Muti Market

The traders in traditional medicinal plants at the market in Durban proved to be the exact opposite of their Malawian counterparts - they were completely unwelcoming.

I went down there after being told that one of the healers who spoke English would be able to translate for me. As it turns out, this was not the case. The healer in question demanded 600 Rand (USD 100) to work with me. I refused as a matter of principle, but also because I would have to deal with the bureaucracy of the project’s funder to be able to pay someone that much. The hard part is that I sympathized with many of their reasons for not wanting to talk to me:
• So many researchers go to the Durban muti market and take up hours of the traders’ and then go home and write their dissertations, never sharing the information with those who they interviewed with.
• The traders said that the last white people who came to the market to talk to them only came to instruct them that they should not sell certain plant species (those endangered that are illegal to harvest)
• The traders are suspicious because it seems to them that outsiders come and talk to them and then suddenly there is a new law that hurts their business.
• On the other hand, as is often the case in Africa, when people see a Gringo asking questions they think that it means that there is money to be had.

In the end I went back the next day with my own translator and managed to talk to some of the traders. Some were friendly and helpful. Others not so much. But as I stood interviewing muti traders on the side of the highway with minitaxis rushing past, I had a little moment of pause; I’m lucky I’m paid for this.