I had heard about Sydney's Chinatown Friday Night Market from various sources and wanted to experience it for myself. We are fortunate to live in Australia which has a considerable Asian influence. So every opportunity that allows me to understand Asia I embrace with open arms. I believe we are so fortunate to have a vibrant active Asian community that continues many of their traditional pursuits one being that of a typical Asian market. I show up one afternoon on Friday as the markets swing into action. As I take my first photo I am greeted with "NO PHOTO - NO PHOTO !!!"
An angry lady behind the counter is protesting about having photos taken of her stall. I continue to take photos as I have every right to do so.
The lady is protesting to her workmate and shortly afterwards I am confronted by a second hostile lady waving her arms shouting and shouting at me "NO PHOTOS - NO PHOTOS !!!".
I read them the riot act and explain and explain that I have every right to take photos in a public place. The lady tries to argue that she has paid rent for the stall and it is private property for that moment and I am taking photos of private property. (Strewth, I must have stumbled across a practising Queens Council earning extra money on Friday nights). To my surprise a diminutive elderly Chinese gentleman takes my side and starts to yell at the ladies; "It's a public place, he can take photos!!!". I was surprised by his support, possibly an observer who simply thought I was doing nothing wrong and possibly impressed by my bravado to take on the angry ladies. This might just simply explain the bustling dynamic energy of a bustling market.
I tell the ladies if they have any issues they should contact the Police and as you can see it put them back into order. They simply ignored me as if I didn't exist. Anyway I was hungry and needed a bite. I wasn't game to buy from the hornets nest of ladies I just disturbed just in case they were going to add Arsenic as a condiment.
This gentleman doesn't object to having his photo taken, so he gets my business. Three rounds of various skewers. My apologies for not providing close up photos of the food, but as you can imagine it is difficult to hold food in one hand and to single-handedly operate a camera with the other. Oil dripped on my camera bag which was bad enough. So I scoffed down the three skewers. I had chicken on a skewer, octopus balls on skewer, and baby octopus. All in all an excellent feast was had.
The crowd started to become bigger and the cues became longer so I decided to do some people watching. I found a seat towards the end of Dixon St. (near Goulburn St.) and watched to world go by. Later got into a deep and meaningful discussion with a "good sort" (man was I drooling but that is another story for another blog) about humanity which lasted over an hour. There is no good reason to be lonely in a city like Sydney and there is always someone to chat with. What more does one need to be content. Well feed, content, watching the world go by. Now this is living.
Chinatown Friday Night Market
(every Friday night after 7:00pm)
Dixon St.
Haymarket, NSW
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