Bruno to vendor: Are you a Moor?

Vendor: “I am a Pulaar (ethnic group from Senegal) sir, and I am from Lao Air. You can't read? It's nevertheless well written on my beautiful stove! - - aere lao cité baratal fouta toro.  ... I know this way of preparing meat better than the Moors. It is a job, like any other, that does not belong to any ethnic group."

Depending on the time of day, meals with varied menus are served to this very diverse clientele. For breakfast, for example, the saleswomen have bowls on a table, each containing a sauce to make a sandwich, at the customer's discretion, on site or to take away, wrapped in newspaper:

"Arame provides its customers with three long benches. On his table are bowls containing mayonnaise, tuna, pea sauce, spaghetti, French fries, canned meat, ndambé etc. It adds seasonings and spices (chilli, pepper, broth) to foods to suit the taste of customers.

"We used to pack food while wearing gloves but some customers would ask us to take them off and then pack with bare hands," one of the vednor's response to us when we asked her why she didn't wear gloves while packing food.

We were puzzled by this response. Why did the customers ask the vendors to remove their gloves? How did the customers perceive gloves? Is there lack of awareness over hygiene? Do people - vendors and customers- view hygiene differently?

Pitha is the common name used in Assam for rice cake. The Boro pitha is traditionally prepared during the harvest festival. In earlier times indigenous varieties of rice were used for making pitha. Each household has its own way of making pitha/ rice cakes and it is generally women who engage in such activities.  Now-a-days with indigenous rice varieties slowly disappearing, hybrid rice varieties are used for making pitha; and pitha is no longer related with festivities alone.