Art From London Markets, a-n feature

You may remember that at the time of the Pocket Arts Place and Proximity Story collection I was having an unconscious luddite patch (I put this down to my West Country origins, where resistance to technology has history, as does persistent retrospection). Unfortunately this means that some of the stories recorded then will have to be presented in my words. At the event, while I was struggling, it was recommended that I buy a dictaphone, which I will before the next collection, a nice piece of old tech.

This is the first story:

She had chatted to me about the bacchanalia of seasonal strawberry markets in Poland when she was a child,  where in her family the kitchen table would be pilled high with a mountain of strawberries, which would be simultaneously on the table, on every surface and cooking in pans on the stove. This created an overwhelming sensory overload of gorgeousness and added to this was the joy of a small child allowed to eat however much she wanted.   Talking about the comparison between North End Road Market and the markets she grew up with in Poland she said:

” I just do compare them because I am missing the lack, the total lack of inhibition of food markets, of Polish fruit markets, big piles, big heaps of fruit in season and here what I  found were these little small boxes, which were so restraining, and so sort of mean, yeah, packaging all that wealth and vivacity, that life energy into little plastic boxes, yeah…but still there the fruit and veg is seasonal …and I do shop [here at North End Road] I do go round and I do enjoy the colour and shape and try to find what I fancy that day, so more a spontaneous shopper and I do appreciate that they sell (indistinct word) these days, everywhere  [prompted to talk about the excess she continued] Maybe its the memory of a child…well I wasn’t really a child the last time I was regularly shopping there, so yeah, because you’ve got just, just the  piles and heaps of stuff and it was like you could actually imagine yourself actually rolling in that in a helpless way, and the smell obviously, the beautiful smell, and the stall after stall after stall where you have the indoor market….just something to watch and marvel, and then when you regain conscience…buy, go home and eat, eat, eat until you cannot eat any more.  So there was this abundance, bacchanal, that feeling that it can go on for ever, no restriction, no end. [You also talked about seasonality] Yeah, which changed now, we joined the rest of the world, we import from all over the place, but I love to eat, er seasonal fruit.

Strawberry Bachanal