"Dance with me come on" My boyfriend implored for the second time last Monday night,and though I felt more like Screaming out loud at the soul - dampening London weather,than dancing,I, lifted my very very tired body off the chair and clung unto him as he swayed and rocked my bulk to and fro out of sync with the music soothingly playing on the radio.A great dancer he is not. It had rained from the moment I yawned "good morning " to him at 4am that morning to the time he requested the dance at about 11pm that night.We had a miserable rain sodden ,wet day at the carnival unlike the day before..Furthermore,we hardly had any space in which to tango.We had piles of containers of curry goat,jollof rice,buffalo wings,buns and crates of canned drinks surrounding us .All through the days before the carnival, I had scoured weather forecast centres looking for a positive prediction for the bank holiday Monday but didn't find any.It was going to rain cats and dogs yet somehow I,d swam against the tide and gone ahead and hired the same number of staff,Prepared the same quantity of food and bought even more drinks.I had figured that so long as there was a sound system positioned near our set up, we would mint it.Oh how are the desperate disappointed!There were warning signs that could have served to warn me of the impending catastrophe that was this year,s Nottinghill Carnival but as always when I am desperate , I choose not to follow my instincts.
I have been a food street trader for more than 12 years and have catered at festivals but have never found it appealing to cater at the carnival .That position would still have sufficed but for the fact that I started a new family in the past 3 years brooding 2 babies .Something had to give as I began to find it increasingly difficulit to leave my babies at the strike of dawn to go hustle in the markets.Also I lost my premium spot at Greenwich market during that site,s management,s pretend restructuring(more of which in future blogs)The further loss of even more premium spots at lucrative lunch time market spots like Canary wharf and St Katherine,s dock (as my boyfriend ,s constant squabbles with the wife of the organizer the genteel Mr Shephered got us kicked out) Actually,it wasn't,entirely the boyfriends fault that we got kicked out. It didn't help matters that I also began to organise my own markets and tried poaching traders from Shephereds markets. I hadn't reckoned on the sheepish sense of loyalty some of the traders I approached owed to them. Anyhow,it became necessary for me to take on high risk but higher returns venture like the carnival.So,when last year I was approached by a friend of a friend to pay £1,000 to share a spot from which to sell hot food at the carnival,I got interested.I went with the boyfriend to peruse the site. He grew up in Lad broke grove so knew where the usual trouble spots were and as it so happened,the spot I was being offered was a well known trouble spot so we turned it down. The boyfriend then became obsessed with finding us a suitable site .It was partly his fault that my earning power has seriously diminished. He fought with Mrs Shephereds after all and we have very hungry mouths to feed and expensive baby paraphernalia to buy.He found one 3 days to the carnival.A private arrangement.We are to set up stall in front of this old eccentric,s house and pay him a commission of 5% on all our takings. I didn't like the sound of that and told him so when I met him. I,d rather he named a price to be paid before we started so that we can have autonomy over our takings and not have to declare our takings to someone we hardly knew.He refused to budge so we caved in.Come carnival morning , the boyfriend arrived at his building to set up and alas! there was another stall already set up on the same spot.He told the boyfriend that he had double booked. He was sorry! When the boyfriend rang to tell me I screamed at him to better make sure he found another spot or else he had better prepare both to feast on the tonnes of food myself and two staff were busy preparing and to pay the invoices as well. A while later he rang to I say that the Man,s neighbour had agreed for us to use her front porch.Incidentally,that spot was flanked on either side by two well known disc jockeys. On the one side was the legendary Norman J and on the other side,Pasha Sanchez.Suffice it to say that it was one of the most successful gamble we ever took as we had a snaking queue from the moment we were set up untill closing time. I was very happy indeed and curried favour with the woman who was also very happy to have earned a handsome fee and good food for her and 10 family members for the two day period.We arranged to use the same spot again in 2014.
