The first sign that we were not going to have another run of good luck at this year,s carnival happened when a month before the carnival ,I began to ring Anne,s number.Anne is the name we will call the lady,from whose front porch we sold food at last year,s carnival .The phone rang on each occasion but was not answered. I am a natural worrier so I began to panic.My Butcher likes to know in advance if there will be a dramatic increase in the quantity of meat and poultry that I order because he has to debone the goat and broiler Chicken which is no mean feat.When I told the boyfriend ,his answer as always and with everything is to pre-determine a fight with Anne."Oh no she better not Chicken out " He said venom in his voice. "She did promise that we could use her porch again this year" he continued not listening to himself speak."She did not promise not to give the space to a higher bidder this year and what we had was not exactly a cast iron legal /binding agreement" I reminded him."Seriously she had better not mess us up" he continued dimly.The boyfriend has the most one track mind of anyone I know and in the world according to him,no one should ever ever break a promise made to him no matter how flimsy "I think there is only one way to find out if we have got the space this year .Lets, go visit the woman ." I suggested.
"Thank God you are still in the country " I said as she let us into her home."You are not returning our calls,have we still got a deal?" "You bet you have" She replied.And so off we went to begin preparations in earnest.
Last year,we paid at the end of trading each day so we assumed the same arrangement this time but got a rude awakening the day before the carnival when I saw 6 missed calls from Anne in under 20 minutes. Thinking she,s had a change of heart and getting a sense of déjà vu , I steadied my nerves as I put a call through to her."You lot need to pay me for the two days trade tomorrow morning or the deal is off". My heart sank.My normal reaction would have been to tell her where to go and insist on only making payments after each day's trading but I know when I,ve been had. I am my father,s daughter .Bless his soul.He always said tread cautiously when you hold neither the knife nor the Yam .Anne held both the knife and yam. Only a fool would begin to argue with her now.! Like good school children,we presented her with the money the next morning and went about trying to sell to revellers who were already forming a queue.And it was indeed a very busy day for us.Back at the unit,An aunt of mine and Waheeda (see previous blogs)did a good job of doing all the preps for me .Jollof rice sauce was ready and all the poultry and meat seasoned.My Aunt even surpassed herself by peeling 80 kg of Maris piper potatoes.The unit was clean too.Exactly how I like my kitchen when I have loads of cooking to do.
Fast forward Bank holiday morning and despite, willing the weather prediction to improve, it didn,t I had gone ahead and prepared more food.The boyfriend and my nephew held the fort at the stall whilst I took more freshly cooked food along at 2pm.
To say that business was bad will be a massive understatement .Let me give you an idea of how very bad things were.The street where we were was alive and buzzing the day before with revellers spilling out of a trendy pub next door to us and though the DJ played from inside the pub ,you could feel the vibe streets away and it was good music too. A mix of Reggae,Soul,Calypso,House and the like.Today there was no live DJ and as I approached the pub , a stall holder held out 2 pieces of Corn on the Cob and shouted."just a pound now for them 2" Oh dear I thought .Business must be really awful today if I am being offered corn that would normally sell for £2 a cob that cheap.I did not have to wonder for too long for as I raised my eyes towards our stall my boyfriend,s demeanour told me everything I needed to know.Two youths were haggling with him over the price of 2 pieces of Buffallo wings." You lot are expensive bruv . You get me .Like this should cost no more than 50p a piece .I mean it's raining bruv . You get me .You should be thanking me for standing here in the rain and trying to buy some food off you." The boyfriend just glared at him whilst my nephew fiddled with his apron.It was not an encouraging sight. Mountains of food that revellers couldn't get enough of the day before stood before me liability written in stark letters all over it.Whats a girl to do now.I had only broken even. It hurt to think that we would be chucking all that rice 8 coolers of hours of sleep deprived slaving in the bin.Moreso,my own family back in Africa may not have had much to eat for dinner that night and here I am wasting food.I took the youths grand gesture £2.68 in all and gave them two full plates of food. Before long ,I had about 15 of them offering me various denominations of money for a full plate of food that we retailed for an average of £10 the previous day.When they were done and the rain cleared .We began to gather our equipments -gas burners, gazebos , paper plates,gigantic paella pans ,Bain Marie and of course tons of food .As we drove home, we could see in crevice like corridors ,sprouting stalls doing brilliant business that late in the night whilst I carried my trade home. My heart felt a pang of envy and my heart also knew that it's brief love affair with the Notting Hill Carnival has come to an expensive abrupt end.
