Binh Tay Market

Binh Tay Market was built, or at least heavily financially supported, by a Chinese businessman named Guoyan better known as Quach Dam, (1863–1927), originally hailing from Chaozhou in Guangdong.

Quach Dam operated his businesses under the trade name of Thong Hiep, but he was best known by his nickname "Handicapped Thong" among local Chinese. He started out very poor, making a living by recycling garbage and other used material; later, he began to enter into other types of businesses, in which he earned his fortune. There used to be a life-size bronze statue of Thong Hiep standing right in the center of the Binh Tay Market, surrounded by four bronze lions, and four bronze dragons spitting water into the fountain under in which the statue of Thong was standing. The full size statue of Thong was replaced with a smaller glass altar sometime between 1976 and 1980 for unknown reasons. Nowadays, that statue is located in the Fine Art Museum of Ho Chi Minh city. The four bronze lions and dragons are still standing as of 2007.