[Sundae]

Friars Square, Aylesbury circa 1986.
I may be off on the date there, but it's how I remember it from that period in my life.

The sunken area is the market. Underneath that and completely covered is the underground market. Not as exciting as it sounds, but it always felt a little risky to me as a child.

When Nanny and Grandad came down from London we would sometimes eat in the Wimpy. It was so exciting. Instead of taking the escalator down to the underground market as we did every other time, we opened the Wimpy branded door and were hit by a heady wave of burger smell, climbed up the stairs and emerged into the bright world of plastic chairs and fake tomatoes. All the staff were Asian, with varying degrees of English. I honestly assumed that Wimpy, although faux-American, was some sort of Indian business. I mean the only curry I'd seen in those days came from a box by Vesta. By the time I was old enough to go to a Wimpy elsewhere I understood the concept of minimum wage and had had real Indian take-away.

But back then, Coke Floats, Brown Derbys and Beefburgers (served on china plates with knives and forks) were foreign in many ways, and an outstanding treat however you looked at it.

Oh, if I haven't already mentioned it (surely I have?) a few external scenes in A Clockwork Orange were filmed in the concrete modernity of Friars Square. And yes, when I picture it, it always looks like this - wet and grey with the buildings and sky in shades of clotted porridge.