Alain Mabanckou - Black Bazaar

* * *

Looking back on it, I think it must have been Rachel Kouamé who had spoilt her. The Ivorian girl was a bit older than Original Colour and rented a studio on Rue Dejean, in the heart of Château Rouge market where she sold saltfish, having abandoned her chaotic studies in accountancy. The two girls were now working together. They bought their saltfish from a Chinese wholesaler in Rue de Panama and sold it piecemeal, on the ground, at the fringes of the market between police raids. But their business demanded patience without turning in much of a profit. Plus their stall had to be very portable, with the result that it was often just a box so they could pack it away again and take to their heels at the first sound of a police car.

Original Colour observed the Château Rouge community and how it lived. After a few months, she came to the conclusion that we Africans spent astronomical sums on whitening our skin. That we would rather die of hunger than put up with dark skin.

One evening, when their business had been struggling for some time, she suggested to Rachel that they try their hand at selling de-negrifying products:

“We can sell this stuff, I know where to buy Ambi rouge and Diprosone at heavily discounted prices. This trade is like being an undertaker: undertakers are never out of work because people are condemned to die. Well, it’s the same with us Blacks: we’ll never give up trying to lighten our skin as long as we’re convinced that the curse hanging over us is simply a matter of colour …”

* * *

Unlike Original Colour, Rachel wasn’t cut out to be a businesswoman. She bullied her customers and chased after the latest Paris fashions, which she would flaunt in the nightclubs of Abidjan during the Christmas holidays. A chronic big-spender, she squandered their joint savings. Without warning her friend, Rachel would go off to the Champs-Elysées or Rue du Faubourg-Saint-Honoré on shopping sprees, returning with bulging bags of clothes and luxury shoes. She couldn’t wear it all, so she sold on clothes and shoes from past seasons to her friends in Abidjan. She knew all about a taste for luxury. She bought her jewellery at Cartier on Place Vendôme, and wanted to wear the same perfume as Cathérine Deneuve, Juliette Binoche and Vanessa Paradis. She was finding it harder and harder to justify her spending when Original Colour demanded they do their accounts and look into expanding their small business to reach other Blacks from further afield than Château Rouge and Château d’Eau. Their arguments became more frequent, and at one point the two friends and business associates didn’t speak for a week. Each cooked for herself in a corner of the room, without bothering about the other. Original Colour swallowed her pride and tried to strike up a conversation, but she could barely get a word out of Rachel. In the end, Original Colour was made to feel that she was to blame for her business partner’s mismanagement. They lost the goodwill of their suppliers who refused to deliver on credit. It was cash only from now on. But the coffers were empty …

Relations were already tense between the two girls, and they deteriorated further when Rachel imposed a man on the household. Like her he was from the Ivory Coast, and he had the muscles of a fisherman of the open sea. But it turned out he was a shrewd gigolo who became lethally violent when drunk, smashing the crockery, and threatening to set the entire building on fire. This lout moved into Rachel’s place where he considered himself master of the premises. When he returned from his trips out and about, his food had to be ready with Rachel at home to serve it to him and massage his feet. Then he would collapse on the sofa-bed in front of the television, legs splayed. He would watch the football on Canal Plus, or else the pornographic film broadcast by the same channel on the first Saturday of every month. Unable to put up with this any more, Original Colour gave him a piece of her mind one evening when Rachel was there.

The Ivorian was quick to put her down:

“Since when a woman does have the right to speak, you’d think a man like that, eh? Is a woman same on a man? Who you are taking you for, isn’t it? Are you even coming up to my ankles? Is your small French you talk bad going to push me out? Have seen your big fat bumper moving in the crowd like a black snake in a Camara Laye story cutted in half? If you don’t agree, get out our house! I spit on your race! You are not here at home, you bloody Congolese girl from Bacongo …!”

Because Rachel did nothing to put this predatory scum in his place, Original Colour came to the conclusion that she was a crowd in their two-room apartment.

After a heated argument with her friend who defended her man tooth and nail, Original Colour packed up her belongings during the week, and rented a room in a cheap hotel on Rue de Suez, which was mainly occupied by Nigerian female stallholders from the Marché Dejean. She was quickly introduced into the network of women who imported de-negrifying products from back home. And they wasted little time in adopting the young Congolese woman, because she helped them write the letters and fill out the forms in French that are a necessary part of everyday life. Original Colour became, if you like, their public writer …

* * *

Living alongside these Nigerian women was no easy ride. Petty squabbles about twice nothing set the girls against one another. Boyfriend trouble or something to do with witchcraft. As soon as one of the Nigerian ladies brought a man onto the premises, the others were all competing to sleep with him.

And then there were the nocturnal catfights. The police would turn up, sirens blaring fit to burst the eardrums of the crowd gathered in front of the building. The Nigerian ladies would threaten each other with pestles, forks and sometimes even with cans of caustic soda. Some ended up with faces streaked with deep scars. Was there still room for Original Colour, caught in the middle of all these frenzied females? The young French-Congolese woman needed to win her independence back. Around this time, on the stairs of their hotel, she met a man who said that he owned a ladies’ underwear shop in Les Halles. The man was a regular client of the Nigerian ladies. I never found out exactly what kind of relationship he had with Original Colour. She was very evasive on the subject. But what I do know is that from one day to the next the man hired her to work at Soul Fashion.

She started looking for somewhere to live and found a studio in the 18th arrondissement, which meant burning her bridges with her Nigerian friends who accused her of stealing their man who “paid handsomely” and didn’t haggle …

As soon as Original Colourappeared in front of Soul Fashion, I used to break off my conversation with my pals, leave my glass of Pelfort and rush over to her. I made sure I wore my most elegant suits, for the sole purpose of charming her, and she liked it because she knew about the Sapper scene and Château Rouge. She used to say I was the real deal, a Congolese man from head to toe. And as she said it, she would point to my tie and my Westons. Not only that but why hide it, she liked to hear me talking about my plans. And she wondered what on earth I was doing in that bar instead of continuing with my studies, since I’d made it into the final year at school. And my reply would be that I didn’t want to waste my time with a bunch of kids in a lecture theatre. I’m a trend-setter, I live my life to the full …

* * *

When three days went by without my showing up at Jip’s, Original Colour would go into the bar and ask Paul from the big Congo who, in her eyes, was the person in our group most likely to take her seriously, whether he had any news about me. The truth was, I was waiting for her to call, which she used to do late at night. And we would talk for ages. It seems I made her laugh a lot, and she melted at my accent. It was that very deep accent from back home, the same as her father’s — but she never made the connection, even though later on I would hear it in his voice on the phone. I rolled my R’s on purpose just to please her. I could switch effortlessly from a deep voice to a high-pitched voice because it’s not rocket science for a negro to play at being a negro. Just go with the flow: what’s bred in the bone comes out in the flesh.