Malaysia Night Market
Night markets or night bazaars are street markets which operate at night. Most of the people like to go night markets because of convenience, cheaper price of items, shop for leisure, temptation of local food where you might not get it from restaurants, and strolling.
Pasar malam is a Malay and Indonesian word, meaning of “night market”, “pasar” being related to “bazaar” in Persian. It is very common to find a pasar malam, a street market in Malaysia that usually opens from evening till night. Pasar malam is usually located in residential areas.
Night market is a one stop place whereby many stalls sell goods such as local food, fruits, vegetables, toys, clothes, shoes, and many more at cheaper prices, where at least the items are cheaper. Some of the night markets are selling pirated DVDs, CDs and computer software too.
You are able to find a pasar malam only one to a few days of the week at one residential area. The traders will also be selling their things around different neighborhoods on different days.
The good thing of pasar malam at Malaysia is, you can see the night market’s stalls are selling different things by our main three ethnicities, which are Malay, Chinese and Indian. This is one of the reasons why more and more tourists start to hit the night market at Malaysia, as they are able to see the culture of Malaysia, goes with the traditional food from different races.
There are few well known pasar malam at Malaysia, which are night markets at Taman Connaught, Cheras (the longest pasar malam at Klang valley) and Melawati, Kuala Lumpur (the best and most varieties of Malay food can be found at here).
A Malay pasar malam will often contain stalls selling Islamic prayers’ books, kopiah hats, sarongs and other Malay costumes and clothes.
As we are pacing up the trend of advanced technology of lifestyle, same goes as the demand of food. A combination of traditional Malay food in the modern life, we have even more tasty delicious food yet maintaining the traditional taste of recipes when we pay a visit to the Malay night markets.
During the olden days at the malay food stalls, most of them are just selling the traditional food such as satay, nasi lemak, kuih, spicy rendang chicken, lemang goes with the delicious rending beef. Normally the traders will cook at home or restaurants first, and then only they do food packing and sell to the customers.
As time pass, we are getting better and better. We understand more people aiming for new trendy yet delicious food with different recipes. Hence, nowadays, we not only able to see the same old traditional food, but also more new kind of recipes were created.
Even the traders have change a bit of their marketing at the market. Some of them bring the whole big pot of food which have been cooked and displayed to public, this has increase the sales, as to show to people, it has sufficient mass amount of food.
Some of them even bring along their portable stove, and pots, and cook on the spot, to show to public that they do really cook and the food are to be served while it is hot and fresh.
Some malay traders do also sell some Chinese or Indian concept of food. For example, you can see some Malays are selling ‘yong tau fu’ or muruku. As we said, Satu Malaysia as Malaysia has all different kind of food and culture, yet you can find it simple and easily at one place regardless of any races.
By : Jessica Ong
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