White Elephant

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How tough life has been

I have this habit of talking to the stall owners whenever i buy something from them. It's not to earn that extra bit of rice or that additional scoop of mince meat, rather, I want to brighten their day. Imagine standing infront of the same stove day in day out, repeating the SOP for each bowl of food delight. It gets pretty boring after a while.

I had two chat ups today, one with the chicken rice stall owners at the arts canteen and the other coffee uncle at techno edge. Found out more about the tough life of a hawker. As i waited for my chicken rice, i decided to try my luck with the uncle and aunites. I asked if they have a stall out side of NUS (which most hawkers do), and they were quick to jump to the answer, almost simultaneously. "Of course! if we depend on this alone, we'ld have died long long ago ah!!!". I was pretty taken back at their sudden out burst of energy and pressed on to find out the reason behind. Apparently, they are paying about 3K++~4K for the stall per mth for rental and then a separate 1K+ for the "dish washers". All these are the fixed overheads less the electricity and water bills which naturally come up to a hefty sum too. A simple calculation of their variable "raw materals" costs, I can see why they don't earn much from the $1.80/plate of chicken/duck rice. Tough life?

The coffee uncle at techno edge works really hard together with his fellow co-workers. I arrived at NUS 6.30am this morning as I drove my dad to work (morning shift). The drink stall was the only one open(ing) at the time of my arrival and i bought a cup of kopi-O from the uncle as well as some snacks to fill my morning stomach. At 6.30pm, i went back to the shop and bought another cup of coffee from the same uncle who stood there throughout the whole day. Struck a conversation with him and found out that he works about 12 hrs MINIMUM a day, mostly standing.

And i'm complaining about my workload as i punch my calculator and scribble with my ballpoint in the comfort of the aircon in the central library.