Market Time

Thursday, 27th February

Although the borders were still closed and I was meant to be in Kariba by now, town had reopened so we made our trip in. We went into the market which was a maze of dust, dirt, straw, smells, heat and darkness with people crouching here and sleeping on piles of clothes there. It was constructed of wooden poles holding up sheets of plastic and, despite looking rather small from the outside, it turned out to be a huge Aladdin's cave, selling everything you could think of from clothes to phone chargers to those bright red African tomatoes whose sweetness I had come to love. There was a greater variety of clothes laid out than I have seen in any department store I had been to in the UK. Most of the people there were women, but instead of hustling us for being mzungus as I thought they might, they simply watched us pass through and gave a friendly smile if I caught their eye. Tom had promised me it was exactly what I would imagine an African market to be, and it didn't disappoint. I bought 3 beautiful shitengas (long cotton cloths that women fashion around their bodies, but equally can double up as a table cloth, picnic blanket or almost anything you can think of).

I also bought two pineapples for the family, costing 5 kwacha each (about 20p). Apparently the way to tell if they are really sweet is to pick the ones without spikes - which I unwittingly did and unashamedly took the praise for once home. They were the sweetest fruit I have ever tasted, absolutely delicious! After nearly 3 weeks of no fruit it could have been ice cream to my tastebuds. The sugar rush certainly sent the boys crazy and we had a tough time getting them to settle down for the night...

trad African shitengas (not my photo)