Another London Series | The People Of Shepherd's Bush Market

continued from here

I turn my attention to the people. If you take my skin colour and match it with the rest of the population milling about in Shepherd's Bush Market, it'll probably be close to the average. Brown.

As a brown-skinned and clearly Indian-featured woman, I should blend in, but I stand out with my camera and attire - just as it was in Brick Lane. I document the reactions to me and my camera - and suddenly I'm the subject - a change from the usual routine of being the observer, the photographer.

Some men wave and strike a pose.

Some shyly wave, and then blush furiously.

"Don't kill him with your camera, now!" joked a black man watching me click this sweet Sikh shopkeeper.

I click a shop sign while the Sikh owner watches me with a smile.

"Give me a pound"

"Excuse me?"
"Give me a pound", he repeats.
"Why?!"
"Because you clicked my shop sign" he grins.
I give him a look, shake my head and smile that says "nice try Mister" without saying it aloud. We both know the other is Indian. I walk away, as he laughs.

Some others deliberately saunter into the frame and pretend to be nonchalant about it (a typical behavioural trait of Indian men)

Yet some others are unaware of me - too drunk to notice, too taken by the glittery pawnshop.

I notice an elderly gentleman watching me from a distance, for the fourth or fifth time. He seems to be appraising me - perhaps curious, perhaps suspicious; I cannot say. He himself looked a bit out of place in this setting.

But the women are different. They do not want my camera on them. Some turn their backs on me, a bit arrogantly at times.

Some look away deliberately.

And some just go on with their business even though they know I'm clicking them - which is both a relief (after the men's reactions) and a bit unsettling at the same time.

She looked up at me once and I smiled at her. She just went back to her work. I could have been invisible.

But some women tear out of the frame! I had to put away the camera and reassure a couple of very scared hijab-wearing young women that I did not take their picture, that I was only clicking the signboard above their heads. I have to repeat myself a couple of times, gently, firmly, asking them not to worry. I do wonder what scared them so much. It couldn't have been me, they were only threatened by my camera.

****

As I walk out of the market, I hear two men calling out to me in Hindi in that leering way that only Indian men of a certain type can.
"Kya baat hai badi photo le rahe ho!" (What's with all the photography, then?! - loosely translated and said in a leery tone)
Hello?! Oh Hello!
I pretend not to hear and decide it's time to go home.

****

On the bus back (I live a few miles away), a small, scared looking Bangladeshi man hesitantly approaches me. In faltering English he asks me why I took a picture of him in the market. I say I'm not sure I did.
"Are you from TV?", he asks, looking extremely worried.
I say no.
"Then why you take picture of me?"
"I don't think I took a picture of you specifically, but I was clicking the market, I do these things..."
"You click why?"
"I click London because I like it"
He finally relaxes.
"Where will these photos go? Print?"
"On my blog, my website"
"How can I look at it? I want to see because I think you click me and I would like to see my photo"
"I can give you the website address if you want"
He breaks into a smile. "Yes please"
"Do you have a piece of paper?", I ask as I pull out my pen.
He rummages through all his pockets and finally hands me his oyster card. Thankfully my pen is a Sharpie. I scribble the url down and hand it back to him. He takes it, tries to read it aloud "ffll.... OK, thank you very much".

Dear Bengali gentleman, I don't know why you were so worried. I went through all my pictures carefully and you were nowhere in them. Sorry!

Another London Series | The Texture of Shepherd's Bush Market

The ability to make you forget that you're in London is part this city's endearing cosmopolitan charm. There are little urban islands tucked away in this megapolis that take you by the hand and transport you across cultures, countries, continents and sometimes, even time itself. The word 'islands', is in fact somewhat of a misnomer - as different as these little clusters seem to appear from the larger city around them, they form an indelible, inseparable link with it. London wouldn't be complete without its 'others', the others that sew it together into a whole.

These 'others' make up what I call Another London.
(click here to see the whole series)

Shepherd's Bush Market is one of those small phantasmagoric fragments of west London. It sits in sharp contrast to most of the rest of West London, but is a very important economic centre for the micro-community. Tucked into the middle of two busy traffic streets and under a railway viaduct, it's almost completely hidden, except for the relatively new sign that announces its existence.

Step in, and the mind boggles. This is Haberdashery Central - fabric by the metre, hijab scarves, curtains, lace, imitation leather - it's all here and it's dirt cheap.

A lone dingy pet shop announcing goldfish sits unfortunately trapped between a meat shop on either side. Poor pets - I bet they come psychologically scarred. Plastic, stainless steel, feather or wigs - tack and cheap kitsch are the order.

Look just beyond the mountains of shiny-this-and-that, though, and you see the darker side. Overhead, the meagre Christmas decorations this market could afford still hang - unassuming strings of 40W bulbs. The grime and the graffiti tell of the ugly underbelly of the local community. Signs warning that you're being watched appear alarmingly often - and thank goodness for comic relief - in funny juxtaposition at times.

I find myself being watched closely but not just by the CCTV's. Time to shift my focus to the people around me, my internal radar tells me. More of that in the next post.