Portland Saturday Market

             I walked from the Hawthorne District to the Saturday Market, which is just across the river, in the Old Town section of downtown.  I have only lived in this apartment for two months and was a bit weirded out to discover that I live close enough to downtown to walk all the way to the Saturday Market.  This was on pavement, and I later found two fresh blisters on my feet, but it was worthwhile.

            The furthest I had ever walked on Burnside Street was up to Columbia Art Supply.  I kept going, past two lots full of garden sculptures, including some Buddhas and bodhisattvas—one of the Buddhas had sort of a slinky evening gown look.  I kept walking and walking and after I reached about tenth street, I began to notice that on the left side of the street quite a few buildings have simple square columns in front, so that pedestrians walk under the columns, which support larger upper stories.  One such building houses Hippo Hardware, which has the distinction of having Grecian-inspired murals with yellow hippos wearing ancient Greek or Roman style draped garments.  A graffiti artist had drawn a heart-shaped tattoo on one of the hippo’s arms, and another hippo sported a pair of sunglasses.  The very last one I passed was painted on a column that was crumbling.  Inside, the store looked very eccentric and packed full of, well, hardware, including a wide variety of doorknobs, door plates, and light switch plates.

            As I came nearer the river, I saw across the street a building that appeared to have large paintings hung up between the windows, and on the top floor signs advertised a nightclub.  I came to the conclusion that all those paintings must use water-proof paint, presumably house paint.

            As I came to Burnside Bridge, I was happy to see that it has a wide sidewalk on either side.  I wasn’t walking along a little footbridge; this is a bridge with five lanes of traffic—seven if you count the two narrow bicycle lanes.  The bridge has a couple of charming green and white towers, and on one is a plaque announcing that the Burnside Bridge was built in 1926.  Looking to the right, I could see the twin greenish glass towers of the Oregon Convention Center, another bridge, and various buildings in the distance.  Looking to the left, I could see a couple of bridges, a great deal of blue water sparkling in the bright sunlight, and some boats.  When I first stepped onto the bridge, I saw what I can only describe as a long and sturdy pier running parallel to the riverbank, and where a few people walked. 

Looking beyond the bridge to the other side of the river, I could see a carnival with a Ferris wheel and other amusement park rides, and at first I thought the Saturday Market might be as far to the left as the Ferris wheel.  As I drew closer, I noticed the tops of many small white tents just slightly to the left of the bridge and came to the conclusion that this indeed was the Saturday Market.  When I walked above this market, I began to wonder how I would get under the bridge, but before I quite reached the end of the Burnside Bridge, I came to a decorative iron archway that I had seen countless times before, with the words “Portland Saturday Market” curving above, and so I turned and found myself on a black metal staircase that turned here and there and led down, down, below the bridge, directly to a train platform. 

I was in the Saturday Market.  Ahead of me was a strange series of elaborate white free-standing archways amid booths shielded by white tents.  On the sidewalk sat a musician, or rather a one-man band, was playing an accordion and drums and perhaps a few other instruments on the sidewalk, and he had a suitcase open with CDs available for ten dollars each.  A small crowd was gathered, standing in front of him.  He sat facing rows of white tents selling arts and crafts.   

I turned to the booths on my right and turned into a narrow lane….and instantly found myself transported back to Kathmandu.  I stood in a narrow lane full of a slowly moving crowd, and the merchandise surrounding me consisted of imports from India, Nepal, and/or Tibet.  The merchandise looked just like items I saw available in the Thamel neighborhood in Kathmandu, and in the streets of Bodh Gaya, India:  shawls, kurtas, tiny Buddhist and Hindu statues, Tibetan amulets, Tibetan turquoise and coral beads, Tibetan jewelry and beads in general, colorful machine-embroidered patches that I recall witnessing men sewing on old-fashioned sewing machines.  I also saw hand-woven bracelets made of beads, and a variety of hemp jewelry.  As I kept moving down the aisle and around a corner, I saw more American-looking booths, but that first plunge into the lane had been surreal.  It later struck me that merchandise I had previously seen on the other side of the world is now available within walking distance of my apartment.

I heard a rock band and moved in the general direction of the music even though it was quite loud enough from where I was.  The Kathmandu-like feeling had not passed away; I had heard a rock concert from my hotel room in the Thamel.  Due to curiosity, I wanted to see the musicians.  As I moved on, I passed a booth run by a Tibetan couple selling an abundance of Tibetan beads and jewelry.  One little box was labeled “old turquoise beads from Tibet” and I was just a little too tempted.  I wasn’t there to buy anything but rather to simply take in the Saturday Market experience and think about whether I was ready to apply for a booth.

I went around a corner where a homeless guy held up a cardboard sign, turned, and at last came to the temporary black stage where a group of older male musicians sang what may have been popular tunes from the eighties, but during that decade I listened almost exclusively to folk and classical music.  The musicians were on my left and real shops inside buildings were on my right.  They were charming little independent boutiques, a common sight in Portland, but surprisingly the front of the shops were open garage doors, just like in India, Nepal, and Tibet.  At least two of the stores were appropriately full of items from those countries; one had a long row of Tibetan wooden masks, and another was full of shawls and incense.

I emerged out of the crowded, narrow lane onto the sidewalk where I had started, and I walked across the railroad tracks that run beneath the bridge.  On the other side of the tracks were a water fountain and a vast, slowly moving crowd of people.  A shirtless Hippie dude wearing Mardi Gras beads beat out a rhythm on large plastic upside-down buckets.  A large man in a yellow kurta sat by the fountain and gave tarot readings.  I passed the fountain and headed for the rows of white tents ahead.

The pavement seemed much newer here; it consisted of grey, perhaps concrete, bricks.  The lanes were also much wider than on the other side of the tracks, but it was still easy to get stepped on and bumped into by other pedestrians.  I was gazing at the merchandise and the occasional dogs rather than paying much attention to people passing me.  I passed booths containing bright, colorful blown glass art; woodcarvings; all kinds of jewelry, including the largest hemp necklaces I’ve ever seen; tie-dyed garments; a vast and colorful array of handmade hats; patchwork garments made of hand-dyed cotton and silk; pottery; paintings, including a booth full of paintings that are obviously from an artist whose work is on display at In Other Words, the feminist bookstore where I volunteer.  I noticed many Hippies and Hippie merchandise.  At some point I encountered a lane of nothing but food stalls.

As I came to the far end of one lane, I noticed that I could see a steel railing and beyond it the Willamette River.  To the left, in front of a curved white wall, stood a musician singing and playing a guitar while a pair of toddlers danced in front of him.  I walked past them, straight to the steel railing, and leaned against it as, like other pedestrians, I gazed out at the river and watched the boats drift past.  A small electric boat with a driver and four passengers had a stereo blaring out hip hop music, and a couple of people standing by the railing shouted and whistled in approval.  Slightly to the left was the Burnside Bridge and I looked at the full length of it, remembered that I had walked across that big bridge.

I returned to the rows of merchandise and continued gawking.  I came to one booth that had strange optical illusions hanging from ribbons.  The objects consisted of sturdy wire formed into a sort of tunnel and ending in a curlicue, and in the center of the tubular hanging spiral was a glass ball with an abstract swirly pattern. As I gazed, transfixed, the glass ball seemed to slide downward and then to slowly slide back upward.  But as I observed this, I noticed that the same amount of spiraling wire was always below the glass ball, so it couldn’t have really been falling downward but rather spinning in place.

I saw a booth selling blocks of fudge wrapped in plastic, and that tempted me quite a bit, but I told myself that I don’t need any fudge and moved on.  One booth sold a variety of homemade soap and even a few feet away I could smell it. Some of the soap was very brightly colored and formed into circles that looked like rows of bon-bons; I imagined a houseguest taking a bite out of the soap.  One merchant sold beeswax candles and jars of wildflower honey, and I thought I might come back for the honey later but wanted to look around more so that I would have to carry the honey for as short a time as possible; I never did find my way back to that booth.

I found myself back by the river and decided to wander along it and past at least some of the amusement park.  I noticed some people seated along a low white wall and eating gyros and other foods from the food venders.  I passed them and saw many people, mostly children, inside the amusement park, and as I walked past I remembered that I have never enjoyed amusement parks; they’re just cheap thrills, and to me they’ve never been thrilling anyway.  I turned and looked at the shining blue river instead.  I had picked the perfect day for this expedition; it wasn’t rainy but on the contrary was bright and sunny, and the high for the day was seventy.  I turned and headed back toward the market, and as I passed some guys sitting behind a white cloth-covered table, they called out, “Bottled water for a dollar!” and, “Ice-cold lemonade!  Just a dollar!” and “Chocolate chip bars!”  I thought:  Lemonade wallah.

During my perambulations through the lanes between white tents, I stopped in front of the water fountain and witnessed a couple of guys impressively using numerous upside-down plastic buckets and at least one metal upside-down bowl as drums.  It sounded like an African rhythm, and they were attracting a large crowd.  To the left of them, a guy had a trained dog standing on the ledge of the water fountain; a little black kitten sat on the dog’s back.  People cooed, “That’s so cute!”  However, I noticed that the kitten was crouched and meowed piteously, and I felt sorry for it.  Then I noticed that the dog’s tail was tucked between its legs and it was panting, likely from thirst.  I realized that neither animal was happy and I was tempted to walk up and take the kitten down.  I wondered whether their training had been humane, given how it seemed to me that both the kitten and dog had been trained to set aside their own needs, their comfort, in order to entertain humans.  I later, to my relief, saw that the kitten was next to the dog and the dog was lapping up water out of a bowl, so the trainer could have been crueler, certainly. 

I eventually retraced my steps, back to “Kathmandu” and back to the staircase off the bridge.  When I got onto the bridge, I was astonished to see the bridge was raised and the lanes of traffic sitting at a halt.  As I watched the central portion of the bridge moving up into the sky, I noticed an empty motorcycle parked between two cars and a guy in a helmet leaning over the side of the bridge on the sidewalk ahead of me.  I moved close to the edge of the bridge and saw a sailboat with an extremely tall central pole just as it was coming out from under the bridge.  I moved a few feet further forward and continued to watch.  An enormous and somewhat rectangular boat, perhaps a ferry, that appeared to be several stories tall, came out from under the bridge and followed the large sailboat. I gazed after both vessels as the bridge slowly began its descent.