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I’m running down to the love market, Honey!
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Here is a story idea which Hollywood is going to buy from me for maybe four million dollars, so don’t tell anyone else.
These are ethnic Hmong people waiting for lovers at a “love market” in Vietnam. The captions say that on one day a year, ”married men and women wait for the return of their former lovers with whom they can meet again without jealousy from their spouses…”
Are you fricking kidding me? Can we run through this deal again, more slowly?
So married men and women meet up with former lovers, and get a one-day free pass from their spouses?
Do the spouses in this village not have access to machetes, pipe wrenches or rat poison?
How does this annual conversation even go down, anyway?
“Lamar, is it that time again already? Land sakes! Well, run on down to the love market and see your old prom date, and I’ll just stay at home with the children and plow the fields.
“Oh wait, Lamar, I almost forgot! You can’t go without breakfast! Here, take some of these extra-special muffins I made and eat them on the way…”
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Top: Ethnic Hmong wait for their lovers at the Khau Vai ‘love market’ in Vietnam’s northern Ha Giang province, May 10, 2010. For nearly 100 years, the Khau Vai love market has been known as a lovers’ rendezvous. Local residents annually gather there from March 26 to March 27 of the lunar calendar to seek lovers. Married men and women wait for the return of their former lovers with whom they can meet again without jealousy from their spouses during this one day out of the year. Single young men and women also seek lovers at the market. REUTERS/Kham
Right: An ethnic Hmong man lies on the ground drunk at the Khau Vai ‘love market’. REUTERS/Kham
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Blog Guy, do you think that outsiders can go to the “love market” and meet up with their former lovers? Or is it only for locals? I’m only asking for a friend!
What I keep thinking about here is the lucky former lover heading to the market on this special day only to find that guy who is already passed out drunk.
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“How long can I possibly keep this up? Find out by joining the Oddly Enough blog network!”
That was a bonus one.
I have more of a concern about the young children there waiting for their former lovers.
True. Or maybe that’s really just Lamar, having eaten his wife’s “special muffins” on the way to the market….
I am going there next year RB… you are too cruel to tell us AFTER the event
Umm…. I dont think I want to go to this market at all!!
Really? That drunk guy might still be there….
The kids are there because somebody told them about puppy love and they’re hoping for a beagle.
Let me guess – for “inexplicable” reasons authorities notice a spike in domestic violence and divorce rates every April in the Giang province
Lost things are always prized very highly. And imagined romances with former loves will always seem better than they actually would have been, better than the relationship you may with a current partner.
You don’t have to pick up the dirty socks of former loves or listen — wide awake — to the snoring of a former love at 4 a.m.
A real relationship may find it hard to compete with an imaginary relationship with an ex. Maybe it is a good idea to remeet with an ex, so that you can see that s/he is a real person, not a perfumed/cologned ghost. I don’t know.
Shoot! We got this right here in the States, only we call it Mardis Gras!
All my former lovers are jerks, so that won’t work.
Bob, would I have better luck at the Social Safeway in Georgetown?
Well kgolden, that’s my neighborhood store, and I don’t think running into Blog Guy is anybody’s idea of “better luck.”
@AllThatJazz…LOL….beagles are awesome though!
That’s quite a crap form of stalking.
@CrowGirl: LOL
Doc, now we all know what your wife goes through….
Basler, I think I am worth nore than a drunk’s attention…
Of course you are, Shra. But is it fair to prejudge this young man just because he’s down at the Love Market during working hours, wearing a disco-style leisure suit and passed out from cheap liquor? Once he wakes up, he could be the best catch at the market.
Did you know that there is some sites called Matrimonial sites that exist?
You dont???
You didnt hear it from me then…. I dont want to zap myself…
Isn’t that E-Harmony?
See – those rice-growing bras suddenly make sense now. You can go to the love market AND tend the crops at the same time.
The thought of running into any of my ex’s makes me shudder, and not in a good way!
I’ll skip the love market thanks. Me and my cat are happy the way things are!
E.
I agree E… most of the time, I actually feel, “What the hell was I thinking!!!!!!!!!”
Yeah, not a good thought/feeling…
How typical is this? You go out looking for love, but all you find is beer. Men – sometimes we really are just that dumb.
OK – MOST of the time we are really that dumb.
Okay “tend the crops” is my new least favourite euphemism – EEWWW !
Nosmo, that is a highly unusual realisation!! I am so glad for you!
Nosmo, thanks a lot for that… now you’ve gone and given it away!! Shra, zap him, please… he’s gone and revealed secrets AND has taught something at the same time!
I call that self-realisation M… he doesnt deserve to be zapped at all…