Mirror to the Local Soul

I learned at a very young age that to really get to know a culture, you need to shop where the natives shop.  I also learned at a very young age that of all shopping, I prefer the food kind of shopping.

When I was about 10 years old, I lived in the diesel-crusted capitol city of a middle-eastern country, and for some inexplicable reason my parents allowed me to go to the local koutche store and bread shop alone.  There, I would buy warm, fresh barbari or nan-e taftoon and carry it to our marble and parquet home, where my mother would prepare simple sandwiches with crunchy green onions, a creamy cheese or butter, and salt.  This freedom was brought to an abrupt halt by a violent revolution that involved lots of hostages and embassy explosions that gripped the Western world for quite some time. 

But this story is about a western culture in another hemisphere in a new millennium.

My friend Vanessa was in town recently from Boston, on vacation, and so she was a tourist.  When she visits, she always brings a few trinkets from her most recent adventures—prayer beads, bracelets, necklaces—that she no doubt procures from bazaars and independent artisans that sell their crafts along pathways to this or that point of significance.  While Vanessa likes food as much as I do, she tends to survey local cultures through their crafts. 

Through these two perspectives—of food and of crafts—we discovered a view of San Francisco that I, as a local, had not yet seen.  It was the view from Treasure Island, filtered that day through the Treasure Island Flea.

It is oddly fitting to find a flea market on a place called Treasure Island, though if you’re unfamiliar with this particular Treasure Island you wouldn’t know that it dangles like a patina pendant from the Bay Bridge, halfway between Oakland and San Francisco. 

Admittedly, it was a pretty cold and windy Saturday morning, even with the mostly clear, blue sky.  Treasure Island Flea is held on the last Saturday of the month, a kind of appetizer to the Bay Area’s mother-of-all-flea-markets, the Alameda flea market, made popular recently by the Afghani protagonist from the wildly popular book The Kite Runner.  We paid our $3 entrance fees, and I scanned the tent tops for the food stalls—sadly, way at the other end of the market.  We started to troll the booths. 

Sometimes, you get lucky.

I immediately spotted a chunky, silver David Yurman-style necklace that the vendor explained was from the ‘70s.  I plunked down a whopping six bucks, and chirping with delight, showed off my acquisition.  People craned their necks to see, anxious to find the next treasure hidden in these piles of old bracelets and necklaces.  I could feel the silent, competitive energy, and felt triumphant.

We grazed through stalls of vintage American ‘70s and ‘80s clothing, 20^th century jewelry, accessories, and household goods like brass lions, hammered buckets, and lawn chairs. Somebody walked by with a large paper cone filled with miniature donuts covered with icing and colored sprinkles.  We were getting closer to the food.  I felt like one of those hungry lions on the Discovery Channel, stalking its knock-kneed prey.  I distinctly remember craving coffee. 

My friend Sheryl had joined us, and eventually, we three separated, each immersed in our own obsessions.  I made a break for the food stalls, but not without a brief delay to purchase two dashing, pink, deer-resistant plants from a horticulturalist. 

I shamelessly inspected each small kitchen, not hesitating to stare at other people’s food and how they were eating it, here in the wind with no tables and a sea-level view of San Francisco’s east face.  South American, Italian, Greek, the choices were all intriguing.  It was hard to decide, which reminds me of when I was in grade school, and my friend Sally and I would ride our bikes into town on half-day Tuesdays to buy candy, and I would labor for minutes (read: hours to a 2^nd grader) over which candy bar to buy… Marathon, Butterfinger, Almond Joy… so many choices, only one lifetime!  I might have been better off growing up in an Eastern Bloc country, where I hear the options were much more limited. 

I decided on an arepa, because I’d never eaten one.  Oh, it was good!  A crusty, gluten-free bread pocket stuffed with black beans, avocado, shredded cheese, and tomato.  Oh, the joy!  People ogled at my arepa, and I pointed to the stall with my saucy fingers.

It didn’t take long for Vanessa and Sheryl to fall in line.  There was immediate and unanimous consensus that we must have—and share—one of those paper cones stuffed with Harvey’s mini donuts.  We did.  Chocolate glazed, if you’re wondering.  At the bottom, the donut crumbs float in the melted chocolate.  You want to be the one holding the cone at the end.

Freshly juiced, we poked around a jewelry table, where the artist assembles necklaces with chain and found objects like old keys, locks, etched glass hearts, and so on.  We each bought one, a silent bond.

At this flea market, floating on the Bay, you won’t find any Moroccan spices, prayer beads, or dreamweavers. Rather, you'll find food, crafts, and treasures of two water-rimmed cities in 21^st century America.

Special thanks to Vanessa, guest photographer for all the images in this blog post.