Being known as one of the biggest Chinatowns in the world, modern-day Cho Lon (big market) refers to the area of District 5 and 6 of Saigon, where a major group of Chinese are residing.
However, what you might have not known about this Chinatown is that it was originally a city called Cho Lon City, which was separate from Saigon. It was once among the most important commercial and cultural centers in Southern Vietnam.
After hundreds of years of formation and development, the streets and alleys in the Saigon - Cho Lon area still retain their cultural beauty, becoming an appealing tourist attraction.
How Cho Lon Was Born
In the seventeenth century, a group of Chinese that did not follow the Qing Dynasty left China to settle in Dang Trong (Cochinchina) and founded Minh Huong Village. The development of the village led to the emergence of generations of mixed-race Vietnamese-Chinese people, who dressed like the Vietnamese but spoke Cantonese.
Later, the Minh Huong people established Tan Kieng market, which became a bustling business attraction of Chinese people from all over. However, with the high level of immigration of Chinese due to political unrest and the increasing needs for trading, a larger market got to be established and called Cho Lon. Over time, the area grew in size, scope and population and became Cho Lon City in 1865.
The Scars Of History
Under Vietnamese feudal regimes, Saigon and Cho Lon were single towns, running different functions based on their own geographical-social-economical features. Saigon became the political-cultural center, while Cho Lon was known as the town of trade and religion. This reciprocal combination had caused Saigon-Cho Lon becoming one of the remarkable economic centers in Southeast Asia at that time.
Cho Lon took shape along the Ben Nghe canal and the banks of narrow canals. Along both sides of the canal, some houses were built as hotels for Chinese merchants. The main products being traded were rice, fish and salt, with rice being the main product at the time. Therefore, Chinatown soon became the rice capital and wholesale point in Southern Vietnam and neighborhood areas.
“Chinese people from China have been doing business in Vietnam for hundreds of years. However, since the 1940s, many families, wanting to escape the Sino-Japanese war, chose Saigon, especially the Cho Lon area (including today's districts 5, 6, 8, 11) to settle down because of its prosperous conditions,” Mr. Sanh, whose family immigrated from China to Vietnam in 1930, shared.
To accommodate the religious needs of the Cantonese community, two significant structures were built: Giac Lam pagoda (1744) and the Ba Thien Hau pagoda (1760). These buildings not only reflect the socio-commercial growth within a bustling town of Chinese trade but also illustrate a harmonious integration of religion that provided both physical and spiritual support to the inhabitants.
In 1931, during the French colonial period, they merged both the cities of Saigon and Cho Lon to form an area known as Saigon-Cho Lon, which was soon dissolved following Vietnam's gain of Independence from the French in 1955. Consequently, the name Cho Lon was officially dropped whereby this part of the city is included and treated as Saigon as a whole.
Today, the Cho Lon area still preserves its cultural, architectural and religious values. Notably, the temples and guildhalls appear untouched by time, and hundred-year-old restaurants, hotels and commercial streets still exist until now.
Although both names Cho Lon and Saigon have disappeared from the administrative map and are no longer place names, modern people still consider the Nguyen Hue - Le Loi intersection as the center of Saigon, and the area in District 5 and 6, where many Chinese people live, as the center of Cho Lon.
The Development Of Names
Then Cho Lon Market, Now Binh Tay Market
After a period of operation, Cho Lon became too narrow; therefore, a Chinese trader named Quach Dam used his own money to build Cho Lon Moi (New Cho Lon), today's Binh Tay market.
Meanwhile, the name Cho Lon now refers to a busy area stretching over half of District 5 and a considerable part of District 6. Binh Tay Market is today referred to as "The New Market of Cho Lon" by the local Vietnamese-Chinese living in the area. Generally, the local Vietnamese also refer to it simply as Cho Lon, Binh Tay market, or New Cho Lon.
Saigon Could Be Orignalled Named Cho Lon
When Minh Huong became an important commercial center of Southeast Asia, there arose a need for written transactions. People write the name Cho Lon in Chinese as 堤 岸, the Sino-Vietnamese sound is Đề Ngạn, the Cantonese sound is Thày Ngòn, transliterated into Vietnamese as Saigon.
Many generations of scholars still have not reached a consensus on the origin of the name Saigon. In many research works, Saigon currently has 3 most highly appreciated explanations.