sell their products for less than the 
adult women do, and since the quan- 
tities are very small, their customers 
are mainly children. Child entrepre- 
neurs even extend credit to other chil- 
dren. 
Aisha is a ten-year-old girl who was 
notoriously unsuccessful as a trader. 
She disliked trading and regularly lost 
her mother’s investment. Disgusted, 
her mother finally gave her a bit of 
charcoal, some flour and oil, and a 
small pot. Aisha set up a little stove 
outside her house and began making 
small pancakes, which she sold to very 
young children. In three months she 
managed to make enough to buy a 
new dress, and in a year she bought 
a pair of shoes. She had clearly chosen 
her occupation after some unhappy 
trials at street trading. 
In the poorest families, as in 
Aisha’s, the profit from children’s 
work goes toward living expenses. This 
may occur in households that are 
headed by divorced or widowed wom- 
en. It is also true for the almajirai, 
or Arabic students, who often live with 
their teachers. The proceeds of most 
children’s economic activity, however, 
go to the expenses of marriage. The 
income contributes to a girl’s dowry 
and to a boy’s bridewealth, both of 
which are considerable investments. 
The girl’s dowry includes many 
brightly painted enamel, brass, and 
glass bowls, collected years before 
marriage. These utensils are known 
as kayan daki, or “things of the 
room.” After the wedding they are 
stacked in a large cupboard beside 
the girl’s bed. Very few of them are 
used, but they are always proudly dis- 
played, except during the mourning 
period if the husband dies. Kayan daki 
are not simply for conspicuous display, 
however. They remain the property 
of the woman unless she sells them 
or gives them away. In the case of 
divorce or financial need, they can 
provide her most important and im- 
mediate source of economic security. 
Kayan daki traditionally consisted 
of brass bowls and beautifully carved 
calabashes. Today the most common 
form is painted enamel bowls man- 
ufactured in Nigeria or abroad. The 
styles and designs change frequently, 
and the cost is continually rising. 
Among the wealthier urban women 
and the Western-educated women, 
other forms of modern household 
equipment, including electric appli- 
ances and china tea sets, are becoming 
part of the dowry. 
The money a young girl earns on 
her own, as well as the profits she 
brings home through her trading, are 
invested by her mother or guardian 
in kayan daki in anticipation of her 
marriage. Most women put the major 
part of their income into their daugh- 
ters’ kayan daki , as well as helping 
their sons with marriage expenses. 
When a woman has many children, 
the burden can be considerable. 
For girls, marriage, which ideally 
coincides with puberty, marks the 
transition to adult status. If a girl mar- 
ries as early as age ten, she does not 
cook for her husband or have sexual 
relations with him for some time, but 
she enters purdah and loses the free- 
dom of childhood. Most girls are mar- 
ried by age fifteen, and for many the 
transition is a difficult one. 
Boys usually do not marry until they 
are over twenty and are able to support 
a family. They also need to have raised 
most of the money to cover the cost 
of getting married. Between the ages 
of eight and ten, however, they gradu- 
ally begin to move away from the con- 
fines of the house and to regard it 
as a female domain. They begin taking 
their food outside and eating it with 
friends, and they roam much farther 
51 
