Rickshaw Run, Feasting In Footscray/Melbourne Food & Wine Festival, Footscray Central

Sen, 74-76 Nicholson Street, Footscray. Phone: 9687 4450

Another day, another volunteer stint on the Rickshaw Run – is it really worth another story?

Well, yes, actually – as this proves to be quite a different experience, and in many ways a more enjoyable one.

I have Bennie with me for starters.

I’ve already warned him that he’s not big enough – yet – to manhandle a rickshaw with two adults aboard. But I figure he’ll be useful anyway.

Wrong.

He’s quickly dragooned into oyster duty by Jessica and Aleshya, with whom he spends the rest of the night goofing off.

I figure his internal logic goes something like this: “Hmmm – hard choice. Follow my sweaty old man around or hang out with these two cool pop culture mavens?”

If he new what “maven” actually meant, of course …

Oh well – off I go, helping my fellow volunteers haul two groups of 10 guests around all the usual spots.

There seems to be more time this outing to get to know my colleagues.

Among them is Eve, who regularly posts on westie food haunts at Conversation with Jenny and with whom I swap notes for the rest of the evening.

And steering the rickshaws is notably easier as, early on a Sunday evening, the footpaths are much less crowded.

The previous week, there had been only three of us sharing our complementary volunteer meal at Sen.

Tonight, there’s a whole table of us – including deputy mayor Grant Miles – and a jolly time is had by all.

When we first moved to the west, this place was called Ha Long and it was our habitual Vietnamese stop in Footscray, so it’s rather nice to be back in such familiar – if spruced up – surrounds.

Sitting next to me is Leo (short for Leonor), who is Filipino. So, of course, we discuss Filipino food and this blog’s ups and downs with it, before moving on to Korea and beyond.

Several of those around me order diced beef with tomato rice.

It looks sensational, with oodles of fluffy red rice liberally flecked with egg, heaps of rough-cut pickles including cabbage and gorgeous, glistening beef that elicits many “oohs” and “aahs”.

Bennie orders a really ballsy duck and vermicelli dish.

The soup that accompanies is REALLY unlike anything I have ever seen or tasted in a Vietnamese restaurant.

It’s dark, mysterious and – for me – cloyingly rich. Bennie ignores the mushrooms and slurps it up anyway.

And he raves about the rest of it all the way back to the car.

I order banh mi bo kho (beef stew) with bread roll, but end up making do with the noodle version.

It’s good, but I suspect this is a rather new batch of stew in which the flavours and ingredients haven’t fully merged.

The no-bone, no-fat meat is wondrously tender, though, and I enjoy my bowl of goodies very much.

Will we be putting our hands up for Rickshaw Run duties next year?

You bet!

Rickshaw Run, Feasting In Footscray/Melbourne Food & Wine Festival, Footscray Central

Being typically Consider The Sauce early for the 11.30am check-in time for my first experience of rickshaw pulling allows me the opportunity to get the inside scoop of these marvellous vehicles.

Deputy mayor Grant Miles, today in fluoro-vested blue-collar mode, tells me that after a long search, a single job lot of them were found in a small Chinese town, where they were dismantled and packed into a container for Melbourne.

Here they were re-assembled and fitted with bearings.

And now they’re a seemingly excellent and permanent fixture of the Footscray scene as the Melbourne Food & Wine Festival rolls around for another year.

This year’s Rickshaw Run sold out in a couple of days, but there’s still plenty of scope for volunteers, so I plan on making myself useful – and doing it all again in a week’s time with Bennie.

I’m told that in the previous year there were stacks of volunteers, so each rickshaw puller stayed with the same couple of guests for the whole run.

Today, there’s more to-ing and -fro-ing.

And even though the run travels no further than a block from the registration point near the corner of Leeds and Byron streets, a good deal of concentration is required.

A loaded rickshaw takes more grunt to get moving – and stop – than I’d figured.

And manoeuvering along crowded footpaths and avoiding clashes with people, especially children, and retail displays and signage is tricky.

First stop for punters – even before they board their rickshaws – is D&K, where they feast on icy, freshly shucked oysters.

I never knew!

Apparently, this delicious trick can be done any old time – with prices ranging from about $9 to $13 a dozen depending on size.

I’m so there!

My first passengers are Cathy and Anita (top photo), who are followed by Wendy and Lucy, and then Mike and Dosh.

I enjoy asking them all how their Rickshaw Run is going as the day progresses.

And I tell them: “If an oxygen mask should drop down in front of you, make sure you place one on your own face before doing the same for your children!”

First stop after oysters is Little Saigon Market, where guests get to sample such exotic treats as mangosteen, rambutan and dragon fruit.

At Sen Restaurant, Rickshaw Run punters make their own rice paper rolls.

At the corner of Hopkins and Leeds streets, they receive a massage while chomping on bo la lot – beef in vine leaves – and taking in some rowdy Vietnamese music.

I grab a skewer of bo la lot at $3.50 for myself. So good and chewy, with a heavy garlic hit and sublime chilli afterburn.

From there, it’s on to Sapa Hills for bun cha Hanoi (grilled pork, noodles, salad and dipping sauce) at Sapa Hills and, finally, Dong Que for traditional spring rolls made with rice paper.

A big part of the day have been the wide smiles and guffaws of laughter coming from many amused locals as we’ve made our way around Footscray.

Maybe some of that’s due to the inherent post-colonial humour of having people with pale skin – in my case, very pale – hauling rickshaws around streets on which brown skin is very much the norm.

And for just a moment, on our last run along Hopkins Street, I see, hear and experience these so-familiar streets, sights and aromas through a visitor’s eyes.

So very, very cool!

Yet someone had said to me earlier in the day: “I’ve never eaten much around here – I’ve always been too scared!”

It’s been a fine experience.

Rickshaw Run volunteers still needed! Contact president@footscraytraders.com.au