Under cover of darkness: inside São Paulo's vast illegal Feirinha night market

Every night at 1am, thousands of sweatshop workers emerge on to the streets of Brás to sell Minnie Mouse and Nike knockoffs. When 7am strikes, the police break it up. But is this nightly choreography hiding something more dangerous?

Every two months, Aziz Abdel Rahman boards a bus in Brasilia. The journey takes all night, 700 miles in total. At 2am he reaches his final stop, disembarking into the dark and crowded – and largely illegal – Feirinha da Madrugada: the secretive “little dawn market”, the biggest informal market in South America.

Rahman travels all that way to find the cheapest clothing in the country, and the few hours before the sunrise are the best to browse. Here on the streets of Brás, a downmarket but bustling neighbourhood of Sao Paulo, Rahman scours the seemingly endless racks and piles of clothing, looking for bargains such as sports trousers at R$10 (£2.30), which he will later sell back in Brasília for up to R$55.

Continue reading...

from The Guardian http://ift.tt/2nbr3gN