We arrive about 1 p.m. The place is heaving with people. Italians, not renowned, in my view, for moving to one side, bump and jostle with each other to get to the stalls, get to the next aisle, get to a place for food.

There’s a whole stall selling those little ceramic pieces allowing you to put in a block of smouldering incense, so as to make your home smell of cedar-wood or the like.

There are stalls selling knitted items. Scarves, hats, jumpers – none of which would grace any of the smart shops in Milan. Other stalls selling African masks, crudely made (otherwise they wouldn’t be ‘hand-made’, now would they?). There’s the typical Sardinian pottery, the individual plates with their garish colours and rough style. Perfect for the terrace in Sardinia but, in Milan, perhaps not.

There are the stalls selling the N’dujna (a soft salami, almost spreadable, which is fairly hot), Serrano ham from Spain, bread, cakes, wine, etc. Special ‘artigiano’ versions of the usual stuff. More expensive than last year, we feel.

But, aside from the expensive food, who, given the current economic climate, is actually buying this stuff? And why?

I mean, if your house is at risk, why buy the picture within which is the clock face that is a real clock? What good will the Red-Indian smoking ceramic figure bellowing incense smoke out of his mouth actually be?

And, my thought, again and again, as we were going round the place was – and, if people stop buying this crap, who will employ the people who make it? What will they do in the Great Depression? Who will employ the sellers at the stalls; the people cleaning up; the administrative staff of the Exhibition Centre; the electricians; the carpenters, etc, etc?

And the answer was, of course, no one. Since no one will be buying the stuff any more. And, if these people are unemployed then they won’t be buying any of that crap either.

To be honest I was shocked. I would be interested to know if the stallholders felt they had had a good fair this year (compared with last). I suspect (by looking at the lack of bags people were carrying around) that it was nowhere near as good as last year.

We left about half past 10. I had been fairly bored since about half past one. V had bought some stuff for work colleagues – from collections for birthdays, etc. Otherwise we had nothing to show for our visit – which says it all, really.