January 7th Market

It's been almost two months since I moved to a new apartment. We've settled in, gotten used to things, have been rejoicing in the cooler temps over on this side of the neighborhood. The move was only maybe a quarter of a mile away, but the new place has such a different feeling than the old one did.

For instance, we now have a pack of dogs who like to howl. When a siren sounds, when a cart rolls by playing some silly tune...the sound of howling is shortly to follow. This is, unfortunately (or maybe fortunately) not restricted to nighttime howling. At 3 pm on a Tuesday, I have been forced to look up from an article about HIV interventions when the howling became too much.

The street is much busier, so there's more traffic (quite a difference from the quiet house before), but it means that moto taxis and tuk tuks are available whenever we want them. It's also closer to get into the center of town, which means the weekly trips to the grocery store take a lot less time, and it's not such a chore to run errands.

I think what's most interesting is our proximity to the market. Most Khmer go to the market at least twice a day, purchasing food and other little things that they need for their meals, or for their houses. In the mornings and afternoons, there are always lots of women out on the streets, market bags in hand, walking to or from the stalls with food, and sometimes a child in tow.

We used to live near a market, but not as close as we do now. That market was pretty well known, as was the school that we lived near, but I rarely went inside to purchase things, stopping occasionally for fruit on the side of the road instead. The market we're near now is a lot smaller, but people know where it is. I had to re-learn how to give directions to the house (everything is done by landmark, rather than street number), so I asked some Khmer staff the name of this new market. Psar bruhm-peul makara, they told me. Psar means "market" and bruhm-peul is the word for "seven" (literally, five-two). The last word, however, I didn't know, other than as a name for one of my Khmer friends. Turns out it means "January." I've not had to learn the names for the months, as most of the younger Khmer refer to the months by number, rather than by name (Month-1, Month-9, etc.).

So now I live near January 7th Market. Now, being American, I'm used to markets having some interesting names. I mean "Kroger" isn't really a word in the dictionary, nor is "Vons". But we accept these names because they were probably the name of the man who started a very small store and grew it into an empire. January 7th? That just seems like a random date. Until you dig a little deeper.

On January 7, 1979, Vietnamese forces finally captured Phnom Penh and ended the Khmer Rouge rule of Cambodia. Of course, this only prompted more fighting, all the way up through the late 1980s while the Vietnamese maintained a puppet government in Cambodia. I don't know how the troops made their way through the city, but I do know that our neighborhood, in the northern part of town, close to the river, is a place where there is a history of political violence, and it has only recently stabilized. And certainly, when a city is under siege, violence isn't limited to one area.

I'm not sure why the market picked up its name. After all, it could be for lots of reasons; to commemorate a day that brought freedom from oppressive rule, to remember a day when Cambodia fell to armies from a neighboring country, as a reminder of all the rebuilding that took place after that day...I might never find out. In any case, it's humbling to live so near to something that, because of its name, is a symbol of a different time, a difficult time. It's strange to let this piece of history into my thoughts, to know that even as Cambodia struggles to put the past behind, some things will always remain. And until a giant supermarket comes in and bulldozes Psar bruhm-peul makara, this small testament to what came before will stay a part of many people's daily lives.