Another example of the changing face of Ireland can be found in a quiet lane off Wexford's Main Street. Exotic vegetables, fruits and spices, dried fish, African clothes, hair extensions and even African videos are on sale at the Afro-Caribbean Variety Store, which opened two months ago in Fettit's Lane.
The shop is run by a Nigerian woman, Ms Tawa Karim, for its owner, Mr Moses Aviyor, who comes from Ghana and lives in Dublin.
Ms Karim, who worked as a bank cashier in Lagos and has lived in Wexford for two years, said the idea for the shop arose because she and friends had to make frequent trips to Dublin to buy African goods. "We used to put our money together and send one person to Dublin at a time. We couldn't get the kind of food we wanted here."
The shopping excursions involved lugging, among other things, 25 kg bags of semolina back to Wexford on the train. "It wasn't too bad," said Ms Karim. "You would get a taxi to the station and people would help you." It was necessary to buy in bulk because semolina is a staple food for many Africans and the small packets available in supermarkets were too expensive.
Other products on sale in the Wexford shop include pounded yam, dried crayfish and pepper, palm oil, plantain crisps, palm nut soup, frozen tilapia fish, a variety of herbs and spices and a popular green vegetable, efotete.
While the majority of her customers are members of the African and Asian communities, a high proportion of Irish people are also beating a path to her door, said Ms Karim. "They ask me for advice on how to use certain spices. I had some people in the other day and told them how to use the ingredients to make pepper soup. People come back and say `Yes, that was lovely, thank you'."
Many of the shop's Irish customers, she believes, lived abroad at some stage and broadened their culinary horizons. Hair extensions have proved particularly popular with local young people.
The shop was opened on a trial basis, but the response has been encouraging. "The profit margins are very low, and at the moment I am working voluntarily, but people are coming in. I think the boss [Mr Aviyor] is quite happy at the moment," Ms Karim said.
