Every day, we exchange something with someone.
Money for food.
Time for salary.
Attention for entertainment.
Trust for convenience.
Most of these exchanges are honest.
You know what you’re giving. I know what I’m receiving. The exchange is clear.
A clean transaction.
But not every transaction stays that way.
Sometimes the exchange remains exactly the same, but the meaning of the exchange doesn’t.
That’s when I think it becomes a dirty transaction.
Not because transactions are immoral. Civilisation is built on them. Markets, businesses, employment, trade, even something as ordinary as buying a cup of coffee, depend on people exchanging value. There is nothing shameful about that.
The transaction itself isn’t the problem.
It becomes difficult the moment the exchange means different things to the people involved.
A clean transaction is one where both sides know exactly what they’re exchanging.
A dirty transaction is one where one side believes they are exchanging something deeper than the other.
I often think about a scene in Django Unchained.
The deal has already been negotiated. The money has already changed hands. Yet Calvin Candie insists on one final gesture.
“A handshake.”
Legally, the deal is complete.
But symbolically, it isn’t.
A handshake has never been about paperwork. It’s an acknowledgement that two people stood across from each other, recognised the exchange, and accepted it.
That ritual carries weight.
When Dr King Schultz refuses to shake Candie’s hand, he isn’t rejecting the contract. He’s rejecting what the handshake would symbolise. He refuses to grant legitimacy to something he cannot accept.
That scene stayed with me.
Not because of the violence that follows.
Because it made me wonder whether every transaction carries an invisible layer beyond the transaction itself.
I started noticing this idea outside that scene.
A company may call itself a family.
A business meeting may sound like friendship.
A favour quietly becomes an obligation.
A compliment sometimes becomes the beginning of a request.
The transaction itself hasn’t changed.
Only the meaning around it has.
Sometimes that’s enough for two people to walk away believing they were part of two completely different exchanges.
Perhaps that’s why some transactions leave people feeling betrayed.
Not because someone broke the agreement.
The work was delivered.
The salary was paid.
Nothing in the agreement was broken.
Yet one side still walked away feeling betrayed.
Not because the contract failed.
Because somewhere along the way, the contract had quietly become something else in their mind.
I’ve always found that interesting.
Perhaps that’s also why so many interactions today feel strangely hollow.
We complete more transactions than ever before, yet fewer of them feel complete.
We order food without speaking to another person.
We pay by tapping a phone.
We resign through a WhatsApp message.
The exchange happens.
Something else quietly disappears.
There is dignity in saying,
“This is our agreement.”
“You bring your skills.”
“I’ll provide the opportunity.”
“As long as this exchange creates value for both of us, we’ll continue.”
There is no betrayal in that.
The betrayal begins when we decorate a contract with the language of unconditional loyalty, then feel surprised when the contract behaves exactly like a contract.
Since then, I’ve started paying attention to transactions differently.
Not to judge them.
Just to notice what each side believes they’re exchanging.
Sometimes both people are making the same deal.
Sometimes they aren’t.
And I’ve started wondering whether that difference is what separates a clean transaction from a dirty one.