What Does 'before' And 'after' Really Mean? Can I Use Them To Describe Directions? Can I Use "before" In Describing Places Like The" Market Is Before The Fruit Shop?"

It's a typical grammatical question. It depends in which way you are describing the directions. For example, if you are telling someone in a way that, " Sir! please go straight then turn to left, then there is a shop which comes before that hotel you're asking for." In this way it is alright and you have made no mistake in using this word.
Let us understand it with using there meaning. If you will see its meaning in some famous dictionary you would find it is defined as "ahead of time, early, sooner,in front, ahead" so you can use this in both ways. For example you can tell someone that you had said this and this before him.

That means you've said all that in the presence of that specific person. Similarly you can use it as described in the above example.
The word " After" means "Behind in place or order, next to or lower than in order or importance" So keeping these meanings in your mind you can also use after whenever necessary. Let's contemplate the following examples.
1)go after big money.
2)asked after you.
3)they are still friends after all their differences.
Now you can understand it and you can also make and use these words in your conversations.

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It is not necessary to use "before" and "after" to describe directions.
Before can be used to describe places.

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Hi,I think your usage is wrong.BEFORE means' at an earlier time; in the past; already ' 'earlier than (sb/sth) 'and something else,but it is concerned with TIME not DIRECTION,so you can say market is in front of the fruit shop.

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