The Garapan Street Market
The concept of the Garapan Street Market is a good idea. It should be a gathering of prospective entrepreneurs from food preparation, sale of farm produce and fish, handicraft, among others.
But this concept is limited to a venue that has stirred complaints about congestion and the obvious lack of parking space. It needs to be moved elsewhere. It also needs to be reinvented!
I strongly suggest the venue in Susupe where farmers sale their produce every Saturday. It should be organized so that it is opened to prospective businessmen. This concept worked well in Honolulu. It included, among others, young guys and gals who plan such fast food services as assorted soba, burger, pop corn, hot dogs, etc. Kids love it! What’s important is the very idea of getting into the feels of running your own business.
Fishermen need to study the market, specifically, the behavior of guest workers. For instance, most Chamorros and Carolinians prefer the big ones for sashimi and other dishes. Our guest workers only want a small piece for next day’s meal. It’s time fishermen begin filleting fish (tuna and deep water fish), wrapped and displayed in glass coolers or something or other. This is a fairly big market in itself.
The market should target both tourists and residents alike. For instance, the fact that we love lechon should encourage those with large numbers of pigs to roll a whole pig on fire and sell it as it gets cooked. It’s good food (without the fat) that one could pick and head to a picnic table with the family for dinner. I mean, the opportunity to sport real international cuisine and the manufacture of items by artists and other prospective entrepreneurs, abounds. So that customers could get a hold of, i.e., the lechon vendor, a business card should be made available for contact purposes. In fact, everybody should have one ready at the concession.
And the venue and activities should be so organized to make it a weekly family outing for those who wish to get out of the old kitchen. The current venue is a nuisance for established businesses on that street. The old legislative venue in Susupe should seriously be considered. It’s good even for taxi cabs too who can make extra bucks ferrying tourists to and from hotels. And everybody can get a piece of the action. It needs reinventing to make it worth everybody’s while!
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Ever quizzed why we have to put up with the high price of yam these days? Well, most folks then engage in subsistence farming. This traditional method of food growing is basically gone. A new way of life threatens to take its permanent roots: Weight Lifting and Twisting. If I may explain:
The former is a new fad where you lift beer cans until you start twirling your tongue. The latter is meat and fish turning on the grill. Put them together and we now have a new culture: Beer and more beer and burned meat!
My buddies would laugh their hearts out if I ask for ice tea, coffee or just plain water. And so like a political prostitute, I’d succumb to a few beer until it’s one beer too many. This doesn’t include yet another culture that seems to have taken its permanent hold: Potato Couch Culture. Yeap! It’s here to stay and we’re headed toward an increase in obesity beyond our wildest imaginings. Seessssussss!
Strictly a personal view. John S. DelRosario Jr. is publisher of Saipan Tribune.
