By Nelly Andon
Crystal Palace, South East of London. The morning of Saturday was truly wet and damp, but this did not dampen our spirit. Although it was cold and very wet to start with, by 10 am, Mr Sunshine showed up, and brought the smiles to everyone’s face. Our prayers have truly been answered.
The very supportive Indonesian community started to arrive around 11 am, we hadn’t even had our kitchen ready by then. Luckily, our Senggol market is really a family market, everyone allows for a little imperfection, there were chit-chats to be done and some catching up to do with friends who we hadn’t seen for ages who visited us so early in the day.
The amazing thing was, most of the traders were trading like “one” big family where we supported each other, especially the experience one like Hariyanto Radiman who has been trading for many years, was there to provide us full support for the unexpected incidents.
By 12.00 noon, the local people were pouring into the market, leaving the new traders (particularly the novices) like myself, feeling a little panicky, but comforted by the joke and laughter’s of customers and other traders, and everything turned out to be great and comforting.
The Food Court was really packed by 1 pm, and no chance we could take photos during this time, as most of us were busy cooking. Most of these photos were taken, around 5 pm, hence we could pose around a little, so you can imagine how packed the food court was at around 1 pm. We had no chance to even sit down from 10.00 till 5 pm, just serving our valued customers and busy cooking.
Apparently, this is the first Indonesian Food Cour in the UK ever, so we are truly proud that Connect Indonesia, The Charity has made this possible. Our sincere gratitude to all our traders for putting on the great smiles all day (Yuli, Ina, Yumi, Ross, Hariyanto and all our volunteers). Our huge thanks to all our valued customers for appreciating our food on the day. See you all again next month. INDONESIAN FOOR ROCKS!!
The Pasar Senggol Team & Traders.
