My Dad did not own the coffee shop. He just rented one of the stalls and sold chicken rice there for 40 years. The coffee owner owner was a middle-aged lady who lived on the first floor. She was the second wife of a rich man who gave her this shop as a means of income.
There were a couple of stalls being rented out to sell different oriental fares. The anchor stall belonged to the drink seller. He was like the chieftain because he paid the highest rent. The second highest rent was paid by a team of three Cantonese cooks.They occupied two stalls and sold the most variety of food. The stall that had the larger space sold Char Siew and Siew Yoke (two versions of barbequed pork). That same stall also sold Chow Hor Fun which was the Cantonese version of fried rice noodles. I loved their Chow Yi-Min (pre-cooked egg noodles) fried with seafood. Their other smaller stall was situated next to ours and it sold Kon Loh Min (dry egg noodles with barbequed pork known as char siew) which is still one of my favorite breakfast noodle dishes. (The Singapore version of Kon Loh Min is said to be able to drive the Malaysians up the wall. Not that they love our version, it’s that they cannot believe we actually add tomato catchup into ours. Their version is the more traditional one – they add dark sweet sauce).
My Dad’s stall and three other stalls should ranked third in term of rental payments – the rent of our stall at that time was around S$100. It went up to S$300 in the late 70s. The other three stalls that paid about the same amount of rent were the Char Kway Teow (fried noodles with sweet sauce and fresh clams) stall that also sold Hay Piah (Prawn fritters with other assorted soya bean cakes, deep-fried spiced spring rolls and vegetables), the fishball noodles stall and the Lo Ack (Teochew braised duck) stall. A newer stall was later set up next to ours and it sold prawn noodles.
The whole coffee shop had a kind of synergy that brought many customers to it. The cooperation among the original stall operators was fantastic. It was the second generation that would later create the problem of strife and disunity. I will share about that in future blogs. Apparently, most of the original stall operators were migrants from China and thus their patience and resilience were exceptional. Hard work was a common virtue and so laziness was really frowned upon. Tolerance was also expected and even when offended or misunderstood, these original stall operators made peace and reconciled quickly.
Every morning, Cantonese opera and then Teochew opera music blasted loudly from a Rediffusion set. Nobody complained that it was too loud or that the programs of their dialects were not being broadcast. After so many years, these opera musics still bring sweet memories of my time at the Coffee Shop. Amazing, isn’t it? How music can do that!
The one thing I have learned from my early years in that Coffee Shop is that everybody is different but we can work together if we learned to accept each other differences. Tolerance and subsequently acceptance are very important to a happy community life.
My Dad operated a chicken rice stall at the coffee shop in Katong. During the mid-60s, gas cylinders were not popular. So everything was cooked with charcoal.There were two types of charcoal – a slow burning type made with knotty smaller, more condensed branches and a fast burning type made from the a lighter density plank-like wood. Dad taught me how to use the appropriate type for different foods. For example, the slow-burning charcoal could only be used for our Satay grill. (Satay is barbeque meats stringed together on a coconut spine). This was used also for cooking chicken rice. The fast burning ones were used for cooking chicken and boiling soups fast.
The supplier of our charcoal was a skinny young man whose name no body knew. He was known as “Ore Ngeow”. In the Chinese dialect, Hokkien, his nickname means ‘Black Cat’. It was pretty obvious why he received that nickname – every time when he arrived with his load of charcoal, he was as black as his goods. Black Cat was a gregarious person with a ready smile. I had never seen him frown… no, not once.
After Black Cat had stored his load of charcoal in our depository, an old small wooden cupboard which was also used to support the Satay grill, he would pay a visit to every stall owner and also make fun of all the young stall helpers. For that half-hour that he was in the coffee shop, it was like a party. Everybody brightened up and there was laughter every where. Even the grumpy coffee stall assistant smiled his reluctant smile.
Black Cat was also the brunt of many jokes and pranks. It was common to see him on the floor because someone had just pulled the chair under him. He however had his reward too. From time to time, he would secure a free piece of chicken
Like all young men, Black Cat had eyes for beautiful women… well, honestly, even to my young teenage eyes, not all his targets were that beautiful. At one time, while he was depositing the charcoal into our cupboard, he suddenly jumped up. I thought he was bitten by a rat but that was not the case. He began walking side way, with his neck stretched out to the left. Black Cat had spotted a young girl in mini skirt. He was so engrossed with the sight that he kept walking side way like a crab. The girl was walking away out of his view and he had to stare at her. The inevitable happened – Black Cat landed in the open drain that was between our row of shops and the road.
Everybody ran out and cheered. After being rescued from his wet quarry, he was still looking at the direction where the girl had disappeared. His smile never left him. After everybody had a good laugh, Black Cat went back to complete his task of filling up our cupboard.
Hello! Welcome to my Coffee Shop Story Teller Blog. I am Uncle K, the Coffee Shop Story Teller. Why do I call myself that? Well, it is pretty obvious that I must have lived and grown up in a coffee shop (thank God it was not a coffin shop). For the first 20 plus years, I witnessed at close quarters, life as it unfolded in a Chinese Kopitiam (Coffee Shop in Hokkien). I used to hate the place but now, I look back at those memories fondly.
Am I still living and working in a coffee shop? Nope! Not any more. I have moved on and now doing something that is out of this world. I will tell you about it, some other time, so that my present career and life will not interfere with my coffee shop stories. Just a warning – the stories will flow according to my aged memory. If anything is remembered and described incorrectly, it is your responsibility as the reader to write to me… but you cannot scold me or accuse me of being a liar. Agree? Now, you may ask how would you know whether I am accurate or not? Many of you are scholars and so there may be many historical facts that you have crammed into your gigantic brain… and from time to time, you allow the facts to steal out and make minus corrections for old uncle here. Thanking you in advance for doing that.
The time and place of the stories – mid 1950s to late 1970s at Katong, in Singapore. To the foreigners who are reading this blog, the old Katong was like your little suburb by the sea. The new Katong is like… well, like any other street in Singapore. To find out more, please google ‘Katong’ and you will get to read all the wonderful information on Wilkiedia and some other websites maintained by pseudo-historians. (Some of them with worst memory power than mine). Many of what they tell you, I don’t even know. For example… Uncle here never knew that Katong was named after a certain species of extinct turtle.
When I was growing up, no one asked intellectual or intelligent questions like “what is the meaning of ‘Katong’?” Even if we were to ask, Mr. Wilkipedia did not live in Katong at that time. So, who knew? My dad would have given me the Chinese meaning of the name and it means ‘Add to the East’.
No one, absolutely no one in old Katong, would even guess that some extinct turtles were involved with the name. Most probably, if we were to catch and hold the turtle in our hands, we would not be able to associate it with ‘Katong’. As overseas Chinese (my dad came from China on an old ship), we were hungry folks and definitely did not have time to ask the turtle about its name or find out whether it was the last of its species. We would just kill the fella and cook it.
We, Chinese, are notorious for eating anything that moves, flies or swims. Except for rubber tires, what we see, we will eat. In fact, what we don’t see, we will also eat. Apart from the normal food, we eat rats, dogs, cats, bats, slugs, insects, lizards and even roaches. My dad swallowed live newborn mice for health. Some cousins ate roaches to cure certain ailments. That is the reason why some sharks are going extinct, just like the sad fate of the poor Katong turtles.
Did you know that Singapore is the second largest trading center for shark fins. We just lost the first position to Hong Kong by maybe their two extra fins. We are that close to being no. 1. This shark-fin eating tradition started with some ignorant Chinese emperors who were always looking for new delicacies to consume. (They lived in cold palaces with no TV and Ipad. So, their favorite past-time was dining and sex). Well, that was what i heard since I was a child. As I am no historian but a former coffee shop boy, please do not quote me.
Do I like shark fin soup? Of course! Do I eat that now? No! If I can avoid it I would. Too many unethical killing of sharks out there in the oceans. The shark hunters cut off the fins while the poor shark is still alive. Then throw the fin-less body into the ocean and let it die a slow agonizing death by drowning. My toothless grandma would pass terrible judgement upon such evil deed and conveniently she would destine the perpetrators to the deepest depth of the Chinese hell which happens to be at the 18th level. She would say that the demons in hell will cut off the limbs from these terrible people and let them choke in their own blood. For me, this image is just too real – I had been to hell at the Haw Par Villa and back.
Another reason is that these creatures are getting extinct. One day, our descendents will only depend upon photographs and cliparts to see what the different species of shark look like. Just like the other day, I was looking at the photos of the last Tasmanian tiger. So sad, that what God had created, man has a way of destroying them. So, I must apologize for the terrible deeds of my fellow Chinese because now I believe that we have to prevent the extinction of these sharks.
By the side, let me tell you that the Chinese are also responsible for the extinction of tigers because some ignorant fellas think that by eating various parts of the tiger, they will become strong in those parts. That is the reason why the first organ that the poor tiger loses is always its genital. Maybe there is some truths to this myth – just look at the exploding Chinese population in China and around the world. No, there is no truth to it. I am just joking – there is no such thing.
We Chinese are also responsible for the extinction of elephants because we use their ivory tusks for some stupid decorations, meaningless artworks and useless ornaments. The rhinoceros are quite high up on the extinct list too. The rhino horn is apparently good for certain ailments and also believed to help in balancing the Yin and Yang of the body.
Scientists have proven that our hair would have similar nutritional and medicinal value as that of the rhino horn. Today, unscrupulous manufacturers in mainland China are manufacturing plastic rhino horns and selling them to naive buyers. I mean what is the different – putting hair into boiling water and drinking it as compared with putting plastic into boiling water and drinking it? Both are of no use to our health! The plastic may be more dangerous but one cannot tell maybe after twenty years when suddenly cancer appears.
Well, I have done well in deviating from my original intent and I believe this will be the case henceforth. Take care now… smile till we meet again in the next posting.
My Dad did not own the coffee shop. He just rented one of the stalls and sold chicken rice there for 40 years. The coffee owner owner was a middle-aged lady who lived on the first floor. She was the second wife of a rich man who gave her this shop as a means of income.
Albert Connect 