The ¨Fresh¨ Food Market

Only a young child could be excited about going to the market when it is 40 (104 F) degrees out. With our eyes squinting, we stumble from the car up to the blankets draped over the entrance to keep the world inside in darkness. In our 20 meter walk, the sweat already sticks to us as though rubbed in honey. With our six feet now inside the blanket fort, we see the bustling place that Camilo knows too well.

The concrete path is narrow amongst the numerous wooden stalls holding fruits, vegetables, cleaning supplies, and pre-made food. The vendors seem even more lifeless than us as the metal roof holds in the heat. 

Camilo leads the way to our typical first stop, eggs. We pass through stalls of fruits and vegetables and up a step to the meat and fish section. As we pass the cow fetuses, goat fetuses, and not yet cut up pig heads, Misa makes the claim to Camilo that the animals are sleeping. By now, he has caught on and replies, “Dead.” We find the “aunt” who sells us eggs and her prices mark three different types. When she sights Camilo, her face lightens up and she comments on his long hair and how dirty his face appears. Meanwhile, another woman leaves her booth and grabs Camilo up and takes him off.

Our ¨aunt¨ removes our requested 30 eggs from the cardboard egg crates and places them into a clear plastic bag. While we pay, I spot Camilo near again having his hands washed in the sink before the woman who whisked him away hands him a small tomato to enjoy. I silently ask for my child back and we walk through the meat. At this time of day, in this type of heat, purchasing pork is off limits to us. The lifeless Lao use what little energy the sun has left them to fan away the flies feeding off hacked up corpses. We traipse through the tables with butchered pigs sprawled about. There are metal bins with more finely chopped ear, tongue, and organs. Even if it appealed to me, I wouldn’t know what to buy without clearly labeled and separated containers. Yet, the unrefrigerated pig guts have never appeased me, not even in restaurant meals. 

Camilo leads the way to the fresh fish, our only viable option for protein to purchase here. We slip on rosy colored water and try to forget the sight of the pig guts bin that was knocked onto the floor. The scraps of tongue were licking the filthy floor juices until they were simply thrust back into the bin with an ungloved hand, ready to sell all over again.

Our fish ¨uncle¨ asks how many fish we want and chuckles with a nice belly laugh when reply in Lao. Camilo gets closer to the live fish existing in their one hand deep water. He watches intrigued as their gills expand like a fan and return. He is too engrossed in the movements of our future food to realize that his forward was just speckled with blood as the uncle aggressively chopped a creature open. When the wooden butcher block is emptied of our order, we pass 200,000 kip over and cringe at the return of our now wet and fishy 80,000 kip.

We get the pleasure of passing through the meat one more time before moving out, back into the safer vegetable area. Camilo catches sight of our favorite stand and passes through the opening allowing him to access the vendor. His backstage pass gives him the benefit of sitting on a plastic tub with a calculator in one hand and a newly washed cucumber in the other. He is content as he picks at the buttons and kicks his legs out under him. I pick out the vegetables I recognize, which tend to also be the most expensive. The russet potato, known in the Lao language as ¨French fruit¨ is always a first choice. My hands ignore the bags of small red peppers and long root vegetables I have only seen here. Onion, garlic, cucumbers, carrots, limes, tomatoes, and pumpkin. These are my safe options.

I shudder as I pass over the uncovered tub of coagulated blood with two cockroaches inside going to town. I alert the vendor and she steps off and just shoos them away, her product now good as new. I then look over in the leafy greens section, where there is bok choy, mustard, chinese kale with small yellow flowers, and a simple lettuce. There are also some other leaves I have regretfully purchased in the past. Celery leaves are ready to sell, but the stocks cut off and gone to the trash as they are not a part of the Lao diet. Because I am not pushy and grew up politely waiting my turn, it takes six people interrupting my purchase to get their vegetables and be on their way before the worker puts like items in individual plastic bags to then shove all together into one large plastic bag for me. 

Camilo helps me pay the woman now that his cucumber has gone to his belly. We then stop at three different stands for fruits. Camilo enjoys picking at the grapes one by one at the first stall. Then he unpeels himself three bananas and eats them at the second stall. At the third he scares the workers as he peels himself a lychee with a pit inside and eats it. We had already practiced not eating the pit skill at home, so I had to simply push past the glaring eyes that labeled me as a careless mother. My last purchase is the irrestistible Gala apples with a Washington sticker, one of the only foods in this place whose origin of existence is confirmed. At this point, we have enough food to last us about a week if we decide to make a meat stop at a supermarket geared toward foreigners…with refrigerated meats cut into more recognizable shapes. Camilo helps us carry our newly acquired 25 plastic bags to the car and the whole market seems to melt back into exhaustion as the curly haired blonde boy disappears.