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Saturday, February 27, 2010

Market exchange loneliness with smile

The sky was clear up and sunshine was beautiful. Wow, I felt like catching light. I visited a market. It was a treasure hunting and nice to see familiar people there. I have not come to the market for a while, as I was busy.
A market is a crossing point of cultures and people from all over the world. No exaggeration. It's my privilege of living in Sydney that I can encounter different cultures and any people on the earth.

A Middle East man always displayed a bit unique and fascinating goods. He whispered me that they came from overseas. Two stalls showed Japanese kimono, dishes and antiques. An Indian man put all his DVDs on the ground, shouting for a bargain. Some stalls exhibited Chinese cultural heritages such as garments, stones and tiny crafts. An old German man with a mustache enjoyed a chat with customers rather than selling his WWII army uniforms.

Of course, so many stalls mixed up different cultures without any time frame.
Young-student-like gals tried hard to sell all their old clothes and worn out shoes at cheap prices. Collected goods and bric-a-brac were flooded over on stalls, such as old coins, stamps, rusted instruments, secondhand books, CDs, and brand new unnecessary goods, etc, etc. Even an owner of a stall had no idea about where it came from!
Only once I came across a linguistics lecturer's stall in the past. The lecturer wanted to sell unnecessary belongings for the moving out. Thank goodness, there wasn't any linguistics book on the table?!
Oh, yeah, a market deals not only "past" and "present", but also "future." A gypsy fortune teller would tell you about a future. A market also gives buskers job places.

Another great fun is to negotiate a stall owner over prices. It's all up to a customer's skills, luck and "timing" of telling a price. It seems when packing up comes near, a customer can take advantage of buying goods. Even though
owners want to sell goods at a right price, they know " An egg today is better than a chicken tomorrow." Some visitors told me their sagas how cleverly and bravely beat right prices.

While I was listening to a busker's music, I sketched the market.
I imagine, probably, Silk Road could be much like this market. In our modern society, we get isolated more and more in technology. The market is the place for us to share time. In Japan, I do not have any memory like these markets in Sydney. Personally, I really love a market. We recycle goods, enjoy human interactions and care for each other there.

I assume a market is the place we chuck loneliness into a bin and exchange smiles over a stall.





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