Two days ago, we were told that stallholders can have their meal in front of their stall, albeit with safe-distancing measures.
There’s a collective sighs of relief from hawkers all over Singapore, but that hasn’t covered all the grey area.
How about food delivery personnel? PHV drivers? Taxi drivers?
And in this case, a person who works in a mall that sells food through a kiosk (think: Old Chang Kee), so there is no dining area for her to makan her food?
For a lady who works in an essential business (F&B), she improvised…by having her meal in the toilet instead.
F&B Frontline Staff in Mall Resorted to Eating Meals in Toilet After Security Stopped Her From Eating
If you need a story of “when life gives you lemons, make lemonade”, then look no further than Facebook user Mabel Ng.
Now, for a start, the lady didn’t even have a trace of complaint about the situation. Damn it I wonder if she’s a Singaporean (seems like she is).
Instead, she started her lemonade story with this post on the second day of the Circuit Breaker period:
In it, she mentioned that she was almost chased out after having a curry puff outside her stall. I don’t know why she needs to emphasise what food it is because that’s made me hungry, but she aptly mentioned that it’s some “blind implementation”.
Which we’d all agree.
And soon after, the resourceful lady found a solution.
She tried asking another café staff where she had her meal and her friend said she would just endure the whole shift without eating.
But Mabel isn’t going to let the lemon dampen her spirits or damage her stomach.
Instead, she went to have her meal in “a clean, deserted toilet in a deserted part of a nearby mall.”
Later in the day, she started feeling “low” and wanted to cry.
Still, not a trace of complaint. I think she’s made of steel instead lah I don’t know.
That night, she got notified that her outlet is not going to open until the end of the Circuit Breaker period.
Her first reaction? She’s glad that she’s no longer having to eat in the toilet anymore.
By the way, if you’ve read her post and are wondering what “furlough” means, it’s basically “leave” (usually unpaid), and the word is used more often in the US or in the military.
But the management seems to be as fickle-minded as my boss because the next day, she’s back at work and back in the toilet, this time having fried rice that looks so delicious that I’m regretting having to write this article:
This time, she got to know that her fellow F&B employees have been sneaking into closed shops to have their meals. And she said, “Anyway I felt like a bloody Jew hiding out in a Nazi regime for that few minutes. Somebody has to voice out and highlight how mall staff are blindly implementing these #circuitbreaker measures without any thought of the welfare of the essential staff such as F and B who are left behind in this #covid_19 crisis to continue working.”
And on the next day, she seemed to have found a place to makan…in a closed kitchen:
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She’s currently still making lemonade from the lemons given to her, and it seems like it’s going to be a tad more tricky from today onwards as people would be fined immediately if they break the Circuit Breaker rules.
And as of now, there hasn’t been any updates on where people like her can eat.
I don’t want to say this because I want to appear pitiful, but let’s call a spade a spade: at least we people who’re forced to stay home still have a place to eat, so let’s count our blessings as the authorities work on overdrive to fix the cracks in the new regulations.