The Introduction combines a contextual introduction to disability in Kinshasa with an outline of the research problem as the tension between exceptionality and normality in a city that has long defined itself as in ‘crisis’. The interlocutors, their city, the times in which they lived, and their livelihood activities were all subject to ambiguous judgements as to whether they stood out as a negative or positive example, or if they were better viewed as simply part of the general experience of life in the wider community. The Introduction thus outlines the focus on mobility-impaired people in the grey area between work and welfare, where ‘crisis’ (mpiaka) opens a discursive space for experimentation, critique, and evaluation. The unpredictability that marks life in Kinshasa, in this respect, leads people to constantly reckon their social and economic value projects in relation to time. The Introduction introduces how crisis confronts people with choices of realising the short-term values of ‘fending for yourself’ or the long-term values of cultivating dependent relationships.