Stuck in traffic

                One particularly ingenious – and sometimes annoying, and dangerous – form of commerce in Africa is the street merchant. This doesn’t mean what it might mean in the States, a few guys selling things on a sidewalk. No, this is literally the old-fashioned Five & Dime, setting up business on the fly right in the middle of busy, multi-lane roads.

Sometimes one person will have pillows and Super Glue for sale, or other odd combos.

                You might be waiting for a traffic signal, or simply stuck in one of the huge traffic jams that are so prevalent here. Suddenly, your vehicle is surrounded by specialized merchants, plying their wares with varying degrees of aggressiveness, squeezing in between tro-tros and cars, heavy trucks and buses, taxis and whatever else might be on the road. And the assortment is nothing short of mind-boggling. Sitting there waiting for the jam to clear, you can buy (and this is just scratching the surface):

                Sets of tools. Newspapers. Shoe polish. Airtime cards for your phone. Full-size covers to protect your parked car from the sun. Large wall maps of Africa, or Ghana. CDs and DVDs, including soft-porn titles that the young man may pitch slightly leeringly to “madam,” glancing at “papa” and saying “He will enjoy it…” One guy specializes in electrical plugs, another in belts. Need a new air freshener for your car, or bathroom? Wave to the guy three cars down. Are your children having trouble learning the parts of the human body? No problem: here’s a full-size poster with everything (well, nearly everything) labeled. One guy sells neckties, another, socks. Soccer shirts and knockoff athletic shoes. Wall clocks, and wristwatches. An item in a box labeled “Tummy Trimmer.” Sunglasses, and ordinary eyeglasses. Assortments of wall decorations with religious slogans. Comic books.

                And if you don’t watch out, the guy with the bucket and squeegee will be halfway done with washing your windshield, holding his hand out for a donation, before you have a chance to say you don’t need it.

                Of course there is lots of food, of the easily-consumable-in-the-car variety, usually sold by women. Little plastic bags of plaintain chips. The small “satchets” of chilled water that locals are adept at holding in one hand, piercing the corner with their teeth, then sucking the water out in one quick motion as they drive. Four apples, bagged and ready to go. Bananas. Grapes.

                One of the most amazing, purely from a “degree of difficulty” point of view, is the young women who balance large round metal trays on their heads, packed full with maybe six layers of peanuts in the shell, all laid out in concentric circles stacked on top of each other, their ends pointing outward. Order some peanuts (or G-nuts, as they’re called here – ground nuts), and she will reach her arm up over the top of the tray, carefully removing a handful and bagging them for you. We have never seen a spill.

                This goes on in Uganda, too, though the variety and volume seems more in Ghana – which may be why the government wants the practice to end. It does get a little exciting out there, when somebody is in the middle of buying something just as the traffic starts up, and the kid has to run alongside in his flip-flops, right in the middle of the lanes, holding out his hand to grab the payment out the car window. But they’re all pretty good at it, the drivers and the merchants alike, and it would make the jams that much more boring without all this street theater to enjoy. Besides, come to think of it, we needed a new broom – and there’s one, right over there!