Market Day

Saturday is market day in Barbados. In the later days of the slavery era, slaves were allowed to grow their own foodstuffs on the plantations’ marginal lands -- called “provision grounds” at the time. Allowing slaves to grow their own food got masters out of having to provide sustenance for their workforce, which usually consisted in them having to purchase food from overseas (typically New England). It also let to an improvement in slave diet, as slaves themselves were better judges of how hungry they were, and consequently how many calories were needed on a daily basis. But, growing your own food in addition to the plantation’s cash crops meant more field work, so in exchange for this masters typically gave slaves part of Saturday off. Different areas on the island are better for growing different kinds of crops, and the more entrepreneuring slaves quickly developed a network of trade amongst the island's plantations so as to secure a more diverse diet. In time, this behavior led to the creation of bona-fide markets for trading wares each each Saturday.

Today, Saturday is still the Bajan day of choice for selling and buying daily necessities. Perhaps this is a legacy of days gone by. But probably it's simply because most people now work 9-5 jobs and everything is closed on Sundays, leaving only Saturday left for such things. In either case, city streets are packed on this day.

Works fine for me, as I too am busy during the week. Yesterday, as the archive was closed, I ventured into Bridgetown to get some necessities and check out the scene. Here are some pics. (You can click on each pic to bring up a larger version.)


Bridgetown is the capital and the only real “city” on the island (approx 100K of the island’s 300K people live here.) Most of these pics are from the downtown area, in particular Victoria Street, which is a pedestrian only zone filled with shops of all shapes. The last two are from the Cheapside Market, one of two public indoor areas where licensed vendors set up stalls, selling everything from fruits and vegetables, to butcher items, to sugar cookies, to clothes and accessories, to short order food.

For my part, I was looking for a beach towel and a local music store, but also out to sample the local street fare (which I’ll post in an upcoming entry on food). I found all of these things, now have something to sit on at the beach, and a good disc of the latest Bajan pop-hits.