Sweat Shop!

This is not the second part of my Toubacouta post, but... Today I bought a pair of patchwork African pants at a sweat shop! It was what we here at MSID call a "funtresting" experience- while many of the things we do here are interesting, but not necessarily fun, and others are interesting, but also boring, this one was fun AND interesting.

6 of us took taxis downtown to le marche Sandaga, (in the N'ice Cream region,) and then split up. Rachel, Trina, and I stepped into this shop so Rachel could try on a dress. It was too small, but this random guy said, "Venez! J'ai des robes grosses." ("Come on! I have fat dresses.") We followed him around for 5 minutes before we ducked into what was definitely a sweat shop. There were young men and a few children sitting at around 25 sewing machines churning out dresses, bags, pants, mumus, etc.

By this time we had around 5 guys following us around handing us random articles of clothing. I spotted the sweetest pair of pants ever, Rachel found a couple things she liked, and then our entourage lead us up 3 flights of stairs to the "changing room"- a side room off of a second sweat shop, where there was a mat on the floor where one or two preteen boys were passed out sleeping. Rachel, worried for our safety, asked our friends "Est-ce que ca c'est prudent?" Our 5 assistants just laughed. They waited by the open door while we changed, yelling out every 4 seconds, "Can we come see now? Now? Now?" We picked out the items we wanted and spent around 20 minutes bargaining our sweat shop liaison, and when we finally bought our 3 items for 15,000 CFA, (around 3o bucks) everyone was happy.

Anyhow, I can honestly say that this was my favorite sweat shop I've ever been to. More on Toubacouts tomorrow!