A recent trug of vegetables delivered from the garden to a neighbour's doorstep.. Nothing special but consolation for having to throw away a similar trug full of potatoes today laboriously lifted but nastily affected by blight. We are lucky not to depend entirely on potatoes for nourishment . I think of the Irish famine which lasted from 1845 - 47.
With a Peroni in front of me I watch a man who trying to back his car into a space easily large enough to accommodate it. His car meanwhile is reluctant to cooperate. Judging by the noises it makes its engine or gearbox or both are as dodgy pieces of machinery as he is to be a dodgy driver. Having parked his car he sits at the wheel to recover. No sooner has he relaxed than the car in front drives off. He switches on the engine gets into gear and edges forward into part of the space just vacated. Only to be ticked off by a newcomer, eager to back into the remains of the vacant space. He is now it seems occupying two cars worth of space. Schadenfreude is the name of the game.
Tunbridge Wells is supposed to be a quintessentially English town with a reputation for stuffiness, old fashioned values and reserve. Just in case anyone thinks this is still true, note that we are host to as many exotic influences as elsewhere in England. In Grosvenor Road for example the shop called Ocean 2 has flourished now for two or three years. Polski Sklep, it proudly announces above the door followed by the words: "Polish, Lithuanian,, Latvian, Russian, Romanian, Bulgarian Food." Wonderful herrings, bottled vegetables, sausages, sauerkraut and the like. Beer too. Not so conservative it seems after all.
1 comment:
Lucky neighbour.
I feel for the parking man, under your wry observation!
Envious of your Mittel-Europe food shop. I recently discovered an Armenian food blog - more Middle Eastern than European of course, but with some cross-overs and similar flavours and ingredients.
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