Pedlars
kuwait diary
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Pedlars |
pre war Kuwait kuwait diary |
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"ruba dinar, ruba dinar" |
December
2, 1989 Have I already mentioned the pedlars? Of course there are those who sit on the sidewalks with their few cheap wares spread out on a ragged cloth in front of them yelling "ruba dinar ruba dinar" over and over. And there are the vehicular ones: selling those dark brown, shiny, incredibly hard little nuts (or whatever they are!) from a large round tray with which they tantalize the passing masses by constantly scooping up the wet, shiny bottom ones. They also sell dried garbanzo beans. And there are the suicidal ice cream vendors on their big tri-cycles, weaving, or rather being woven, into the fast moving traffic at intersections, or peddling along blithely after dark, without the smallest light or reflector to mar their black-cloaked night visage. What their mortality rate is is not hard to imagine: very high. Then there are the Iranian car washers, with their buckets of dirty water on either side of their bicycles, balanced. They'll wipe the dust off your car at almost every parking lot, (though for how much I don't know as I've always had our harris to do it except for the two week hiatus, before he was replaced, when Abu Thayer did a bunk after being questioned by the CID about his activities with a pair of Filipina sisters. Undoubtedly, he took his 10,000 KD stash with him when he ran as he took everything else-washer, AC, cooker, God knows what-everything except those poor caged-with-their-own-filth pidgeons.) Anyway, the pedlars I like best are the ones who wander around on foot calling out an animal sound. With their heavy, huge bundle on their backs, they look just like peddlars out of a storybook. They yell "kham kham" ("cloth cloth") which sounds just like "caw caw" and they will come into your house and show you their wares: yards of fabrics. Women buy these at home (those who only ever are at home) and take them to the neighborhood Pakistani tailor to be made up into a durah-a long, usually violently colored house dress which is worn outside of the house covered by an abbayah (and on these ladies' feet are worn slip-on high heels with the cross strap covered with flowers and/or birds made of sequins and glitter-precarious). Šjanice
adams |