Market Day

Day 43: Yangshuo (CN). Enquiring of Lily, the best day to visit the travelling markets in the outlying villages of Yangshuo, we received the following reply: “Markets take place every third day, however , after the third market the next one is in four days not three but this doesn't happen in all towns – there are no markets on the 10th, 20, 30th and 31st of the month”. Miraculously, and by accident rather than design, we happened to stumble upon Xinngping on market day!

For these small communities the travelling markets are the social and economic highlight of the week but for Karen and me they provided a fascinating way to while away a few hours and an opportunity to learn a little bit more about the Guangxi region of China. Vibrant, bustling and noisy; the smell of fresh spices and cooking wafted through the air as we meandered through the lanes perusing the sellers wares.

From our western, point of view, the market provided a challenge to our own expectations: In what looked like the pet area, caged animals squawked and barked, only for us to realise we were actually walking down the food aisles. A local man loaded an 8 ft tree on to the back of his motorcycle while his wife rode pillion; clutching the weeks shopping and two live chickens under both arms. “It's only strange to us because it's different”, Karen said, wisely “Imagine what they would think if they came to England and saw us eating baked beans on toast and collecting the newspaper in our gas guzzling 4x4's”. I laughed, but she was absolutely right.

In need of lunch time refreshments we stumbled on a intriguing little café with a whole menagerie of live animals on the terrace: Snakes, chickens, pheasants and pigeons. Caged at the back of the shop were two of the most enormous bamboo rats we had ever seen; available fried or boiled. On this occasion we politely declined, and settled for a nice cup of jasmine tea!