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Living in an 'ethnic' neighbourhood
Jun. 9th, 2014 10:40 pm...means never worrying about finding fresh produce.
Our modest high street doesn't have many chain stores, and they're concentrated at the other end of the street from us. But it's very well stocked with local shops, run by mom & pop & older brother & brother-in-law & cousins and everyone else who has moved from the home country.
On the very end is the 'Gulf bazaar' offering an Arabic-speaking barber, abayas for 60% off (any colour so long as it's black), and a fresh juice bar that also serves fresh cane juice: they crush a length of sugar cane straigth into a glass while you wait.
Our closest food shop is an Arab grocer, with fresh bread, a halal butcher, every spice you could want, 8 different kinds of olives in bulk, loads of fruit jams, syrups and sweets, and a goodly variety of fruit and veg.
The Iranian kebab shop serves the most delightful lamacun (lamazhin), and fresh bread from their huge flatbread ovens. The guys running the shop seem to know most of their customers as friends, with a warmth and cheer that is suprising in London.
The next shop is a 24 hour grocery run by Eastern Europeans - some mix of Poles, Ukranians, Romanians and Hungarians. These aren't the newly-arrived Romanians from 1 January: these folks have been here long enough to establish grocery supply chains and a market to feed.
There's a bakery upstairs, a fresh meat counter, every variety of preserved meat that a pork-loving culture could enjoy, followed closely by the cattle-loving culture for the yoghurt and fresh cheese supplies.
In fact, the yoghurt and cream cheese are hard to tell apart; the drinking yoghurt tastes cheesy, the 'yoghurt balls in oil' are much more like cream cheese to me; I'm not certain they're labelled correctly, but they're very tasty.
The busiest shop, though, is the Asian fruit and vegetable shop; there's a continuous stream of deliveries to the front and the back, perpetually clogging traffic as they unload stacks of crates. The shop is packed with customers every time I pass by, with 3 cashiers working continuously.
Quality control appears to be the Indian and Sri Lankan grannies and aunties of the neighbourhood, who look over offerings with pursed lips, and grill the attendants suspiciously, 'Is this fresh? when was it cut? has it been sitting out for hours?' God help any goober who tries to pass off yesterday's watermelon to them.
...means you're in a car-based neighbourhood. In these suburbs, 95% of the front yards have been paved over to make extra parking space for the second and third car. Clearly, the good life requires four wheels or more.
...means if you find your favourite beer in a shop, buy it all. The 'ethnic' communities here are not traditionally big drinkers. The two pubs within walking distance seem populated only with ageing Irish builders who seem happy with lager and Strongbow.
Even the pub near work, which is now run by a former Medieval Baebe, doesn't yet have a tasty beer. In this aspect, I miss Hackney a lot, where we were spoiled for choice and price.
...means the parks seem empty; there is not the same dog-owning and dog-walking community here that was in Hackney.
When I walked through a park almost anytime of day in Hackney I'd see dogs and their owners; there was a regular group of morning walkers on my commute, and I enjoyed seeing the doggy social dynamics. The dogs seemed so happy to be out and about in the morning.
Now, there's the occasional single dog walker on my way to work, and an elderly gent walking a geriatric dog outside our building - the kind of couple where you're not certain who is walking whom.
Instead, the morning run is the parents towing children to the school next to us - crossing 4 lanes of traffic with lousy traffic lights not designed for pedestrians. The options for non-car-users are just appalling. Sigh.
Our modest high street doesn't have many chain stores, and they're concentrated at the other end of the street from us. But it's very well stocked with local shops, run by mom & pop & older brother & brother-in-law & cousins and everyone else who has moved from the home country.
On the very end is the 'Gulf bazaar' offering an Arabic-speaking barber, abayas for 60% off (any colour so long as it's black), and a fresh juice bar that also serves fresh cane juice: they crush a length of sugar cane straigth into a glass while you wait.
Our closest food shop is an Arab grocer, with fresh bread, a halal butcher, every spice you could want, 8 different kinds of olives in bulk, loads of fruit jams, syrups and sweets, and a goodly variety of fruit and veg.
The Iranian kebab shop serves the most delightful lamacun (lamazhin), and fresh bread from their huge flatbread ovens. The guys running the shop seem to know most of their customers as friends, with a warmth and cheer that is suprising in London.
The next shop is a 24 hour grocery run by Eastern Europeans - some mix of Poles, Ukranians, Romanians and Hungarians. These aren't the newly-arrived Romanians from 1 January: these folks have been here long enough to establish grocery supply chains and a market to feed.
There's a bakery upstairs, a fresh meat counter, every variety of preserved meat that a pork-loving culture could enjoy, followed closely by the cattle-loving culture for the yoghurt and fresh cheese supplies.
In fact, the yoghurt and cream cheese are hard to tell apart; the drinking yoghurt tastes cheesy, the 'yoghurt balls in oil' are much more like cream cheese to me; I'm not certain they're labelled correctly, but they're very tasty.
The busiest shop, though, is the Asian fruit and vegetable shop; there's a continuous stream of deliveries to the front and the back, perpetually clogging traffic as they unload stacks of crates. The shop is packed with customers every time I pass by, with 3 cashiers working continuously.
Quality control appears to be the Indian and Sri Lankan grannies and aunties of the neighbourhood, who look over offerings with pursed lips, and grill the attendants suspiciously, 'Is this fresh? when was it cut? has it been sitting out for hours?' God help any goober who tries to pass off yesterday's watermelon to them.
...means you're in a car-based neighbourhood. In these suburbs, 95% of the front yards have been paved over to make extra parking space for the second and third car. Clearly, the good life requires four wheels or more.
...means if you find your favourite beer in a shop, buy it all. The 'ethnic' communities here are not traditionally big drinkers. The two pubs within walking distance seem populated only with ageing Irish builders who seem happy with lager and Strongbow.
Even the pub near work, which is now run by a former Medieval Baebe, doesn't yet have a tasty beer. In this aspect, I miss Hackney a lot, where we were spoiled for choice and price.
...means the parks seem empty; there is not the same dog-owning and dog-walking community here that was in Hackney.
When I walked through a park almost anytime of day in Hackney I'd see dogs and their owners; there was a regular group of morning walkers on my commute, and I enjoyed seeing the doggy social dynamics. The dogs seemed so happy to be out and about in the morning.
Now, there's the occasional single dog walker on my way to work, and an elderly gent walking a geriatric dog outside our building - the kind of couple where you're not certain who is walking whom.
Instead, the morning run is the parents towing children to the school next to us - crossing 4 lanes of traffic with lousy traffic lights not designed for pedestrians. The options for non-car-users are just appalling. Sigh.
