Diary Of A Busker Day 2603 Saturday September 27th 2025 Winchester.
No one at the top spot; unusual for a Saturday morning but my job is not to reason why. Don Lavelle’s outside Nero’s with his painting of the high street, looking east towards the King Alfred statue. He comes up while I’m setting up – ‘You should be OK until the Gaza protesters turn up around 12:30. They usually congregate here – they do it across the country at the same time.’ In fact, they turned up early, at midday but didn’t bother me, setting up in a line outside the Nat West Bank up the road. Don came up and said ‘Well, they’re being respectful of you!’ Their signs read; Justice For Palestine, Stop The Genocide, Red Line For Gaza, End UK Complicity, Starvation Is Being Used As A Weapon Of War, Children In Palestine; Bombed, Shot, Starved, Maimed, Orphaned/Imprisoned…and a rainbow coloured banner with PEACE on it.
As Don said the other day, this is a silent protest. It got quite noisy an hour later when the Trans Pride Portsmouth/Trans Pride Winchester march came down from the direction of Jewry Street. I don’t know if they stopped at the other end of the high street but I never heard them again. I lasted an hour and a half with the Faith 12-string (its third outing) before a break at home then back in to set up outside Nando’s. One good thing about this spot is the massive pot plant just behind and to my right. It serves as a perfect display counter for my The Last Flight Of Billy Balloon album, which was something Graham noticed. After a short chat, he left to listen on the other side of the road. I went into Layla then remembered he’d donated so I’d better do his favourite Robinson Crusoe Theme. Unfortunately, I’d never done it on the 12-string and buggered up the first middle bit. Fortunately, I got it right second time round.
Another hour and a half (an hour and 35 minutes, actually) session made the total just over three hours; a long one. The coinage totalled £41.14.