Stories of Real People at Work Around the World

Real people in remarkable jobs.

Nonfiction business/career studies, sociology of work, true stories of people in jobs, and how-tos for job hunting.

Photo by Manuel Ortega.

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My Brother & Pablo: a Virtual (WFH) Bromance

Jun 18, 2022

Working from home (WFH) surged during the COVID-19 pandemic, and it will only increase moving forward: 74 percent of companies plan to continue the trend, according to The Atlantic. However, remote workers often experience virtuality as “a barrier” to forming...

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Hello!

In the MY JOB book series, I share an insider’s view into unique workers from all ages, genders, cultures, and personalities; so you can see and feel what it’s like to be, e.g., a banana farmer in rural Uganda, a slack-rock guitarist from Hawaii, or a pornographic webcam model in Pennsylvania. The narrators’ intimate stories also reveal how very similar we all are at our human core. I believe their first-person, true stories will surprise and inspire you, both here and in the pages of our books! My story here.

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Meet the author (me!) and narrators, get an overview of the series’ content, and join me as I read excerpts from the books and ponder the impact of work on our life.

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Nonfiction business/career studies, sociology of work, true stories of people in jobs, and how-tos for job hunting.

Meet the Narrators

Purnima

Interior Designer, Kandy, Sri Lanka

“In Sri Lankan culture, it’s hard for a woman to do things alone. There are so many restrictions imposed by society. I did a design for an upscale auto-service station and people said, ‘It’s about cars, what do you know about cars?’ I wanted to bring out the womanness in a car and bring that out into the lobby . . . Based on my internship, they actually changed their perception of what women could do in this field.”

Book 1—Real People

Muhammad

Rickshaw Puller, Dhaka, Bangladesh

“The whole day I spend pulling the rickshaw. I start from 7a.m. Often I ride until 10p.m. If I miss one day, we don’t eat that day . . . I want my children not to be like me—not to have to do the same work every day. Everything is aching. Everything in me hurts.”

Book 1—Real People

Misozi (3rd from L)

Mobile-Money Agent, Lusaka, Zambia

“My name means ‘tears.’ At the time I was born, it wasn’t a happy time. Through hard work and determination I have been able to build up my business. Now I have nineteen employees and have empowered five to operate their own shops independently. I love the fact that I get to be my own boss.”

Book 2—More People

Alberto

Stay-at-Home Dad and Art Teacher, Chicago, Illinois, U.S.

“The year before I was incarcerated, I moved to Guanajuato, near Mexico City. That’s where my folks are from. I was living with my grandparents at the time. My brothers lived there. I was fifteen. I just loved the open space and the freedom. I consider myself 100 percent Mexican and 100 percent American. It was amazing to live in a place where I could be myself and nobody’s judging me.”

Book 2—More People

Mike

Gambling Recovery Counselor, London, England

“In the U.K., 75% of people gamble (although fewer than 1% have an addiction problem). It’s a big part of the culture. Bizarrely, our helpline number is on the back of every single national lottery ticket in the country and scratch cards as well. Gambling sells the illusion that, ‘I’m going to win big and then I’m going to suddenly have wealth, and I’ll have the life of ease and the life that I want.'”

Book 2—More People

Mary

Banana Farmer, Mbale, Uganda

“We have to fetch water by five or six in the morning. Then we’ve got to dig, do planting, then weeding. The whole day we are busy. When I have free time, I am on my phone, studying agriculture. The phone advised me . . . So, I am now doing crop rotation. I love my banana trees! I love them like my children. They’re a source of food and income, like the friend who’s always there, whether I’m tired or not.”

Book 2—More People

Kevin

Nursing Student, Santa Lucia, Honduras

“When I was five years old, my father came in and showed us this knife. Then, later that night, he killed my mom. I ran to my mother. She had a knife wound in her throat and another one close to her heart. She put her hand in my hand, and she fell and died . . . I chose nursing because it’s a way to help others. I remember when I was a kid, I hated people so much, and now I love them.”

Book 1—Real People

Sandra

Midwife Clinic Director, Ciudad Vieja, Guatemala

“He started to hit me. He beat me several times. I had visible wounds on my face, and I was really ashamed when I went to work like that. I said, ‘I can’t continue like this because I’m going out to speak to women about their rights, and here I am, obviously hurt.’ So I decided to leave him. I feel blessed to have a son with Asperger’s because he’s helped me to cultivate my patience and the more humane side of me. He’s changed my life.”

Book 2—More People

Nadine

College Admissions Counselor, Kigali, Rwanda

“The worst part of my job is seeing these girls looking in my eyes and asking me to help them. We can’t accept all of them at Akilah because we’re not so financially sustainable . . . I learned a lot growing up in the genocide and later, always hungry, in a very small rented house made of mud, no running water and no electricity. Now, I want to advocate for other African girls so they can able to be educated and have the opportunities that I’ve had.”

Book 2—More People

Kelly

English Teacher, Daegu, South Korea

“I really love my students. They work much harder than I did at that age. When they finally finish their academics and leave to go home, they are very tired. They don’t have any more power [energy] left. They move very slowly, lugging their big bags. They go, ‘Bye bye, Teacher.’ When I look at them, I feel like their life is very sad. My heart is sore for them.”

Book 2—More People

Srey Pouv

Rice Microfinancier, Siem Reap, Cambodia

“Our family didn’t have enough food to eat. I started my business with just twelve dollars. What’s important for me first is my business; I want my loan business to be able to help as many people as I can. It’s very difficult to get someone to really take the initiative and start up a business, even when you hand it over to them. I want to help my family stand up like me.”

Book 2—More People

Sena

Tomato Canner, Anloga, Ghana

“Every year, my people grow tomatoes and they go rotting in the field. I see that waste, and I feel the pinch of it. I went to Switzerland to see their farming methods. When I got back to Ghana, I bought a crate of tomatoes, and pureed them as my mentor had taught me. We did a sample with the hand crank. I said, ‘Let’s make it five-star.’ So, I coupled an electric drill onto it. This is how Tip Top began.”

Book 2—More People

Tania

Dancer, Toronto, Canada

“For me, the biggest achievement is if someone can watch your show, and then they’re crying. It means that something that you did, something in the music, something in your movement . . . touches their heart, and makes them feel. A lot of people come to dance because they have issues. I’ve seen students overcome anxiety, grief, and depression. It’s almost like getting a new life.”

Book 2—More People

Michele

Arts Cultural-Exchange Officer, State Department, Washington, D.C., U.S.

“At one point, I thought I wanted to be a bartender [laughs] . . . Now, I manage cross-cultural exchange programs for the Bureau of Educational and Cultural Affairs. We send American artists abroad–whether they be dancers, musicians, or visual artists–and bring international artists to the U.S. It’s grassroots-level diplomacy. We can reach non-elites, those that are disenfranchised, marginalized in their communities, don’t have access to high standards of education. The arts help cross a lot of boundaries and barriers.”

Book 2—More People

Junior

Environmental Activist, Naoma, West Virginia, U.S.

“I just don’t agree with the fact that you send men into an underground coal mine to break their backs and kill themselves, either outright in a mine explosion, or a rock fall, or later on by black lung and other coal-related illnesses. And there’s somebody sitting up on Wall Street who’s never had a callous on their hands, ain’t never worked a day in their life, never seen West Virginia, and they’re making millions upon millions of dollars off of the sweat and blood and labor of those people working in that mine.”

Book 2—More People

Greg

Mideast Peace Diplomat, New York, New York, U.S.

“Israel-Palestine feels half a world away; it’s not. We lead trips to the Mideast to build a movement of pro-Israeli, pro-Palestinian, pro-American peace activists. What they experience completely rocks their world and tests and pushes their assumptions. It transcends political beliefs. Connecting people is at once the simplest thing that you can do, and it’s the most radical, if you want to change the world.”

Book 2—More People

Mickey

Fringe Diplomat, Tel Aviv, Israel

“Fringe diplomacy goes beyond what governments are able to do in international relations. It’s not the photo ops. There’s no game or dance to be played. It’s just real people . . . I resist the claim that everybody that we don’t agree with is irrational: the Iranians, the North Koreans—I’ll take it to the extreme: Suicide bombers are rational people. They just have a very different way of calculating and looking at the world, and unless you try to get into their shoes and understand what it is, it will be really hard to get anything positive from that engagement.”

Book 2—More People

Makana

Slack-Key Guitar Musician, Honolulu, Hawaii, U.S.

“Art is totally unstable. It doesn’t just validate; it elicits a sense of intimacy and aversion, like at the same time. Art should at once grab you and draw you in . . . but also repel you. It’s dangerous.”

Book 1—Real People

Arindam & Debaleena

Eco-Manufacturers, Assam, India

“Our focus is to create jobs in rural northeast India, making an ecofriendly product, which also reduces pollution because we are replacing Styrofoam and plastics. We’ve had to work through things like complete scarcity of electricity in this region . . . We just designed a dryer, which is non-electrified, fueled by biomass.”

Book 1—Real People

Christina

Online Lingerie Entrepreneur, Ramallah, Palestine

“Lingerie matters because it’s the first thing you put on in your day. And that’s our goal: to save the world, one bra at a time. Starting a business can have a larger effect than being directly involved with politics.”

Book 1—Real People

Nga

Life-Vest School-Backpack Manufacturer, Hanoi, Vietnam

“I grew up in a very poor family. I was a teacher for 22 years, then trained as a traditional doctor, and then I built this factory. My son created the idea of the life-vest backpack. So there are about 200,000 children in Vietnam who go to school every day by ferries or boats, who are at risk of the floods. Now, we don’t see any news or any stories about children die of flood anymore.”

Book 1—Real People

Hannah

Recruiter/Headhunter, Tampa, Florida, U.S.

“Recruiting is a rollercoaster: I can sit down at 7:30 in the morning and have a hard time taking a pee break [laughs] . . . I rarely take lunch. The American dream? I don’t know. I mean, the American dream of escalating your career and having a house and a stable family? It hasn’t exactly come true for me.”

Book 1—Real People

Wantay

Maasai Warrior, Ngorongoro, Tanzania

“When I was growing up, my childhood dream was that I would be a good warrior, that I would be able to kill lions and be able to protect my community. They do three things that are like a test of bravery. You don’t make the noise; you don’t cry. It hurts a very lot. When you kill a lion, it’s like ‘wow.’ Everyone talks about you for the rest of your life.”

Book 1—Real People

Mayra

Coffee Co-op Farmer, Managua, Nicaragua

“The men never listened to us. So I said to the women, ‘Let’s find a piece of land and make our own building for our meetings. We’ll each kick in a certain contribution to save and buy it.’ We started selling our coffee beans. Then we bought a mill and a grinder to grind corn for the community. This dream has become a reality. We think that we’ll be able to make good income from that.”

Book 1—Real People

Robin

Horse Coach, Jeffersonville, Kentucky, U.S.

“A lot of kids bond with horses, especially girls . . . I’ve seen it happen time and time again, kids just completely and utterly changed because of these animals. We’ve had some pretty rough kids. They have a tendency to bond with horses very well. They usually end up staying on the team. They usually end up healing.”

Book 1—Real People

Matt

Google Technologist, Mountain View, California, U.S.

“It was tough growing up bicultural. I My friends were like, ‘What the hell are you doing? You have piano and violin and basketball and soccer and saxophone and swimming and tennis.’ It was like fifty million things. My mom grew up very, very poor. She wanted a better life for us. Now, I love the fact that I also have this other culture that is a part of me, and I think being Chinese is pretty cool.”

Book 1—Real People

Pablo

Xerox LatAm Finance Manager, Cordoba, Argentina

“My dream was to work in finance for a multinational company. My father is an accountant as well, and I received a lot of influence from him. He had his office at home. I could see him working every day with all the papers, all the calculators, and the typing machines. A kid like me wants to be like his father . . . I think that, like it or not, money moves the world.”

Book 1—Real People

Nik

Equity Investment Manager, Hong Kong, China

“Hong Kong is defined by excess in every way—big cars, expensive jewelry and bags. It’s about having wealth and showing it, even if you don’t have it. But the metric that nobody talks about, is actually happiness. You have like overachievers like me, who do well in school and in their career. They put their head down and rush, and succeed. And then at some point, they look around, and there’s a void.”

Book 1—Real People

Kevin

Architect, Cincinnati, Ohio, U.S.

“There’s a difference between collaboration and sort of being told what to draw, especially when you’re told what to draw, and it’s absolutely horrid. One client wanted to take out all of this beautiful wood and iron storefront, really ornate, nice stuff, and wanted to put it back with basically hideous, modern sort of stuff. And it broke my heart. I still have to drive by that building every day.”

Book 2—More People

Darius

Hip-Hop Artist, Chicago, Illinois, U.S.

“Some of our families are in the opposite gangs and are fighting the other gangs. It’s crazy, like this is real. But me, I’m married to my music. I’d be up at like three, four in the morning, writing songs. Music is like my wife, and my songs are our babies. No matter how I’m feeling, if I’m crying or sad, she’s always going to be there. She’s going to listen to me . . . and we make a lot of babies.

Book 1—Real People

Christine

Pediatric Cancer Care, Cincinnati, Ohio, U.S.

“I went home, and I couldn’t get past the kitchen floor. It’s hard to go back and relive all this. I was making deals with God, because I had lived my life. I was a grown woman, I was married, I had kids. I was like, ‘Take me, let him live.’ I just sat there bargaining, promising, ‘I’ll go to church forever. Take me. Don’t let him go through any pain.’ I just lost it.”

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Catherine

University Student, St. Andrews, Fife, Scotland, U.K.

“I worked as a barista at a local bakery to earn money for my future travels . . . Currently, I am a university student and do not have a job due to time constraints.”