Eat already?
-No?
Let's talk about it!
-Yes?
Let's talk about it anyway!
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| What a long queue, it must be a good place... or maybe the stall is just really slow at serving? In any case, in Singapore a long line is seen as an indicator of quality food and is a form of advertising. |
In Singapore, food is a massive thing.
Wait, what is this John? Are you writing a food blog? The body snatchers must have finally got to you...
Wait, it's OK, below you will find no tedious descriptions of the hottest places to eat in town, no 'Top 15 Secret Foodie Heavens in SG' click-bait malarkey. There are no painstakingly composed food portraits to drool over, or thinly veiled advertisements for the latest place from which I have managed to cadge a free lunch.
The reason I am starting my series of life in Singapore pieces with food is that it is the best (and least offensive, haha!) entry into studying the national psyche.
I get the impression that many people here seem to think about food continuously, maybe because many of them seem to actually eat very little to remain fashionably thin, not that I'd know anything about that... Food quickly becomes the subject of any small-talk and every incidental conversation but it is also the fallback topic in any social interaction.
Therefore, starting with 'what's there to eat?' in Singapore is like starting with 'talking about the weather' in the UK; it's a natural choice.
I get the impression that many people here seem to think about food continuously, maybe because many of them seem to actually eat very little to remain fashionably thin, not that I'd know anything about that... Food quickly becomes the subject of any small-talk and every incidental conversation but it is also the fallback topic in any social interaction.
Therefore, starting with 'what's there to eat?' in Singapore is like starting with 'talking about the weather' in the UK; it's a natural choice.
Exhibit A
Food is also being continuously photographed, shared, blogged about and discussed on social media, yes I know this is quite common elsewhere in the world, and yes I am fully aware that I may have been living on Mars the past few years, however, in Singapore the food obsession is notable by the sheer quantity of human effort that goes into it and that pretty much everywhere else people are sick of looking at what other people are having for dinner. The hunger (sorry) with which the Singaporean seeks out new and somewhat sensational dining experiences is highly notable, their free time being invested in the research, travel to and discussion of their meals. This is eating as leisure, pure and simple, then add everything that goes with that, and we may well have a taste (sorry again) of the future.
In my defence, it is my opinion that a preoccupation with food is a defining characteristic of Singaporean culture (or at least they have been told it is, which is interesting in another way). I find it fun to ask why and formulate some hypotheses as to why, which again may or may not just be my opinion, it depends on how offended you are, dear reader.
In my defence, it is my opinion that a preoccupation with food is a defining characteristic of Singaporean culture (or at least they have been told it is, which is interesting in another way). I find it fun to ask why and formulate some hypotheses as to why, which again may or may not just be my opinion, it depends on how offended you are, dear reader.
To try to explain my observations to you, I am afraid I am going to have to give you a little history lesson....
According to various arcane sources, it is said that the food culture of Singapore lurched into being when Prince Seri Teri Buana of the kingdom of Sri Vijaya stopped off for a coconut at he coconut stand (see what i did there?) one stiflingly-hot Thursday afternoon in the 12-somethings before he cut up the coast, Malacca way. It was he it is said, who, out of the corner of his eye, inexplicably spotted a lion, thousands of miles from its nearest habitat, doing some lion stuff at the edge of the jungle near the coconut stall. In the face of all sorts of logic and the fact he was slap bang in the middle of tiger country, he decided to name the place Singa - lion Pura - city.
According to various arcane sources, it is said that the food culture of Singapore lurched into being when Prince Seri Teri Buana of the kingdom of Sri Vijaya stopped off for a coconut at he coconut stand (see what i did there?) one stiflingly-hot Thursday afternoon in the 12-somethings before he cut up the coast, Malacca way. It was he it is said, who, out of the corner of his eye, inexplicably spotted a lion, thousands of miles from its nearest habitat, doing some lion stuff at the edge of the jungle near the coconut stall. In the face of all sorts of logic and the fact he was slap bang in the middle of tiger country, he decided to name the place Singa - lion Pura - city.
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| The 'Merlion' on Sentosa, It's like a lion with added Mer, get it? Invented by the Singapore Tourism Board as a national mascot sometime in the 1970's, the original Merlion shoots a jet of water from its mouth giving rise to the local term 'to merlion' for projectile vomiting. |
That is about all of the 'legendary' stuff I'm willing to relay or repeat, the national mythology makes way more of it however, it is like The British Museum having a display about how Brutus founded Britain, indeed, Singapore even has a stone. (fairly important note: on a recent visit to the Singapore National Museum, the exhibit I have alluded to here has been replaced by something decidedly less mythological).
Then many, many, many years later, in 1819, the history of modern Singapore began when a British East India Company man named Thomas Stamford Raffles cut a deal with the local aristocracy (spoiler- they got rather rich) by throwing British support behind a local prince who had been away from court when his father, the previous Shah, popped his cloggs and as a result of succession customs, had been usurped by his younger half-brother. The Prince became Hussein Shah of Johor and got some of his kingdom back. Raffles struck this deal in order to expand his company's influence in the Malay Archipelago by establishing a free port (technically an entrepôt) at the mouth of the Singapore River.
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| The statue of Raffles near the Singapore River where he is said to have come ashore. Dashing, what-what? |
In doing so, he intentionally challenged the dominance of the Dutch East India Company by selecting just about the best location to control sea trade between south Asia and east Asia, especially the opium trade with China. The Dutch were edged out incrementally, eventually acknowledging British control of Malaysia, maritime trade had been cornered.
Unintentionally, Raffles established a set of circumstances (perhaps by just enabling the ones that were already in place) that, to a large extent, determined the direction of the city and republic. The racial composition of its people, their languages, their cultures and social conservatism, the love of the uniform, for order, laws and rules, even the width of the pavements and of course the subject of this blog; its culinary culture.
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| Still very much the global shipping hub, assorted vessels in the straits off Singapore. |
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| Masjid Sultan on Bussorah Street at the heart of the old Malay district. |
Next into the mix came the Chinese, who have been trading in the region for a very long time. With the growth of trade came more money making opportunities and more Chinese settlement. An interesting early fusion cuisine was formed when the Chinese merchants married local Malay women and produced the Baba-Nyonya people (Baba the men, Nyonya the women). This mixture produced what is today known as Peranakan or Nyonya food.
Indian Influence to the food of Singapore is another part of the mix. Before the spread of Islam into the region, the Malay Peninsula was home to a series of cultures heavily influenced by Indian culture. Regional traders moved influences across the Bay of Bengal. Then later, during the colonial period, large numbers of workers and settlers came along with the influence of the British East India Company.
I feel I must also mention another culinary fusion tradition, this time unique to the region. The union of early European settlers from Portugal and later Holland with the locals formed an evolving community in all of the Straits Settlements, originally known as the Kristang people, but after successive waves of other European mixing, are know as 'Eurasian' in Singapore today, or, most amusingly 'Other' in the 4 races government classification system.
All of the cultures brought together by the port influenced each other to produce their own unique local versions of their traditional cuisine, as well as a whole bunch of new dishes.
WHEN IT COMES TO FOOD WE ARE ALL THE SAME
One notable trait of Singaporeans is the symbolism of food when it comes to the relationship between people of different races. People will speak about their food preferences to signal their status in and appreciation for their multicultural society. "I like x food, but I'm y race, so I'm all right with people x," or something like that. To my over-sensitised British ears, THIS SOUNDS RIDICULOUS, I can imagine the reaction people in the UK would get if they went around saying, "I'm alright by Indians because I love to eat curry," or something similar, (in fact, wasn't there a joke about this in East is East?) maybe we Westerners are just too sensitive these days?
However, here it actually works, people genuinely get the warm fuzzies when somebody waxes lyrical about their love for nasi lemak, or the heartfelt patriotism stirred when someone states, "We all love chicken rice." Government ministers show they are 'just like you' by wolfing down plastic plates full of steaming sloppy stuff from hawker centres (after standing in line for 30 minutes of course, you know, because they're just like you).
Heck, even Singapore's own Olympic gold medalist, Joseph Schooling (famous for beating Michael Phelps to gold in the 2016 Olympics), had his food preferences used to affirm his Singaporiness when his nationality was doubted by some who suspected he was secretly 'ang moh' (meaning western, kinda, it means literally 'red head' in hokkien, or maybe tomato, perhaps referring to the red 'glow' northern europeans exhibit in the local climate) and not really Singaporean (i.e. Chinese). In fact, because this anecdote touches on the peculiar form of racism in Singapore, I will discuss it properly in blog 2, 'The Uniform Island'.
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| A typically crowded (and cheerful) lunchtime at a hawker centre |
The thing that strikes me about the food culture in Singapore is that Singaporeans seem to rarely eat at home. They love to eat out! For that matter, many seem to never go home, perhaps the city is a little overcrowded?
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| HDB flats |
The style of food, both 'local' and 'foreign', that Singaporeans prefer determines this to some extent, recipes are often complex and require a very hot wok or some other specialised gas blowtorch-like equipment to prepare. The super hot flame often required is very hot, far too hot for many in the type of housing most common here- The government HDB flat. Strong cooking smells are understandably undesirable in such compact living spaces.Ovens and grills are culturally also very uncommon. The housing situation dictated by the population size, small land area and government strategy must surely determine the trend for eating out.
Worth a watch.
Eating out is also relatively cheap here due to the intense competition between (often small) businesses and low wages given to most involved in the industry. It is said by many that eating out is cheaper than cooking for yourself and certainly less difficult. I would happen to agree, I have found that cooking wholesome food with quality ingredients at home is considerably more expensive and harder work than eating hawker food.
And.
That.
Is.
Precisely.
The.
Point.
Singaporeans don't seem to wonder why their hawker centre plastic platefuls are so cheap compared to buying fresh ingredients, it cannot be just the economy of scale, can it? There is surely a significant gap in ingredient quality and nutritional quantity. It is little wonder that A 2015 report revealed Singapore is now world number 2 for diabetes, and that cardiovascular disease is skyrocketing compared to other Asian countries. It is common knowledge that many local favourites are high in salt, cholesterol, added sugar, MSG and invariably fried in palm oil, sometimes of a prodigious vintage and having the appearance of motor oil. How could it go this wrong?For answers why, we could try going back to a historical narrative, the immigrant population, especially the Chinese, was often a poor population who lived in simple, overcrowded and fire-prone accommodation. Their descendants today are much better off but have retained a cultural predilection for going out (or staying out after school or work)to eat some inexpensive 'street food', in effect, behaving like they still do not have cooking facilities. Even the very wealthy, although having access to air conditioned modern kitchens with all the mod-cons in their condominiums and even a domestic helper/maid or two to help with the more burdensome chores, still regularly go in search of their favourite 'soul food' dining experience. It could also explain partly why the big western fast-food chains are universally popular, in direct contrast to their image in the west, some, such as McDonald's, are seen by many as a healthy option!
There is no doubt many older people say that in the past, they would always eat at home, perhaps these people did not live in the crowded conditions that I referred to earlier. If not, then it must be down to the increased pace of modern living, which has undoubtedly grown more intense over Singapore's modern development, to the point that people simply do not have the time to prepare the food that they would like to eat. There are several related trends that correlate with this theory. The length of the working week has steadily grown over the past 20 years, the GDP per capita continues to rise and many families hire (or aspire to) domestic helpers/maids as they are presumably too busy to do the chores themselves. There is also a lot of anecdotal evidence from the parents of the children I teach and other adults, that their lifestyle is increasingly hectic and eating for the family as done more and more 'on the go'. It may well be a combination of the two.
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| McDonald's- cheap, family friendly and very popular! |
Street Hawkers
Where does a hungry rickshaw puller go to get some carbohydrate for his hungry muscles, or a goods porter or day labourer for that matter? Being a constantly growing port city, Singapore has always been home to multitudes of newcomers, separated from their homes and families, living in some very basic accommodation. Therefore there has always been a niche for the street food hawker selling simple and cheap bowls of rice or noodle based sustenance.
Sometimes just a guy carrying two baskets on the ends of a long stick, other times more substantial little stalls with cooking fires, awnings and a bunch of little stools to sit on, The hawker was omnipresent for much of the history of Singapore. They would cluster around popular places like cinemas and shopping streets, often cluttering the thoroughfare to the extent traffic found it really nearly impossible to pass. I suppose eating as a form as leisure started back then. However, eating out was nowhere near as common as it is today and was seen as a luxury by most.
Hawker Centres
All this hawker business was far to messy and unsanitary for the new independent Singapore. Hawkers created a lot of food waste and patrons invariably littered the floor with vermin-attracting rubbish. The government realised that to clean up the city, they needed to clear up the streets and their large, unregulated hawker population. So that's what they did.
The districts famous for their unofficial street food were first 'regulated', then later forcibly cleared from the mid-1960s to the 1980s, the people who ran these stalls had the option of moving to a stall in a coffee shop or one of the new hawker centres, the first being constructed in 1971, though for the life of me I cannot find its name.
The new hawker centres moved the preparation, cooking and sale of food into neat uniform rows of three-walled units or 'stalls' inside a roofed building with the minimum basic hygiene standards provided, running water,a sink and a gas supply to end cooking over smoky coals. Cooking smells, smoke and suchlike are exhausted into the local atmosphere by extractor fans.
Each unit's equipment can differ according to the type of food being prepared, but invariably, there is a glass and steel cabinet at the front so the customer can see a bit of what they are getting. Each stallholder has a standardised space above his/her stall for a signboard. The act of eating was moved off the little wooden seats on the street to communal 'free seating' around the food stalls. The furniture is standardised, utilitarian, laminated, wipe-clean and bolted to the floor in fixed arrangements catering to a variety of group sizes.
The building interior is clad in tiles so that the whole dining area can just be sluiced down at the end of business. Each centre commonly has a centralised dish-washing facility and a team of cleaners to collect the dirty dishes, wipe down the tables and wash up for the stalls. Waste is disposed of properly in a waste centre, the effect being a humongous leap in hygiene over the street hawker.
Now, Singapore is renowned for its cleanliness, random locals, foreigners and occasionally dewy-eyed home-counties florists will trot out the 'such a clean city' speech (you know the one, clean streets, low crime, efficient public transport, summer all the time etc).
This infers so much; that we are living in a clean and orderly society, replete with such good manners, law-abiding citizenry, polite. Ever so much better than its dirty, dangerous, corrupt neighbours, and in the case of home counties florists, undertones of 'why can't it be like that here (perhaps with a racist subtext)?'
Like so many oft-said things about Singapore, this idea is incorrect, a misconception. Singapore is not a clean society, it is instead a cleaned society (I stole that).
Huge numbers of people are employed as cleaners in coffee shops, food courts, hawker centres and in some restaurants to free up waiters from clearing the tables. Often these workers are elderly and visibly have difficulty moving. A few seem that work in the food courts by their facial expressions, seem to be in a fair bit of pain when they go about their duties. A large proportion of customers, freed from the toil of cooking and from responsibility of tidying up after themselves, coat the tables (and sometimes the floor) in food waste, crustacean shells, bones and sodden tissues before swanning off leaving their trays and dished behind to be cleared. The cleaner is then expected to clear the mess up and wipe down the table with a (dirty old) cloth as the next wave of diners is often hovering.
The truth is that the table manners of the 'regular Singaporean' (whatever that is) shock me. It is only the employment of this sub-class of cleaners that keeps the place relatively clean, if just a little bit wet and sticky.
Coffee shops
Coffee shops fill an important niche between hawker and food court, mostly because they are found everywhere. Usually there will be a coffee shop a short distance from where you live or even at the ground floor of your block. They started out way back when, as the name suggests, serving beverages. Today Kopitiam (coffee shop in hokkien) offer a range of hawker-type foods at affordable prices. Most coffee shops can sell bottled beer (surprisingly fresh and cold) so some end up looking a bit like al-fresco pubs with a bunch of crusty old regulars who sit there for hours drinking beer and watching Chinese/Taiwanese soaps on a big TV. Other places are more food orientated and get very busy during peak times. The 'coffee shop' is usually the main tenant while the food stalls sub-let. They serve traditional hawker-type fayre with some interesting specialty foods here and there (frog porridge, anyone?) Some food stalls have become so successful in their own right that they 'make it big, get famous' and move to more luxurious surroundings of a shopping mall or even their own restaurant.
Food Courts
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| Street food 1957 style, Singapore River. |
Sometimes just a guy carrying two baskets on the ends of a long stick, other times more substantial little stalls with cooking fires, awnings and a bunch of little stools to sit on, The hawker was omnipresent for much of the history of Singapore. They would cluster around popular places like cinemas and shopping streets, often cluttering the thoroughfare to the extent traffic found it really nearly impossible to pass. I suppose eating as a form as leisure started back then. However, eating out was nowhere near as common as it is today and was seen as a luxury by most.
Hawker Centres
All this hawker business was far to messy and unsanitary for the new independent Singapore. Hawkers created a lot of food waste and patrons invariably littered the floor with vermin-attracting rubbish. The government realised that to clean up the city, they needed to clear up the streets and their large, unregulated hawker population. So that's what they did.
The districts famous for their unofficial street food were first 'regulated', then later forcibly cleared from the mid-1960s to the 1980s, the people who ran these stalls had the option of moving to a stall in a coffee shop or one of the new hawker centres, the first being constructed in 1971, though for the life of me I cannot find its name.
 |
| A popular hawker centre stall, standard issue long line in evidence. |
Each unit's equipment can differ according to the type of food being prepared, but invariably, there is a glass and steel cabinet at the front so the customer can see a bit of what they are getting. Each stallholder has a standardised space above his/her stall for a signboard. The act of eating was moved off the little wooden seats on the street to communal 'free seating' around the food stalls. The furniture is standardised, utilitarian, laminated, wipe-clean and bolted to the floor in fixed arrangements catering to a variety of group sizes.
 |
| A cleaner doing his job. |
The building interior is clad in tiles so that the whole dining area can just be sluiced down at the end of business. Each centre commonly has a centralised dish-washing facility and a team of cleaners to collect the dirty dishes, wipe down the tables and wash up for the stalls. Waste is disposed of properly in a waste centre, the effect being a humongous leap in hygiene over the street hawker.
Now, Singapore is renowned for its cleanliness, random locals, foreigners and occasionally dewy-eyed home-counties florists will trot out the 'such a clean city' speech (you know the one, clean streets, low crime, efficient public transport, summer all the time etc).
This infers so much; that we are living in a clean and orderly society, replete with such good manners, law-abiding citizenry, polite. Ever so much better than its dirty, dangerous, corrupt neighbours, and in the case of home counties florists, undertones of 'why can't it be like that here (perhaps with a racist subtext)?'
Like so many oft-said things about Singapore, this idea is incorrect, a misconception. Singapore is not a clean society, it is instead a cleaned society (I stole that).
Huge numbers of people are employed as cleaners in coffee shops, food courts, hawker centres and in some restaurants to free up waiters from clearing the tables. Often these workers are elderly and visibly have difficulty moving. A few seem that work in the food courts by their facial expressions, seem to be in a fair bit of pain when they go about their duties. A large proportion of customers, freed from the toil of cooking and from responsibility of tidying up after themselves, coat the tables (and sometimes the floor) in food waste, crustacean shells, bones and sodden tissues before swanning off leaving their trays and dished behind to be cleared. The cleaner is then expected to clear the mess up and wipe down the table with a (dirty old) cloth as the next wave of diners is often hovering.
The truth is that the table manners of the 'regular Singaporean' (whatever that is) shock me. It is only the employment of this sub-class of cleaners that keeps the place relatively clean, if just a little bit wet and sticky.
Coffee shops
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| A busy coffee shop or Kopitiam in the Bugis area. Cleaning lady to the left in orange. |
Food Courts
The open air food courts and hawker centres are for too hot for some people, especially when they want to eat some steaming hot soupy contrivance with a little fire burning under it. The advent of the air-conditioned shopping mall presented an opportunity for cooler dining in the form of the food court.
The set-up is broadly similar to the coffee shop in that tenants rent individual stalls of standard size and them outfit them with specialised cooking equipment. The food is pretty much the same variety as the coffee shop/hawker centre. Especially as the food court business is dominated by a handful of big companies that tend to price out the small independent operators in favour of larger franchises.
As a consequence, on entering a food court you will see a the same kinds of food stalls shuffled in a slightly different order, a lot like the British high street shortly before its current final death-spiral.
There's the drink stall of course, a 'Western' food stall, Yong Tau Foo, wanton noodles, Mala/Fragrant hotpot, 'Japanese' cuisine, maybe 'Korean' too, handmade noodles in soup, Pepper Lunch Express, Indonesian barbecue, fish soup, bak kut teh, Chinese herbal soup, beef/pork noodles, maybe a Chinese-Buddhist vegetarian stall, a congee shop, maybe an Indian or Malay food stall, local favourites/Penang/char kway teow , Mini Wok, maybe Vietnamese, Rojack, claypot rice, Thunder Tea Rice, asian desserts stall and everybody's favourite (allegedly) chicken rice!
That's most of them I think.
As I can't stand that really fishy taste you get from shrimp paste or belacan, my options are somewhat limited making my eating experience somewhat limited in its variety. On the face of it, there is a lot of variety, problem is it's the same variety everywhere you go.
Pasar Malam
Do not despair friends! Not all food is being brought into the sanitised, air-conditioned control of big business, as well as the coffee shop soldiering on in several niche areas such as Geylang, the Pasar Malam (night market) has preserved a great deal of hawker culture too.
Scattered around the neighbourhoods of Singapore are little rough patches of grass that regularly have marquee tents erected upon them. Sometimes it is to mark a specific event, on others there seems to be no particular reason. There is often a little fairground, clothes stalls, plant stalls, furniture, electronics and household goods stalls and, or course, street food.
Notable mention must be made of the love for western fast food in Singapore. In the west, Fast Food chains like McDonald's, KFC, Burger King etc are constantly on the back foot when it comes to public perception of nutrition, food quality and health scares. In Singapore the big franchises seem constantly on the up and up for some reason. Perhaps they fit better into the region's culture of food than they do where they originated. Certainly the customer demographic is different here, a fast food restaurant will be full of all ages and classes of people including a lot of families.
...and back to the question:
So what is it with the food obsession? I cannot pin down why it is so significant in the Singaporean people's interactions with each other, though I think I'm getting close with:
'Chope!'
Now for a curious cultural adjunct somewhat related to the topic.
Choping (pronounced more like chopping or chop meaning to mark/stamp) is, depending on who you ask, a defining characteristic of the eating experience in Singapore. Some say it is necessary in the overcrowded communal areas of food centres, some insist it is a form of good/practical manners (I have no idea) while on the other hand some perceive it as the height of rudeness.
What is for certain is that this behaviour is here to stay until the government bans it (unlikely). How does it work? I'll explain.
A few diners enter a food centre or restaurant with free seating, instead of going straight to the self-service counters to order something, they spend some time walking around, scanning the area (with uncharacteristically sharp observation skills) for an empty table. When they find one that suits the size of their group, they stand for a while by it, just in case a better option presents itself. Having satisfied themselves that they have secured the best possible table (if there is more than one available, there may be a discussion what the relative value of the tables are determined according to a set of unknown variables), the diners then proceed to mark their territory with personal items. The classic item being the very Singaporean pack of pocket tissues, although other items are frequently used.
Business cards, id lanyards, umbrellas and bags are routinely left to designate the table as 'occupied' and I've heard stories of iPhones and laptops being left.
The party then go their separate ways, in busy periods, like lunch in the central business district, they join the back of some very long queues. Meanwhile, the table goes unused. Mysteriously the little packs of pocket tissue work their powerful magic and scare off any potential interlopers. Even those carrying their food (which always seems to be extremely heavy and hot as mentioned earlier) already and looking for a place to sit. Eventually, after a period of time the diners return to their reserved table.
The critical fact is that many people have observed that 'choped' tables that were empty when they sat down to eat remain empty for the duration of the meal and in many cases were still empty when they left.
As you can probably tell, I find this custom ridiculous and impractical. It is however fascinating.
Although comparisons can be drawn with the infamous 'towel wars' between British and German tourists, there are some specific differences that help to explain local culture.
As with the towel wars, choping functions in an environment of behavioural selection. Once the arms-race starts, individuals that have not adopted the habit begin to miss out. Those who choose not to play along are are a distinct disadvantage. Clearly being able to blame the other person for not playing the game as not to feel too much empathy for them is common to both situations, exacerbated in Europe where there are issues of 'cost-value' motivation (i.e. trying to get the most out of the holiday you saved all year for) and the people you are competing 'against' are foreign, the archetypal 'outsider'.
There are, however, some big differences. In Singapore this is an everyday event, the large groups of work colleagues who simply must sit together, the patrons of hawker centres are paying relatively little for their meal as supposed to a Mediterranean holiday and the 'competition' so to speak, are their own neighbours. Most worrying is the way the majority gleefully go along with this selfish behaviour. There's something in the psyche of these well-dressed, lanyard-toting office drones that thoroughly enjoys beating someone to something and smugly hogging it. Even if the person they beat is an elderly person who is searching in vain for a place to sit. Empathy is for losers.
In addition to this, comes the obsession for rules and their enforcement. Most patrons who would like to sweep the tissues and whatnot onto the floor do nothing for fear of causing a scene or getting into an argument. Chope-ing is enforced by bullying, peer pressure and the meekness of its victims.
There was a recent and well-publicised incident (here) where a couple was filmed enforcing their 'right' to reserve a seat. There was some discussion on the practice, but mostly as is usually the case a bit of a witch-hunt and discussion petered out after the convictions. Meanwhile, nothing has changed.
Some people blame colonialism, that could have some mileage especially when it comes to the normalisation of it being OK to put yourself above others- entitlement in other words. The problem with this is that Singapore has been self-governing since 1955 and ceased to be a British colony in 1963, a proportion of the population explosion since then has come from immigration, more in recent years as the birth rate has been well below replacement levels for some time. The proportion of residents whose family lived in colonial Singapore shrinks every year. How much of a cultural effect it has is highly debatable and receding every decade. Therefore, the colonial past is a factor, but not the only one.
Overcrowding undoubtedly is a big factor in the way that people think in Singapore, the number of people in the central areas going out for lunch is staggering. It's not just that, overcrowding is experienced by most ordinary residents throughout life. The effects of living so closely to so many strangers has a curious effect on human psychology and when combined with a social system that encourages competition in all levels, produces such behaviour.
Cultural heritage plays a part too, Kiasu or 'fear of losing out/over-competitiveness' seems ingrained in Chinese Singaporeans, some people will go to illogical lengths to get an advantage or get ahead. Even if doing so is counterproductive. More about this in a later post.
With a society of first, second and (etc, etc) third generation immigrants, it could be said that school is where citizens are formed. Having taught children in Singapore for more than three years, there is something terribly familiar about all this. Students turn up early to reserve the 'best' seats with their bags, even though there are usually enough to go around. The students police their classes, constantly telling each other to do this or that, not to run, not to use this or that colour ink, 'teacher, he did this', not to talk, to get in line. Hell, they love queues. Being first to class is something to boast about. As is being first in the queue to go home. When I sometimes dismiss the class directly from their desks, I can see the angst and discontent in their eyes; they want to line up, after all, they could be first!
I can see a similar mindset in adults, either the school system has infiltrated society or society is modeled after the school system, this could explain the love of uniforms. The Food Centre can be seen as merely an adult School Canteen, where it is so crowded that the only way you can sit with your friends is to reserve your table with your bags. Indeed, most school canteens are set up like a food court, separate stalls complete with ridiculously long queues to join for the absurdly short break times.
The question is, is this the result of intentional social engineering or behaviour modification? Could this be a foretaste of the future of human society given our own political leaders in the western democracies seem so keen to adopt practices from Asia?
This brings us off the topic of food in Singapore and brings me nicely onto the subject of the next blog in this series: The Uniform Island.
If you have stuck with it through my rambling social observations, firstly I'm sorry and secondly congratulations are in order, well done. Here's a picture of some pigeons.
Do not despair friends! Not all food is being brought into the sanitised, air-conditioned control of big business, as well as the coffee shop soldiering on in several niche areas such as Geylang, the Pasar Malam (night market) has preserved a great deal of hawker culture too.
Scattered around the neighbourhoods of Singapore are little rough patches of grass that regularly have marquee tents erected upon them. Sometimes it is to mark a specific event, on others there seems to be no particular reason. There is often a little fairground, clothes stalls, plant stalls, furniture, electronics and household goods stalls and, or course, street food.
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| Street food in the pasar malam, at lunchtime there is only a limited selection as the focus is on the late evening. |
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| You can have anything you want, as long as it's fried. |
Notable mention must be made of the love for western fast food in Singapore. In the west, Fast Food chains like McDonald's, KFC, Burger King etc are constantly on the back foot when it comes to public perception of nutrition, food quality and health scares. In Singapore the big franchises seem constantly on the up and up for some reason. Perhaps they fit better into the region's culture of food than they do where they originated. Certainly the customer demographic is different here, a fast food restaurant will be full of all ages and classes of people including a lot of families.
...and back to the question:
So what is it with the food obsession? I cannot pin down why it is so significant in the Singaporean people's interactions with each other, though I think I'm getting close with:
- We really do all have food in common, its part of the human experience. A varied and diverse population can easily converse easily about what they will be having for dinner while ignoring all their differences.
- Such a hard-working, serious people tend to just work, eat, sleep and consume entertainment. There you have 2/4 conversation topics. You can't talk about work in case the boss hears/reads it and gives you the sack. It's too easy here.
- With such a choice available from many areas and cultures,each with its own slightly different versions everywhere, there is a lot to discuss.
- The weather is pretty constant, apart from the haze. Oh how I miss haze-related small talk.
- The love of novelty, everyone simply must try that new place. Posting food photos and restaurant reviews on social media causes this to 'snowball'.
- Considering the conversation topics among friends and co-workers in the UK would, in 95% of instances, offend someone, get you the sack or get you sued for slander/libel, food is a safe topic.
- There's not much else to talk about.
'Chope!'
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| Ooh, an empty table, wait, why look, those little packs are having a lunch date. |
Choping (pronounced more like chopping or chop meaning to mark/stamp) is, depending on who you ask, a defining characteristic of the eating experience in Singapore. Some say it is necessary in the overcrowded communal areas of food centres, some insist it is a form of good/practical manners (I have no idea) while on the other hand some perceive it as the height of rudeness.
What is for certain is that this behaviour is here to stay until the government bans it (unlikely). How does it work? I'll explain.
A few diners enter a food centre or restaurant with free seating, instead of going straight to the self-service counters to order something, they spend some time walking around, scanning the area (with uncharacteristically sharp observation skills) for an empty table. When they find one that suits the size of their group, they stand for a while by it, just in case a better option presents itself. Having satisfied themselves that they have secured the best possible table (if there is more than one available, there may be a discussion what the relative value of the tables are determined according to a set of unknown variables), the diners then proceed to mark their territory with personal items. The classic item being the very Singaporean pack of pocket tissues, although other items are frequently used.
Business cards, id lanyards, umbrellas and bags are routinely left to designate the table as 'occupied' and I've heard stories of iPhones and laptops being left.
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| Seat''s taken. |
The critical fact is that many people have observed that 'choped' tables that were empty when they sat down to eat remain empty for the duration of the meal and in many cases were still empty when they left.
As you can probably tell, I find this custom ridiculous and impractical. It is however fascinating.
Although comparisons can be drawn with the infamous 'towel wars' between British and German tourists, there are some specific differences that help to explain local culture.
As with the towel wars, choping functions in an environment of behavioural selection. Once the arms-race starts, individuals that have not adopted the habit begin to miss out. Those who choose not to play along are are a distinct disadvantage. Clearly being able to blame the other person for not playing the game as not to feel too much empathy for them is common to both situations, exacerbated in Europe where there are issues of 'cost-value' motivation (i.e. trying to get the most out of the holiday you saved all year for) and the people you are competing 'against' are foreign, the archetypal 'outsider'.
There are, however, some big differences. In Singapore this is an everyday event, the large groups of work colleagues who simply must sit together, the patrons of hawker centres are paying relatively little for their meal as supposed to a Mediterranean holiday and the 'competition' so to speak, are their own neighbours. Most worrying is the way the majority gleefully go along with this selfish behaviour. There's something in the psyche of these well-dressed, lanyard-toting office drones that thoroughly enjoys beating someone to something and smugly hogging it. Even if the person they beat is an elderly person who is searching in vain for a place to sit. Empathy is for losers.
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| Selfishness is becoming normalised. |
In addition to this, comes the obsession for rules and their enforcement. Most patrons who would like to sweep the tissues and whatnot onto the floor do nothing for fear of causing a scene or getting into an argument. Chope-ing is enforced by bullying, peer pressure and the meekness of its victims.
There was a recent and well-publicised incident (here) where a couple was filmed enforcing their 'right' to reserve a seat. There was some discussion on the practice, but mostly as is usually the case a bit of a witch-hunt and discussion petered out after the convictions. Meanwhile, nothing has changed.
Some people blame colonialism, that could have some mileage especially when it comes to the normalisation of it being OK to put yourself above others- entitlement in other words. The problem with this is that Singapore has been self-governing since 1955 and ceased to be a British colony in 1963, a proportion of the population explosion since then has come from immigration, more in recent years as the birth rate has been well below replacement levels for some time. The proportion of residents whose family lived in colonial Singapore shrinks every year. How much of a cultural effect it has is highly debatable and receding every decade. Therefore, the colonial past is a factor, but not the only one.
Overcrowding undoubtedly is a big factor in the way that people think in Singapore, the number of people in the central areas going out for lunch is staggering. It's not just that, overcrowding is experienced by most ordinary residents throughout life. The effects of living so closely to so many strangers has a curious effect on human psychology and when combined with a social system that encourages competition in all levels, produces such behaviour.
Cultural heritage plays a part too, Kiasu or 'fear of losing out/over-competitiveness' seems ingrained in Chinese Singaporeans, some people will go to illogical lengths to get an advantage or get ahead. Even if doing so is counterproductive. More about this in a later post.
With a society of first, second and (etc, etc) third generation immigrants, it could be said that school is where citizens are formed. Having taught children in Singapore for more than three years, there is something terribly familiar about all this. Students turn up early to reserve the 'best' seats with their bags, even though there are usually enough to go around. The students police their classes, constantly telling each other to do this or that, not to run, not to use this or that colour ink, 'teacher, he did this', not to talk, to get in line. Hell, they love queues. Being first to class is something to boast about. As is being first in the queue to go home. When I sometimes dismiss the class directly from their desks, I can see the angst and discontent in their eyes; they want to line up, after all, they could be first!
I can see a similar mindset in adults, either the school system has infiltrated society or society is modeled after the school system, this could explain the love of uniforms. The Food Centre can be seen as merely an adult School Canteen, where it is so crowded that the only way you can sit with your friends is to reserve your table with your bags. Indeed, most school canteens are set up like a food court, separate stalls complete with ridiculously long queues to join for the absurdly short break times.
The question is, is this the result of intentional social engineering or behaviour modification? Could this be a foretaste of the future of human society given our own political leaders in the western democracies seem so keen to adopt practices from Asia?
This brings us off the topic of food in Singapore and brings me nicely onto the subject of the next blog in this series: The Uniform Island.
If you have stuck with it through my rambling social observations, firstly I'm sorry and secondly congratulations are in order, well done. Here's a picture of some pigeons.
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