When I was young I used to love watching ‘Little House on the Prairie’ - it wasn’t the schmaltzy storylines or fine acting that held my attention, but the unspoken promise that one of the Ingles girls might be asked to accompany her dimple-cheeked father on a trip to the general store. I watched in rapt attention, longing to be the pig-tailed girl with the overbite who got to ride on the bench seat next to the man with the badly-permed hair. One crack of the reins and a ‘giddyup mule!’ later and we’d be off, bouncing along the dusty track and over the hills into town.

The mercantile was a place of mystery and promise; it sold feed and grain, saddles and shovels, handguns and hard gums. That shop had everything, and I wanted it all. I wanted to walk through the door, passing as I did so a woman in a bonnet. It may have been my imagination, but she always seemed to be in the shop, holding a length of gingham cloth up to the light in order to check it for flaws and imperfections. So, after squeezing past her dusty bustle, I would stand and gaze around the sacks of maize, barrels of molasses and rows of picks and hoes; and then I would let my eyes settle on one of the large, glass jars on the high shelf above the counter. The sweetie shelf was always so enticing, but what I really wanted to buy with my shiny nickel, was a cart full of implements, some seed corn, a big gun, a cowgirl outfit trimmed with suede, and a snorting black stallion. In fact, I wanted to be just like Laura Ingles Wilder - only wilder.

We don’t have a general store in our village, just a small post office, and much as I like to support local business, loading my wagon with a pair of rubber shoes, a dusty jigsaw puzzle and a packet of Happy Shopper digestive biscuits doesn’t seem to fulfil my fantasy in quite the way it should. That leaves me with only one option – a trip to Plymouth…

Plymouth is a city of huge historical significance. It is home to the Pilgrim Fathers and Sir Francis Drake. But not many people realise that Plymouth also has a rich local dialect; most have forgotten that the original line uttered by Drake as he played his game of bowls on the Hoe, was, ‘Spanish Arrmadder – where’s that to? Shall I finish this game or no?’ Many people are also unaware that the success of the Pilgrim Fathers was due, not to good seamanship, but to the fact that they had the foresight to go ‘Up Asder’ and stock up for the long voyage with plentiful supplies of Sunny Delight and Pot Noodle.

With such a rich historical background it is easy to see why Plymouth is such a magnet for discerning shoppers, and for that very reason it is always a deep joy for me to take my girls there on a Saturday morning…

Parking is always interesting: I once got into an altercation with a couple of Plymouth maids, who had pulled their car in front of the space I was indicating to back into. They wouldn’t budge and I couldn’t reason with them, so I drove off, fuming. I was lucky enough to find a space nearby, but was so enraged by the way they had ignored my pleas for reason (by turning away from the car window and giggling), that I decided to go after them on foot. They had just loaded up a buggy with a mewling infant, and were on their way out of the car park, when they heard me coming up behind them. They quickened their pace, causing the small infant to drop his bottle of coke, but I caught up with them, and, tossing a five pence piece into the air, shouted, ‘There - take this and go an buy yourself an intellect.’ Futile I know, but somehow rather satisfying.

Once you have parked your car and entered the main shopping thoroughfare you are immediately confronted with a choice – up or down? And it’s not an easy choice to make. Up means M&S, Boots, Debenhams, House of Fraser and Costsafuckofalotfora Coffee; down means Shava Centre, Big ‘H’ Pet Supastore, Anne Summers, Krazy Kuts Kards and The Pound Shop. In fact you’d be hard-pressed to find a better place to buy a hamster, give it a Brazilian, then splash out on a latex body stocking, a card to say you’re sorry and a bin bag to hide the evidence.

And flowing between the two, like the river Styx, is Arrrmadder Way - home to groups of idling Plymothians, or ‘Janners’ as they are known hereabouts. The wide pedestrian thoroughfare throngs with casually dressed women (Kappa slappers), young men with tattooed calves and eyebrow rings, and their hideous progeny. I know I am not alone in feeling a good deal of trepidation at the thought of ‘going down’ to Jannerland, and so rarely make the journey. Sometimes I am tempted by the culinary delights of eating an ‘Oggy Oggy’ pasty in the street, but generally I choose ‘up’.

I took my girls into Plymouth today, and I can honestly say that at one point we all felt genuinely afraid for our safety. All I wanted was a couple of cheap pairs of trainers, not a fist fight and a trip to casualty, so I hurried my terrified children out of ‘Sports and Soccer Violence’ and assured them that the Next catalogue was a much safer place to shop.

At night, Plymouth’s genteel city centre takes on a rather more sinister air, and the local constabulary can be seen happily filling their wagons with a screeching assortment of stiletto-wearing Plymouth ‘hoes’ - tool of choice for the visiting matiloes. I never venture into Plymouth in the evening, but very occasionally I have to drive down Union Street at night. On the last occasion I had to slow right down to let a group of intoxicated young ladies cross the road. They made unsteady progress from one side of the street to the other, and then, once safely across, one of their party bent forward and vomited into the gutter as I passed. Nice.

I had a conversation with a friend recently. She’s very attractive, hugely entertaining and sharp as a whip, but like me, she cannot find a man. She suggested that we should take a trip into Plymouth for a night out. But then we looked at each other and said in unison, ’Where do we go?’

Any ideas for a suitable venue for a night out that doesn’t involve a getting a tattoo, body piercing or DNA sample, would be greatly appreciated, and the winning suggestion will receive and pair of Kappa slippers, an Oggy Oggy pasty and a magnum of Sunny Delight.


© Kate Boydell 2004. All rights reserved. e-mail: [email protected]. Close window.