Tam Thanh Market

Anyone who grew up near a morning market knows the rhythm: people about while the sky is still grey, hot food at the market's edge, talk everywhere. When did you last go to a market like that? Chợ Tam Thanh (chợ means market), beside 27 Tháng 4 street near Phú Quý port, still keeps that rhythm. It is an everyday market for the islanders, not a souvenir market: a small market ground with two roofed buildings in the middle of an open yard, selling everything mixed together — live and fresh seafood, household staples, clothes, shoes, hands of bananas, bunches of greens, bundles of spring onions.

Tam Thanh Market — the morning market the islanders kept for themselves

What the place holds on to most clearly is its food. Breakfast here means soups made from fish, cooked by the islanders themselves — bánh canh chả cá (a soup of thick, chewy noodles with fish cake), bún cá (rice noodles with fish), bún riêu (another rice-noodle soup) — dishes regarded as the signature taste of Phú Quý. One diner described a bánh canh chả cá stall in front of the market as having a clear, lightly sweet broth with plenty of fish cake. Next to it is a trà tắc stall (tea with tắc, a small local citrus), and people often order a glass to go with their bowl. Nearby you can also find cháo lòng (rice porridge with offal), bún mắm nêm (rice noodles with a fermented fish sauce), and instant noodles cooked with egg or squid. For that diner, breakfast here meant sitting among island aunties and uncles chatting in a thick Phú Quý accent.

Phú Quý — Cù Lao Thu is one of the island's many old names — long lived closed off and self-sufficient, with fishing as its main livelihood. That trade still runs through the island's markets: boats head out in the afternoon, fish all night under lamps, and come back to the landing at dawn; traders from the island's communes, Tam Thanh among them, collect the fish there and bring it to market. The fish laid out in the island's markets in the morning is last night's catch. Today Tam Thanh is the island's hub for trade, fishing, passenger boats and eating out — and yet its market is still where islanders do their shopping.

The morning session is the busiest: come between first light and early morning. For breakfast you have to be early — the food stalls pack up before mid-morning, and latecomers find little left. The market runs from first light and still has goods in the late afternoon, and in the evening there are snack stalls around it — bánh căn (small rice-flour cakes), bánh xèo (crispy rice pancakes), chè (sweet dessert soup), noodle soups. Breakfast costs what islanders pay, seafood is reasonably priced, and vendors do not hassle you. One thing trips up first-timers: many stalls have no sign or menu board, so it is easy to walk past without knowing what they sell.

Enough to decide whether to go

What it is

An everyday market for the people of Phú Quý island, not a souvenir market

Where

Beside 27 Tháng 4 street, near Phú Quý port, Phú Quý Special Zone (đặc khu, a special administrative unit), Lâm Đồng province

When to go

From first light to early morning; breakfast stalls pack up before mid-morning

How much

Cheap — breakfast at islanders' prices

What to eat

Bánh canh chả cá, bún cá, bún riêu, with a glass of trà tắc

Not to be confused with

The wholesale seafood market at Phú Quý port — a different place