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74 I came back to May Pen in 1955, some eight years after that unhappy day when my father snatched me away. Some of the old places remained, some were new, and others were gone. I recognized several buildings instantly. These were the places that my Aunt Joyce would have taken me to or were the places that would have been the subject of overheard conversations . I recognized the May Pen Market, Shagoury’s Haberdashery, the Hardware Store, and Mr. Black’s grocery store. Mr. Levine’s Dry Goods Store, which had been next to Mr. Black’s, was gone. I missed seeing Mr. Levine again. He used to give me sweeties and talk to me when I was little and accompanied my aunt on her outings to buy cloth, trimmings, and notions for her dressmaking. ∗∗∗ Philip Young’s supermarket was new. This Chinese merchant family also had a cloth shop on Main Street. In these premises, he made the finest bullah cakes. At lunchtime, those of us who did not spend our lunch money in the soup kitchen went to the supermarket to buy bullah and cheese. My friends and I used to sneak behind the store and watch the bare-chested black men, skin glistening with sweat, who were mixing and kneading together the big bags of flour, baking soda, ginger, sugar, and molasses.We would gasp and exclaim that we would never eat Philip Young’s bullah cakes when we saw the men wipe the sweat from their forehead with their index finger and shake it into the dough. Of course, during the avocado pear season, we would forget about this and buy the bullahs because they were the best-tasting cakes to eat with avocado pear for lunch.When the pears were out of season,bullah cake and New Zealand cheddar cheese was eaten instead. This lowly bullah cake was sold for about a penny. It was about the diameter of an old-style singles record, about one inch thick, and looked and tasted somewhat like ginger bread. I watched Mr. Black quarrel about how Philip Young was squeezing him out of business. His supermarket was glamorous, and the prices were Chapter 3 Life and Schooling in May Pen, circa 1955–62 Chapter 3 Life and Schooling in May Pen, circa 1955–62 75 lower than Mr. Black’s. Shoppers could help themselves and not wait to be served as they had to when shopping in Mr. Black’s shop.At the supermarket , some shoppers thought they could literally help themselves and not pay. Mr. Black, who allowed his customers credit, was left with unpaid debts as many of his customers switched to buying with cash from Philip Young’s supermarket, which did not carry credit. There was a section of the supermarket that carried such items as foreign dolls, cameras, sets of fancy hairbrushes and combs, and small mirrors. Although Mr. Black struggled to stay in the grocery business until the mid-1960s, he was among the last of the small grocers. His heyday was in the late forties and early fifties when the market people could buy their salt provision, sugar, condensed milk, and Milo (an instant chocolate powder) after they had sold their ground provisions in the market. In those days, people bought groceries on credit. ∗∗∗ Storks De Roux’s Hardware Store seemed to cater to the wealthy few. At Christmas time, he created a Toyland in his store. The windup trucks and cars intrigued the boys, while the girls loved the blonde and auburnhaired dolls with their pretty clothes. Toyland brought toys from a white world far away in England and America. I always wondered who bought these toys because none of my friends’parents could afford to buy them. They were simply unaffordable. We assumed that Mr. De Roux, a white man, must have sold the toys to the other rich white families who lived and worked on the nearby sugar estates of Sevens, Yarmouth, and Monymusk as well as those who worked for the Sharp Citrus Company. At lunchtime, we children would literally swarm the Toyland to play with all of the toys. Mr. De Roux would get mad and have his sales clerks call us little thieves and chase us out disgracefully. We took to going into the store in smaller numbers and made less noise as we wound up fewer toys. Intermsof hardwaresales,theShagouryHardwareStorethatwasalmost next door drew more customers. I think these Syrian owners were better sales people...

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