Outdoor produce markets are a fixture throughout Europe and they are becoming more and more common in the US. The outdoor market in Ljubljana, Slovenia not only has row upon row of fruit, vegetable and flower vendors, but also basic non-food products like shoes, woolens and even candles in a variety of jewel-colored glass containers for graves. There are so many sellers that the market overflows the market square and trickles down the side lanes.
The most intriguing feature, and one I’ve never seen anywhere else, was a coin-operated milk dispenser. You can buy a sterilized one liter bottle from one part of the machine if you don’t already have one. Then, follow the instructions (English in red) by depositing the coins, positioning the bottle in the alcove and hitting the button to start and stop the filling process. If I’d had more change, I might have tried it out. But then how and when to return the bottle?
Also, take a close look at the box of grapes. The photo doesn’t really convey the globs of bees that made themselves at home in every box of grapes in the market. Nothing else in the market attracted them and I had to check my bag of grapes very carefully to be sure I wasn’t paying for bees, no matter how docile they seemed to be(e)!
