Market Day

We decided to wander about today, collecting various ingredients for a yummy Christmas eve and day, and although we thought we were up and about early for a Saturday, we discovered that some people had set about their errands much earlier:

I ran to the back of the top level of our double-decker bus to snap this picture, since it was a sight we'd never seen in Vancouver--an impressive queue at the local butcher shop two days before Christmas.

After picking up some veggies at the Pimlico farmers' market, we passed by this plaque, marking the place where Mozart composed his first symphony. There was a man in the ground-floor left window, eating his breakfast, but I walked past until he wasn't in the shot--I wonder how many times he's been sitting in his window when people have stopped to snap a pic of his house...

Being in this part of London felt very strange after being so immersed in setting up our flat--we've been surrounded by neighbourhood-y things for the last while and suddenly plopping ourselves in the middle of a touristy area felt very odd. But wait--aren't we tourists too? Market #2 of the day was Borough. We wanted to treat ourselves to the wild mushroom paté that was sold out last week, and the woman had a few containers left today! She told me she had been up until three in the morning all last week, making paté, in order to keep up with demand. "It's full of hard work and love! Happy Christmas!" she exclaimed as I made my purchase. From the paté stall, we began to search for lunch. Bob made a beeline for the yummy sandwich stand, but my nose caught something else that I had to have:

Real raclette! Yes please!

The man assembled the boiled potatoes and gherkins on my plate, all the while checking how much of the wheels of cheese had melted (he had four wheels going at the same time, two on his right and two on his left) under the hot plate. Then, the magic moment came when the top of one wheel just started to brown: he scooped up the cheese from the rounded side and ran a knife along the hot side, scraping off an amazingly huge hunk of melted goodness over my entire plate:
Some sea salt and freshly ground pepper and that's lunch! Very nice in the December chill.

From Borough, it was over to market #3, Stoke Newington farmers' market, to get some of the delicious vegan cake (all that cheese needed to be balanced somehow) we sampled last week--we got two half-loaves (cocoa and fig/ginger) and returned home for coffee and a slice of cake before heading out again. This photo is of one my favourite buildings on Church street, with wonderful evidence of history on the exterior brick and an aromatic flower shop as its current tenant.

Later in the day, while we were waiting for the tube, Bob whispered, "Hand me the camera...hand me the camera" and this was the result:

The woman wasn't with any children, didn't appear to be doing any shopping for children, and wasn't carrying anything else to indicate that the bear had been a carnival prize. She was just commuting around London with her bear!

We thought about going skating at Somerset House later in the day, but this was before we realized how many of the skating sessions were long sold-out. Still, we decided to head down for a peek. We got there just as the Zamboni had finished resurfacing the ice, but the rink soon filled with skaters in a lovely Christmas scene: