The Koyambedu Market

Today was a trip to the Market. A HUGE Market. It reminded me of Pike's Place—just India Style. Vendors and tables were set up everywhere with lights hanging from rafters and people trying to sell you their goods. There was the flower market, the fruit market, and the vegetable market. Oh my goodness the place went on forever and ever and ever. We spent a good number of hours there and still saw maybe half of the entire thing. Alan visited it a couple of months ago and took pictures of some of the vendors. If they see a camera they insist you take a picture of them in their little shops...it is so funny. Alan promised them he would print them off and bring them back to them in the months to come, which is why he wanted to go today. Trying to find these people was a journey—let me tell you, but when we found one—or a person who recognized the person within the photo—they would woop and laugh and yell and crowds of guys would gather around us and press inward to look at the pictures. Miles and I stood back in amazement. Then the guys would start asking us to take their picture and give us their cards to help us remember their shop...too funny. In the flower shop all the guys were yelling at me to stand with them in the picture. They were so excited to have a "madam" in the picture with them and they showered me with flowers to hold up in the pictures with them from their shops. It was so sweet.

Entering the market
Piles of red flowersPiles of yellow flowers

Inside the market

look, they gave me a flower to hold....

All colors—all kinds

"A rose for the maddam", he said.

More flowers for Jenn.

and more....

Iit was strange to have these random guys throwing their arms around me like i was their best friend, but they meant no harm. They were so caring and nice, and welcoming.

The fruits and vegetables were absolutely gorgeous! The colors and textures were so pleasing. It was just the smells that got to you after a while. The Pomegranates, pineapples, papayas, pumpkins, mangos, squash, eggplant, and peas were so pretty and colorful and so were the people in the markets.

The bananas were the most interesting to me along with the fruits and veggies I had never even seen or heard of before. I had no idea they grew and were harvested like this.

Did you know bananas grew and are harvested like this?

limes

Market people swarming Alan when shows them their pictures.

The ground was covered in rotting leaves of fruits and veggies. it was squishy but the colors that surrounded us make it all beautiful.

We loved the colorful tarps that shaded the vendors from the hot sun.

Squash

Showing off for the camera.

Banana leaves (aka plates)

One fruit I had never heard of was this one, the Jack fruit. No idea, but it was very popular. There were beggar women with their knives digging in the piles of rotten thrown away fruit and pealing off chunks of the Jack fruit they considered still edible. I wonder if we will ever get to try it. Could be interesting.

Jack fruit

Alan told us that this market experience was his favorite of all his year in Chennai. That the people here were the friendliest, sweetest people and that it was the richest, warmest of his experiences here. Now, we can see why and are so glad we went. It will be fun to go back there in the months to come with the pictures of the shop owners and people we saw and see how proud they are of them when we hand them out.