This story about Saint Paul's Hmong Village is part of Home, Made, a collection of stories honoring Asian diasporas creating vibrant communities by weaving their heritages with their American hometowns. Read more here.
In late 2009, when my cousin Maiv told the family that she’d set down a $10,000 deposit on two tables in the produce market at a new shopping center that was opening up in Saint Paul’s Eastside, the collective response was one of uncertainty. Across the city, there was already Hmong Town, a collection of vendors selling household products, traditional clothing, Hmong food, and a green market full of produce from central California’s Hmong farmers. Could this city support a second Hmong market?
“What will it be called?” I asked.
She replied, “Hmong Village.”
I thought then, exactly what I thought of Hmong Town when I heard it for the first time: What a lovely possibility—but is it viable? I had no idea then what I know now: that it would become a center of commerce not only for the Hmong American community across the country but that it would become an integral part of life in Saint Paul and its newest refugee groups, among them the Karen. I also didn’t realize the role that space would play in my own life.
As a child from the refugee camps of Thailand, I was born keenly aware that I belong to a people without a country. When I saw my first globe in second grade, I remember trying to find among all the named places, a spot where my people might call home. I often heard my elderly grandmother talk of her life “long ago and far away, before the guns fell into the hands of the men and broke into the hearts of the women.” It was a life on the high mountains of Laos, in villages and towns filled with Hmong farmers and craftspeople, places of business and belonging. Her words painted a vision of the world I had never known before. As I’ve grown up, I’ve learned we are an ethnic minority, separated as a consequence of war and now scattered around the world, from France to Australia to the United States of America, and many nations in between.
I was six years old when my family was resettled in St. Paul, Minnesota as refugees of war in 1987. We were part of the biggest influx of southeast Asians to enter the country. The Minnesota waiting for us had no idea who we were, let alone the history and circumstances that had brought us to its doors. Growing up, I saw the Hmong community gather during our New Year’s festivities in cold November and the Fourth of July soccer tournaments in hot July. It was then that I heard Hmong music blast from loudspeakers, smelled the scent of grilled Hmong sausage wafting through the air, and saw the bright red and green of our embroidered clothing glint under the sun or the fluorescent lights atop old stadiums.
In November of 2010, Hmong Village opened its doors to the community and changed what it meant to be Hmong in Saint Paul. Instead of waiting the year out for those precious few days to gather and be Hmong together, we had a physical space to call our own where vendors were selling Hmong films and clothing, Hmong food, and herbs and spices year-round. Above and beyond this, it became a place where we could move freely among each other, without explaining who we were or what we were doing here.
For nearly a decade, Maiv stood behind her two tables, filling them with produce and selling boxes of fresh greens to Hmong and non-Hmong shoppers alike. When she was ready to open her law practice, my older sister Dawb chose to rent a stall between the bubble tea lady and a shoe store. I stood beside her as the contractors put up her sign, “Village Lawyer.”
Recently, I asked her why she opened up her “law firm” at the Hmong Village. She answered, “The people I serve live here on the east side of Saint Paul. This is where they shop. This is where they gather. This is a place where our lives can be lived with a measure of dignity and pride.”
Dawb and Maiv are just two of the more than one hundred vendors at Hmong Village. From tax preparers to herbalists, anything a Hmong person may need can be found in the sprawling shopping complex—coconut bubble tea, crisp-fried sesame balls, timely haircuts, and bitter tree bark to suppress winter coughs. From industrial toilet paper to cooking pots big enough to feed entire villages; from vendors who speak only Hmong to vendors who are fluent in a multitude of languages like Lao, Thai, French, and English; from newborn babies to bent-over old ladies, Hmong Village is a place you go to to experience the diversity of Hmong America.
Hmong Village is also a place where the variety of the world enters into our community. It was lovely when the bubble tea shops started including mangonada on their menus as a response to the growing clientele from Latin America who missed the spicy tanginess of tamarind taruga sticks dipped in ice-cold, sweet, and spicy mango slushies with chunks of fresh fruit. And when Hmong vendors in the produce sections started learning how to count in S’gaw—a language of the Karen refugee families—more people soon filled the market's aisles after discovering fruits and vegetables familiar to them. You just have to visit during lunch hour, when groups of office workers, families, and students gather at the food court, to witness the racial and ethnic diversity of the immigrant communities of the Twin Cities.
For years now, I’ve taken the students at the various classes I teach to end-of-semester meals at Hmong Village. This past spring, a graduate class of writers and I gathered around containers of steaming hot sticky rice, plates of papaya salad, bowls of curry noodles, and grilled meats. Sandesh, a student from Nepal, was delighted to see the bunches of green Thai bananas, the spiky red rambutans, and the clusters of longans. Others were dazzled by the hand-embroidered clothing on plastic mannequins outside the long lines of vendors who specialize in traditional Hmong designs. Each time and every year, my students have communicated their surprise that such a place even exists.
Maiv was one of the earliest micro-entrepreneurs who believed that Saint Paul would be able to support another Hmong shopping center—and that it would then do its part in bringing to this city the richness of our people, the sights and sounds that call us to each other, and gift us with bits of home in the bigness of a world where belonging is hard to come by.
Where to eat, shop—and cut your hair—at the Hmong Village
For Hmong Clothing and Fashion, head straight to Stall No. 95. Flanked by mannequins in Hmong garments, this stall features traditional clothing and embroidery. And yes, you can try the outfits before you buy them.
For fresh produce, Booth No. 213, like many of its neighbors, never fails to impress with its bountiful fruits and vegetables, from bundles of fresh bamboo to containers full of plump logans.
If you are hankering after steak, stop by Santi’s in the food court. He features a Crazy Steak that is prepared to order, tender and juicy.
Sticky rice and sausage is something well worth trying here. While each vendor specializes in their own sausage recipe, Grace’s Diner features no less than four different recipes, each with a specific blend of herbs and spices.
Sida Kitchen’s papaya salad is different from the other vendors because it features fresh, ripe mango (with the skin on), and traditional shredded papaya in a sweet, savory, spicy sauce that will make your mouth water and pucker all at once.
If you find yourself in need of a haircut, pop in at Louev Salon where Pa Houa Lor delivers an excellent (and efficient) haircut at very reasonable prices.
Kao Kalia Yang is an award-winning writer from the Hmong American community. She writes books for both adults and children and is a Guggenheim fellow in nonfiction. Yang lives in Saint Paul, Minnesota with her family.
