Khlong Toei market is Bangkok’s largest wet market. The place is huge, mostly open air, under umbrellas and tarps or under large open air roofed areas. It’s maze like and you can easily loose your bearings. There’s all sorts of fresh produce as well as a poultry, pork, seafood, some reptiles, and beef, most freshly butchered or some still alive and butchered while you wait. The market is open 24 hours per day and 7 days per week. It’s most busy during early morning, well before 7AM, when many street vendors and local restaurants purchase what they need for the coming day. I visited the market a few times, arriving between 4:30 to 5:00AM, and it was buzzing with activity. A great memory from one visit was a python emerging from a drain and making its way to a live chicken cage for a meal. It was quite the scene, watching people scatter and then a couple of guys catching the seven foot or more long python and setting it free in the canal behind the market.
Klong Toey market - Bangkok, Thailand. The entrance to the market from a walkway over Rama IV at approximately 4:30AM.
Klong Toey market - Bangkok, Thailand. A refreshing hose off after a warm and humid night cleaning chicken.
Klong Toey market - Bangkok, Thailand. Large refrigeration is done with large plastic ice coolers and ice. Low tech but effective. I think these fellows have the best job in the market - nice and cool and good excercise moving the ice around.
Klong Toey market - Bangkok, Thailand. Showering after a night cleaning chickens.
Klong Toey market - Bangkok, Thailand. Bags of chicken parts line the floor.
Klong Toey market - Bangkok, Thailand. Workers hose off after after a night cleaning chickens.
Klong Toey market - Bangkok, Thailand. A small army of porters, identified my their vest color and number, haul goods through out the market.
Klong Toey market - Bangkok, Thailand. Around 6AM and the end of the shift, workers shower off in the same place they were cleaning chickens.
Klong Toey market - Bangkok, Thailand. A chicken cleaning/butcher stall.
Klong Toey market - Bangkok, Thailand. Around 6AM and the end of the shift, chicken feathers pile up. Chickens are placed into large pots of boiling water, making it easier to remove feathers.
Klong Toey market - Bangkok, Thailand. Workers wearing boots stand in pieces of chicken fat and skin while they prepare other parts.
Klong Toey market - Bangkok, Thailand. PIckup trucks filled with fresh hog carcasses pull up to the market.
Klong Toey market - Bangkok, Thailand. Chicken await their fate.
Klong Toey market - Bangkok, Thailand. Pickup trucks loaded with fresh half hog carcasses pull up to the market. I figured the slaiughter house must be close by but I didn't find it, fortunately I guess.
Klong Toey market - Bangkok, Thailand. Chicken meet their fate. People purchase live chicken and have them butchered at the market. Some are cooked as well.
Klong Toey market - Bangkok, Thailand. The pork she is carving was probaby walking 8 hours earlier.
Klong Toey market - Bangkok, Thailand. Waiting for fresh fish.
Klong Toey market - Bangkok, Thailand. I've seen dumspter divers before but never a chicken cage diver. This fellow is fetching live chicken.
Klong Toey market - Bangkok, Thailand. Aisles of fresh pork, poultry, seafood and beef. It was about 80 degrees F and 80% humidity, and closed in under umbrellas and a patchwork of tarps to stay dry. Being closed in, you start smelling like raw meat parts after a while.
Klong Toey market - Bangkok, Thailand.
Klong Toey market, Bangkok, Thailand. After hopping and dancing around for a minutes, the python's head finds its way to the bag.
Klong Toey market, Bangkok, Thailand. The python was at least 7 feet long. They want to get the python into a bag.