Even a found Christmas can be dull and gloomy and it was like that when I headed out to Brick Lane on the Saturday before Christmas – Christmas Eve Eve! I visited the hairdresser and trusted my head to her. I came away wondering just what she’d changed – there was very little hair on the floor and more time spent on diffusing and perfecting my curls than cutting – but the back did look better, I’d had a good time, and I wasn’t upset. That’s a major achievement.
I stopped at Ambala for some samosas and grabbed a chicken tikka roll for some lunch. But the view from Whitechapel was dismal.
The East London mosqueThe gloaming!
My friend, Judy, sent me a message when I got on the bus and we switched to talking for real (yes!). The whole of Cambridge Heath Road and Mare Street was the same dismal grey as Whitechapel Road had been. And then we passed Mare Street Market and the lights caught my eye. I had to get out to look more closely.
Inside was a real Christmas grotto. I wandered around and enjoyed the atmosphere, everyone laughing and everything glistening.
In this neighbourhood, there are houses being sold all the time. The real estate market is booming, even now with things looking so precarious.
When we first moved to Hackney no one wanted to live here. Over the years this has reversed to Hackney being one of the most desirable areas to live. In between there has been much buying up of cheap properties, large gorgeous renovations and the cheap, hasty ones, and the scenery is changing quite rapidly.
The cost of a one bedroom flat has gone from around £100,000 and less in 2000 to £500,000 and more in 2018. All of the buying, reno, selling cycle translates to scaffolding. What a business to be in! If I had invested money in it back when I first arrived, by now I could have been buying and renovating a home of my own.
Earlier this week, I was a bit dismayed when a truck pulled up out front with a large amount of wood planks and metal rods. More scaffolding was on the way. That would make about five houses in this little block that were being done over. My fear was that it would be this one, since there’s been a For Sale sign outside for some time. Scaffolding spoils my view and takes away my privacy, with men outside the window without warning. But phew, it was for three houses over. Sorry, guys!
Scaffolding
I suppose the farmers’ markets have been around long before the real estate boom but I’m sure they will have changed. They probably started as honest fruit and veg stalls, bread, cake, a few wholesome crafts – I think I even remember going to the Stoke Newington one when it was like that, and not so many years ago. Now many are artisan markets with stuff no one really needs, but it’s fun to look.
Niko, a stalwart, selling chocolateI kinda fell in love with the pottery at this candle stall Turnips – apparently once a Hackney staple – at this honest stall. He was packing up with way too much unsoldThe back of the market has a fragrant Christmas tree lot
Some places are quite Christmassy along Stoke Newington High Street. This year I’ve noticed that the shopping has begun very early. I’ve never seen such queues at some of the shops. Until the last couple of years you could go into a shop or supermarket on Christmas eve or even the day before and find completely empty shelves. One year we found ourselves without Christmas dinner and from then on, we shopped a little earlier too. Last year it seemed to have improved and I was surprised to see there was still a little selection.
If November was dark and rainy, December is starting off very mild and even sunny sometimes. And it’s getting pretty Christmassy!
On upper Well Street, the florists are bringing out their Christmas best
At St Paul’s church, the yellowed leaves are a nice mix with the trees on the tree lot.
And this Turkish kebab place on Kingsland Road is accidentally festive!
Check these daylight hours, though! By 3pm twilight creeps in and between 4 and 4:30 it’s just like night time. Yesterday I was thinking that, if I were working, it would be properly dark by the time I headed home. I’m not sure if other years have been so dark but they must have been. There’s just more cloud this year…?
Is it really December?
However, December has lots of promise. I started jotting things down on one of my quickly drawn up calendars – I like to do this on paper and revise it almost daily. And this week there will be two workshops (one a serious mental health one, and one a fun Christmassy one) two family visits and there’s company coming over for dinner, if Susanne doesn’t succumb to her threatening cold. And Hackney is having a Festive Lights event, marking the first night of Chanukah and turning on the lights of the Christmas tree. I love lights and candles so I’m in!
Venice’s houses can be beautiful or ugly, clean or dirty, elegant or rough, crumbling or pristine…there are many versions. Each street level building is protected at least at its windows and often also at its doors. The variety of the doors and windows and their coverings is incredible. So I did photograph quite a few.
Venice is built on the water. There are many canals that come from the sea into the city. And that’s interesting too since there is a smell of the sea around you – quite comforting.
Venice has more than 150 canals dividing the city into over a hundred little islands.
Venetians are completely at home on the water. They speed about in their boats, often standing rather than sitting, hopping in and out. This reminds me of how much at home the motorbike riders are in Naples. Yes, there are streets but there are no roads. You walk about on car-free lanes and alleys, moving about across bridges that connect the various bits of ground from canal to canal.
Just another day in Venice – commuting?
Boats line one of the larger canals
Boats line a small canal
The bridges are interesting and varied. As you get closer to the centre, they become crowded with people taking photos of themselves, of their friends and family, and of the scenery. This is prime selfie territory.
The bridges are simple or fancy, wood, iron or stone – no two are alike, or so it seems
I definitely don’t want to cross THIS bridge
And the tourist bridges
Above all, the canals can be extraordinarily beautiful
When work needs to be done, there are the work boats. They pick up garbage, they repair bridges, they deliver goods, they pick up sick people, and they run water taxis. Everything is done by and on the water. If you ever wonder why prices are so high there, it’s good to remember how difficult it was to get everything and everybody everywhere!
Working boat – delivering construction material
Garbage boat
Ambulance boat
Delivery by cart
Laundry aross the canal
Then there are the gondolas. They are a staple of Venice and I’d imagine that many young men – and sometimes these days, women – who know this is one way to earn a living in a city that relies on tourism and boats. For 80 euros you can ride in a gondola for 40 minutes. The gondola is meant to hold four people but can stretch to six. Each one has pillows to make the journey more relaxing and luxurious, and each gondolier is happy to tell you something about the city, and to take your photo!
