Perth, Part 2: The Real Melting Pot

The Real Melting Pot

Fremantle’s immigrant culture is not just for touristic show. In the hyper-local Growers’ Green Farmers’ Market, racial integration is promoted by smoked salmon, Persian cakes, tortillas, and even potted plants.

Ethnic integration comes alive at Fremantle's Growers' Green Farmers' Market.

White Australia is no more, at least in Fremantle. I reached this conclusion after a Sunday morning spent browsing the stalls in the Growers’ Green Farmers’ Market. In its place is a tightly-knit local community of diverse cultures who bond over a common love: of quality market produce.

Compared to the famous Fremantle Markets in the city centre, this hyper-local counterpart is an undiscovered gem populated by even more diverse cultures, such as Persian, Salvadorian, Japanese, and Chinese. Its authenticity– such that everyone knows each other on a first-name basis – almost made me feel bad for intruding on someone else’s neighbourhood.

Yet, rather than guard their secret jealously, its inhabitants are eager to share. When I identified myself as a journalist, John King, a volunteer of the South Fremantle Senior High Parents and Citizens Committee that organises the Sunday market on the high school grounds, asked me to tell readers that “the fat guy at the gate will take care of ya!”

(Not) By Invitation. Every Sunday, the private community takes off its fences  and demonstrates a unique local hospitality.

As “the jolly mobile traffic light”, John helps with car parking for visitors since “we didn’t insure the front lawn”. In return, visitors can donate spare change into a big metal tin that the parking wardens carry. The money raised from donations and stall rentals are then used to fund school programmes such as camping trips and environmental initiatives.

The market, as manager Georgie Adeane said, was conceptualised as an “alternative to supermarket shopping”. Rather than promote impersonal buying from shelves, it focuses on bringing both the producer and consumer together by selling grower-direct fruit, vegetables, and potted plants, as well as food such as pastries and burgers. The result is a true bazaar that transact beyond money and products.

Here's a Charmer with Honeyed Words. A friendly proprietor of Colombian  descent, manning a stall that sells organic honey products. 

Oh, but for the Love of Food

The love of quality fare is probably a unifying trait for both vendors and patrons alike. Don Heather’s smoked products cut across these nationalities. He sells Irish whiskey cured smoked salmon, which is an Irish-inspired, but wholly Australian invention. The cuisine was a fortunate accident, as he misread “smoked by whisky oak barrels” as the alcohol alone. Yet, it won him nationwide fame as a “mastersmoker” chef and great demand for the dish in the nineties.

Despite scaling down his operation to a simple Sunday stall, Don’s specialties have caught on even with expatriates. His smoked olive oil and semi-dried tomatoes passed even regular customer Karine Boulmier’s strict French standards, who normally deem Australian cuisine too overpowering. The French, she said, “are crazy about their markets, and if they had their way, half the restaurants here should close down”. Yet, Growers’ Green’s immunity to these food purists suggests that there is something universal amongst cultures after all.

Bon jour, Mastersmoker. Even the French taste buds agree with Don's smoked specialties.

Even ethnic desserts transverse these racial differences. The Persian-influenced cakes made by housewife Parvin Bahremand sold out even before the market closed. Perhaps the extra bit of effort to cater to the healthy-minded Australian helped. While there is the typical Iranian influence of saffron, almond, and macadamia, her cakes are also gluten-free. There are even vegan options for the dietary-conscious.

Purr with Pleasure. Even the health-conscious would agree with Parvin's gluten-free, vegan Persian cakes.

Parvin also has a bigger purpose in mind: to continue popularising these Persian-Australian fusion desserts amongst the locals. This is despite the tedious process of baking ninety cakes – the work is so hectic that she sometimes has “only one hour available, which is to bathe”. Yet, the pride on her face because of the community’s acceptance of her pastries was obvious, as she kept lamenting how I should been there earlier to see the bulk of her cakes being “devoured by the locals”.

Same Same, but Different: Repackaging Australian Culture

Ethnicities are not the only that sell. The novelty of an unfamiliar body embodying Australian culture does equally well. The Salvadorian mother-and-daughters team has acquired the talkative Australian candour, which they put to good use in chatting up the snaking line of patrons who wait hungrily for their Salvadorian Pupusas (tortillas filled with cheese and kidney beans).

Even though I approached them at this busy period, that humour was still intact.

            “Mind if I ask you a couple of questions?”

            A toothy smile. “How much are you giving us?”

            “So, uh…. That’s a yes?”

            “Yes… and no.”

Not something I expected, but after spending close to six years in the hawker trade, Leticia, Iliana, and Anna seem to have fully mastered Australian banter. There was a fluidity to the verbal to-and-fro between them and their patrons as they flipped the tortillas on the outdoor grill.

The Salvadorian family gamely pose for a photo.

Other than chatting up their customers, Australian entertainment is in their blood as well. Restaurant rentals are too expensive in Perth, so the family business tries to “do big music festivals to generate more word-of-mouth”. Once people try Salvadorian food, “they can’t get enough!” This local acclaim, coupled with their Australianised nature, seem to be the main draw for customers.

Yet, some have assimilated so well into the community that they are essentially Australians selling Australian products. Margaret Wong, who emigrated from Malaysia more than 40 years ago, is one such example. She does brisk business selling potted plants to gardening enthusiasts with a perfect Australian accent.

Her gardening expertise is very Australian as well in the nature-loving and land abundant country. Despite having less than one acre of space in her backyard, she constructed a patio to shield her plants from the sun. Even her stall space is handpicked. She insists on setting up shop in Growers’ Green because of its grass field, which is not as hot for plants compared to concrete pavements in the Fremantle Markets.

This gardening knowledge has impressed the locals, who probably do not expect a Chinese to take up an Australian pastime. Even gardening hobbyists stop for a prolonged chat with her as she freely shared her experience with high-chill and low-chill plants, soil variety, and fertilizer use. To Margaret, the Australian saying “customers are your bread-and-butter” rings true, and “it’s all about building a personal relationship with Aussies so that they’ll come back.”

The influx of new immigrants has led Australians to question its national culture and integration issues. Yet, Growers’ Green has demonstrated that integration can occur in a simple marketplace, by interacting with other ethnicities that might not be all that different. Perhaps the enduring aspect to Australian culture is its subtle welcome to all new inhabitants. As I left the market, Margaret pulled over in a dingy old Volvo, and gave this mere acquaintance a lift. A morning spent experiencing the diverse cultures that call the community home already makes me feel like one of them.

Stop and Smell the Roses. The local community's idea of a day out: enjoying the buskers and world music band.

 

Growers’ Green Farmers’ Market

Every Sunday, 8a.m. – 12 p.m.

South Fremantle Senior High School

171 Lefroy Road, Baconsfield

Fremantle, West Australia

http://www.growersgreenfarmersmarket.com/

Perth, Part 1: Caffeinated Dreams

Something from the oh-so-far school days, when you could just write anything you want come hell or high water. Or just something a writer wrote, not a journalist.

Caffeinated Dreams

What is good coffee without a novel companion? Ng Kaijie browses through the bookstores near Fremantle’s Cappuccino Strip, and admires the idealists who continue to resist the superficial tourist culture.

“Books occupy a space that time doesn’t own, so we find them when we need them.” – Jeanette Winterson

You can’t judge a book by its cover, and you can’t see the heartbeat of Fremantle by looking at its squeaky clean and freshly scrubbed façade. It’s fake. Tempting, pretty, alluring, but fake.

Fremantle, or Freo, as the locals call it, is famous for its South Terrace coffee stretch that is the heartbeat of the city. The 200 metre strip houses a selection of alfresco cafes, restaurants and pubs in a meticulously preserved 19^th century streetscape.

Colonial facades have been maintained, but the buildings are hollow. The pleasure district is one where people dine and drink, to see and be seen. Beneath the bustle of middle-class pleasure, it is hard to see any sophistication in Fremantle’s culture. Overpriced meals herald a period of plenty, when tourists and locals alike, in place of yesteryear’s prospectors, pay the surcharge for over 300 days of sunshine a year.

A touristy bubble world has descended on a fiercely independent Australian culture. In Freo, both tourists and locals are plugged into the same drip – caffeine, microbrewery beer, fish and chips, and in the words of more than half a dozen locals I met, “bloody good weather”. Once you approach the Fremantle Market where the Cappuccino Strip begins, independent thinking ceases, and customers flock to the pleasure abodes with abandon.

Yet, there is a cure. Tourism pretends to be old and significant, but this false front is easily exposed by the real deal. As I wandered beyond South Terrace and onto nearby High Street, I discovered defiant grey-haired exiles - traditional bookstores that inhabit the same district, but offering a counterculture of books and nostalgia.

Looking Inwards - Redefining Fremantle’s Soul

“What I say is, a town isn't a town without a bookstore. It may call itself a town, but unless it's got a bookstore it knows it's not fooling a soul.” - Neil Gaiman, American Gods

The façade of the New Edition Bookshop shows no sign of its 27 years of age. Its front is a perfect rendition of a theme park’s New York Courts of Justice. Indeed, the pillars are so phony and the shop sign’s font so infantile that it might as well be a kitsch copy of Rome-inspired architecture. Yet, there it stands, almost sarcastic in a flamboyance that suits the heritage-and-façade conscious city so well.

The design also symbolises a booklover’s protest against the tide of superficiality. At 40, James Calligaro has spent more than a quarter of his life managing the store and owning it for half that period. His black-and-brown outfit (from spectacles, to long-sleeved shirt, pants, and shoes) make him the stereotypical intelligentsia, while his genteel voice gives the impression of patience and stoicism. Both characteristics, I assumed, were nursed by the store’s setbacks – falling profits and a forced relocation.

The Mid-Life Mission. At 40, James Calligaro didn't go through a crisis. He made it his commitment.

The New Edition Bookshop specialises in paperback Penguin classics and modern classics - playfully described by Mark Twain as books that “people praise but don’t read”. However, James maintains the necessity of these books in instilling “insightful thought”. This is despite publishers dropping their prices overnight from AUD$14-50 to AUD$10 as a response to cheaper e-books. More books were sold, but profits continued to decline.

Even though the New Edition Bookshop has been a veritable grandfather of Fremantle’s book industry, it has not all been plain-sailing – due to increasing rentals, the store was forced to move from South Terrace in 2007. While relocation has thinned the crowds, it has also allowed for a revamp of the business concept to keep up with the times.

Seeing coffee as “a phenomenon that people do in the morning”, James decided to merge a café with the bookstore to cater to the caffeine-loving crowd. A partnership was worked out with the Grumpy Sailor (which, funnily enough, was also born to adverse circumstances. The name was intended for a fish and chips shop that didn’t work out) to provide coffee and cake on its premises. Quality coffee, not the “terrible goop being offered on that stretch”, was what people would come for and meet up over.

Victorian Coffee Culture. Calligaro's re-creation of a bourgeois salon.

Books, on the other hand, “sell incidentally in comfortable and interesting environments”. Coffee was merely the bait that reeled in the catch. The bookstore’s interior represents James’ private war against “sterile public spaces”. He points to the Woolstores Shopping Centre that sits beside the main train station, lamenting, “It is the number one community place, but it is chock full of generic shops.” In contrast, James envisions the bookstore as a forum where “people gather and ideas collide”.

He is already halfway there. The store’s interior successfully melds contemporary library furnishings with old English-style reading furniture. It is a meeting place where you just feel intelligent and talkative enough to discuss the significance of some classic or recommend favourite novels to a total stranger. The harder part is in the conversion. Sipping a cuppa at the Cappuccino Strip is still remains more attractive than getting some food-for-thought at the bookstore.

A Business of Nostalgia, Where Books are Sent to Die

With first-hand paperbacks sold at fire-sale prices, how do second-hand bookstores survive in a lower-tier market of condemned titles? I found the answer in Bill Campbell Secondhand Books. Its exterior was refreshingly simple – the words “SECOND HAND BOOKS” in giant letters fronted the store, leaving no mystery as to what it offered. I was reminded of Notting Hill’s The Travel Book Co., with grayish-blue paint and full-length windows that revealed a treasure trove of tomes.

Old, But Not Out. Antiquity lives on at Bill Campbell Secondhand Books.

If Hugh Grant ever owned a bookstore, he would be Bill Campbell. Everything about Bill and the store said old school. At 55, Bill cuts the figure of an English professor with his poise and measured tone. There is a subtle charm about someone who has spent more than 7 years in the book trade, which has also translated to the store’s décor. Bill merely wanted “something that smelt literary, where people can sit down, read a book, but also buy one”. It was basic and backward, but that suited him fine. His renovation plans consist of little beyond “maybe shift the counter over there?”

Hugh Grant at 55.

All in the Family. Ancient mixes with the mature, young, and titles that have just shed their first ink on the bookshelves.

The truth is, he doesn’t need to. Locals and tourists continue to flock the premises. Even though there are only dark wooden stools and chairs for the sit-down reader in cramped quarters, there is a certain allure in imagining yourself as a classic author, sitting cross-legged and smoking an ash pipe in a great library.

Yet, with the drastic drop in book prices, why would customers prefer a used copy? Rummaging through the shelves of books, I hoped to find my own answer. After all, not everyone is an avid antique collector. Or are they? The distinct smell of some ancient titles lured me to open them and smell it, as if uncorking a fine bottle of vintage wine. The aroma of yellowed paper pulp caught me as times past, complemented by the occasional written dedications and notes on the margins.

And then it struck me. Bill was in the business of selling nostalgia, and I was living someone else’s life – the dog’s ears and creases piece together to reconstruct the tale of its previous readers. This is the real history of Freo’s past inhabitants.

I walked away from High Street’s book stretch, feeling less perturbed. Freo’s touristy culture may be alive and fed well just a street away, but its antidote lies here, just waiting to be discovered. While the New Edition Bookstore tries to introduce sophistication through a nourishing public space, Bill Campbell’s second hand trade casts light on Fremantle’s forgotten legacies. In these secret vaults, their custodians persevere in a common purpose, biding their time for the next golden age.

New Edition Bookshop

Monday – Friday, 730a.m. – 6p.m.

Saturday, 8a.m. – 6p.m.

Sunday, 9a.m. – 6p.m.

82 High Street

Fremantle, West Australia

Telephone: +61 (08) 9335 2383

http://www.newedition.com.au/home

Bill Campbell Secondhand Books

Monday - Friday, 10a.m. – 5p.m.

Saturday - Sunday, 12a.m. – 5p.m.

48 High Street

Fremantle, West Australia

Telephone: +61 (08) 9336 3060