Lost and found

What a lovely day Saturday can be when one does not have to work. Today was such a day. My parents and I went to Bright Hill Temple to pay our respects to my third uncle who had his ashes there. Then we headed down to Chinatown to have our yummy porridge.

Actually, in between, there were lots of arguments among the three of us as my Dad was being his usual stubborn self and wanted everything to be precisely right. Not forgetting that he had to have the last word to everything.

Luckily this time around, Mum was on my side as she was also on the receiving end. She chided Dad for being difficult and I took the opportunity to tell her gently to sometimes try to see from my point of view and not keep siding Dad.

It was a yummy brunch of pork ball porridge. The last time I went there, I told Dad that that was the only stall closest to the one that we used to eat and like. It was called Ho Kai Kee (Cantonese intonation). That particular porridge stall inside an old coffee shop had to make way for redevelopment as the whole road was closed and converted to be something else.

Dad had already mentioned that the man behind the stove looked very familiar and he thought it might be one of them working at Ho Kai Kee. This time around, he was more determined than ever to find out. First, he got a name card from his wife and surprise, surprise! His surname was (and still is) "Ho"!

You could say that curiosity killed the cat next, when he decided to ask her upfront. Low and behold, he was from that same stall that we used to eat almost every week when I was in Secondary school (I think)! Strange though for I could only remember the other brother who was the main cook back at the old stall. That brother used to have a stall at Bedok after the ended the Chinatown business, but later ended it too. That was during my Uni days I think. You can imagine my excitement and joy when I found out this morning that this was indeed the person from my favourite stall from years back!

This stall is at a corner coffee shop at Keong Saik Road. One can get a good view of The Pinnacle from where one sits at the coffee shop.


I think the Sunday ritual of eating porridge in Chinatown is going to resume very soon. This was what I used to do with my Dad when I was little. We would go to the Chinatown food centre and eat at this stall just behind "Er Gu Tang Shui" (Ee Gu Tong Shui in Cantonese intonation). This stall is called Wen Ji (Mun Kee in Cantonese intonation) and when we went back there to eat last week, the standard of the porridge has dropped greatly. I think, first of all, the old man has passed on, leaving the matriarch and her sons. Only one of her sons man the stall at Chinatown now. The other two have each opened a stall at Bedok Central and another food centre at Bedok South respectively (I think it's BLK 58).

Anyhow, we rarely ate at Wen Ji in recent years but more at Cheng Ji (Cantonese intonation: Seng Kee) at the Maxwell Road Food Centre. As you can see, I am quite a porridge lover.

I owe all this pickiness for porridge to the fact that I am Cantonese and when it comes to food, we are a little like connoisseurs. We can even take our mundane food very seriously and critique it to no end. At least for my family. That said, I know when to shut up and just eat. For one should be grateful that there is food to eat at all.