The good old days when everything was worse.

'My hands were empty and cold.'
---Breece D'J

Small quotes from 'The Market', 'Aschinger', 'The Fire' and 'Frau Wilke'...after this digression..

The market, as a place, was always more interesting than the market as a principle. Sunday markets, full of shoddy wares, the promise of a bargain, though you'd settle for an 'oyster delight' and a quick return home for the Big Match. Now and then a 'French market' springs up in Walthamstow or Wanstead and you suddenly realise how ordinary a lot of cheese sold in the shops is-the standard fare, that is.

At Walthamstow market there is a young Englishman who has taken to shouting out in Urdu to attract some of the desis to his stall. You can be sure to bump into an old aunty with a trolley, moving forwards, looking back over her shoulders and thinking about the shops 30 m down the lane. Did I say 'moving'. It's more like a confederation of WW1 veterans swaying on their stumps from the good leg to the bad one, a sort of horizontal shuffling. Will I ever get out of this alive?!

There are no attractive women at Walthamstow market. Lots of people have fake hair or highlights. The burger stalls with their fried onions are like some ancient relic from the past. 'England's gone,' and all that.

The Chinese man has a remarkable collection of watches on display. Four for 10 pounds..or 10 for...But what would I want to do with ten watches?! Micky came back from Thailand with four watches on his wrists and sold them for a small profit and a friend once brought a suitcase of ties from the land of the pure to sell back in ol' blighty. He's now a t.v. celebrity, selling something else. 

Asad gave the toffs a real speaking to at the William Morris gallery. "No wonder there are no black people or brothers here: who's going to spend four and half quid on a sandwich?"

The problem with rich people is that they're always so accommodating and never lose their temper-unless threatened with decapitation. "Yes, excellent point, young man, do you have any other ideas on how we might encourage greater community participation?" And so he was roped in and got his free sarnies-which, I suspect, is what he wanted all along.

We go down Brick Lane and are sickened by how good it looks. "It was a real dump in my day," I say, sounding like someone from a Monty Python sketch. He brings his crazy Canadian-Irish friend with him and no-one can understand a word he's saying. Not just the accent. A physicist who thinks everyone else knows what he's on about. He has gentle eyes and wild, curly hair. "What do you do?" 

"I design Marxist computer programmes" 

I was about to laugh before I realized that he was serious. The revolution will be televised, brother.

k