We were making our regular pilgrimage to the Dagu Lu dvd shops last Sunday. As we crossed the bridge over Yanan Lu we noticed crowds of people milling around in the section of Chongqing lu between Yanan Lu and Dagu Lu, on reaching ground level we found ourselves in the middle of a small market, mostly birds but also bonsai trees and tat (think twenty year old kettle power leads).

There were probably a hundred stores or so, the majority of which were selling birds, bird cages or writhing bamboo bowls of worms which made H’s stomach turn. Also, a large number of Shanghai’s bird loving population had turned up with their bird cages stacked on the back of bicycles and motorbikes and were walking around the market carrying their favourites.

At one store we noticed the store owner very carefully placing down a box and opening a jar of mashed up paste (probably mashed up cockroaches or something equally minging). He opened the box and I was amazed to see that inside were two nests of chicks with mouths wide open, begging for food. The store owner carefully fed them with the paste from the end of a wooden stick, it seems that the birds are pretty much hand-reared from birth and were due to be fed during the market so he had to bring them with him. After feeding the chicks his friend went on to feed the adults in much the same way.

One of the stall owners tells us the market runs every saturday and sunday in the afternoons, best to get there just after lunch though, we walked back through at about 4pm and the majority of the stores had already closed or were closing up. It’s well worth a look if you’re stuck for something to do on a weekend afternoon, if you’re there next weekend you might even bump into us, H wants to buy Bonsai trees!

A couple more photos: