Markets

The US may be the hub of the global marketplace, but try and find a local street market with fresh fish, live chickens, and cheap mismatched clothes and you’ll come up empty. They’ve been walmarted and suburbanized out of existance. But such markets are alive and well here in China and Taiwan. From what I understand, they’re becoming more rare in Hong Kong though. Street side vendors are allowed to continue to operate, but can only pass the business on to the next of kin. Since these parents have higher hopes for their children many of these stalls will close up within a generation.

In China and Taiwan, street markets are where you can find everything from fresh food to new shoes to the latest unreleased DVD. I particularly love the markets in Taiwan. Dounan’s morning market the day before Chinese New Year was packed to the point of immobility. Everything necessary for a proper feast could be bought. You could watch your chicken meet its demise right there, pick up live shrimp, or any of another hundred ingredients.

Meanwhile, the night markets are part fair, part outdoor warehouse. And the food is the best. Stinky tofu, fresh juice drinks, BBQ squid, and my favorite, tian-bu-la. I always wished we had weekly or daily night markets in the US like they have in Taiwan. It would at least give kids something else to do in the evening. In the Dounan night market we watched some huckster gut snakes in front of a large crowd. The Shirlin night market in Taipei was the largest I had ever been to and made all others look tiny and empty. It spanned for blocks on end and I know we only saw a small part of it.

So far, we’ve been to morning or night markets in just about every single city we’ve visited. Each market has it’s own specialities and unique traits. Walking along these markets and enjoying the local tastes are one of my most favorite aspects of living here. You can see some of the markets we’ve visited on Flickr.