than when he was with me. Now I working I feel good about me self because I never used to work.
“I can’t afford half of what we need but I does feel so good when I collecting a salary because I work for it. All I hope for one day is to own a little house so I wouldn’t have to pay rent.
But most of all I want all three of me daughters to grow up and be something in this life, you know, so that they wouldn’t have to punish.
I does pray for them that they don’t get children too young and so. That is all I does pray for in this life nothing more,” she told me.
As this sister continues to navigate the financial difficulties facing all of us, I will join her in prayer as well for her three daughters that they would grow and become productive, happy citizens. That is her biggest wish and I pray it is granted.
