Singapore's Street Food: Surviving COVID-19 | 101 East

singapore street food is world famous traditional stalls serve up a vast range of cheap and tasty dishes a staple diet for the masses but the kovit 19 pandemic is turning up the heat on the focus they face a stark choice to innovate or admit defeat the pressure is on it's both physically and mentally accurate and financially 101 east examines how covet 19 is changing singapore's hawker culture [Music] beneath the shimmering skyline of the city-state where i grew up a humble trade fuels the workforce across the island some 20 000 food stalls serve up delicious dishes a melting pot of cuisines by the early chinese and indian migrants who mingled with the local malays yeah okay these dishes have become part of singapore's cultural heritage party fun i know the scene well mom used to sell chicken rice considered one of the country's national dishes and like many singaporeans i love my hawker food you know this is really the smell and taste of growing up it's my comfort food and it's very much a part of singapore's hawker culture i can't believe i get to eat it for work a lot of hard work goes into making these dishes kept alive by recipes and businesses passed down the generations [Music] at the golden mile food center tucked away in one of singapore's oldest neighborhoods 56 year old alice chu sells fish soup and porridge her family has been in the hawker trade for three generations thank you alice took over the business from her mom chiang gupta who's 80 years old and continues to help out madame chang moved from a roadside stall to this food center 45 years ago she worked tirelessly to raise three daughters alice is her youngest um over the years they've stayed true to traditional ways and built up a loyal customer base but then along came the kovitt 19 pandemic in the nationwide fight to curb the corona virus most workplaces were shut down between april and june eateries could only serve take away food [Music] food is an integral part of singaporean life but half of the hawkers are more than 60 years old and few young ones are joining the trade [Music] i visit alice and her mom on their day off they don't expect their family to have a fourth generation of hawkers to make ends meet alice's store is open more than 12 hours a day she's on her feet the whole time overheads are high up to several thousand us dollars a month a typical meal costs about three dollars and hawkers take home only 10 to 15 percent in profit alice needs to sell more than a thousand servings foreign having seen how much hard work it takes it wasn't something i wanted to do [Music] but there is a young hawker who is confident of success i'm proud of my family fishbowl recipe dalainix tan is just 22 but his family has been in the hawker business since his grandfather's time having a fishbowl we could actually have a small party they actually have more air inside because we use our hand to squeeze it at the end of 2019 delanix applied to join a government program to start a hawker stall the following april his dream came true when he opened a fishbowl noodle store in the business district he named it sandai fishball santai means three generations in chinese his parents stall in the market provided a ready supply of fresh fish bowls since i've been helping out my dad i've always wanted to start my own business so i think that instead of wasting like time to go and learn other things that i was thinking like i can just like work on this business and then like maybe expand it but just four days after opening his stall growing fears over kovitt 19 triggered singapore's restrictions dalainix was forced to suspend business i was panicking because my money was on the line and i was very passionate about this he had no income for two months when the restrictions began to ease dalanix couldn't wait to relaunch to advertise he posted in a popular facebook group hocus united tapau which was created during the crisis for hawkers to promote their food online i was starting back by the response because my post basically went viral and then there's a lot of like news media social media uh platform that actually featured me a lot so i got a lot of support from local singapore and stuff like some even donated money i think singaporeans are very happy that there is someone young that is willing to join the trade his passion caught the imagination of singaporeans but will he succeed it's quite daunting for them i'd spoken a lot of young talkers you see what they fear is the older ones wow you know they've got to eat me up kf sito is a well-known champion of singapore's hawker food he says it's a tough industry to break into even before the pandemic if you don't know the 360 game of being a professional hawker just going to sit there and swap flies and watch your soup reduce to a sauce at the end of the day and this 360 game is important for luring customers among a host of other things you should know as a brand new hawker uh what must you sell what was it look like do you understand uh the food culture it came from um are you good on social media how should you lay out your kitchen so that it's sexy and people walk by wow hey so all those little little touches you got to know dalainix did everything he could but with the pandemic forcing many singaporeans to work from home hawker stalls in the city center struggle hi everyone i'm daelonex so today is basically the last day of suntai fishbowl at armoire street in august dalanix was forced to close his stall for good just two months after he reopened like many other hawkers at my street we realized that football is just so bad and it's not sustainable to keep throwing money into this black hole and i just want to do this video to thanks you guys especially those who supported me which one is your store also bc this was my store yeah and what about the rest around you were they affected as well yeah they are i mean today when i came in we came here i was shocked to see that you know this prawn noodle everybody closed down as far as the burger store over there and they were both affected by the yes deeply affected for the stock behind me right things are different because they have been doing this for very long and that's really good i think the learning point is like uh the most important thing is building a customer base i feel quite set like not nostalgic about this thing i've been wanting to do this for quite some time really and also feel kind of like embarrassed passion is not enough especially in street food it's becoming an all too familiar story for seto so how hopeful are you for the future of singapore's porker culture right now it looks kind of gray man if you just walk you'll see a lot of stalls are shuttering up not enough people are replacing the older hawkers that are going off if things don't change it will die maybe in 10 years time 15 20 years time [Music] desperate to keep their businesses alive some hawkers are trying to adapt with help from her daughter alice true began to embrace technology to sell her fish soup using facebook for online orders sanctions [Music] just suddenly thanks to mobile phone apps people working from home are just a few swipes away from ordering in their favorite food but not all hawkers want to do business with them hello man good morning can i help you like 58 year old sulaiman abu yes because they just are very high 34 32 is too high for us it's not right we cannot mark our price you cannot simply just increase in price you have to be affordable to all kahooka for more than 40 years sulaiman runs a thriving stall selling nasi lemak it's a traditional malay dish rice cooked with coconut milk and served with egg fried anchovies peanuts and chili paste please thank you in 2013 sulaiman was chosen as a master trainer to mentor new hawkers in a government program to preserve singapore's food heritage to create this masterpiece we need about 10 years to master the hard thing is the profession of the poor for me is no shortcut like how you prepare a chili you might use a stone grinder for suleiman the best way to future-proof his business is not technology but to stay authentic to his parents values when you think of nasi lemak who do you think about see among parents and the hashid the haroun they showed to us and from there we brought up if you can deliver good food with a good price and with the same quality people still come back to you that's what been taught by our parents while established hawkers may still thrive on walk-in customers home delivery has become a lifeline for others and two young entrepreneurs have made it their mission to help 1621 call themselves the hawker heroes seeing how the pandemic affected stall owners the two friends started a delivery service with a difference we are one of the few platforms that don't actually charge any commission or onboarding fees to the hawkers so that's why they were really very skeptical every single hawker that you see on our platform i had a face-to-face conversation with them initially was very tiring but i guess a lot of them really suffering so they took that chance with us the heroes take orders online for lunch on weekdays featuring a different food center each day hawkers pay nothing for their services customers pay a flat delivery fee all of it goes to the driver hawker heroes also charge customers 10 of the food bill for their services but with just over 100 hawkers from four food centers on board they're not even covering costs how do you plan to make it sustainable well i always have trouble with this question for us to sustain i think it's really a demand and supply thing as long as hawkers one we are committed to be here my motivation to start hockey heroes is really to help out the older hawkers today is a big day for the hawker heroes they are expanding to their fifth food center bringing their services to chinatown complex finally it's like a dream come true for us in chinatown because chinatown is quite legendary in singapore right it's one of the largest upper centre here and we have been wanting to be able to help them for the longest time because of the sheer number of other hawkers today they're putting in extra effort before the collection time to remind hawkers of food orders sent the night before also he rolled up okay oh my god [Laughter] oh another hawker couldn't figure out how to load the order details on his smartphone i actually said you know last time i saw the order hope that after maybe a couple of more times as the hawkers get more used to using whatsapp checking the message we can get this whole operation more spoof up i've been here since i was young ordering food from them but right now i'm able to help get them through this past time as well it makes me feel very happy about that [Music] to save costs elroy helps with the delivery as well but one thing continues to trouble him not all force it's well being packed away because the sauce gets absorbed and whatnot by the time all this food it reaches the customer becomes a bit lumpy a bit dry so it really doesn't do justice to the quality of food that the hawkers actually do deliver today i'm meeting someone who's already trying to solve this problem chef mingtan runs a chain of restaurants business has suffered from the pandemic and he hopes his invention will help it turn the corner oh fair is love by everyone whether you're rich or poor it's a common local thing ming and his team spent four months researching how to cook hockey and me a famous noodle dish that requires plenty of skill with a wok and fire control he calls his version the damn easy hockey and me it comes pre-packaged customers complete the final steps of the cooking at home in 10 minutes straight out of the fridge using just a pot on a stove how do you think it measures up with a really good hokkien meat from hawker center this is the first item that we brought to markets and we're happy with we're going to carry on refining this i think there's some aspects of flavor that i still can't replicate and put it down to the old masters and the skill at 18 us dollars for a pack that feeds two or three people it's nearly three times more expensive than fresh hawk and me fried up by the old masters but most singaporeans expect hawker food to be cheap and are unwilling to pay more i think the mentality we have to shift in terms of our price increase there's definitely room maybe i should you know be more willing to spend the extra maybe 50 cents or a dollar on their on their food items as singapore weathers the worst recession in its 55-year history elroy and jankai have front row seats to how the pandemic is hurting the hawkers there was a period of time i think especially in the last one to two months every friday we had one mentor coming messaging us say hey bro thanks for the support we'll be closing down it's heartbreaking for us i think sierra boys have to see the what it takes to be a hawker the hard work behind the long hours what they don't realize is that they are enjoying all this very low price food at the expense of the hawker how do you see the future of singapore's hawker culture so if this doesn't change we should see more and more of them closing down because of the price issues penguin hong and his wife chia sue hawk retired this year after a lifetime as hawkers his knee can no longer withstand the hours of standing after 50 years in the trade cataracts hinder his vision they had to sell their business for 15 000 us dollars the noodle store has been the main draw in this coffee shop since mr pang's father started it in 1949. the new owner is a younger hawker as part of the sale he will retain the stall's facade and signboard and mr pan will impart his wealth of [Music] knowledge mr pang is teaching how to cook the dish that made him famous hockey and me i know another person who might benefit from his mastery i've arranged for chef ming to come today so that the puns can do a taste test of his pre-packaged hawk and me a few more trade secrets later it's time to ask the all important questions this is such a hard working experience you know speaking to these two masters of hokkien noodles i'm very humble the fact that i'm learning so much just from one conversation with them i am determined like to turn that seven out of ten into eight or nine out of ten [Music] with the pandemic far from over most talkers can't afford another crisis justice alice chu's fish soup business is beginning to improve the food center where she works is about to close for three months for renovations [Music] [Music] [Music] my for young dalenix ton it's not quite the end of the road yet for his hawker journey [Music] on weekends he still helps his family at their stall in a neighborhood market [Music] the signboard from its fishbowl noodle adventure hangs right here let us bring it over so people can know that this brand is still alive if in the future like there's opportunity in the market that is near my dad this right i might consider reopen again because i didn't know the fundamentals the proximity will help him save on the cost of transporting supplies from his dad's store but his decision also hinges on the cost of labor singapore doesn't allow low-wage foreign workers to be hired as stall assistance dalenix hopes that will change the major concern for me is manpower issue most of our workers here is all family members and they're already aging already it will really help the workload and i think that will actually can attract more people to join enjoy the trade and to help them thrive in the trade sito has long insisted that young hawker's need formal training we really need to set up a hawker culinary institution a hawker food institution not just teachers people about how to cook and how to set up a stall but the full gamut of being a street food professional worldwide i think there are no heroes in our hunger food culture we don't have a like a gordon ramsay or a bortain or somebody off hawker culture that people want to i mean oh wow i can be that what's the problem disdain they like it but they want to be in it singaporeans think hawkers are there to provide them a service cheaply and affordably okay they feel that oh it's a culture i can blog about but to ask him to go then cook and do this i got money i don't want to be a hawker maybe that's why my parents never wanted me to be a hawker and neither did i aspire to be one today chicken rice brings back fond memories of growing up but it's never quite as good as how mom cooked it unbiased of course but the pandemic has unmasked some hard truths until hawkers become heroes no amount of tech innovation will keep our street food culture alive [Music] you

Channel: Al Jazeera English

Views: 530,140

Keywords: Singapore's Street Food: Surviving COVID-19, singapore, Singapore street food, street food, singapore covid 19 news, singapore covid, singapore covid 19, street food singapore, street food singapore 2020, singapore coronavirus, coronavirus, al Jazeera live, al Jazeera, al Jazeera English, 101 east, food

Id: yNcfyqW7URo

Length: 26min 0sec (1560 seconds)

Published: Thu Dec 17 2020