Back to may favourite marché

For almost 11 years at least two Saturdays a month found me out of the house early to go the Ferney-Voltaire outdoor marché. Marché shopping is fun where grocery shopping is boring. So much better to taste a bit of cheese, talk about which is the best honey for a cake than to drop stuff into a shopping cart with nary a human communication in the process.

People who did not realise that I lived on the Swiss side of the Swiss-French border but just four short bus stops from the French border didn’t quite understand if I said, I was going to France for coffee, dinner, leave my dry cleaning whatever. However, now I live the other side of the lake and dropping into the marché isn’t as convenient as it was before.

This past Saturday I was meeting a friend, who lives in Ferney. What a delight to march through the marché again. It takes about an hour to wander through looking at all the out door stalls and tables, some with gay awnings and coloured umbrellas that surround the statue of Voltaire who peers down in metal britches, stockings and buckled shoes. http://www.ferney-voltaire.net/en/visites.php

The first block is mainly clothes, jewellery, soaps, cloth, pocketbooks. Then come several blocks of all kinds of food from roasting chickens, to bread that was in the oven hours before. In Saturday’s spring sunshine, the smell of strawberries wafted out. A man showed me his spring onions and said they had been picked last night after dinner.

All French towns have marchés one or two mornings a week, run by farmers, artisians, and small business people, but this one will always be my favourite.

My daughter when she lived in Geneva often went with me and one day, she started to laugh as we crossed the last street before the roads were blocked for the marché. “What is it?” I asked.

“We’re in France, right?”

I nodded.

“Look at the license plates.”

I did. Geneva, Geneva, Geneva, France, Geneva, Geneva, Geneva, France, France, Geneva Geneva, Geneva, Geneva, Geneva, France, Geneva, Geneva, Geneva, France, Geneva Geneva, Geneva, France, Geneva.

And this day I was reminded of it because as I wandered around, I ran into old colleagues and other people I know from the other side of the border.