Flea Markets and Coconut Candy

I have a lively bunch at work that I lunch together with. The Philadelphia Metro was running a full page on the last page on a local Flea Market in Philadelphia. This lead to a discussion about Flea Markets.

I have been to several of them in Pennsylvania and these markets could be a good pastime with a bunch of people selling their used wares and folks bargaining with them. One of my lunch mate is an intern doing her Master's at Drexel. I recommended her to go to the advertised flea market. The only other colleague at the table that day was a naturalized British who like me is also very fond of flea markets. That was one thing a British and an Indian could agree upon.

We were all sharing our experiences and teaching the newbie at what to expect and what not to. Flea markets bring out the entrepreneurial abilities of people in surprising ways. I am not talking about the junk that people sell on their tables. But here are some instances that might throw a better light.

One guy at a flea market had a van with electric generator. He would charge a small fee for testing any equipment that runs on electricity like a toaster or a blender. Personally this is a great idea. It is better to test your precious junk bought at the flea market than to go home and be disappointed when it doesn't work (like the all-in-one printer I bought). The guys surely had enough business to make his trip worthwhile. Remember that this is a big flea markets that spans multiple acres and close to 100 vendors.

One vendor would have a makeshift table with not so salable items on it. But he would be drinking a soda with a cooler under the table or next to him. The people coming to his table, seeing him drink soda and a cooler next to him inquire 'Where did you get that? Do you have more?'. He would then sneak out a bottle/can and take a buck or whatever he takes. The deal is that you are not allowed to sell eatables and drinks in some flea markets. This guy was catering to a demand with a sneaky supply of his own undermining the non-suspect authority.

What strikes me surprising about these eventful flea markets and yard sales are that they are unique to USA. At least they are not to be found in India. I assumed that this must be an American thing, but I was not sure if that existed in Europe since culturally America has a lot in common with Europe.

I have never seen anybody setup a yard sale or a flea market in my hometown. I mentioned this to my British friend and he was surprised to hear that. I explained to him that we rarely sell items to regular folks. Our junk are mostly donated to others in need down the social economic ladder. The junk are sometimes sold to or bartered with street hawkers. I narrated several commodities like paper(newspaper, books), iron(cooking utensils, old broken tools, left over iron rods from house construction), aluminum(cloth hangers, bulbs, wires) etc.

I narrate the same with detail below at the expense of risking my image. My narrative later could be misconstrued for having a childhood like the kids from the Christian Child Fund promotion that airs on TV regularly. The Christian Child Fund is rechristening to 'Child Fund International' to better market itself to a wider audience leading to an uproar(Video here) by the conservative media at Fox News. But perception is reality in most cases. 'The organization shed its religious teachings more than 30 years ago'. The organisation was perceived as a Christian Charity by having a Christian in it's name. In it's efforts to shed a religious image and reach a wider audience they are apparently losing their current Christian donors. Isn't that a irony. Shouldn't charity be done irrespective of the religion? But I digress

There used to be newspaper hawkers who bought used newspapers. English newspapers like The Hindu would fetch more(when sold by issues) than the native newspapers for whatever reasons. I think the English newspapers had more leaves in those days. The newspapers would fetch Rs.4 per Kilogram (little less than 4 cents/pound) in the late 80's. Then there are the used clothes that would be exchanged for Steel Utensils. The housewives of AP(Sree Lakshmi comes to mind immediately) were notorious for selling their old clothes in exchange for these vessels and were made fun of in several Telugu movies especially in movies by Late Mr.Jandhyala who was very famous for his subtle clean humor in Telugu movie industry.

My favorite vendor was the aluminum hawker who would exchange aluminum metal(anything aluminum) for a coconut candy (Kobbari Mithai). It definitely must be my pre-teen age, but I still remember it vividly. I would stash any item made of aluminum so I can exchange them ounce for ounce of the savory coconut candy. I would save the broken hangers(they used to be made of aluminum in those good old days). The metal end of light bulbs (both incandescent and tube light) were also a part to the cause. We would hang around the electric pole whenever there was work going on there. The crew from APSEB (Andhra Pradesh State Electricity Board) left behind some electric cable that contained aluminum in them. Luckily for us we had an electric pole right in front of our home and we had frequent maintenance requests by our neighbors. I thought the coconut candy exchanged for the aluminum was worth the trouble of collecting them. In retrospection, some of the stuff we did was highly hazardous. Breaking a bulb or a tube light is dangerous and accident prone. All this to extract out a few grams of aluminum to exchange them for a few grams of coconut candy to be shared by four(we were four siblings who had equal stake in the candy).

Some hawkers would barter onions and/or munchies like roasted chana (chick peas) for old iron and other metal items. Other than the above there are other means where one can buy and sell used items in India. Used book stores at Barracks in Vizag and Koti in Hyderabad comes to mind quickly. Then there was also an auction house of used items near Nehru Bazaar in Vizag where my dad bought a sewing machine. Well the sewing machine had no table where the sewing machine could sit and hence the sewing machine stayed unused for almost a decade until my sister got married and took it home with her (It was one of the several parting gifts that still continue to date). The story of the sewing machine is for another day.

My colleague doesn't recollect if there were any flea markets in Europe as he came to USA when he was very young. His cousin from Belgium is visiting him soon and he promised to ask him about it. But I could not wait for my colleague's cousin's story. So I used the help of our dear good friend Google to find some answers. From what I could find, flea markets might have started in Paris where they were called Le Marche aux Puces which literally means market of the fleas. The Parisian's those days were highly unoriginal - they named the market 'Le Marche aux Puces' as they used to find fleas in the wares sold at these places. If French were not so subtle, the English were not any better, the translation 'Flea Markets' appeared in English sometime in the 1920's. The history is not so good, but the continuation of the legacy is.

A to Z easy, Z to A not so easy Mr.K

The basic law of physical distances is that 'the distance between x and y is the same in either direction'. Like from the image below, if a person say Mr. K moves from Z to A, the distance to go back to Z (from A) should be same.

But that is true only when the all the basic conditions (environment) of Mr. K's homecoming to Z (from A) are same as they were before going to point A (from Z). But whenever human try to apply, mathematical laws to daily lives, the outcome sometimes is quite different than the expected. An example of this is the mathematical model (based on Random Brownian movement and heat diffusion principles) driven hedge funds trading by LTCM in stock market which lost huge money in the 1990's. LTCM was too big to fail in late 90's like Citi, Bank of America, AIG are too big to fail now in a nation that is getting too big to fail.

Going back to Mr. K, his expectation is normal. But now, as you can see in the image to the right, he faces many challenges to visit his home town Z. Now Mr. K has to go to R then to G to go to Z. This violation of basic law can be seen below where distance to go back from A → Z is sum of A → R, R → G, G → Z is lot greater than the distance from Z → A. Before I explain what A, G, R, Z are and who Mr.K is, I have to give a background story. All stories should start with once upon a time. No, this story is not about old times.

So a few weeks ago, I was talking to my colleague Mrs. Kikorov, aka Mrs. K. She was going on a week long vacation. Knowing her nationality, I inquired if she was going to Russia (you should have guessed what R is now). She said she was going to an island in the Pacific Ocean near Dominican Republic. I asked if she was going with the family. She replied 'With a friend'. I asked if her husband was Russian and she said, 'He was when we married'. His home is in an Internationally non-recognized self independence declared country called Abkhazia (Z).

She went nostalgic on mentioning Abkhazia. Apparently, Mr. Kikorov's home is walkable distance from the picturesque Black Sea. She proclaims that Abkhazia is a heaven of earth, with beautiful tourist destinations abound. There are several man made boundaries that prevent Mr. Kikorov visiting his home in Abkhazia. According to Mrs.Kikorov, our protagonist has to get a Visa in America (A) to go to Russia (R), then a Visa in Russia (R) to go to Georgia (G) and special permit in Georgia to go to Abkhazia (Z) and now Georgia does not permit anyone to go to Abkhazia. There is a lot of sectarian violence that goes on between Georgia and Abkhazia and there were 3 full fledged wars between the countries since 1991. The map of the region discussed above can be seen below.

View Larger Map

It is a shame to deny a person to visit his home in his homeland. I can only imagine the pain and anguish people felt during the division of India and Pakistan and the fate of Kashmiri Pandits driven away from Kashmir by the militants and violence in the valley. Not everyone is lucky to settle in a relatively safe land like America (A) outside their native homeland. 

Coming back to our story, while man made physical barriers have prevented Mr. Kikorov from visiting his homeland, there are other non-physical but man made and self induced barriers that are preventing Mr. Kikorov joining his wife on the vacation to an alias to Abkhazia. Mr. Kikorov is a business man in Philadelphia who owns a restaurant. The recession (excess leverage induced which is ultimately man-made) has hit his restaurant business badly.He could not afford to close the restaurant and go on a vacation with his wife. So off goes Mrs. Kikorov to an island near the coast of Mexico with her friend.

While bad-luck and responsibilities have restrained Mr. Kikorov, though she could go to the vacation Mrs. Kikorov does not seem to have avoided bad luck either. She had multiple phone calls, emails etc from her manager, her company HR asking her not to come to work within 96 hours of her returning back from the coast of Mexico. Little did she know that in two days into her vacation, Swine flu would break out in Mexico and the whole world is terrorized by the rumor of an impending pandemic. She had to convince the powers that she is healthy, did not come in contact with anyone with a flu on her vacation and that she did not actually go to Mexico.

Not knowing that she jumped through these hoops, I asked how her vacation during our weekly staff meeting. She replied 'And your next question is?' to which I joked 'You don't have swine flu right?'. The whole team joined me in poking fun at her. She gave the safety message for the week about Swine Flu.

Baby Shower

I had invited a bunch of our friends with their families to the Baby Shower of Seshu on April 25th, 2009. Seshu is due in 5 weeks time. Hopefully things will go well. The mother and baby are doing fine for now.

Some of my colleagues had asked me if I was having the Baby Shower in the Indian tradition or American. I tried to make it a mix of both traditions as I know neither of them completely well (just in this case). This is my first time attending or organizing a Baby Shower.

I had the ladies do their thing in Indian tradition at the beginning of the function. Our friends from New York city were gracious enough to bring the betel leaves and nuts for the function. I had the guests entertained with games like, Guess the Bag(s), Mummy's Tummy, How well do you know the Mommy and Blow the balloon. Indian food was served for lunch in a buffet style while these games were being played. I made the event a co-ed which I believe is an American way of doing it. If I not mistaken, the Indian(Andhra) equivalent-Seemantham is an all women event.

About 30 attended the function, as you will be seeing me counting somewhere in the video. We thank you for coming and bestowing your warm wishes on us. For those who could not make it, here is your chance to view the event via photos and video.

I have a new found respect for feature film editors and directors. You kind of fall in love with every frame of your product. In this case, my brother is the producer of the mother video which was about two hours long. But still, the event being personal to me, I developed an ownership feeling with it. To give a perspective, I spent more time editing the video than on planning and organizing the event. I have managed with terrible pain to edit the length of the video from almost 2 hours to about 15 minutes. So please, please watch the video. Here is the link to it.

I personally like paintings better than sculptures, 2D better than 3D, photos better than videos. So, here are the pictures from the function. As you can see Seshu is looking gorgeous as ever.

While I am anxiously waiting for the Baby, Seshu is very tired now and wants to have Baby out as early as possible. We thank you all for your well wishes and will send an update one more time when our baby is born.