Chicken soup for the hawker centre soul

From Straits Times Forum:

Nov 30, 2004

Roaches in food, unhygienic hawkers

IN THE last few weeks, I found a baby cockroach in my food on two occasions. In the first incident, the cockroach was dead while, in the second, it was alive.

Lest anyone thinks that dead was better than alive, it was not. The live cockroach scurried out from the food when I opened the plastic bag and I threw the whole packet away. I discovered the dead one only after I had eaten half of the food.

Last Monday, I had a late dinner at Lau Pa Sat when I saw the woman at a drinks stall stick one of her fingers into a cup of ice. The woman at a carrot-cake stall was cutting her nails.

Lau Pa Sat serves not only the office crowd in the area but also tourists wanting a bite of local food.

I had previously reported another hawker at Lau Pa Sat for handling money and then using the same hand to grab onions to garnish a plate of fried rice, but was subsequently informed that checks did not reveal such errant practices.

Would it help if members of the public take pictures?

Lee Liang Fan

First of all, let me just say that I absolutely detest cockroaches. I wish they were all dead. I can't wait to kill every cockroach whenever I see one. Slippers, newspapers, even textbooks had been used by me to kill cockroaches before. So you can imagine the uproar if I were to find cockroaches in my food. Therefore I absolutely do not condone having cockroaches in food. (Who does anyway?)

But having said that however, I am slightly bemused and disturbed by the above writer. One suspects that the writer is unfairly trying to portray hawkers in a bad light. The Straits Times forum had through the years degenerated from an avenue for high quality debate to a written version of coffeeshop complains. The recent debates about the advantages and disadvantages quite rightly had a high level of exposure in the forum because it concerns the whole nation. But the above issue? Everybody has their fair share of experiences with dirty food and dirty hawkers. Does the above experience add anything of value to other readers? Hardly. Does the above incident of such utmost importance that our continual survival and welfare is affected by it? I don't think so. So why use the forum to express such issues in the first place?

Secondly, it paints a very bad impression of hawkers in general. Firstly, the writer mentioned that he found 2 cockroaches inside his food in the past few weeks without any further explanation. How many weeks? Was it from the same stall? If it was the same stall, why did he or she go back again? Did she tell the hawker? If (as is more likely) it wasn't from the same stall, then lumping them together without any further explanation is unfair to hawkers in general because they may be mere coincidences. If they were stalls in the same area, there might be cause for concern as there may be lots of cockroaches in that area, but again this letter does not help anything at all.

The writer also wrote the following: Lau Pa Sat serves not only the office crowd in the area but also tourists wanting a bite of local food. Why mention that line at all? Are we supposed to maintain cleanliness only if tourists are around? The hygiene level of food for locals is less important than that for tourists? Obviously not! If the writer had been so genuinely concerned about the level of hygiene, it should have been for everyone and there is no need to include that line.

The writer also said that the woman at the drinks stall stuck one of her fingers into a cup of ice. Again there was no further explanation. Was it deliberate? Was it the way she held the cup or what? I can find no reason why a normal person would deliberately stick her finger into a cup of ice. Indeed, I don't think I had ever seen a person stick his finger into a cup deliberately. Again, there being no further explanation by the writer paints a very unfair picture of hawkers in general.

The writer also said that he saw a lady cutting her nails at a carrot cake stall. What the fuck is wrong with that? Without further explanation or description, who the fuck will know what is wrong with that? If it was at a table outside the stall, what is wrong if she washes her hands later? If it was done inside the stall and she was for example standing over a rubbish bin, what is wrong with that? The only problem is if she was standing next to the wok or over the food and some of her nails got into the food. But without further explanation, this again puts hawkers in general in a bad light.

Being a hawker's son, I can fully understand the difficulties with the whole issue of hygiene. That is not to say I condone unhygienic practises. It is of course good to be able to put on gloves (plastic, or rubber or whatever) to handle foodstuffs and then take off gloves to handle cash and coins. In an ideal world, that is what it should be.

However, one must understand that using such practises involves - to use an economic term - transaction cost. Or in lay man's terms, it is too leh-ceh. Firstly, there are 2 main types of gloves. One type is those transparent plastic type which is tight but when u put it on it pretty much feels like not having gloves on at all as it still allows you to be rather flexible. Unfortunately, it being tight means that it takes a hell lot of effort and a significant amount of time to put it on or off. Another type is those big rubber kind which allows you to take it on or off very easily. However, putting on the rubber gloves also mean that you are not very flexible and handling food with it takes a bit more time and inconvenience. Either way, this increases the time to handle your orders. If patrons are willing to wait, everything is fine. However, from my parent's experiences, the niao ones who mind hawkers handling money and food with bare hands are very often the ones who complain when you take time to serve them and bring them their orders and all. They are also the ones who complain about a slight bit of dirt here and there. If you want hawkers to use gloves, you have to be prepared to sacrifice a bit more time here and there. Hawkers are not machines who are able to put on gloves in a split second.

Similarly, if you want to eat at a popular hawker centre, you have to be prepared to put up with a bit of dirt and also sacrifice a bit of time waiting for seats. The high turnover of people unfortunately means that a bit of food or drink will be spilt somewhere somehow. Insisting on a high standard of hygiene is admirable but ultimately unrealistic. Something to work towards, but not be too harsh upon. If you can't stand a bit of dirt here and there, go and eat at fastfood restaurants. You might just be served food which had dropped onto the floor.

Hawkers are also sometimes being unfairly screwed left, right and centre. Remember Sars? Was there any proof that Sars were spread through hawker centres? As far as I know no (please correct me if I am wrong). But did you all know what happened? Hawker centres were made to close entirely for one day every now and then during the Sars period to carry out "spring cleaning". Even up till now, my parents' food centre will close for one day every other month for spring cleaning. On paper it sounds good, maintaining cleanliness and hygiene and all. But on the ground, what are the implications? Every now and then, a hawker would have to close his stall. He has to inform his suppliers he would not want any supplies for that day. More importantly, he would have to lose a day's earnings. I think I am lucky that my parents are able to handle not having earnings for a day every other month, but is it so for everyone? I don't think so. It also unfairly penalises those who make genuine attempts to clean their stall everyday after they stop selling. By forcing everyone to stop business for a day to clean, you are just decreasing the incentives for someone to clean the stall everyday. Why bother? You would still be forced to stop business for a day to clean. Of course if the guys on the left or right of your store are cleaning, you selling your food also doesn't make sense as say the cleaning liquid may get into yur store and worse still your food blah blah, but it still doesn't change the fact that it is unfair. Especially so when you clean your stop on the mandatory rest day, the person owning the stall besides yours comes late, sits there drink coffee and read newspaper and leaves 2 hours earlier than you and in the end the inspector never even come to check who had been cleaning and who had not been cleaning.

And remember when the food centre near your block underwent upgrading and after that you were impressed with the cleaner and brighter look? But then you were not too impressed with the prices? Fishball noodles which sold for 2 bucks suddenly became 3 bucks? Well for all of you out there who don't know, rents for the stalls generally increase after renovation. And before you complain about the price, spare a thought for the poor hawker whom you think is trying to cheat you out of your hard earned money. They either had to stop work for 6-9 months while the hawker centre was undergoing renovation (meaning no income) or they have to temporarily move to another location, having to compete all over again for new customers. When they come back, they find that their rents had been substantially increased, to earn a decent amount, of course they have to increase prices. They would also have to once again try to win back their old regular customers who in the meantime might have found other places to shop and eat. Note that I am not saying that you can't complain about the prices, but think of the flip side as well. Development comes at a price. And the price can be nasty at times. But it's not nasty to you only most of the time.

Yeah so after so much ranting, what IS my point? My point is I hope Singaporeans can be more responsible when they pen letters to the Straits Times forum. Poorly written letters with no proper description only serves to paint a biased and unfair picture of the subject. The majority may not be like that at all. More generally, whenever you eat or shop at any place (not just hawker centres but fastfood restaurants, high class restaurants too) don't complain at the slightest thing. (That's a lot coming from me the ultimate complain king :P) If food or drink is spilt, it's most likely to be an accident. If your order is wrong, think about whether you had made yourself clear while you were ordering. If it doesn't really matter, why not just accept it? You might just find another delicious dish! If the service is slow, don't be pissed at the waiter first. If the cook in the restaurant is over worked because the owner refuses to hire more cooks, hardly the fault of the cook and waiter isn't it?

Now that's what I call food for thought.