Photo credit: the Sun
When I was much younger, there was, opposite the then Leventis Stores in Marina, Lagos what was known as Quay Side. True, it was a place where ships berthed and sailors did sailor-like pastimes of womanising, smoking Indian hemp, drinking – sometimes to a stupor, those of them that wanted to listen and even dance to quality music could stroll down to the ‘Floating Buka’ which was a stationary trawler. There, they could listen and dance to the king of music, Jazz!!!
There was also a thriving market place there. It was a market for imported fashion items. There, both new and fairly used apparels competed for space.
Also in Suru Lere, along Ogunlana Drive, another textile market used to exist. That one was without any apology, for used clothing. I wouldn’t know whether it was the fact that it was a bus terminus that influenced a highlife musician of the time to compose a popular song of those days – ‘Bosi Kona Lo Laye’.
However, the ‘second hand’ market for clothes was not that common in those good old days. It hardly existed for machinery anyway.
Those were the days when once a vehicle was showing any sign of malfunctioning, the owner would just park it on a side street and process a loan to buy a brand new car! It was the old jalopy we children used to play ‘hide and seek’ in.
That was then!!!
Now, we have been consumed by the spirit of ‘tokunbo’, ‘second hand’ or ‘the bend down boutiques’. The last appellation is derived from the fact that we have to bend downdown and pick the used clothes that have been thrown on the ground for our perusal.
Even the so called rich people are not left out. They beg the tokunbo cloth sellers to bring their wares to their homes for obvious reasons. They have class and so they don’t want to be seen struggling for tokunbo with mere commoners!
We have even gone to the extent of wearing tokunbo under wears. As long as it is imported, we hardly care about the health implications. Neither do we care about the spiritual effects. We are said to be the most religious nation, anyway. Please note that the most religious does not necessarily mean the most Godlike.
But I love the Yoruba language. There is a saying that when you wear a used cloth it is either too small or too large a size.
(To be continued)
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