July 10, 2004
"Market Day"
by Laurel Redding

Market day in Andranofasika! A tribute to consumerism while simultaneously evoking images of the exotic and the ethnic.
After an early breakfast and a hurried trap check session, where, of course, since we didn't want to catch anything so as to get to the market in time, we caught a wild cat! We quickly brought the cat back to camp. Morphometrics, blood, tissue, feces and parasites were all taken from the cat while we menacingly grumbled under our breaths that there had better be food left at the market by the time we got there!

No worries there - we were able to gorge ourselves on the delectable goodies of the market - from batter-dipped bananas to pretzel-like dough cakes - before setting off to explore the rest of the marketplace. The main street of the village was lined with vendors and buyers - about half a kilometer long! While mostly provisioned with utilitarian goods (from cooking pots to heavy rope), there were nevertheless plenty of attractions to satisfy us tourists.

Most relevant to the area were the lambas - large, thin rectangles of cloth with images and designs on them that could be used for anything from a skirt to a baby halter to a small rug. Second to this was the local witch doctor/medicine man. After assurances from our Malagasy guides that he would not be offended by our purchases, we approached his stall. He sold all kinds of lotions and potions, charms and cure-alls. Several of us bought "charm" bracelets whose effects ranged from the granting of courage to curses to supposedly aphrodisiac powers!

In addition, tables of Asian-imported plastic trinkets and goods also spanned the market, alongside jewelry stands, second-hand Western clothes, recently slaughtered-meat and recently caught-fish, and fruits and vegetables.

The market was a great time, and, for me, very impressive by its size relative to the small village it took place in.