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People You Can TrustAwake!—2010 | October
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Consider Berthe, a widow in Cameroon who sells manioc-based savory sticks in her little miando stall. “Traditionally, there are 20 miando sticks in each packet,” she says. “It is common for storekeepers to put just 17 or 18 in most packets, but I prefer not to make my earnings by deceiving others.”
Is Berthe’s business thriving? Not always. “I often spend the whole day without selling anything,” she says. “But when I ask the food vendors for a dish of food and tell them that I still have not sold anything, they serve me because they know that I will pay them as soon as I have the money. It is a question of trust, which is earned over time.”
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People You Can TrustAwake!—2010 | October
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[Box/Picture on page 9]
HONEST SCALES
Moïse’s stall is well-known in a market in Douala, Cameroon, where he sells fish. “I called my little shop The Scales,” he says, “because my scales are among the few in the whole market that have not been tampered with. I know that people test me out regularly. If they ask me for a kilo of fish, I give it to them. They always find a way to have the bag weighed elsewhere. When they do, they find that they have what appears to be more than a kilo! Then they know that I have not tried to deceive them! Many people say to me, ‘We come to you because you are honest.’”
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