Читать книгу Phobos & Deimos - John Moehl - Страница 8

Markets are not all the same. Albert had seen pictures in the old newspapers he used for wrapping cloth; pictures of beautiful expansive stores with shiny floors, bright lights, and shelves upon shelves of wonderful merchandize. They called these supermarkets. Well, that may be all well and good, but here in the Central Market, the marcado, he knew they, too had a super market.

This was the Big Market and it was truly super with everything anyone could imagine. Whatever you could eat, wear, put in your house, or use on your farm was to be found somewhere in the vast expanse of the market. There were rows upon rows of small market cubicles located around a maze of narrow byways that amounted to footpaths, albeit the pedestrians had to share them with bicycles, mopeds, motorcycles, pushcarts, and even the occasional horse. The shops themselves were a conglomerate of corrugated roofing sheets, wood, and whatever scraps might have been considered useful in constructing some sort of structure to keep out the rain and thieves. Inevitably, regardless of how flimsy the stall, it sported a disproportionately large padlock; a case where size really did not matter because, irrespective of how big, most of these cheap Chinese imports flew open with a good solid rap on their shackle.

The alleyways twisted left and right and back on themselves, the vendors selling dry goods interspersed with small lean-to chop houses and mimbo bars. These lanes were more like grooves, worn deep in the soil under the feet of thousands of market-goers. The hard under-surface was overlaid with a smooth ooze of all variety of detritus which took on major proportions in the rainy season. These ruts would be literal streams in the rains, changing to a trickle in the dry season when they transported mostly human by- and waste-products. The combination of these rich liquids and sludge imparted a pungent fragrance to the market that mingled with the tang of cassava, a myriad of special spices, aging fish and meat, along with over-ripening vegetables.

The food-selling portion of the market was located on the Northeast corner of the plaza. Here the goods were sold in long sheds with cement floors and more structured drains. Under the metal-roofed hangers, which burned like ovens in the hot season, the foodstuffs were arranged along wooden tables, the men and women selling the produce sitting behind on a variety of stools and chairs, 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 shop.

Then one day he came to open his doors to find a wrinkled sheet of paper crudely stuck to his doors with common white paste. What was this epistle? There, nearly hidden by the city, commune, and Ministry of Finance stamps were the few words that would change Albert’s life: Notice to Shop Owners—effective immediately the Central Market will be relocated to the old parade field; market space and licenses to be allocated on a first-come-first-serve basis to those vendors who present a written demand, proof of tax payment, and a deposit of two-hundred-thousand francs.

This was the knell of doom. The rumors have been flying about the Mayor’s intentions. It was now clear. All the impossible was soon seen as possible, as Albert confirmed the situation with adjacent shopkeepers. The current market plaza would be leveled and converted into a taxi park and bus station, the Mayor holding all the concessions for fuel and food for the businesses supplying the transporters and their travelers. What’s more, the Mayor had already sold all the licenses for the new market to his political cronies, family, folks from his village, and high-paying Asians. This meant that the only way the current businessmen could continue in the new market would be by sub-contracting with the new license holders, paying as much as ten times the price to be able to open a new stall; a sum most would not make in a year. The long and short of it was that they were all shut down.

The super market was no more and the super marketers were adrift. Each was pushed and pulled by the tides and winds of their own sphere; Albert feeling as though he was dashed on the rocks and pummeled by the surf. He managed to keep his stall open for another two weeks before the bulldozers came, liquidating as much of his lovely stock as possible before he removed his remaining inventory to his house, putting piles of bolts in the corner of his room and under the bed.

Once the market was razed, Albert felt as empty as the old market plaza. He had no clue of what to do now. He had little or no chance to get a license for a stall in the new a market. He could not go back to the village. The extended family’s resources were already over-subscribed. Furthermore, he owned his home and had children in school here in the city. He had no special skills and would be most reluctant to become someone’s Olivier—a simple store helper. How could he pay his bills, keep food on the table, and keep his kids in school?

When the new market had been built, Albert went to see if by any means he could find a way to have a stall. What he found was an aberrant structure in no way resembling a super market; rather a maze of prefabricated interlinked blockhouses with no personality and critically no ventilation. Furthermore, there was absolutely no chance for him to get a shop. Not only could he not get in, but all his former competitors also found themselves on the outside, the new market’s fabric sales completely under the thumbs of Asian businessmen who sold only cloth from their part of the world. There were no more rich batiks or waxes, no woven kente or colorful kangas; there was only blasé poor quality machine-made material that was not suitable for a curtain, let alone a fine set of clothes for Christmas.

Olivier was luckier. His experience, but lack of ambition, made him the perfect gofer for the new cloth sellers and he had quickly found a new employer. He had wanted to keep on living with Albert, but this was plainly impossible and he had had to find a room to rent somewhere in the quartier which almost made his balance sheet negative from the onset.

Albert’s wife was full of suggestions. What of this, what of that? Why not try this? Did you ever think of . . . ? While he did try to examine the opportunities and take the advice from his wife, or anyone else who was thoughtful enough to offer it, he found no open roads. He was at a dead end and did not know how to turn around.

If he had more money, he would have become a drunk; killing the pain with kaikai, arki, or any home distillate that would bring numbness to his troubled brain. If he had been able, he might have even killed himself; but this too was something he did not even know how to set about. So he worried and worried and worried.

Every day he walked about town looking for some possible chance, some way to keep his head above water. He was lost.

The pressure built and he continued his fruitless pursuit of another life. Then, one day as he walked home after yet another unsuccessful pilgrimage around town, he saw a flash of light, felt a snap like a branch breaking in the wind, and then felt nothing.

He awoke in a dirty bunk in a dirty ward in the Central Hospital, seeing his wife sitting on the dirty floor next to his foul bed. He tried to ask her what had happened but nothing seemed to work. He moved his lips, or at least thought he did, but there was no sound, or no sound he could hear. He was confused and afraid.

When is wife became aware of his wakefulness, she came close and moved her lips in his face but he heard nothing. She saw his big, fear-filled eyes and realized serious damage had been done. She tried to make gestures for him to calm down; to reassure him that she would do what needed to be done, although she had no idea of what could or should be done.

She tried valiantly to do something, anything. She ran to the Matron’s desk and begged someone to come and help. She grabbed nurses, doctors, and hospital aids by their sleeves and tried to drag them to her husband’s bedside. She screamed and she pleaded, but all she received were patronizing shrugs and a few indifferent words soliciting patience. Patience. She had been patient. She had waited for hours for someone to come to her husband. No one had come and no one came. Patience. There was no more patience. There was nothing.

Totally exhausted, she returned to the ward and slumped by the bed. What had happened with their life? What would become of their life?

Through some sort of distorted haze like gossamer cloth, Albert sensed more than saw his wife. Somehow he felt her love. And then he took her by the hand and led her into the new super market with rows and rows of fabric dealers selling the finest materials. He saw her dressed in a magnificent English wax, with her head-tie high and haughty. Life was good.