CONSUMER GOODS 



135 



Only women buy in the local market; Pana- 

 jachel Indian men do not even walk past the 

 vendors, even if they spend all Sunday morning in 

 the adjacent church or on the edges of the market 

 place. Panajachelenos in markets of other towns 

 will buy as well as sell, but if with their wives, the 

 men usually buy the large things, leaving small 

 food purchases to the wife. 



Traveling merchants are often to be found in the 

 Panajachel market place on days other than Sun- 

 day. When women come to market to sell, they 

 therefore have the opportunity almost any day 

 of the week to buy some of their needs in the 

 market as well as the stores and meat markets. 

 It is thus impossible to separate time spent buying 

 from that spent selling, although one may estimate 

 roughly (table 47) time devoted to pm-chasing 

 goods when not connected with selling. 



Most commodities the Indians need can be 

 bought at one time or othei- in one or another of 

 the nearby markets. Large fiesta markets display 

 the whole variety at once; in ordinary markets, 

 many of the less common commodities are likely to 

 be absent on a particular day, for the variety and 

 quantity change from week to week. Thus for a 

 while in December of 1936 no Atitecos brought to 

 the local market their usual tropical fruits, which 

 were therefore simply imavailable; they were back 

 the next month with tomatoes, bananas, plantains, 

 and so on. Similarly, one Sunday no Maxenos 

 came as usual with pitch pine (due to the Chichi- 

 castenango titular fiesta); the next week one 

 returned, and there was a panic to buy. Two 

 months later an Indian from Cubulco brought a 

 more favored variety and the Maxenos were 

 deserted. Some weeks there are no merchants 

 with thread and yarn, or there are no mats in the 

 market, or no com, and so on; while at other times 

 there is a surfeit. The following list of commodi- 

 ties noted in one Sunday market of Panajachel 

 (April 5, 1936), therefore includes items not 

 frequently sold and excludes some that are often 

 sold: 



Staples: 

 Corn. 

 Beans. 

 Dry chile. 

 Salt. 

 Panela. 

 Coffee beans. 

 Ground coffee. 

 Bread. 



Staples — Continued 



Rice. 



Sugar. 

 Vegetables: 



Onions. 



Garlic. 



Tomatoes. 



Huskcherries. 



Potatoes. 



Vegetables — Continued 



Green beans. 



Carrots. 



Cabbage. 



Radishes. 



Sweetpotatoes. 



Lettuce. 



Green peppers. 



Turnips. 



Squash (guicoy). 



Indigo. 



Swiss chard. 



Cintula. 



Horsebeans. 

 Fruit: 



Oranges. 



Litnas. 



Limes. 



Avocados. 



Granadillas. 



Bananas. 



Pig-bananas. 



Plantains. 



Vegetable pears. 



Anonas. 



White sapodillas. 



Pepinos. 



Papayas. 



Pataxtes. 



Coyoles. 



Melocotones. 

 Spices, etc.: 



Anotto. 



Cinnamon. 



Cacao. 



Pepper. 



Ginger. 



Barley. 



Anise. 



Origano. 



Balsamilo seed. 



Pimienla gorda. 



Linseed. 



Jahilla. 



Cloves. 



Alusema. 



Sesame. 



Pepiloria. 

 Dry goods: 



Yard goods. 



Notions. 



Dry goods — Continued 



Dishes. 



Cutlery. 



Trinkets. 



Cotton yarns. 



Raw cotton. 



Fans. 



Rush mats. 



Reed mats. 



Hammocks. 



Rope. 



Wooden combs. 



Hats. 



Sandals. 



Incense. 



Copal. 



Cigars. 



Cigarettes. 



Matches. 



Inner-tube bands. 



Tin lamps. 



Tin pitchers. 



Pottery 



(small articles). 

 Pitch wood. 

 Cornhusks. 

 Miscellaneous: 

 Eggs. 

 Chickens. 

 Dried fish. 

 Lake fish. 

 Dried shrimp. 

 Pork. 



Blood sausage. 

 Lard. 



Lard cracklings. 

 Coffee (beverage). 

 Corn gruel. 

 Tamales. 



Cookies (rosquitos). 

 Taffy candy. 

 Peanuts. 

 Cold drinks. 

 Rice-and-milk. 

 Flowers. 

 Starch. 



Cross-sapodilla seed. 

 Sugarcane. 

 Chitacayote seed. 

 Palaxle seed. 

 Ayote seed. 



These items are brought in different combina- 

 tions by the vendors, patterns varying with the 

 towns from which they come. McBryde's new 

 publication (1947), an exhaustive study of pro- 

 ductive specialties, trade routes, and markets, 

 describes what vendors from various towns of the 

 region usually carry. Suffice it to say here that 

 in the Panajachel market there are, in general, 



