Belen Markets and Coconut Grubs Galore

lets start by something that Mieke had said to me before a group of us decided to venture into the Belen Markets.        

"How are you feeling? ... Not queasy from drinking last night are you?" 

Rules that the locals will tell you before entering the markets. 

1. Do not carry anything valuable on you

thats ... pretty much it hahaha. 

The Belen Markets are in Iquitos the city right off the amazon. The city itself has no roads that go to any major city. If you want to go to Iquitos you have to go by either Plane or Boat. Boat sounds like a good idea and a lot of fun, but on the third day you might change your mind about it... its a long boring boat ride. 

Iquitos is a cool city, the last few years though, crime has gone up quite a bit. Since there are not many roads that go to Iquitos the city has a lot of "Motocars" which are exactly the same as what you see in Thailand which are called "Tuk Tuks". A motocar is basically a motorbike that has been transformed with two wheels on the back with an open carriage. The city is over run with them they are everywhere and the traffic is crazy. But, its a cheap way to get around the city, I have taken many a motocar. 

hmm that was a nice piece of trivia... which has nothing to do with the post on the Belen Markets... because it was down the street from the hostel. :D

So... I have been to the bazaars in Nepal, Seen the Markets in Thailand and visited many places that have crazy markets. They got nothing on this one! 

We walked in, already people were busy going back and forth, lots of locals, shouting and bartering over fish and other random things... "Wow, this is pretty crazy!" I had said openly which was replied with "yeah we haven't even got into the crazy part yet". 

lets make a list of all the crazy crap you can buy in the markets. Fish, pig, chicken, beef (I should mention most are dead but you can buy alive if you wish) any kind of clothing, bracelets, jewelry, ayahuasca, medicines, turtles, turtle meat, cigarettes, machetes, radios, watches, purses, wallets, belts, fireworks, fruits and vegetables, grains, beans... then you can go deeper into the markets where they sell things that you have no idea how they got and are very much illegal. Monkeys, alligator meat or clothing, jaguar teeth/ skulls/ paws/ clothing, various different animal skulls. random random random shit!

I think we were approached by the local security police a 3 or 4 times asking to put away our cameras or not even bring them into the markets at all and to be very very careful. Pick pockets in Iquitos is very bad, however the Belen Markets amplifies this, there is so many people are jammed packed together, there are many parts where you can barely move.

Can you spot the turtle penis?

Its not uncommon to see a slab of meat or fish laying in the sun in the +30 heat of the day and people owning restaurants wanting to buy them... yeah I'm starting to eat more vegetarian hahaha. and right next to that someone selling herbs or spices or maybe fireworks or some other random thing, there is common sense to this chaos that is the Belen Markets.

sigh* ... now we must talk about the smell... if you have a queasy stomach? hahaha yeah the heat in the middle of the day is strong, hummid as hell and not a good place for any food you don't want to spoil. hmmm try to think of a huge room with many pounds of meat I couldn't guess what it is, fish and sausage as well as pork heads at 35 degrees Celsius... the smell of it, you cannot escape, you cannot leave, it does not smell fresh, it smells musky and dirty, it catches you in your throat and leaves you through your eyes. rotting meat and dirty socks... not socks that are just dirty, but have been worn for 3 weeks without being taken off, rubbed on bloody meat and fish and left in the sun for a few days and SOMEONE SLAMS THAT SOCK IN YOUR FACE!!!

ok now you get a good idea of what it smells like all over the place in the markets, I'm very happy I can share this experience with all of you!

Mieke said that she wished she could add smell to pictures for people back home... I told her I was decent at describing things. You are Welcome!

We wondered through the markets and got lost, saw so many random things. I will tell you that I went to the markets a few times, once for the thrill of something new, once to get to the floating markets and once to take some pictures, just for you. all of this is just for you. So I am blending all my experiences together for this one blog.

I didn't take pictures of everything, but I got some good shots.

We asked directions from one of the security dudes who brought us to an asian kitchen store... yeah... anyways we asked again because our spanish obviously wasn't that good. Then we got an "ohhhhhh si si!" Hahaha, I guess he was wondering what three 'whiteys' wanted in an asian local kitchen store. 

The security always go in pairs so they escorted us, one in the front in the rear... wow now that is service. They brought us to a man that had decent english and gave us a price for a tour in a boat around the floating village. The price was reasonable and the security came right down to the river with us. 

Three of us jumped on the boat and headed out, its not high season for rain yet, but you could see the marks on the stilts of some of the houses and shops where the water had rose to the year before, sometimes upwards of 4 metres. 

I shook the boat because Mieke thought we might tip and was a bit nervous and I grabbed Devin by the waist when he stood up and scared the crap out of him.... hahaha, yeah I know I'm bad. 

We got to see all the peoples houses, people swimming, bathing, fishing, even stopped at the boat drivers house and said Hello to his dad. 

A lot of the poorer people live on on the floating houses, they use a specific type of tree for the bottom on the houses so they float. The Logs need to be changed every couple years.

After the floating village we were escorted back up to the markets by the two people that gave us the tour in the boat, they were very friendly, showed us pictures of other tourists they had given tours for from all over the world and wanted to expand their small business and do more tours in the jungle as well. 

When we got back up to the markets... yes we saw it... The Coconut Grubs! (I feel there should be a cue for some sort of music that comes on when something great is presented right now!)

The coconut grub is a harmless worm type bug... a black hard head and a very squished big white body... the creature loves moist and warm environments as well as long walks on the beach and showing you pictures of their children and the often times goes to the cinemas... thats great right.... so we are totally going to eat them!!!

A lot of the locals eat them in the jungle near Iquitos, yet a lot don't hahaha! regardless Devin and I were excited to give it a shot... the only question is... do we eat them raw and moving around or fry em up?

I have heard of both... 

Anyways I wont ruin the surprise for you, I have decided to do more videos as well as pictures, videos give everyone a more realistic vicarious living through moment :)

enjoy this video (copy and paste into your browser):

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=p-hY_oYGmPk&feature=youtu.be

And the winning picture of the day goes to this guy!