‘MORNIN mummy, wuh ya gettin?’ ‘Buy two bill shellotte hay mummy’, ‘Come mummy, buy a shopping bag – two hunnerd dollas’, ‘ De barrel come, get ya leggins, mummy’.
These were the cries of the market vendors as I passed by Water Street one day last week. Laughing inwardly, I thought, ‘Well, I made nine children, but it seems I have a lot of adopted offspring.’

It may be a new year, but the market cadence remains the same. Whether humorous or not, vendors continue to call and cajole passers-by to make a purchase.
The walkway under the Stabroek market clock, reduced to single-file foot traffic over the holidays, is now once wider enough to allow cars to pass. Vendors have retreated to their usual positions, a sure sign that life has returned to normal after the business and busyness of the Christmas season.

Still, calls could be heard of ‘Happy new year’ as sellers and customers greeted each other in this first month of the year. Some would say that it is also part of the market ‘vibe’ to hear a ‘busing out’ – a quarrel that seems to have no ‘rhyme or reason’ – especially if you were not around when it began, which is invariably the case.
And so it was that I suddenly heard voices raised, one overpowering the other, yelling, “You’s a crass, I ain know wuh you tellin’ me, you’s a crass!’ Passing by at the same time was a young man humorously saying softly, ” We all goin thru it!”.

Earlier on the minibus travelling from Golden Grove to town, a young man seated next to me opened his wallet, pulled out a hundred dollar note and asked me in halting English if this was the correct fare to town. I told him ‘yes’, while the young man on his left asked where he boarded the bus, a question he clearly did not understand, turning to me to explain.
I confirmed that the fare was right as he got on the bus after me and so did not have to pay the $120 charged to Grove passengers.

When I heard a woman speaking in rapid-fire Spanish as I disembarked the bus, it occurred to me that, like my travelling companion, she was also a foreigner, though I could not identify whether she was from Cuba or Venezuela.

Later in the day, my attention was caught by a young man parking his motorcycle by the market square, with his pants slung so low that his underwear was exposed.
Once more I wondered how many, of the multitude affecting this style locally, know that in the US it is called ‘jailing’. Federal prisoners are not allowed to wear belts, considered a potential weapon, so their pants are constantly dropping off their hips.

It struck me that those who were forced into this ‘style’ would probably be happy when their freedom allowed them to wear belts and keep their pants up. Such is the irony of life.
Then as I was boarding a mini bus to return home that evening, I heard two men conversing animatedly in what I thought might be Hindi and said to myself, ‘Guyana is fast becoming multi-lingual.

Just then a young man offered to help me saying, ” Mummy leh me hold ya bags fuh ya”. After I was seated he then handed me my bags, asking if I was okay – another of my ‘sons,’ – making me think that chivalry and courtesy are still alive among some of our young men. I smiled and thanked him as I sat back to enjoy my evening journey home.