(.....contd) Saturday was the market day. Grandpa took the whole morning prepping himself up. He took a batj, shaved, brushed, ironed his new safari suit and polished his black leather shoes and left them on the parapeet outside the house to shine. He listened to the news bulletin from the capital on the radio so he had enough to talk about when he met with his friends in Hamro Tea Stall. Badri had left with a basket full of fresh oranges early in the morning. At luch Grandma told Grandpa what she needed from the bazaar. She wanted cloves, spices, a kilo of salt and her prescription medicine. Babu wore his best tee shirt that had a picture of a car and below which was imprinted CARS each letter in a different color. As Grandpa and Babu walked down the dusty path through the pine woods towards the bazaar they saw many people coming and going. Many of them stopped and greeted Grandpa or made small talk. As they reached the pitched road, Grandpa stopped by the road and from his pocket took out a piece of cloth and wiped the dust from his shoes so that they shined again. He also pulled out his golden chain from under his shirt and tucked it neatly so Babu could see it glittering on his safari suit. All the villages from Kachide to Sartap tp Falametar, surrounding the Dhankuta bazaar proper held their market in a alrge public ground near the high school. Women started early in the morning with radishes, spinach, oranges, cauliflowers and potatoes in bamboo baskets and took a firm place on the square of the ground. Men carried milk and brought the cattles and animals to the cattle market which was on the adjoining field. Hawkers from Dharan came in buses and brought with them plastic sunglasses, rubber toys, flutes, key-rings and other cheap gadgets which they spread in front of them in blue plastic sheets and shouted loudly for attention. Clothes merchants had wooden boxes where they dropped all their income. Many stalls had stereo players that they turned up full volume with movie songs and when Babu walked through the stalls all the different music fused to form just one loud noise of commotion as if he were inside a beehive. Grandpa had stayed in the Hamro Tea Stall where they had day-old dailies from Dharan and Kathmandu that came in long distance buses that left the cities the previous nights. All of the self proclaimed intellectuals of the area gathered in one or the other tea shops and talked politics, crops and the prices on market days. They chose one teashop for another based ont he political affiliation of the owners and the rugular patrons. Congress party crooners who were generally old folks huddled inside Hamro's bigger shop while the Communist affiliates and their supporters frequented Surya's place where the owner had hung a large poster of Marx, Engels, Mao and stalin on the red background with crossed hammers. Though the two camps conducted business as required they rarely discussed politics among themselves. The animals market was behind the bazaar grounds and it smelled of pigs, goats and chickens. Butchers set of stalls there.They set up fire and cooked chicken and sold it in large leaves. They also sold local rye liquor and dumped the stinking residue of rye-grains beside the entrance of their make-shift shops where flies buzzed. Many a drunks slept about red-faced. Once in a while some drunk would start to curse and the storeowners spalshed bucketfull of cold water on him while the idle spectators laughed They sold meat by the kilos and dogs waited lazily for the discarded innards and when they got any they fought among themselves and made harsh dog-noises while the merchants shooed them away with a stick that they kept for the purpose. (.........contd) mG.