Shopper's Paradise
Today is market day in neighboring Padrón. It's one of the biggest markets in western Galicia and dates from the Middle Ages. It's almost like an old-fashioned country store where you could buy chicken feed and paté and a coat. But bigger, much bigger.
There are over six hundred stalls where you can buy clothing of all kinds, from underwear to children's to shoes to the latest fashions. If you need a scythe you can find one. Want to find a CD by Beyoncé, the Gypsy Kings, or Mozart? You can. There are all kinds of plants and seeds to build a garden from scratch. There are people selling fruits and vegetables from their home gardens and eggs from their corn-fed chickens. There are stalls with fresh bread and pastries. Inside the market building proper there are traditional fruit and vegetable stalls with produce from all over the world. (If you want to pay, you can find cherries in February.) There are butcher's stalls with different cuts of meat and different meats. At the furthest end of the building are the fish and seafood stalls. There you can find them all from the cheapest whiting to the most expensive sea urchin. The cases of fish drip water onto the cement floor and the entire area smells briny, like the sea on a stormy day when the seaweed has been tossed onto the beach.
In another corner of the market area surrounding the main building are the gypsies, selling the cheapest clothing, shoes, and objects from closed-out stores. There's even a stall that sells second-hand and old hardware and appliances. Another stall is one that has travelled from Portugal and sells simple wooden furniture that you then have to paint or varnish. And sometimes there will be a gypsy with a stall full of old books from bookstores that have closed their doors. I've even found books in English on occasion. And, of course, there are two permanent pulplerías, which set up their tents and benches every Sunday for those who want to make a trip to the market an almost all-day outing.
I haven't been in a long while, but my husband likes to go on the Sundays that he doesn't go fishing. When I first moved here I would go every Sunday with my parents. It became a Sunday habit. I loved walking through the crowds and looking through the stuff in the stalls where everything was thrown together on wooden slabs set up as a makeshift table. There was also another corner then, which has since been closed down, where people sold animals. There were the typical chickens and chicks sold in cages. There were also ducks and sometimes pigeons and other birds. But my favorite were the people who were selling puppies and kittens. Unfortunately, selling animals in the open air was banned after the bird flu first appeared and no alternative was set up, so now there are no animals in the market.
My husband went this morning and brought back some lettuce, a tomato, bread, and spicy chourizos. So spicy, he's the only one who'll eat them.
There are over six hundred stalls where you can buy clothing of all kinds, from underwear to children's to shoes to the latest fashions. If you need a scythe you can find one. Want to find a CD by Beyoncé, the Gypsy Kings, or Mozart? You can. There are all kinds of plants and seeds to build a garden from scratch. There are people selling fruits and vegetables from their home gardens and eggs from their corn-fed chickens. There are stalls with fresh bread and pastries. Inside the market building proper there are traditional fruit and vegetable stalls with produce from all over the world. (If you want to pay, you can find cherries in February.) There are butcher's stalls with different cuts of meat and different meats. At the furthest end of the building are the fish and seafood stalls. There you can find them all from the cheapest whiting to the most expensive sea urchin. The cases of fish drip water onto the cement floor and the entire area smells briny, like the sea on a stormy day when the seaweed has been tossed onto the beach.
In another corner of the market area surrounding the main building are the gypsies, selling the cheapest clothing, shoes, and objects from closed-out stores. There's even a stall that sells second-hand and old hardware and appliances. Another stall is one that has travelled from Portugal and sells simple wooden furniture that you then have to paint or varnish. And sometimes there will be a gypsy with a stall full of old books from bookstores that have closed their doors. I've even found books in English on occasion. And, of course, there are two permanent pulplerías, which set up their tents and benches every Sunday for those who want to make a trip to the market an almost all-day outing.
I haven't been in a long while, but my husband likes to go on the Sundays that he doesn't go fishing. When I first moved here I would go every Sunday with my parents. It became a Sunday habit. I loved walking through the crowds and looking through the stuff in the stalls where everything was thrown together on wooden slabs set up as a makeshift table. There was also another corner then, which has since been closed down, where people sold animals. There were the typical chickens and chicks sold in cages. There were also ducks and sometimes pigeons and other birds. But my favorite were the people who were selling puppies and kittens. Unfortunately, selling animals in the open air was banned after the bird flu first appeared and no alternative was set up, so now there are no animals in the market.
My husband went this morning and brought back some lettuce, a tomato, bread, and spicy chourizos. So spicy, he's the only one who'll eat them.
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