Cultural life

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HOANG THUONG January 26, 2025 10:00

There is a special market, outside of the market days. That is the market held on the last day of the lunar year, before the first day of Tet. People in my hometown call it the "thoi phien" market.

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The market held on the last day of the lunar year, before the first day of Tet, is often called the closed market.

The market of the word "love"

"The village market happens six times a month..." - that song is magical, simple yet incredibly memorable.

When I had a topknot, I used to follow my grandmother to all the markets around the area, enough to remember the market dates: Bui market was held on the 2nd and 7th; Ve market was held on the 3rd and 8th; Goc market was held on the 4th and 9th... then Do market, Trai market, Bong market, Thong market, Thoi market... However, all the markets near each other in the residential areas around the area, whether arranged by someone or not, all held on alternate days, never overlapping with the other markets nearby.

Those who cannot go to this market will take care of their household chores and go to another market about ten kilometers away. And each market is not only a place to buy and sell, to exchange what the people in the area grow and raise, it is also a place to clearly show the imprint of the customs and practices of an entire residential area, a region. But there is a special market, outside of the market days, that is the market held on the last day of the old lunar year before the first day of Tet. My hometown people call it: the market of the last day.

I don't know if the person who named the last market of the year "the last market" had any intention, but after wandering through the village market, smelling all the flavors of the countryside from the smell of vegetables, the smell of crabs and fish, the smell of ducks and geese, the smell of winnowing baskets and trays, to the smell of fried cakes, banh ú, banh duc, crab soup... my eyes were full of the green, red, purple, and yellow colors of the Tet balloons, of the old smell, of the endless bunches of onions and garlic tied up just enough to wilt... then to me, it seemed like Tet had arrived, wrapped in the flap of my shirt.

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The market sells many local products.

But today's market is different from the previous days, when there is the scent of incense, black incense spread in the wind, clinging to every step, when people are not too crowded, there is enough space for us to look around. When the leisurely pace, the huddles, the whispers between buyers and sellers next to the goods... suddenly make us realize, this market is strange.

- Do you have leaves to wrap the cake?

- I picked some up at the end of the garden.

- Take these dozens of leaves and wrap them in garden leaves.

Oh, no, miss.

- You can take it home, I won't charge you. Then the leaf seller "pressed" a few bundles of dong leaves into the old but friendly looking lady's arms.

- Yes, please give it to me. This year's storms and winds have made the leaves at the end of the garden very fragile. I've only managed to scrape together a few dozen leaves, and I only intend to wrap a few cakes to burn incense.

- Fisherwoman - Ms. Ton's voice boomed in the corner of the market - bring some vegetables back, boil them to eat during Tet to cool your stomach. Will you go ashore during Tet or will you drift on the river?

- Damn it, Mrs. Ton's house - the fisherman's voice was clear and mixed with laughter - The job of fishing is fishing, so we have to go ashore during Tet. As for our ancestors, who can drift, grandma?

- Well, you sell vegetables, but if you give them to me, where will they come from?

- Oh, you fisherman. I can grow vegetables, so I can probably give you a few bunches of vegetables and a few stalks of onions. If you're rich, hide it, hide it, if you're rich, hide it, but you're not rich enough to exploit people.

- Then please give me some money to buy seedlings for the next spring planting - the fisherman pressed the small change into Mrs. Ton's hand.

- Does your money have holes in it?, Mrs. Ton's voice was extremely fierce. I won't accept money with holes in it. Oh my god, you act like money is everywhere...

- Please, please. Please.

- Oh fisherman, the weather is cool, please let Mrs. Ton go down to the boat and float with the old fisherman for a few days so that she can understand the love of land and water, said the voice of the bamboo and rattan seller.

- Oh my gosh, "one day leaning on the side of a dragon boat is better than a thousand lifetimes lying on the same fishing boat" - the fisherman said slyly - I have enough fish and shrimp on my own, who would dare to take my fragrant friend along for the rest of my life?"

Laughter spread throughout the market, dispelling the fog of the cold winter days.

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Dong leaves are a popular item sold at the end-of-year market.

Smiling with them, I leisurely walked to the ornamental plant stall. There were kumquats, peach blossoms, yellow and white apricot blossoms, bonsai trees, and countless flowers. The bright red of velvet roses, the burning yellow of large chrysanthemums, the sunny yellow of apricot blossoms, the bright yellow of kumquats, the fragile purple of violets... Only then did I realize that the open space of the roads and highways had brought the remote countryside closer, allowing goods to go from North to South, allowing spring to embrace all the countryside in its arms.

Just as I thought of that, I suddenly stopped when I met the worried eyes of the owner of the kumquat shop. The whole row of kumquat trees was not as lush, green, and young as last year's Tet. The trees looked more withered, the leaves were yellower, the fruits were less big, and the buds were just starting to appear in the leaf axils... It seemed like all the hundreds of kumquat trees in his shop were still the same as when they were just taken down from the truck.

Seeing me hesitate to stop in front of his stall, he hesitantly stepped out. His hands with blackened nails from the soil and the dull tree sap clasped together in front of his stomach, he timidly said: "Uncle, please buy me a tree to start the shop. The market is closed today, I haven't sold any trees, uncle. There are nearly a hundred kumquat trees in the whole garden..."

The invitation seemed to be stuck. The face with red eyes from lack of sleep, the scraggly beard that probably hadn't been shaved for days... I didn't dare to go on, couldn't go on. Looking at all the kumquat trees, I was confused. It was Tet for a whole family, for many people.

"Sells are slow this year, aren't they?". "No, it's not that they're slow, but that my family's stock is too late. We planned to ship them on the 26th to make it to the market on the 27th, but the old lady suddenly got sick with a heart attack and had to go to the hospital urgently, so...". "So how are you selling them now? How much is a kumquat tree?". "Well, the price is still too high at this time, I just hope to sell a few dozen trees, enough to pay for the truck to take them back and forth, and I'll take the rest back to the garden to take care of them for next Tet...".

"At first I planned to sell a few hundred per tree, now you help me open the shop, give me as much as you want...". "So now that we're here, how will Tet be?". "Uncle, like this, we've been playing our cards all year, how can we celebrate Tet, uncle?".

The owner of the kumquat shop said that, making everyone around him quiet down. Many people smacked their lips. The good thing about the rural market is that if no one asks, it might be slow, but if just a few people gather around, many people will immediately follow.

I chose a small kumquat tree, gave the kumquat vendor some money, he hurriedly searched for change and said, “I don’t accept that much from you,” then turned to the people standing around: “Please help me, whoever picks up the tree, please give me some money for my car to take the unsold trees back to the garden.” And, in just a moment, the kumquat stall was more than half empty. Next to the kumquat vendor, I saw banh leaves, vegetables from the countryside, and Tet incense...

The market of cultural continuity

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Tet market is also a cultural beauty of each region.

I remember reading a book, someone wrote: "If you want to know the customs, cultural traditions, and living standards of the residents of a region, you just need to go to the market. The market is like the belly of that region."

Perhaps, even now, when e-commerce with online stalls in the 4.0, 5.0 era is bustling, it still cannot replace the rural market. Why? Because there are still cultural features of that countryside that have been imprinted for generations. People who go far away remember Mrs. Nguyet's banh luon thigh shop; remember Mr. Goong's fresh tea shop, remember Mr. Lang Tu's herbal medicine shop...

The Thoi Phien market reminds us of those things even more. It is the last market of the twelfth lunar month, which means the 7th market of the twelfth lunar month, the 73rd market of the year according to the lunar calendar.

At the Thoi Phien market, there are not only goods, but also colors and flavors, something that online markets cannot do. And at the Thoi Phien market, there are also very private whispers: "My nephew is married. His wife just hatched, my son". "That's the best, ma'am. It's worth the trouble of being a stork". Or the mocking laughter "It's better to sleep on the ground with a incense seller than to sleep in bed with a fish sauce seller". But "If there's no fish sauce, would you wear a brocade shirt to smoke?" ... or "The wicker basket is fashionable, the winnowing basket is double-sided, if you're sloppy, I'm..."

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Countryside markets still have their own appeal to many people despite the growing popularity of online shopping.

Those metaphors, though not as loud as the sound of “Ten thousand three dishes, three dishes ten thousand” coming from that soulless iron speaker, still have a strong vitality, they sink down, seeping into people’s hearts and minds. They make all the hardships of life’s sun and rain soften, hide.

Or like a bunch of old scents, like vetiver, like a basket, a basket, a basket... It is not only an item that still persistently infiltrates the life of every family, even though plastic baskets and bottles of extracted essential oils can replace those items somewhere, when seeing it, it still makes those who have lived with it from the countryside startled and reminded the next generation.

Life goes on. AI has begun to do many things for humans. But no matter how advanced technology becomes, how smart artificial intelligence is, it is still created by humans. And humans have hearts, which AI cannot have, just as online markets cannot replace traditional markets, markets where sellers are just having fun and buyers feel relieved.

And I still believe that the markets cannot disappear when in each person's chest, the heart is not made of hard plastic.

HOANG THUONG
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