…and so began my visit to the fair – with the bus driver taking an accidental detour to drop me off at the gate, which was nice but a little unnerving for the other passengers.
The fair itself hadn’t really gotten into swing yet, there were lots of opportunities for fun but nobody taking them. I’m not a big fan of fairground rides, or indeed theme park rides, not because I dislike them, rather they seem like a lot of waiting around for not much in the way of entertainment.
There are two parts to the fair, they seem to sit rather at odds with each other, theres a small and very sedate flea market which seems to be mainly travelling thing-makers selling their things alongside a large funfair, the boundary between the two if very distinct.
One of the stalls in the flea market was selling videos of “Bear knuckle fighting” – for some reason I’d always assumed it was the knuckles that were bare, rather than they were owned by a bear, but these guys are professionals and I’m not.
“Din-n she yoos-a be a bid chavvy?” comes the question from one of the bright orange girls walking in front of me, the one in white hot-pants, a perfect estuary accent with a little slur for added measure. Clearly I’m no judge of subcultures either.
By the time I’d done a round of both halves the funfair was starting to liven up a little – some of the finest characters England has to offer…this is a far more earthy affair than Strawberry Fair, where everyone is living a dream for the day, this is about thrills now, instant gratification, and somehow they’re not quite enough.
As I was leaving there was a little group of policemen walking along licking ice creams, its not something that should surprise me but somehow it did.
And then I got driven home by the oracle from the Matrix – she was pretending to be a bus driver but I can see through that disguise.
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