Children dart here and there playing tag. A monument to Robert Louis Stevenson, topped by a bronze galleon, stands in the northwest corner. Today the narrow streets of Chinatown are lined with equally narrow shops, with tiny altars tucked into wall niches where incense is burned for the gods. Jewelry shops gleam with 18 karat gold and sparkle with rubies, sapphires, opals, imperial jade carvings, miniature onyx musical instruments, massive mabe pearls and coral. Butchers pile pork rind and chicken feet in shallow pans and hang tea-smoked ducks, pork ribs and skinny sausages from suspended window racks.
Excited shoppers cluster around wash tubs filled with fish struggling in the last throes of life.
An oversized rock cod causes a pedestrian jam. Eel, octopus, squid, clams, mussels, snails and conch fill wooden crates. Tanks are packed with crayfish and lobster. Fish kept in holding tanks are chosen live by haggling shoppers, then knocked senseless on a tiled slab. Herb and tea shops display strange looking dried roots and plants promising well-being and longevity.