The Quiet Market

There is a small market at the edge of my town that opens only on Wednesdays. It is not on the tourist maps. The sellers arrive before dawn with their vegetables and their fabrics and their opinions, and they arrange everything on low wooden tables under a roof of woven palm.

What makes this market unusual is the noise. Or rather, the absence of it. Nobody shouts. Nobody bargains loudly. Business is done in low voices, with small gestures, with the trust of people who have known each other for a very long time.

Once I asked an old seller why. She was arranging tomatoes in a neat pyramid, the way one arranges the small things one has managed to save from the day.