Remember the fella in Belfast near the old Band stand that used to shout this all day? I miss those characters, I wonder what happened to him. Any other characters I'm forgetting?
Posted Jul 19, 2021, 3:47 PM UTC
Ahh that's a 90's nostalgia "day into town with the ma" memory up there with LeisureWorld and getting the black taxi back in a shitty old carpark in the pishing rain.
You just described every birthday I remember in my childhood. Great times
Definitely mate. Even sweeter when the ma took you to Burger King for a munch.
Was talking about BK in the town on another post few weeks ago. Love how it still looks the same. Doesn't smell like stale smoke any more tho.
80's chrome and tiles. A timeless piece.
greasy fry in the inshops
The flower guy
Roses roses get yer love a rose
Followed by concerning winking at couples
I always tell them that my wife is hot for fiscal responsibility.
I get odd looks, at least they go away.
Trumpet violin guy up bear castle court and the king of them all, Gerry Bokebeard, RIP.
I once saw Gerry Bokebeard eating a pigeon. In retrospect it was very sad.
Eating a pigeon! Hahaha - crazy! Ps I always thought he was called Billy Bokebeard?
I think he had many names, Ginger Gerry is what I knew him as
The wee lads and aul' fellas selling the Telegraph.
"EXXA EXXA TELLY! EXXA EXXA TELLY!"
Was it not SIXTH TELLY? The one I remember in Corn Market used to always add an additional quieter telly at the end. SIXTH TELLY, ^(telly.)
I remember the first time our mums let us go down the town unsupervised. We were about 10, still Troubles days but I think the security gates had come off Donegall Avenue so it was practically normal. We ran through all the rules: don’t talk to strangers, ding your bus ticket, keep 10p for the phone, bus numbers, bomb scare etiquette. But basically behave: no ligging about, no shoplifting.
First thing my friend did was saunter up the Sixth Telly guy outside Burger King and say ‘do you want a Locket for your throat mate? You sound rough’. Lucky 10 year olds are bouncy on their toes because he skited a block of Teles at her hard AF as the justifiable way to get into a pissing match with a pre pubescent girl.
She circled round a couple more times when we’d done the shops bellowing the same sound back and then asking ‘is the five lighters for a pound man your brother?’
We were absolutely scundered but secretly pissing ourselves laughing. I don’t think I ever even plucked up the courage to buy a paper from him let alone get smart with him.
Fuck knows what they were saying.
That's what it sounded like to me.
It was "late tellie, siiiiiixth" as in, afternoon print of the sixth edition of the Belfast Telegraph
We weren't Tele readers in my house.
We still aren't.
It took me years of hearing it before someone finally told me that 'SIH LEEEEAH' was actually meant to be 'Six Late'.
I didn't even get the 'Six.'
There was always one outside where Burger King is now. I never knew what he was saying, proper gravelly voice
True aye. They used to sit under temporary wooden huts
And the late edition, “Telly Late” somehow becoming “TELLEEE-EIGHTTT!”
Th'ee fer ah poun' if I recall correctly.
You've nailed it
And the volume up and down like a rollercoaster.
THREE fer a poUN'
Anyone else ever get told the story about the RUC doing a bust at Nuts corner market back in the day?
One of the lads selling dodgy goods was being dragged away by 2 RUC officers, the whole time he's screaming "Two peelers a pound!"
Nut's corner 20 years ago was something else. You'd go for your pirate Playstation games and knock off Adidas trainers, stay for the dinky doughnuts and watching vendors run like fuck when the police arrived.
Miss those days. Getting your playstation chipped made you an absolute lad in school. Getting chipped games for a fiver a head.
Also the game of roulette that was knock off VHS tapes.
I actually used to chip them . Solder a wee ic to the main board of the PS1. £15 a throw I charged . Was only in my teens . The relief when after doing one to see the PS sign load up on screen , and knowing you hadn’t banjaxed someone’s console
Literally didn't have a single friend at that age who hadn't it chipped. Hard to beat fiver games. It's a shadow of a shadow of it's former self.
Have you been recently? I left home about 8 years ago and even when living at home it'd been a while
And your fake Pokemon cards
3 pairs of sports sacccccccccks a poun’
Five lighters for a pound man also sold 10 sheets of wrapping paper for a pound at Christmas time
Mickey Marley and his roundabout
I think this was before my time.
Then you don’t know what you missed https://youtu.be/xfMtOpGcK5A
Class. A penny a go leads me to believe it was waaaayyyyyyy before my time
When I was in hospital around 4 years a man died on my ward from a massive heart attack. I was told that he was the man that operated that roundabout. I remember that roundabout being outside what used to be Dixons.
Wee Alcos asking "Wud u have 20p love" was never nothing more always 20p.
Billy the piper, used to be stood outside castlecourt playing the bagpipes for hours only stopping to smoke the odd feg. One time I saw him in Carrick leading an orange lodge by himself. Legend.
Being called a "Fucking froot" for telling a crowd of 12 year olds you wouldn't get them a carry-out from the offie.
Shouldn't have kicked their ball up on the roof ya wee froot.
Pretty sure some of them moved on to socks. 'theres the socks, 3 pair for a pound' etc
Remember that boy well would stand shouting throw your matches on the ground buy 5 lighters for a pound.
Was it the same fella that sold the lighters/sports socks that sold those massive beach ball sized balloons with the elastic band and rice or peas inside that you could batter and make a quare racket with?
Only managed to convince my granny to get me one of those balloons once, after an hour she cracked and burst it on me.
Older and a bit wiser now, I don't blame her one bit.
And then there's Buck Alec and his lion
Before my time
My granda knew him a bit from the boxing. The fuckin lion had no teeth and was ancient, was more likely to lie down for a sleep than roar.
INTENSE nostalgia from this post. Good job OP.
I remember him. I think he was known locally as Antony GaGa and he used to say 5 gas lighters for a pound. If you walked up to him and made a fart noise at him, he would do it back to you.
Or the Belfast telegraph stalls with people shouting unintelligible guldering that apparently was 'teleeeeeehhhh'
Sixth telleeeehhhh!
Rumour has it he actually found a customer who bought five lighters from him and he retired and lived off the profits of the deal.
And that customer's name? Barack Obama.
AlBic Einstein