The remittance queue
Money from relatives abroad still holds up a lot of Irad's families. A Saturday at a transfer office.
Zholdosh A. · 11 Feb 2024 · Issue 162 min read
On Saturday mornings the transfer office near the bazaar has a queue out of the door. Mostly women, mostly with a telephone in one hand and a passport in the other, waiting for the code from a son or a husband in Russia or Kazakhstan.
The amounts are small and regular. Rent, school, a debt at the shop, a part for the car. What these transfers buy is not luxury, it is time: a family with a regular transfer can wait for a better price, a better job, a better season. A family without one cannot wait for anything.
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