The Thieves Market (Clear Edition)

Do you know that there is a Thieves’ Market in Penang? Yep, thieves as in people who steal things. Legend has it that the Thieves’ Market began with a small band of thieves selling stuffs that they had stolen. Then instead of doing the selling themselves, the thieves got smart and got other people to sell for them. For those who are not in the thievery business and may not be familiar with the terminology of the business, such people who buy stuffs directly from the thieves are called ‘fence’ but please note that one does not call those who buy stuffs from the fence fence, otherwise there would be lots more people called fence than there are fences.

Now that you are duly informed on thieves, fence and fences, let’s move on with our discussion on the Thieves’ Market.

One reason why the Thieves’ Market in Penang is thriving today is that thievery must have thrived for a while on the island. It is not surprising that thievery must have thrived in Penang because Penang was once touted as the Pearl of the Orient or the Gateway to the East or the Land of the Swaying Palm (‘Pinang’ is a local word for a kind of palm), and such like, and as such, there were lots of tourists on the island. There are no longer lots of tourists in Penang today because of a number of factors that shall not be included in this write-up. But suffice to say that during the Vietnam War, Penang was one of a handful of R&R (‘Rest and Recreation’) places in South East Asia for American troops stationed in Vietnam. One does not need to be a mathematics professor to work out that the number of petty crimes is directly proportional to the number of tourists in the area, so there must have been quite a lot of stuffs that the thieves had nicked and had wanted to get rid of.

I was at the Thieves’ Market last Sunday. I hasten to add that I was there not as a thief nor as a fence but as a curious spectator from across the fence. My first impression was that the Thieves’ Market occupied a very large area indeed, and it was very crowded. And yes, I saw the fence. What I mean here is that I saw the metal barrier that ran around the perimeter of the market and not the two legged fence who received stolen stuffs from the thieves, although I would not disagree that I could have seen the fence who received stolen stuffs from the thieves without knowing that he was such a person. Neither would I necessarily want to be introduced to such a person considering I don’t have stolen stuffs to sell.

One of the first things I saw being sold at the Thieves’ Market were small automobile parts, such as a steering wheel, and I remember wondering which car that steering wheel must have been stolen from. I imagined the owner would have bought himself a replacement by now, and if he had not, he was welcome to buy the steering wheel back from the Thieves’ Market. It must evoke a different level of emotional feeling recognizing things that you have lost at a Thieves’ Market.

Then I saw people selling used mobile phones and mobile phone accessories, and I was certain that they must have been stolen from other people who had their handbags snatched. Then there was an old man in his sixties selling a very old spring loaded record player, and to show that it still worked, he wound up his equipment and played a record on the record player for all to hear. For sure, he was not playing Britney Spears’ “Baby One More Time”; more like a Chinese opera from the end of the Ching dynasty.

I also spotted an old black coloured clothes iron made from cast iron, the type that my late grandmother used to iron clothes, weighing as much as a brick.

I also spotted old coins, old sewing machines, used machine parts, old magazines, old cigarette packets like “Players”, “Torchlight”, “Consulate”, old Japanese currency used during the Japanese Occupation, used shoes, lots of used children’s toys, used tools, and even a girly calendar from the eighties.

The Penang Thieves' Market; it's worth a visit indeed. Where is the Thieves’ Market located? Why, next to the Penang State Prison of course, where else?