good durians - a new find




two or three years ago, i had a source of good durians at marsiling. very good xo and d24 durians from a stall near the multi-storey car park opposite the woodlands polyclinic. the owner of the stall was one called richard. when the fruit was in season and he had 'good' durians, he would give me a call. introduced a number of durian lovers to him. in fact, we would order in advance and he would send the fruit to the school. we were willing to pay extra for the premium durians.

all of a sudden the supply was shut off when he disappeared. do not know what has happened to him. the fruit stall is still around and but i have no inkling of his whereabout. with this, getting good durians turned into a game of chance, until recently. somebody did recommend a shop in ghim moh. went there a couple of times to get durians but they were not as good as those sold by richard.

the other day, i was at a friend's place when he offered me some durians. turned out to be quite good. found out that they had bought the durians from a stall at woodgrove. the next day, i dropped in at the stall to buy 3 boxes. measured up to my expectations of good quality durians.

his xo durians are sold by the weight while the other durians are sold by the pieces or at $10 per fruit. smaller durians are priced at $5.

best tau huay in town


i was blissfully unaware that there was a tau huay war going on when i ate a bowl of tau huay at one of beancurd city's outlets, not the one at short street but a smaller one along jalan besar road.

coincidentally, this took place one day before the report appeared in the sunday times' lifestyle section. i was actually searching for another well -known food stall when i chanced upon this nondescript shop with two small tables along the five foot way. i had been looking for the best wanton stall in singapore at rowell court.

instead i found other kind of ware along rowell street. i think they were maids trying to make extra money on their days off. they belong to different nationalities - filipinas, indonesian and indian. they looked invitingly at me but i was not game for a shot in the alley.

i had a bowl of tau huay for 60 cents. it was silky smooth and sweet, the kind that i like. besides selling beancurd, the shop also sells snacks like soon kuay and tarts. takeaways cost $1.00 a container but the drink in a plastic bag is still 60 cents.

my involvement in ne shows





i have been involved in ne shows, since way back in the 80s. it was expectedly messier than it is today; i am referring especially to the dispersal and the transport arrangements for ferrying the pupils back to school. then, i was taking charge of secondary three students. we did not have parent helpers; we had our own teachers to manage the students. in the first year, there was no army personnel attached to the school group.

we had to arrange our own buses to ferry the students there and back. fortunately, because of my other involvement, in track and field, i was very familiar with the stadium layout. i knew where the entrances and exits were and the location of the various car parks. i also knew how warm it could be sitting for hours at the terraces.

although we were given instructions to arrive at the stadium by 3.30 p.m., we took our time so that we did not arrive too early or else we would have to 'bake' in the afternoon sun. we delayed our moving to the terraces for as long as possible by staying longer in the concourse - the holding area.

when the show ended, we did not rush with the rest towards the exits. there was no order of exiting from the stadium; when you were ready, you moved out. from our experiences at syf and our participation at national day parade, we knew that movement would be smoother after the first wave had moved out. so, we waited for the initial rush to be over before making our move.

before the show ended i would have gone out to ascertain the locations of our own buses: where they were parked and which was the best route to take to get there. it was impossible for the buses to be parked together, so we had to cover quite a big area while looking for our buses.

even in those days, we would reach school just before midnight.

newton food centre


my association with newton food centre goes back all the way to the 50s. i attended the now defunct newton boys' school. it was next to another defunct school, monk's hill primary school. the two schools shared a field. the buildings that housed the two schools are now used by a madrasah, an islamic religious school. i started primary one in owen school. i was actually registered to study in dorset school. after three years in owen, i was transferred to newton boys' school.

during that time, there was a cluster of schools in that area. there were winstedt school, tanglin tinggi malay school, monk's hill secondary and anthony road school. as school boys, we used to pick fights with the pupils from monk's hill primary and tanglin tinggi malay school. fights usually took place in the quiet suburb of hooper estate.

i would take a bus to school on most days, the fare was 5 cents. some days, i walked to school as the buses were always packed. we had to literally cling to the handle bar for dear life. as for the homeward trip, i usually walked. i did not always take the same route. some days, i would walk through hooper road, keng lee road and thomson road. other days, i took the newton road way.

at that time, the trolley bus terminated at newton circus, where the food centre is. the post office was across the road and there was this row of shophouses, in one of which was the famous newton char kway teow. the char kway teow man was one of my kampong folks. back in the 60s, on the food centre side of the road, there were a mamak stall and two other stalls selling foodstuff. i think, one was a cheng tng stall.

when i was riding a motor bike, newton was one of our haunts. we would spend many hours drinking.....tea.... at the sarabat stall. the same stall is still operating at the food centre. in the 1970s, when i was teaching at monk's hill sec, we used to raid the food centre to nab the smokers and late-comers.

these days, i seldom eat at the centre unless i happened to drop in at monk's hill secondary to visit my ex-colleagues. from next year, i will not be able to do that as monk's hill will be merging with balestier hill secondary.

original old hokkien @ pahang street


the area around the malay heritage centre - the former istana kampong glam - teems with good food outlets. there is the popular foochow fishball noodles - which was once at beach road. it is now along sultan gate. also along sultan gate is tepak sireh which serves very good beef rendang and sambal dishes. in the vicinity, along kandahar street is the famous nasi padang restaurant sabar menanti. at bussorah street is the sultan cafe, which is located near the main entrance of the sultan mosque. another very popular cafe is the cafe le caire at 39 arab street. this cafe serves both arabian and egyptian food.

i decided to check out the food at the original old hokkien. i remember reading a report in the papers that the owner of lau hock kian @ amoy street sued the original old hokkien for using its name to mislead customers. i reasoned that if the use of a name could lead to litigation, then the food had to be worth trying. should have read the report in the sunday times again before doing so.

it turned out that the food was quite ordinary. tried the chef's recommendations like hae cho, fish maw soup, kong bak pau and sambal kangkong. have eaten better hae cho at the bukit panjang khek community guild building near my place, better sambal kangkong at different taste at frankel avenue and i prefer the kong bak pau we make on our own. rather prefer the version of fish maw soup served at different taste at 10th mile junction.

our first hdb flat at 104 towner road










apart from monetary compensation for resettling us, the government also accorded us priority in the allocation of an hdb flat. we got our first government subsidised flat at towner road. quite a number of families from our old kampong also got flats in the same estate.

we actually had two units in the same estate. my brother's unit - a 4 room flat - is at blk 107. the unit is still there but it is not occupied by any member of my family; it is rented out to some china nationals. my youngest sister bought a resale unit - a 3 room flat - in the same block and she is the only one living in towner estate.

we sold our 5-room maisonette in 1997 for $495 000; we had bought it for $126,000. it would have fetched a higher price if we had sold it at the peak. some lucky ones got as much as $600 000 for the same kind of flat in the same block. however, the sale price of these flats has dropped to $380K, even with the boon keng station at its doorstep.

three cars in the family

we have joined this small band of people in singapore whose families own three cars. this kind of ownership is not uncommon in countries like australia or even in malaysia but it is a rarity in land scarce singapore where a car is a major commitment on your expenditure.

ivy drives a kia rio, lay bee has just bought a toyota yaris and i drive a honda civic. my 1.6 civic vti is due for its first inspection in august this year. ivy bought her hatchback kia a few months after i had my honda. lay bee just collected her red car over the weekend.

ivy's kia is a 1.4 manual, laybee's, a 1.5 auto and mine is a 1.6 auto. ivy paid about s$18 000 (aus$14 000) cash for her korean made car. i paid $87 000 for my black honda civic, (which could be considered a bargain compared to the $103 000 which i paid for the predecessor, a1.5 honda civic). lay bee's yaris cost around $58 000.

we do not really need more than one car at home, and ivy does not really need a car to commute between the place she lives and the place of study. monash university is just across the road from her townhouse. we are paying too much for the convenience.