Adventure 2: SFSU Farmers' Market

During this week, I decided to stroll down to the farmers’ market at San Francisco State University, which is held in front of the Humanities building every Thursday from 10am to 3pm. This farmers’ market is not a very well known place and is not very large in my opinion. <>

Although this is not my first time coming here, during this visit I was able to gain new information and made new observations compared to my other past visits. From my observations I saw a few familiar faces from the last time I visited this farmers’ market and a few new faces. <>

Again, communicating with the vendors allowed me to gain some new interesting facts, which made this visit different from my other visits because of the new information I learned from a vendor representing the ASI Student Association, an organization at San Francisco State University. One representative sitting there was promoting local fruits, vegetables and flower seeds to students and visitors coming by the farmers’ market for free. Because of my curiosity and the bag with a farmers’ market logo I saw at the table, I decided to walk up to the representative and asked what he was there for and what is that bag right there. He responded saying the bag is to promote the farmers’ market on campus and is for sale at a price of $10 dollars and everyone is welcomed to take as many free packs of seeds as they desire. <>

This was such a coincidence because my friend and I were just thinking about planting some vegetables in my backyard but we needed seeds. I asked him why were these seeds free and he told me that local farms in California donated these seeds to San Francisco State University ASI Association to provide students a way to grow their own crops and plants. One interesting fact I found out about the free seed giveaways was the fact that each time a pack of seed is given to a visitor including students, the farms will provide more seeds for the school to hand out.

These seeds travel from cities including Petaluma, California and Mansfield, Missouri through an organization called “Baker Creek Heirloom Seeds.” Their mission is to “…educate people about rural heritage, to teach about our crops and gardens, about cooking and food preservation, about traditional animals, craftsmanship and music.”<>

I thought this was interesting because students can have the experience of planting and growing something, which allows them to learn something new and create a positive feeling for one-self. If I didn’t walked up to this booth and asked any questions, I wouldn’t have learned anything or gotten myself any of these seeds for free.

Learning about the ASI Association was not the only thing I learned from this farmers’ market. As I walked around at 12pm, I observed the number of students buying and visiting the market. There weren’t as many students earlier when I arrived, but later at noon more students gathered here. I saw many students gathering around the “Golden Waffle,” a dessert truck that makes and sell pancakes and other desserts to students. <>

Along with the dessert truck, many students also visited the booth selling tamales and bread. These were the top popular booths from my observations. I also walked past by the Hummus booth. The hummus representatives were calling people to come and try their samples. I tried the avocado dip with their chips and it was delicious. I walked further down and saw vendor selling blackberries for $3 a basket or $10 for 3 baskets. The blackberries looked very good but I did not purchase any. <>

Overall, revisiting this farmers’ market at San Francisco State University provided me new information, observations, and offers that I can compare with to other farmers’ markets.