Indie Suzhou
(Independent market. Clockwise from top right: child watching us, the blues band, Susan and I enjoying the atmosphere, a view down one part of the market: Suzhou, China)
Simon from Shanghai tipped me off about a design market today in Suzhou. He travelled here for the day to sell items from his shop there and I took my friend Susan along for a jaunt. I find these situations slightly stressful in their infancy as I am relied upon to provide an address and to ensure we arrive there, but also I cannot vouch for the event’s quality. We might have gone and it would have been very small with limited stalls, been expensive and had absolutely no atmosphere. I was blessed however with this event being fantastically full of stalls and all of them peddling wares of all descriptions and qualities.
There was a live band setting up when we arrived in the early afternoon whilst we performed an initial prowling browse of the outdoor stalls and their products. On the way round, we noticed a small table selling beers for a reasonable sum so we made light work of our first beverage. The all male four-piece played for around an hour as we swayed with our beers, clapping them at every interval. They comprised a keyboard, guitar, harmonica and voice, favouring rock and roll, blues and a touch of soul, crooning some of their own material before moving on to well known classics like ‘Blue Suede Shoes’. For Susan and I it was a surreal experience, so similar in atmosphere to summery Glasgow’s West End Festival that I almost felt transported to a slice of home, even surrounded by so many Chinese faces.
On our way round for a second, more thorough sweep of the market, whenever we stopped at a stall where someone had a camera to hand, we were photographed several times, for what purpose, I have no idea. It happened on at least four occasions (that we were aware of) but no doubt we were captured candidly several more. We were, I suppose the only ‘lao wai’ (foreigners) present amongst a sea of local faces, so no doubt we were a curiosity.
