their children scurrying about. Each vendor had a plastic sheet that corresponded to his or her part of the common table, the fruits or vegetables stacked neatly and artistically in the center of the sheet, loose change carefully secreted under one corner, readily available when needed. The sellers called across the hall to each other, as they hailed customers and screamed after their children while they nursed younger infants or took care of bodily functions perched on pots that took the place of stools.
Outside the greengrocers, in the more open air, there were more bedraggled tables and slabs where the butchers and fish mongers displayed their wares to the buying public and the flies. Vultures and pied crows were strategically sitting on overhangs to avail themselves of any unguarded morsels or jetsam.
In the Southwest corner, sandwiched between the cloth dealers and the taxi stand, was the market’s dump heap where all that any one took the time to throw away ended up. Here the stray dogs and rats competed with Daniel, the market fool, for whatever could be ingested, regardless of the ultimate consequences.
Albert loved the market. Not long after sunrise he would arrive in his alley and go to his stall with his mobylette which, as soon as he had opened the heavy lock, he would push behind the racks and racks of colorful fabric. When he opened the door the first time each morning, his nose was greeted by the sharp smell of dye from the yards and yards of cloth kept inside. There was rich imported wax cloth from Holland, Indonesia, and England; fluffy denim-colored cloth from Guinea; plissé from Mali; jacquard and matelessé from Sénégal; broadcloth and twill from Belgium; lacy dentelle from Nigeria; flowery textiles from Côte d’Ivoire; rough weaves from Kenya; and, cheap pieces from the local mills. The fabric was all in six- to nine-yard rolls which would be cut based on the customers’ needs: most women needing at least six yards to make a full set, up-and-down, of a wrapper dress, blouse, and head-tie; men needing only about two yards unless they were planning on sewing the now popular pajama-like up-and-down (tops and bottoms) the younger guys sometimes wore.
When he had opened his stall and brought an exceptional selection of his brightest and thickest fabrics to racks near the doors for the scrutiny of passers-by, Albert would take his place on the high bar-type stool just to the side of the doors, cajoling would-be customers and bantering with neighbors and other vendors along the lane.
Soon after he opened up, his helper would arrive: his elder brother’s second son. This kid was not the pick of the litter, but he was cheap. Albert’s older brother lived in the village and had a full flock of offspring; too many mouths to feed with farms becoming smaller and smaller in size as land was bought up by the big businessmen, all the while, those fields that remained producing less and less as the soils became depleted and fertilizer prices rose. Today, city folk just had to help out their families at home. Albert hoped he was somehow doing some good for those still in the village.
Olivier, Albert’s nephew, was in his late teens. He had suffered through his early school years, being too mediocre and disinterested to continue once there was any sort of competition, preferring anything to sitting in a classroom to learn. This was a bit surprising, as his chosen option was to sit all day in a fabric stall. While he was not the brightest, Albert had worked very hard to get him to be able to do mental arithmetic without a calculator, and he was now able to make correct change for customers. Most importantly, Olivier was honest and had a winning smile which helped with reluctant buyers.
Olivier lived in the Boys’ Quarters in the back of Albert’s house where he was basically free to come and go as he chose. Although Albert did not pay him much, with his room and board supplied, the loose change in his pocket was readily consumed each night as he went out on the town, frequenting the cheap Off License bars, eating street food, and gallivanting with young hookers.
Even if he often came to work a little late and with more than a little hangover, he was dependable and looked after the shop well when Albert went to lunch or even when he had to go out of town to buy cloth or go back to the village for a funeral or other pressing family matters. Someday Olivier would move on, who knew where? But for the moment he supplied all the assistance Albert needed, and at a bargain price.
Customers would come pretty much throughout the day, with a surge in the early morning and late evening. On a good day he would be able to sell fabric to at least a score of clients, most often women looking for good buys and cheaper cloth. But at the holidays like Ramadan, Christmas and Easter, he would be able to sell the top-of-the-line material for the special occasions to adorn the city’s womenfolk and bring due honor to their households as they went forth bedecked in the most lush and colorful fabrics from head to toe.
His selection of fine fabrics was unique and he tended to have repeat customers who knew quality when they saw it. Most were mature women who were willing and able to pay for what they wanted. When he had started in the business he had had numerous young customers, both boys and girls. Today youngsters were more interested in western-style clothes they bought at rock-bottom prices at the frippery: that part of the market that sold bulk used clothing that came in bales from Europe and North America.
The Asian businessmen had pretty much monopolized the frippery market. They bought clothes given to charities for the poor by the ton and then sold the items by the piece, making huge profits in spite of the low price of the articles. Local shopkeepers had difficult times accessing the global used clothing market. Here, as well as in many other niches, they were unable to compete with their neighbors from Asia.
More and more the markets and consumables were being dominated by outside investors. Bolt fabrics were one of the areas where the local business people were still able to exert some control, although outsiders were lobbying heavily with the local politicians for more and more access, many fearing they would soon dominate all. Albert felt lucky to be in one of the few areas where he considered himself master of his own destiny, or at least his own profit.
Fabric sales, nevertheless, were not the most exciting of lifestyles. Certainly not to what Albert had aspired as a young man. In those heady days of his youth he had thought the world was his, and all was possible. But he, like Olivier, had left school early. He had married and become a husband and father, as Olivier was likely to do in the not too distant future.
As the years piled on, his life took on a familiar, if un-invigorating, routine revolving around, of all things, cloth. Early to bed and early to rise, his shop open seven days a week, except Christmas and Easter, from seven in the morning until seven at night. His days were his alleyway. When he left his stool, after the morning rush he would go to one of the tiny cafés or chop houses for a cup of Nescafé and a half baguette. Around mid-day he would return to one of these eateries for a plate of plantains and meat sauce—condré—or maize meal with melon seed soup. By the afternoon, after a filling meal, he would fight off the urge for a nap by chewing kola nuts and playing Ludo with his fellow fabric sellers; the board game others called Parcheesi. When the government offices closed at five, there would be another small wave of customers who were shopping on their way home. By the time he pushed his mobylette back outside, gave Olivier a teeny tip, and snapped the mighty lock shut, it was already well after dark. He part peddled, part road the thirty minutes back to his small home au quartier in the northern suburbs of this mid-sized city that served as the administrative and commercial core of the whole province.
Each evening, when he came through the door into his parlor, lit by a hissing gas lantern, he felt like a traveler reaching his destination. The lamp cast shadows and created a silky light that was like looking through one of his gossamer fabrics. The smells of kerosene, wood smoke, and hot palm oil seemed to blend into a homey cologne. He would greet his family, play a bit with his children, eat a hardy meal surrounded by the love of his family, and then fall on his bed and dream of his youth, running carefree across the plains, and smelling the coming rain.
The next day, come rain or shine, he would be back on his stool, anxious to bargain over the best waxes or the cheapest poplin. All was well with the world when Albert was at his
