"Come in! Looking is free!"... aka. The Markets!

I anticipated and over-crowded, over-bearing, in your face experience upon arrival at the markets. Some of this is true but I actually ended up liking the markets a lot more than I anticipated. The thing about the markets is that no price is set in stone, everything is negotiable. We were told before the trip to never offer a price but rather to ask how much it costs. When given an answer, offer half then be ready to negotiate for somewhere in between those two numbers. I loved the challenge. I found that humor worked well, a dash of sass, and a willingness to walk out of the store with nothing was the key to getting great deals. (*that and every stand sold basically the same thing, so they knew as well as you did that if you walked out you could just buy it cheaper at the next stand… so they would end up giving it to you for a good price)
An example of an exchange:
“Oboruni, come in, looking is free”
“Well I’m looking for a bowl but want to see what the whole market has before deciding”
“Come in please, I give you good price”
-I enter and find one I like…
“How much?”
“How much you give me?”
(not falling into that trap I ask again) “How much is this bowl?”
“It’s 30 cedis”
“I’ll give you 15”
“No, 15 is too low… you give 27”
(so I throw in a wood carving into the stack and say) “17”
“too low, you give 23”
(so I throw a batik painting into the stack with the wood carving and the bowl and say) “19” (with a smile on my face) *at this point we are a bit sassy… giving each other a hard time… he responds with
“okay, 25”
(I throw one last wood carving onto the stack and say) “20 and that’s as high as I can go”
*he pauses, questions, tries again, sees me take a step backwards towards the exit and finally agrees to sell me a bowl, 2 wood carvings, and a batik painting for 20 cedi. (approx. $14 US)
***See, it’s fun!***