Portraits of Beijing Street Entrepreneurs
Call it resilience, or resourcefulness, or better still, being “street-smart”.
Some Chinese struggle to find their place in this age of widening disparity between the haves and the have-nots. Some of them find a way.
In the first picture a middle-aged man sits on his stool all day long and all year round. He cooks and sells corn cobs to passersby who only have time to grab a bite. On the side, he vends seasonal items that people cannot do without yet either forget to include in their shopping list or don’t think of until they pass this gentleman: mosquito repellent and paper fans in the summer, gloves (including touch screen ones) and scarves in the winter. Two weeks from the Chinese Spring Festival, he spreads red pockets (pictured), essentials for parents and elders to keep lucky money for kids.
Had I not had dinner with coworkers one night till 10:00 pm near my workplace, I wouldn’t have taken the second picture. I wouldn’t even have noticed its late-nightly existence in the part of the town that is bustling during the day and dead quiet at night. This improvised tent (pictured) is set up some time between eight and ten at night for a few hours only. It is a makeshift eatery presumably catering to the low-income. A peek inside assured my guess. A water container is visible from the shadow. A man is eating from his bowl, squatting.
The lady also addresses a niche market: garbage bags. Her practice is the most nimble of all. A sack, a carton box, a collection of garbage bags (pictured) — that’s all it takes. Transport is a breeze. Put the garbage bags in the box, and box in the sack, and off you go. And not much decision making cost on the part of passing passengers. Have a glance at it and you either buy it or not. Picking garbage bags may look ridiculously simple, yet wisdom is evident. It’s one of those things that you don’t keep track of the stock. Four remaining packs of bags suggest that much store is gone well before 9 pm. Not a bad day.
The owners of the stand, the tent and the bags may not be labeled entrepreneurs properly. But when it comes to suppling the often neglected demand in a niche market, they are entrepreneurs through and through. They contribute to economy, but are not credited, not even noticed. What they care most, perhaps, is through what they do they can make a living and provide for their families. To me, they are a living example of tough-mindedness and a delightful source of inspiration. Hats off to them!
I was inspired by George Orwell’s Down and Out in Paris and London and Brandon Stanton’s Humans of New York project. The stories were written in January 2014 and December 2016.
