Every year on the 6th of February the small town of Otane holds its annual fair. The town closes off a couple of lovely tree lined streets and all manner of stalls and food outlets are set up under the shade of the trees. This year there was a wide range of stalls ranging from second hand books and records, arts and crafts of various types to imported items of giftware and decor. Of course there are also all the food stalls.
I bought a plate of tempura battered vegetable pakoras from the Health Rock Cafe. These were excellent - very light and crisp with a sweeet/sour dipping sauce and they filled the gap from no breakfast quite nicely. I really enjoyed the flavour of the red capsicum pakora in particular. It came through very well and was well complemented by the sauce.
I wandered around the place checking out the wares. I bought a couple of wooden vases from one of the stalls to give to Camille who was away in Christchurch. The price on the bottom of the vases was $39.00 each but the stall holder hurriedly informed me the actual price was $20.00 each. The reason for the drop in price? She had been forced to close her Napier store as nobody was buying in her market and therefore no longer had the same costs to cover.
The stall holder next door to her had also closed the doors of her premises for the same reason.I was also informed that they knew a woman who had closed her entire chain of 14 or 15 stores around the country. Their particular market was dead in the water due to the recession. However, they did say that every retailer they knew was suffering.
I don't think that New Zealand is really in any real recovery from our recession.
Having stuffed myself with pakoras, bought Camille a present and wandered around in the 30 degree heat, I headed home to lie in the hammock in the garden for a couple of hours. Very pleasant. Got some ok photos of some cicadas too. Quite a nice day really.
