When the buildings fall and the roads vanish

Our latest contribution to the Nostalgic Singapore blog is an article from Greg Lawrence who talks about his experiences growing up in Short Street, close to Selegie Road and Middle Road. Greg has recently started a new initiative called 'Old Newspaper' which aims at helping those who are turned away from employment because of their age or who are slightly physically challenged.

My memories of growing up here in Short Street will never be erased...

In 2003, I was walking in Chinatown with my friend who was a specialist black and white photographer. After a while, she noticed that I was a little more quiet than usual, and asked why. I paused for a few seconds and then told her I was listening to the different Chinese dialects I recognised growing up in Short Street. I could hear Sei Yap, Hakka, Hockhew, Hainanese, Teo Chew and some other obscure ones. A certain sadness filled me as I realised that in 10 years or so, these dialects would disappear, and from what I hear these days, some already have.

I grew up in an SIT flat in Short Street, on the 3rd floor of block 2, facing the Selegie Primary School which at that time was the tallest school in Singapore. Every day I would look out the window and see taxi drivers stop at the little tea shop for their break. This was a really ‘old style’ shop where in the middle of the table, there would be a tray with a clay kettle full of tea and small clay cups. 

After drinking, one would pay for the tea at some prescribed price. I never knew the actual price as Yakult, Fruitee ice cream, the famous Rochor soya bean drink and 'sng paus' dominated my taste buds. It was such a vibrant neighbourhood, full of different types of activities, hawkers, games and a fair share of rivalries.

My grandfather and I when I was about 8 years old. Notice the Rediffusion box on the upper right hand corner, old school record player on my right and the huge floor standing speakers on the bottom left!

My grandfather was quite an influential member of the community, having helped many people with writing English, loans of money that he rarely chased and being a spokesperson for the little kampung we called home. He was good friends with both Rabbis of the Waterloo Street Synagogue, Daniel the father and his son Charlie. 

I visited Charlie once at the Jewish Home on Mount Sophia. He couldn't remember me as he was suffering from dementia but smiled when I brought him biscuits. Biscuits would be the one thing that all children in the neighbourhood would remember this family for. 

Every Saturday, when it was the Sabbath, they could not turn on the lights in the house as it was a restriction in their religion to perform any kind of work. So they would get one of the neighbourhood children to turn on their lights for them and reward them with a dip in their biscuit jar which was miraculously always full. The more entrepreneurial ones, such as yours truly, would gather friends and delegate different lights in each room so we could get a better collection.

My grandfather used to make me come with him to Tekka market every Sunday and I used to try to get out of it as my favourite Spiderman cartoon would be showing. I'm glad he did as he taught me how to choose vegetables, fish and meat; knowledge that I would use later in life as a professional Chef. Only thing is, when he rewarded me with half of his coffee at the market (in the old days people would pour coffee into the saucer to cool it down and leave the other half for later), I would miraculously be left with all the shopping bags! He was nowhere to be found and of course knew that I would find my way home....carrying all those heavy bags! Well, no one said learning would be easy, whatever the subject ;).

Styrofoam paper plane kits we would build and fix with Scotch tape when some parts were broken.

On Short Street there were also other vendors of interest and nostalgia. There was a kind of 'chapalang' shop selling all sorts of stuff like kuti-kuti, candy, dried cuttlefish and toy soldiers as well as some sundry goods. My interest was the Styrofoam aeroplanes and I collected quite a few of them. We had near battles with the kite flyers in the basketball court on who could use the empty space, while there was basketball, badminton and a whole assortment of other activities going on in that little court. The funny thing is that they would never sell the actual plane on the cover, it was always some other model or design. False advertising in its early stages, LOL!

Strange game of Kuti-Kuti I never understood but that didn't prevent me collecting them to bribe other children with.

At the start of Short Street right after Middle Road was this Mamak shop, literally slapped on the wall on one side of the David Elias building. This is where we used to buy so many things before NTUC supermarkets started opening up. I remember going to this shop in 1990 to buy some things for National Service. So I got my shaver, Japanese slippers, comb, some stationery and soap. Then I remembered the soap dish so I asked the man, "Uncle, do you have a soap dish". He kept insisting he didn't even though I could see it in display. So I told him I needed it and he vehemently insisted he doesn't have one. Then it struck me that he might not have understood, so I gave him the Indian twang and said, "Aneh! Soapa Disha!". And that sealed the deal..hahaha!!

Another incident that makes my Mum laugh involves this item below.

Old school "stylo milo" bag in those days

Aged 6 years old, I was the only grandson at the time and, although I wasn't spoiled as my family members were very strict, I had my moments. Peer pressure, only grandson, two sisters constantly running away from me to go on their clandestine trips to the SPCA on Orchard Road..I had enough! So I packed my clothes and toothbrush in a red bag like the one in the photograph and prepared to run away. 

My Mum asked me where I was going and I proudly told her..I was a man and leaving! She said ok and not to forget to be back by tea break. I left, ready to conquer the world, walking with my red chequered bag, which was strangely getting heavier by the minute. 

After a few hours of walking around Peace Centre, and up and down Sophia Road, I was getting hungry and remembered the delicious milk tea and biscuits that would be ready at about 4pm. So that was a very short adventure but it still makes my Mum laugh.
But my fondest memories are about the food.on simple pushcarts like the one in this photograph.

Short Street was surrounded by good food.from Albert Street to Middle Road, from Tekka Market and Serangoon Road to Waterloo and Bugis Streets. I remember Alber Street was like a food Disneyland full of delicious food like Hokkien Mee cooked on a charcoal stove and served in an opeh leaf. 

My Grandfather was really good friends with Fatty Weng, known for his eatery, Fatty's and because of that, I could always jump any queue for take away food if he was sitting at his counter. Caucasian tourists would always fill his shop and the tables that spilled out onto the street. On a pushcart, before the corner provision shop named Nam Thye was Kim Chio, an old Chinese man selling homemade drinks, tikam-tikam (the house always wins type!) and other 'kanna', preserved candies. On the other end was the sarabat stalls serving glorious teh halia, sugee biscuits and cakes, triangular curry puffs; they had their regulars.
 

On a kind of mezzanine floor at Selegie House there was Frankie Boo and his chicken/duck rice shop. Little known to most, he was a race car driver, with living proof as there was a picture of him in his car on the back wall of his shop. Rumour has it that he was also a 'financial advisor' of the day..if you know what I mean. Next to him was a Mee Pok shop that had the best chili I ever tasted...to this day!


Even the Short Street compound had its unique food. There was Bhai who would come by in the afternoons with his 'bread shop' on his head. Delicious local bread and my favourite coconut filled buns. There was also a satay man with this shop slung on his shoulder. He had had really rough and calloused hands making me think he was a hard worker and could slap any one of us into next week!. He had his gravy on one side and the charcoal grill on the other where he would cook fresh satay for you. My friends would distract him as I swiped a few sticks off the grill once he sat down on his little wooden stool. Hey we were kids! 

Another memorable satay shop was in the side lane beside Rex Cinema. With 50 cents, you could get 2 sticks of satay and a delicious chendol to wash it down..such was the simple life and memories of food I had.


Where did all this wonderful food go to? Why are there no stalls or outlets that can reproduce this quality? Are we too 'healthy' these days that our tastes have been forgotten? I spent 7 years in Bali, Indonesia and I would always miss Singapore food. Of course while travelling through Java and in Bali there was nice food too, but there is food... and there is food that touches the heart. 

Those meals that bring back memories of friends, family and colleagues. That remind us of certain conversations, festive seasons while growing up and those events that amazed us, family dinners and such. When I returned to Singapore, I was disappointed to find that tastes had changed, some old hawkers gave up and food in the one hawker centre or food court was not much different from the next. This led me to my current goal...to preserve Singapore's food culture.


My grandfather was a philanthropist, helping the community, always aware of people's needs, helping when he could and had provided all of his children with a good education. He believed the community had to move forward together, regardless of race, language or religion. Now my goal is similar - I want to preserve as many aspects of our food culture while assisting the older community. 


And thus its starts...Old Newspaper
In February 2015, I wrote to our Prime Minister Mr Lee Hsien Loong, sharing my social endeavour with him. I wanted to start my project in Tanjong Pagar, one of the oldest neighbourhoods in Singapore. After his PA replied, I started getting a lot of support from other government agencies and the entity known as Old Newspaper was born. 

The primary function is to help those who are turned away from employment because of their age or who are slightly physically challenged. In tandem, I want to set up all the old style food, some in pushcarts, other carried around, the noodle seller playing 'tok tok' on his little bamboo rod and even a satay man walking around cooking fresh satay in front of the customer's table.
 

Old Newspaper will be decorated like how old Bugis Street or the Orchard Road open air hawker centre was. Chairs and tables don't need to be in matching sets, the overhead lamp shade could be a Carnation Evaporated Milk can, communal seating could be old school desks bound together by cable ties. The cashier would be sitting behind an old sideboard counter like the one you would see in older Hainanese chicken rice shops. 

Hey why not even play scissors, papers and stones to get a discount for your bill? Yes I will definitely have a stored value card for payments, but guess what? The cashier has to get her cashier's card from the Milo tin hanging overhead, suspended by a counter weight like in our old provision shops.
 

Instead of waiting at home and or whiling their time away, our older able bodied staff would be proudly earning some small salary or allowance, that might be supplementing their annuities or allowances from their children. More important is their mental state - they have something to look forward to everyday, new friends to chat (or gossip) with, new skills to learn and new people to meet.


I will set up a little mini museum with the help of my recently acquainted friends from the National Heritage Board, and have Old Newspaper employees as museum guides to narrate to visitors how home grown brands like Singapore Airlines, Cerebos, Khong Guan Biscuits or Tiger Beer developed. I would like to have one auntie or uncle take centre stage in the evenings for a story telling session, sharing how they grew up in their own neighbourhood, how things have changed from the simpler life they knew. Sharing their hardships, happy memories and priceless experience!


For the food, I would tap into the repository of information, recipes and experience that the employees of Old Newspaper have stored in their heads. I would have one of the stall equipped with the bare minimum so that we could showcase one uncle or auntie sharing her favourite recipe, with the majority of the sales going directly to this person.

This is a challenge to activate Singapore's richest resource. We had some ground level interviews on how the older generation feels about employment and its was heart breaking to learn of the challenges these people face. I have the interviews here www.oldnewspaper.co and some voice interviews are supplemented with images of Old Singapore.

This is what I want to do for my community, this is how I want to return my 31 years of Food & Beverage experience. this is my contribution to Singapore and its food culture. Keeping it real, alive and very, very Singaporean...
 
This is me.. A Singaporean!  

Note: While we have made every effort to trace the copyright owners of some of the photographs, it has been a futile experience at times. We do not claim to have copyright to any of the photos except those that belong to Greg.