Post by douglaswulf on Jan 26, 2007 7:41:18 GMT
Found the following at this website...
www.thingsasian.com/stories-photos/1538
Key sentence is at the end...
One place that my husband and I periodically visit is the "Thieves Market" at Sungei Road. You won't find whole pieces of furniture here, but you can find little mementoes of days gone by. Called the "Thieves Market" because one can never tell where the items being sold came from, you might find genuine antiques. For the most part however, it is a haven for dealers in second-hand electronics and clothes, and it serves the poorer segments of society who go there to buy their daily necessities.
Located in a central part of the city area, somewhere in between the conserved areas of Little India and Arab Street, the Thieves Market is the quintessential flea mart. It continued to operate even after the shop houses and shantytown that used to occupy the area were torn down in the 1980s. In fact, the dealers and vendors display their wares in the open, by the roadside on Pitt Street, Pasar Lane and Larut Road - the narrow lanes that used to serve that plot of land. They are there everyday, from about 9 or 10 in the morning until the sunsets and there isn't enough light to see by, or when it rains. It is most crowded on the weekends, when it also becomes something of a novelty with the tourists, who are "funneled" through the market on trishaws honking loudly for people to get out of the way and blasting loud Hokkien music. (Trishaws aren't what they used to be, but that's another story.)
Both the vendors and customers are a varied lot. People of all ages, jostling with one another to get a glimpse of a bargain. And bargain, they do! And what's on sale? Used stereo equipment, cassette decks, drills, nuts and bolts, clothes, shoes, old chunky mobile telephones, toys, children's and pulp fiction books, magazines with popular 1960s film stars on the covers, clocks, watches, cameras, postcards of old Singapore (some of which actually have writing and stamps on the back), open reel audiotapes... we've even seen old 8mm and 16mm film reels!
www.thingsasian.com/stories-photos/1538
Key sentence is at the end...
One place that my husband and I periodically visit is the "Thieves Market" at Sungei Road. You won't find whole pieces of furniture here, but you can find little mementoes of days gone by. Called the "Thieves Market" because one can never tell where the items being sold came from, you might find genuine antiques. For the most part however, it is a haven for dealers in second-hand electronics and clothes, and it serves the poorer segments of society who go there to buy their daily necessities.
Located in a central part of the city area, somewhere in between the conserved areas of Little India and Arab Street, the Thieves Market is the quintessential flea mart. It continued to operate even after the shop houses and shantytown that used to occupy the area were torn down in the 1980s. In fact, the dealers and vendors display their wares in the open, by the roadside on Pitt Street, Pasar Lane and Larut Road - the narrow lanes that used to serve that plot of land. They are there everyday, from about 9 or 10 in the morning until the sunsets and there isn't enough light to see by, or when it rains. It is most crowded on the weekends, when it also becomes something of a novelty with the tourists, who are "funneled" through the market on trishaws honking loudly for people to get out of the way and blasting loud Hokkien music. (Trishaws aren't what they used to be, but that's another story.)
Both the vendors and customers are a varied lot. People of all ages, jostling with one another to get a glimpse of a bargain. And bargain, they do! And what's on sale? Used stereo equipment, cassette decks, drills, nuts and bolts, clothes, shoes, old chunky mobile telephones, toys, children's and pulp fiction books, magazines with popular 1960s film stars on the covers, clocks, watches, cameras, postcards of old Singapore (some of which actually have writing and stamps on the back), open reel audiotapes... we've even seen old 8mm and 16mm film reels!
