Location in KumodraškaAddress: 261a Kumodraška St., Belgrade                (Peka Dapčevića St.)

May 16 th , Mark’s birthday and the 13 th ELTA Serbia conference, a taste of SOL teaching

Local people that Serbian SOL students encounter on their visits to Britain

Fair Trade with Helen

Er, right so, this, everything in this shop is from fair trade suppliers, OK which means that the people that we buy it from are all getting a fair wage above the cost of production, cos unfortunately lots of things that are imported, people aren’t even getting the cost of production, so, you know, they really can’t live and making sure that they have good working conditions and on top of that if it has the fair trade mark on, Are you all familiar with the fair trade mark? Little mark? Er, they get a premium on top of it which they can use in their local area so they might build a school or a well, dig a well, or something they need within their community and therefore it’s just tryin to help them make their way out of their poverty. So, most of it comes from, well all of it comes from developing world countries, so Africa, Asia and some from south America, um, the shop’s been here for seven years now and it’s run by a group of volunteers. cos I think if we had to pay wages it probably wouldn’t be sustainable ,so em people that want to help in some way and keep it going, and er yeah it’s doing OK and there are a lot of people in the UK now who want to support fair trade and see that as a right ethical thing to do in order to help people out of poverty. So, that’s why we’re here!

Tim the SOL guide talking about the Cornish Pasty

Now this is the traditional lunch of a working man in Cornwall. And a working man in Cornwall could be a miner or a farmer. Now this one is just for people like us, for tourists, for a working man this would be 30 centimetres and fat and it would be full of meat and potatoes and vegetables. Now if you are a working man like a miner or a farmer you’ve got dirty hands, nowhere to wash your hands and the important thing about a traditional Cornish pasty is this part down the side, this is where the pastry is folded over and joined but this forms a crust and a man with his dirty hands can hold the pasty like this, he can eat the meat, the potatoes and the vegetables and then this piece he will throw away…

But if he’s hungry he can eat all of it….

Yeah, if he’s hungry he can, yeah, slug juice and half a worm and things like that you know, lovely. Now in the autumn when we have fruits if he’s lucky and he’s got a clever wife , half of it could be meat and potatoes and vegetables and half of it could be apple or blackberry or plum, so you would have two meals in one packet.

And the other half wine…

Yeah, you can tell it’s the birthday boy, can’t you? Now these days they sell Cornish pasties in Tescos and other places and sometimes they are round, sometimes they are a square, sometimes they are a triangle but the traditional Cornish pasty always has this crust on the edge for a man with his dirty hands to hold his food.

How Barnstaple has changed with Tom the Town Crier

And how do you think Barnstaple has changed over the last, you know, 25 years? What kind of things have you noticed?

Well, there’s been all sorts of changes but the most significant thing in the last 25 years is the building of out of town shops and the sudden failure of the town centre and the desperate attempt to bring trade back to the town centre which has created a market that is open six days a week instead of two days a week, created pedestrianized streets, greater care about how the town looks to visitors as well as to the locals, so it becomes a pleasant place to shop in and not just a utilitarian town but actually a pleasant place to be and finally the building of the new bridge has meant that the street we’re standing in which was clogged with traffic night and day, heavy traffic here all the time is now pedestrianized effectively, so the town centre is quieter, gentler, pleasanter place to be, a nice place to spend the day.

So, I’m principally interested in the town centre as opposed to the overall town and I’m interested in the economy as well but the town centre is what I’ve been working hard on and for.

I know Ricky Knight , who we’re going to meet on Friday, has introduced, is interested in green issues. In what way has Barnstaple become greener?

There’s a cyclist cycling passed us, I mean, cycling is the new new craze, not exactly craze, but I mean everyone seems to have a cycle now, if you go back 30 years there was probably only one cycle for every ten adults, I reckon there’s probably one cycle for every two adults now, probably more than that and in this town because of the cycle paths, not just the Tarka trail which is for tourists and for days out but throughout the town itself there’s a whole network of wonderful cycle routes.

Just the other day I had to go and buy a can of paint from a company, out a mile from the town centre and I decided that I’d do it on a bicycle rather than the car because it’s quicker and quite pleasant and because there’s often a traffic jam coming back into the town centre. And so I did that and it was very pleasant and very easy. The cycle paths through the town are wonderful and the fact that there are so much more pedestrianized areas makes it safer for cyclists so walking and cycling and, and gardens and flowers….

And recycling…is that..?

Well recycling, Devon has been particularly good at recycling the whole country the whole of Europe has of course has tried, the whole country’s tried pretty well but Devon has done very well indeed maybe because of its mostly Liberal….. government, um…whatever, I don’t know, but certainly, we, we, every household that I know of is very careful about separating all the different materials. And all the different ways of

getting things recycled and clamouring to get other things recycled as well when they’re not being recycled so there is actually a push from down below to try and get other things recycled.