From Sewing Dreams to Kitchen Nightmares: Trader reveals how she ended up cooking instead of learning to sew

Hannah Hagan’s hopes were high as a young woman to become a secretary one day but financial difficulties made continuing her education impossible.

Since that opportunity didn’t present itself, her brothers took her to a local seamstress, to teach her how to sew. However, her dreams soon unravelled after she realized that instead of learning to sew, she found herself in the kitchen, cooking meals for her madam.

On Mondays, her off days, she would leave her home to her madam’s home to cook for her and she would also send her on errands. According to her, she did all that thinking that, it would make her madam teach her better than her other colleagues at that shop.

Days turned into weeks, and weeks into months, but her sewing lessons never materialized.

During her turn on the August 19, 2024 edition of GhanaWeb TV’s Everyday People programme, the brassiere vendor at the Kaneshie Market in Accra, recounted that it took a neighbour to draw her attention to what was happening before she realized it.

“After dropping out of school, my brothers insisted that I learn how to sew, so they took me to a local seamstress. When I got there, I had the mindset that if you serve your madam well, she will teach you from the heart. But instead, she was more interested in my services to her. She kept sending me on errands every time I went to work, to the point that a colleague of mine said, ‘As for you Fantes, were you sent to learn or did you come here to serve your madam?’ Even when she said that I continued serving my madam because at least, after cooking for her, I would get some food to eat, so I was happy doing that.”

“We didn’t go to the shop on Mondays, and the people in the area often thought that because of how I served my madam, she should be able to teach me something on our off days. But it never happened. I later heard that during those off days, she would use the time to teach another woman who was also there to learn sewing for six months. When I got that hint, one Monday I decided to go to her house to confirm if it was true. When I got there, my madam was indeed teaching the woman. I got angry and told her that she had promised to teach me sewing for two years, and I had already completed one year. So, I asked her to give me my balance so I could leave,” she told reporter Victoria Kyei Baffour.

When asked if she learned anything about sewing at all, Hannah replied, “It was only how to make slits and work with fabrics.”

Watch Hannah Hagan's narration in the video below:





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