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In Nigeria, we haggle.
Haggling in these parts has been elevated to an art form. Oftentimes, it isn’t the cost we are saving that matters; rather, it’s the pleasure we derive from the haggling process. It is how you stare down the goods to devalue it before you open your mouth at all. It is the mannerisms that follow as you place both palms on your hips preparing for word-wars deployed to halve asking prices. It is how you shift your weight from one foot to another, modulate your tone of voice, and feign agreement with jerky motions of your calculating head. It is your conversation as it shifts from the price of a tin of groundnuts, to a mutual condemnation of rising dollar prices — the only thing you agree upon as the reason why everything is going up. Then the tangential laceration of sitting politicians who are to blame.
And after all of the market theatricals, comes the coup de grace — when one party walks away in disagreement with the other party’s closing offer, counting down as they depart, waiting to be called back as the other capitulates. This dance, which usually ends in a spectacular dénouement of brinkmanship, is what makes haggling an experience for both the poor with a penny to save, and the rich with more to lose.
