Indian Timing and the Mela

It's kind of an in-joke...if you invite Indian people somewhere say at 2pm, they will turn up at 3pm or later. I don't know why - maybe it's cool to be late, maybe Indians are laid back about timed activities. In other words, they aren't well known for punctuality.
I should have remembered this before venturing out to the Woolwich Mela this morning. I wanted to go for the "Childrens and Women's activities" listed as being from 10.30 to 12.00pm in the programme on the unofficial Mela site (I call it unofficial as it's not the Mela site listed in the Greenwich days out mag but another site).
Like a demented loon, I ignored the heat and chose to walk up Plumstead Common Road and Nightingale Place.
For some reason I thought the Mela was going to be in front of the historical building but walking there showed an empty ground. There was absolutely no mess from the previous day's Armed Forces day (did anyone go??? How was it?)
Of course, the Mela was on Ha-ha road. So there I trudged, alongside the ha - ha wishing it was full of a nice cooling stream of water that I could dangle my heat swollen feet into.
And this is the site that greeted me. It was EMPTY. There were hardly any people, no food stalls, and definitely no "Children's activities" assuming you don't count the fair which was very similar to the one at the recent Make Merry. From what I could make out, they were still testing the sound system on the stage.
The ice-cream van man (yes yes, I broke my rule and bought some lollies for me and tot....it was 27 degrees by then) said it would get busy from 2pm onwards. No chance I was going to sit around until then. I walked around the rather lame stalls, bought a indian suit for tot and a children's story book then jumped on the 291 back to the Plumstead Common Road.
I'm sure the Mela will be full later, and I did spot a caterers van so food will be available but alas I'm not going to see that as I'd rather sit in the cool of our house in nothing but t-shirts ready to watch the big game later on today.