Whilst waiting for Omar, I greeted my friend, the Nescafe boy, whose cafe on wheels stays outside the atelier all day long, every day. He does a roaring trade with the tailors and clients.

"Salaam aleikum." Smiles.
"Aleikum salaam,"
"Please sell me a cafe au lait."

The boy, with buck teeth and a Nescafe bib on over his t-shirt, takes a small plastic cup and shovels in:

One tea spoon of sugar
One tea spoon of Nescafe
One teaspoon of powdered milk.

The tea spoon has been flattened and bent into a new shape, more like a tube, so that the coffee etc pours more directly into the cup. These spoons are also used for shoveling washing powder from 20 kilo sacks into small 25 franc sachets.

He holds the cup up to the hot water flask and pushes down on the lid; the water pours forth. Taking another plastic cup, a bigger one and not disposable, he pours the mixture from the smaller cup into the bigger one. Then he pours it back again, more carefully, into the smaller one. The milk starts to lose its lumps, the mixture takes on a creamy brown colour, and ten or twelve swaps later, I have a frothy cafe au lait.

"How much?"
"75 francs." He clears up the decks, puts the lids back on the Nescafe tins, and puts his spoon back in its place.
"There you go."
"Good. Thanks. Have a nice weekend."

Another exchange.

I am in traffic, on a scooter, and a taxi blocks my way between him and the back of a bus.

"Hello," I call, through the window. The boys smile, the driver hangs his cigarette out the window and gives me a daring grin.
"Um, you have blocked my way. Please could you let me pass?"
Teeth-sucking from within. Comments.
"Yeah, uhu, you can pass. You will pass up above!"
The boys all laugh. I have received my first ever death threat. I wait for the bus to move on and politely go on my way.