We finally ventured to Marché Sandaga – the largest market in Dakar. Several city blocks are filled with stalls of clothes, food, fabric, jewelry, brooms, and anything else they can find to sell. At all times in Sandaga you will be accompanied by some man trying to lead you to his still to give you his card (aka make you buy something) or propose to you – those seem to be their only two objectives. Other men will continually come up to you and vouch for your guide, telling you what a good guy he is. If you have the energy to deal with them, you can have fun thinking up ways to shake them off. Some we told we were to environmentally conscious to accept a paper business card, others we told we had very contagious illnesses, and some we just repeated “no merci” on high speed until they got the message. With Senegalese men, it takes a long time for them to get the message – no does not mean no here, it means try harder. I’m married does not mean no here either, it means explain in detail every way you are far superior to my husband.
Once we found some fabric we liked – which was tricky because if you stand still long enough to get a good look at some you will be entirely surrounded by at least six men- the bartering process began. Vendors are a bit more receptive to us now that we have learned a bit of Wolof to negotiate in, but we still always get the Toubab price. One friend picked out fabric on the sly and then had her host sister go and negotiate a price for it (which was much lower as she was Senegalese). When she then popped in to pay for it the vendor got really angry as he realized he had been tricked out of over charging a tourist.
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