Mararaba, Mai Shai and Me

Ernest Omoarelojie

The first I have ever been to the Mararaba (computer) market, located along the Nyanya-Keffi Expressway, was about a year ago. I went there to fix my phone battery which was giving me a real headache at the time. Although the phone man got me a nice battery, he did a poor job while opening the gadget and left an unpleasant mark on its body, regrettably.

For the second time, I had to go there a few days back, to fix my iPad which, like the phone I went there to fix, had a bad battery. It had gone so bad that it had the panel surface swollen like a pregnant woman some five or six months gone. I could not fix it the first day because searching as we (myself and the fixer) did, we could not find the right battery. Upon his advice, I was compelled to take a compulsory tour of the Wuse market, another commercial landmark in the Federal Capital Territory, FTC. I managed to get the battery, but for a depressingly outrageous price.

The next morning was rather clogged for me. For a start, I was billed to meet someone very early, a bad time for anyone to leave the comfort of one’s home. I was out of the house by 4am, wifey worried that I was venturing out into the unknown at an ungodly hour. I mean, who wouldn’t be worried knowing that a loved one would have to traverse an expanse of unlit and unmanned space before reaching the safety of the main road. Anyways, unnerving as the trip turned out, I made it through and got to the rendezvous long before 5:00am.

Mission accomplished, I decided to proceed to the Mararaba computer market to fix my gadget even as I knew I would have to wait a little while for the market to be opened at 8am. Rather than head back home, it made more sense to go straight to the place, find a place to while away time knowing full well that if I returned home, I would have to get right back on the road almost immediately. It turned out I had no reason to fret in the first instance because by the time I arrived several minutes before 6am, traders were up and about, the market already in full swing. The only exception were the lock-up shops.

I found a place by one of the mosques where a number of Moslem faithful were busy undertaking their early morning prayers, some already done. Not long after, a young man in his early 20s came, carrying a large tray of sweet-smelling, very freshly baked bread which he placed atop the raised partitions on which I sat. He left immediately only to return shortly with two large Arabian kettles with steaming, garlic-flavoured water.

The kettle is a rather unique contraption that has an attached mini stove at the base into which pieces of coal are regularly fed to maintain constant tea-friendly water temperature. To me, it underscores the logic behind the saying that necessity is the mother of invention. Obviously, it is an axiom mobile tea vendors understand sufficiently. 

 Again, he left as quickly as he returned and came back with one more of the kettles and another large tray of more fresh bread. For the fourth time, he left and came back with yet another tray, this time filled with an assortment of items, including innumerate sachets of milk, tea, a bowl of sugar, butter and more. For whatever reason, I began feeling hungry, unusually so, immediately.

“You dey sell fried (scrambled) eggs,” I asked him, eager to strike a friendly conversation, aware that I was obviously in his space.

“I no dey sell egg,” he responded very politely.

“Where I go see egg to take your bread and tea?”

“If I follow dat road, I go see fifo (people) who I dey sell egg,” he told me.

I didn’t need any more prompting as the urgent yearnings from my stomach provided the push. I took the corner he indicated and right in front of me was a line of young men deftly working to provide for people like me with early morning stomach cravings. While some were dealing quick culinary duties to noodles and scrambled eggs, with tea to boost, the others had their hands full working the eggs and tea for those who needed a breakfast of bread.

Between them was a retinue of hungry customers, some already seated and doing justice to their meals, many more on their feet, elderly waiting for those sitting to be done and out for them to take vacated seats and be served. I had to join the latter group even though I had no intention of eating on the spot.

Before even placing any order, the vendor already had his gaze on me. He asked what I wanted, also seeking to know if it was an eat-in or take-away. Scrambled egg, garnished with enough onion and pepper, I told him, and take-away, I added.

He nodded his understanding but quickly announced a N600 price tag, to which I nodded my consent as he went about dealing with the preparation, leaving those waiting to have theirs there to wait a little more for vacant seats.

Somehow, I turned my gaze and got engaged with the morning papers on my hand-held. I didn’t notice that he failed to add pepper, neither did I when he went on to pour sweetening noodle sauce into the egg mix. I discovered the culinary coup when I took a bite several minutes later.

Back at my Mai Shai spot near the mosque, I placed my order for bread and tea.

“Oga, which tea I go make for you,” he asked me.

“Anyone,” I told him.

“Okay,” he replied. Like the dealer in scrambled eggs, he announced that my bread and tea package would cost N800. I was okay with that, having quickly summed that my entire roadside breakfast combo bill stood at N1,400.

I did not bother to watch the preparation process having seen much of it prior to my order. It was another mistake.

Anyways, the process was rather interesting and even thrilling to a novice like me. First the Mai Shai would take a measure of the ginger-suffused water from the steaming hot Arabian kettle, pour it into another cup containing an already mixed combo of one or two sachets of any tea of choice before adding sugar and milk. That done, he would raise the mixture and empty it seamlessly into another cup some three to four feet below, without spilling a drop. After two or three such exchanges, apparently to guarantee a smooth mix, the tea would be ready and presented to the owner. Mine was ready in no time, he handed it over to me.

He asked if I wanted it with butter to my bread. I declined but requested that he spread the scrambled egg inside it. He did and my breakfast was ready.

I took a gentle sip on my tea. Trust me I would have adopted the dip-the-bread-inside-and-munch style if I was home. I have to pretend being a gentleman outside. The tea was like...Oh Jeez!

Literally, he took my ‘anything’ response at face value to prepare the tea his own way. For crying out loud, he added more sugar than I would have taken in a week or more assuming I am a fan of it. I wasn't. The milk was also in excess of what I’d have asked for. He probably wanted to please one Oga who didn’t look like any one of his regulars. Whatever his reason was, all I could do was pretend it was all good.

Thus decided, I dug my teeth into my bread, tore off a good piece, including a copious chunk of the scrambled egg. Dear Lord!

Like the tea, the egg had its own overdose. This time, it was the noodle sauce, something I loathe. It was not within the range of what I would consider okay. But like I did in the case of the tea, I had to keep eating because I was not in any mood to give up on anything I bought with my money, particularly not if it has to do with a one-off malfunctioned menu like the one under review. Certainly not in the present T-economy. After all, it wasn’t beyond what I can sort out with a natural system flush. In any case, every other person around, including travellers who probably came over having seen a seeming ‘big man’ waiting for tea, did not complain. In fact, they were all enjoying the sugary breakfast, some adding large doses of butter to the mix. I had to settle down and enjoy my troubling Mai Shai mix. Boy, do these young lads love sugar!

While sipping my tea and munching my bread, I picked up further conversation with my Mai Shai, not forgetting to commend him for preparing a nice poison for me. I wanted to know how he would sell the bread on the two large trays.

He assured me that he would be done even before 10am and may call for two more depending on the flow of customers. He added that the same process would be repeated in the evening during which he attends to more customers and makes more sales.

I had to count the number of Mai Shai within sight-about five or so, all surrounded by trays of fresh bread and tens of hungry customers. They must be making quite a dough daily.

He told me that Mai Shai like him are the source of daily meals for most of the itinerary traders, hawkers and hustlers (some of whom actually live) in the market. I found out that while some of them, including my Mai Shai who pointed to a corner inside the mosque, others sleep beside their wheelbarrows, a few more anywhere they find space. It is a case of everyone for himself, God for all.

Wherever any of them found the space to sleep, it is important to wake up as early as 4am to clean themselves up, water secured from large containers from which Moslem faithfuls collect water for ablution. That done, they would go for prayers and later queue up in front of any Mai Shai of choice for quick bites before heading out for whatever the day’s hustle would bring. It is the routine every day of the week.

Like every other market I have visited, the Mararaba market also has its fair share of crooks, particularly phone thieves. I witnessed one of them being beaten black and blue. While waiting for my bread and tea to be ready, two young men brought a fairly used, white Itel phone, obviously stolen. In a flash, they pawned it.

I engaged the buyer who explained that it was not a case of theft. According to him, the seller could not continue funding his purchase and pay by installment arrangement, a reason he had to pawn it. The buyer labeled the exchange, “Easy Buy”. However, his take wasn’t convincing by any stretch of the imagination. In my view, it was "easy trouble" loading.

Mararaba market is an all-comers’ rendezvous for practically every item there is to buy. It opens 24/7, the only exception being the lock-up shops, all of which are closed at about 7pm to open at 8am. General trading activities, particularly along the ever busy road, go on without end, day or night. And the market draws such a massive daily crowd that it is the site of a near impossible traffic gridlock both at the early and late hours of everyday. However, whenever one finds a reason to be there, there is a rule one must never ignore-"don't loose guard” as the boys put it. Do so and grieve.