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The Cambridge Encyclopedia of Hunter-Gatherers says: "Hunting and gathering was humanity's first and most successful adaptation, occupying at least 90 percent of human history. Until 12,000 years ago, all humans lived this way."
As have Roch and Brenda for the last 30 days.
The markets in Southeast Asia have been our primary and most successful venues for our daily foraging routine. We have scoured Ho Chi Minh City, Mui Ne and Chiang Mai for the freshest, cheapest and most diverse fruits and vegetables available. Like our early ancestors, every day we trek miles to reach our goals, sometimes making the long journey back to our condo-cave laden down with what seems like an overabundance of food.
Unlike most of the local tribes, we have chosen to forego the use of their preferred mode of transportation, the scooter, to rely on our own horsepower, one step at a time. Nonetheless, sometimes our burden is too great and we must flag down a songthaew (a shared taxi) to return us and our prizes home.
When we first arrived in Chiang Mai, we spent a couple of days in a little guest house near the eastern wall within the old city. Right around the corner was the Somphet market, a very local shopping spot that had pretty much everything we needed, but with less variety than what we had found in Vietnam. Those were easy foraging days that allowed us to expend more time and energy in our quest for a more permanent abode.
We found our new digs on October 31, two days after arriving in Chiang Mai. Located northwest of the old city in the Nimmanheiman neighborhood, our condo is close to hundreds of restaurants, food carts and bars, but alas, very few fresh fruit markets. Bad planning, indeed!
To get back to Somphet market, we have to traverse 2.9 kms of urban jungle on sidewalks that make Montreal streets in the month of March seem smooth and across avenues filled with endless lines of carbon monoxide spewing tuktuks and scooters (cough, cough!).
After doing a little research, we found the Muang Mai market, a huge conglomeration of warehouses, street vendors and market stalls that covers at least 3 full city blocks. It's open 24 hours a day, seven days a week and is where most of the local restaurants come to buy their produce. The best deals are apparently had between 10:00 PM and 4:00 AM when the farmers arrive, their trucks overflowing with their produce, most of which is sold to chefs preparing their pantries for the next day's specials.
Although it's 3.2 kms from home, we figured we could pick up enough produce there to make the extra distance worth our while. Since 10:00 PM is way past our bedtime, we've only been there during daylight hours, but have still come away with some incredible deals. On our first trip, we bought a 10kg bag of mangoes for 150 baht (about $5.37), 10 pomelos for 50 baht and enough miscellaneous fruit to fill up my messenger bag. The thought of carrying all that food 3.2 kms back to our home was very unappealing. On top of that, it was raining quite hard and the market area was filled with tourist and local alike ready to celebrate the climactic day of the lantern festival. Taxis, songthaews and tuktuks were rare and eager to charge exorbitant prices.
We ended up walking about 1 km to the main ring road and snagged a tuktuk to deliver us and our catch of the day to our home.
Despite the great deals, we found Muang Mai to be a little too far out of the way for our daily shopping needs. By scouring the internet, Brenda managed to find a small local night market about 1.5 kms north of our condo, but after visiting one evening, we found the variety of food available to be quite limited.
Also about 1.5 kms from home, every Wednesday morning there is a farmer's market selling (allegedly) organic produce, but it's mainly greens and veggies. The produce is extremely fresh and the prices are good, but one day a week won't really cut it for us.
Then Brenda found the Siri Wattana market. A very pleasant 2.4 km stroll meandering through Thai neighborhoods and high streets brings us to this fabulous bounty of food stalls, clothing boutiques, fresh produce and fruit vendors, Thai desserts and every take-away dish imaginable. One stall will make a green mango or green papaya salad to order, pounding the sauce ingredients in a mortar and pestle before packaging all into a plastic bag to carry home. Delicious!
Another woman sells seeded jackfruit pods for 100 baht per kilo. This is Brenda's favorite stall. On our first visit, we bought 600 grams and devoured it in one sitting when we got home. Our next trip to the market saw us come home with 1.2 kgs of the stuff that we put into the fridge to eat the following day. However, while I was working out at the gym, Brenda had gone off on a long run outdoors. After my workout, I went straight to our Thai language class where I met up with Brenda, who had returned home to shower and breakfast after her run. With a very guilty look on her face, she pleaded with me not to be too angry with her for having eaten so much of the jackfruit. Knowing her capacity for her favorite fruit, I feared she had left only a couple of pods for me to enjoy. When I returned home after class, I was very relieved to find she'd only devoured about two thirds of our catch.
This is now our go to market for the bulk of our needs and will provide us with an ample variety of easy game for us to capture during our hunts over the next four months. Happy hunting indeed!
I've posted photo albums of both Muang Mai and Siri Wattana in the photo part of this blog so you can see what wonderful places these are.
- comments
Betty we certainly don't need to worry that you're not getting enough to eat! keep up the posts roch...always an enjoyable read.