Typical African Market

The market was old, timeless Africa; loud, crowded and free. Here, a man sat making sandals from old discarded motor car tyres there, another worked at an old sewing machine a nightgown-like affair while the buyer waited; a little further on, an old goldsmith worked at his dying art, but using, now, copper filing instead of gold to fashioned with such fine art that only Africans think of it as a garment of utility. Trade was slow and loud everywhere. This was as much as a shopping centre. For an excuse to spend the day at the market, a woman would walk all the way from her village to town with half a dozen eggs. She would spread on a little bit of ground for which she paid rent. Through the day she would squat on the ground and talk to others who came for the same reason. She would refuse to sell her wares till it was time to leave. They were the excuse for her being there. There were many like that. But there were many others for whom trade was an earnest business. Whether in earnest or as an excuse, the trade were boisterously free loud-mouthed and happy, the laughter of the market was a laughter found nowhere else in all the world......