Thursday, 18 February 2021, 2:38 pm
The Queen Victoria Market in Australia’s second largest
city, Melbourne, is usually a thriving affair. Like any
ancient agora, people travel to meet there, purchase fresh
produce, and natter. The fruit and vegetable vendors are all
colour, a profusion of smells and noise. The meat market
heaves with patrons keen to snap up deals; the deli dazzles
with kaleidoscopic seduction.
The noise, usually
towards the latter part of the day, is a din of offers.
“One-dollar bag! One-dollar bag!” Over the course of the
latest lockdown in Victoria – its third since the
coronavirus pandemic began – calls for the one-dollar bag