Myanmar is a developing country. There are two major cities in Myanmar which are Yangon & Mandalay. Yangon has a population of 5,160,512 and Mandalay’s population is 1,319,452 (estimated in 2019). Bagan has a population somewhere between 50k-200k spread out over the region. As a result, you’re not going to find a large Walmart or Tesco type big brand box store nearby. Instead, you’ll find what you’re going to see in several little cities in rural Asia which is a local market. Local markets are always a popular stop on any tour to see how the locals do it. Nyaung U Market was no exception.
Nyaung U Market is one of the local sites you see when you go to Bagan, Myanmar for the world famous Balloons Over Bagan Hot Air Balloon Ride through the Valley of Pagodas.
A Market Rightly Sized For The Community
The Bagan local market, Nyaung U Market, is definitely smaller in scale compared to a market in Bangkok or Ho Chi Minh City. However, it’s very authentic. You will get a peak into how the locals buy and sell goods. In Bagan, Men do the farming and fishing and women spend all day at the market selling. The tour guide confirmed this observation.
Walking through Nyaung U Market gave me a sense of fresh vegetables organically grown with minimal pesticides. This is very different than the United States. You can also see the difference in the overall health of a community that eats fresh food with no preservatives. Rural Asians have to work hard fishing or farming and eat good food. They get lots of activity throughout the day. This is very different than the mass-produced fast food diet of sedentary westerners with a McDonald’s on every corner.
Way Different Than A Big Box Store In A Developed Country
The vegetables in Nyaung U Market are not consistent in appearance like they are at the big box store. Fruit and veggies at a big box stores are all perfectly round and have perfect color. In the local market, the fruit and vegetables are different shapes and levels of ripe. They have dings and defects. The produce is natural and real.
You will also see freshly caught fish at Nyaung U Market. It’s possible the fisherman ran into a school of trout and caught 15 to 30 for his wife to sell. Maybe he ran a net and got two trout, one carp, and a bass. Either way, his daily catch is on display and whoever buys it, gets it. The fish availability changes every day and the community understands this.
Nyaung U Market Isn’t Perfect, But It’s Local
Nyaung U Market, like many other markets, doesn’t have air condition and there are flies landing on freshly cut meat. Yes, the meat is cross-contaminated because the chicken is next to fish next to beef next to pork all on one table. And yes, they are using the same bloody knife to cut all the meat. The fish hasn’t been refrigerated all day. It was probably just pulled out of the river two hours ago. Maybe it’s on ice but it’s still exposed to the elements. It’s very authentic and it’s amazing to see compared to how you have it at home. The one positive is they don’t have a bunch of Styrofoam non-recyclable by-product to deal with. Oh and by the way, most of the street food vendors through Asia handle their raw ingredients the same way.
The Market Continues To Thrive
At the end of the day, this market has been operating like this for a long time. None of the locals are getting sick from cross contamination. It begs the question, how over-regulated are developed societies that pay extra for meat to be separated to avoid cross contamination when cross contamination isn’t killing people?
Nyaung U Market in Bagan, Myanmar isn’t flooded with tourists like Jalan Alor Street Food Market in Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia or Khlong Toei in Bangkok, Thailand. Tourists don’t come to Nyaung U Market from all around the world to eat exotic food and shop for souvenirs. It’s a place for locals to transact and make their ends meet.
I was grateful for the walk through with my tour guide. She pointed out noteworthy stuff and we talked to some of the locals and I got some cool pictures.
