A Hot Bath
I arrived 20 minutes early to scope out the neighborhood. The sun had set and the smoke from a nearby barbecue smothered the street corner. Garbage sat neatly in front of each house awaiting collection. I left my bike next to a park near my prospective home. Down one alley was the apartment, and down another was the local market. I found out later the apartment had a nice balcony overlooking the park, a temple, and the bustling fluorescent-lit market.
Children screamed and ran around the park, elderly women casually smacked a birdie around, no need for a net. Small blades of grass bravely punctured the sidewalk while the garbage woman ignited a mountain of leaves, sending a plume of smoke across the small square park and through the alleys. A cafe on the far corner had stacks of old books, most of them in Russian.
The clamoring at the fringes of the market pulled me in. A row of vendors flanked the aluminum structure. It felt as if a full Home Depot had been stripped down and shoved into these petite storefronts. This was only the perimeter. Past the mountains of pyjamas, casual button down shirts so popular with Vietnamese men, jeans, sun hats, plastic flip-flops, sunglasses, light bulbs, tights, bags of loose tea, glass jars of coffee, towering mounds of watermelon, past all of that, was the food section of the market. I avoided the stinking fish at the back where sea smell mixed with pigs’ blood on the floor and in the air. I pushed out towards the street in need of some air.
I found I was at the corner barbecue that helped smoke out the park. New meat had been placed on the skewers bringing the deluge to a brief pause. The poles holding the animals were attached to a motorized crank, so no body part would go unscorched. It had been skinned, its exterior now a smooth glazed brown, the tail curling in the charcoal heat. The dog’s teeth rested on the skewer running through its body. Next door was a dog hot pot restaurant. Here the grilled pup went in full, fresh from its smoke bath. Nothing was spared, even the paws. Smoke billowed from the barbecue again, thick and pungent, down the alleys towards where I might have lived one day.
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