In order to survive and make ends meet, you can turn your talents, your imagination and your creativity into good use.
That is what 40 year old mother of two Ruth Kassam is doing.
She sells crafted earrings just to help support her two children and most importantly to sustain life everyday with what she like being called a ‘Wokabaut Market’.
Ruth Kassam who comes from the Foina Village in the Asaro District of Goroka, Eastern Highlands province said that the usual places that she go about to sell her earrings are at 4Mile, Islander and at Waigani as these are the places where most of her earrings are being sold.
“I am a mother of two who struggles very hard here in the big city just to survive and because I have children, I have obligations and that is why I am selling earrings and that is how I usually survive daily.”
Her son is currently in school in the village whilst her elder daughter is working in one of the shops here in the city.
Ruth resides at the first block at ATS and early in the morning she leaves home and can usually be seen walking around and selling her earrings at convenient locations.
She has a lot of customers and she even gets orders from some of her faithful customers upon requests.
Ruth explained that she has all the necessary tools to make all her earrings.
The tool that she usually uses are pliers which is her main tool and a hole puncher which is what she likes to call which makes holes into hard accessories or pieces.
“It usually takes approximately 3-4 days to weave and make all these earrings and I usually sell around 20 – 30 earrings daily and at the end of the day, what income I receive from my sales is what helps provide for my family and I.”
Ruth sells her Bagi’s and shell earrings for K20, the coiled wool earrings are going for K10 for the large ones and K5 for the small ones.
When asked about any problems or challenges that she has faced so far, Ruth laughed and said that the only problem right now that she has is the fact that she is tired of the backaches and all the joint aches from sitting down for hours weaving and threading.
“But what else can I say as this is the only way that is currently helping me to survive here in the city.”
“I am not in the village where I can make gardens and eat from what I am growing.”
She further added that she usually takes a day or two off just to ease the aches before she continues making more earrings.
Using her creativity, she plans on adventuring and exploring more of her talent and what she can do and her main goal right now for the future is to establish an SME business using the skills she has.
She plans on setting up a stall somewhere convenient later on to sell her earrings and also she said that she has been selling baskets and bilums that she gets all the way from Wewak in East Sepik Province.
Interested customers can call Ruth on +675 70172214 to place orders.