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Story: Rhythms of daily life

Working hard for the money: paid work

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Working hard for the money: paid work

The daily routine of people with children and low-paying jobs can become an unending round of paid and unpaid tasks, with sleep and eating squeezed in where possible. This photograph of Masiega So’iso’i  in 1989 shows her doing the early morning cleaning job she had held down for 8 years. Starting at 3.00 and ending at 7.00 am, the job allowed her to be home to prepare breakfast and get her four children off to school, do the necessary household work, and be there for the children after 3.00. While she cleaned, her husband Henry was also at work, driving a taxi.

Using this item

Alexander Turnbull Library, Dominion Post Collection (PA-Group-00685)

Reference: EP/1989/2830

by Jon Hargest

Permission of the Alexander Turnbull Library, National Library of New Zealand, Te Puna Mātauranga o Aotearoa, must be obtained before any re-use of this image.

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How to cite this page

Megan Cook, Rhythms of daily life – Working-age adults, Te Ara – the Encyclopedia of New Zealand, https://teara.govt.nz/en/photograph/40510/working-hard-for-the-money-paid-work (accessed 4 June 2026).

Story by Megan Cook, published 11 December 2012.