Four-wheeled wooden carts are especially designed for showcasing snacks and storing utensils or Snacks on wheels

Four-wheeled wooden carts are especially designed for showcasing snacks and storing utensils, ready to serve up a dish for the hungry passerby. The sellers often blare their wares over loudspeakers, a trend that’s become a feature of inner city Yangon street life over the past few years.Ko Aung has been in the trade for 10 years, selling different items such as boiled sweet potato, corn and beans. He now sells laphat thote (tea leave salad), relying on movie-goers near Thwin cinema downtown.

“It has been about 20 years that Yangon sees vendors working with wheeled-carts. Wheeled-carts are useful for vendors who can’t afford a shop’s rental fees,” Ko Aung said.Ko Aung crafted his own cart. With a yellow-painted roof, his heavy cart weighs around 48kg. The other vendors order carpenters to craft and design their carts, using discarded timber.

As a native of Mandalay region, he had moved to Yangon about 27 years ago and found that using the wheeled-cart to sell his products would save him rental fees and earn him more. “I can give my wife around K10,000 for the family to buy a meal a day. On top of all that, the snacks I can sell the snacks directly to the customers and travel from one street to another,” Ko Aung said.

San Myo Kyaw came from Thon-khwa, about 40 kilometers from Yangon. He moved to the city to rent an apartment in Taung Lone Pyan quarter, Pazudaung, with three other cart-wheeling vendor friends. They sleep and keep their four carts in the apartment after a day’s hard work.

He sells mont oak kalay cooked in a molded pan. The taste is similar to that of the Japanese delicacy takoyaki, which are little fried balls of octopus. He learnt to cook mont oak kalay from his uncle who also sells the same delicacy. His cart is often seen parked on 46th Street which is near a state-owned school. Hungry students gather around his cart when the school closes.

“The cart is the best place to store everything after our work. We can move from here to crowded places to attract eaters,” San Myo Kyaw said.

Around 9pm, his snack sells out. Every day, he earns between K20,000 and K30,000 and supports his family with six siblings.

Being a “snacks on wheels” vendor also means avoiding YCDC’s unexpected fines of street vendors, and seizure of their property, if they are deemed to be working in prohibited areas.

The practice of street vending is a vexed issue for the officials of Yangon City Development Committee. The offence carries a fine of up to K100,000 and the offender will face up to one month in prison for second offence.It causes pain to both sides. Officials sometimes face attacks by the rude vendors, and arrests can also provoke public sympathy towards the poor sellers.

Last month, a video of an orange vendor in Bogyoke markets was filmed and shared on Facebook. The video shows the oranges being destroyed with an axe-wielding official, an action that attracted a lot of enraged comments from the general public.

Aung Pyae sells spicy and sour seasonal fruit salad on his cart, and walks a beat from 33rd to 40th Streets, and along Bogyoke Aung San Road. Every day, he earns between K35,000 and K40,000. “Selling snacks on wheeled-cart is more convenient. We can run easily,” Aung Pyae said.