Ipoh trip 1
Well, I’m back from my trip. And I have an (well maybe two) interesting stories to share. For now, I present to you Why You Should Not Let Hunger Cloud Your Best Judgment.
For breakfast, we chose one of the ‘sa hor fun’ shops that looked relatively crowded instead of its neighbour which was literally bursting at the corners with people eating, and people waiting to eat. Hunger led us to forget one of the very basics of eating in Malaysia, and let it be known we learned this lesson well. Too well.
This ‘rice noodles with clear soup’ dish came with not-so-clear soup. Oil, oil, oil everywhere on the surface where you could skim it off and still be left with more from down under. The taste, though it was a ‘sa hor fun’ taste (thank goodness), just… wasn’t good at all. Barely fitted the mediocre category. A relative description but an objective decision by the jury. So, we decided to drown our sorrows of an unsatisfied meal wasted with empty calories by ordering satay, THE guaranteed-to-cheer-you-up-but-no-money-back-if-otherwise dish. Because, you know, ordering satay is like participating in a lucky draw. 2 out of 10 times you actually get something worth the money you paid and not some half-baked item unusable for daily living. But I digress.
As the rest of them were eating -I sadly had to forego this one true cure because it was pork, and I have not eaten pork since I watched Babe 13 years ago (not joking)- my father amiably shared with us a wondrous tale of the golden age. “You know, in the olden days, they used to count by the sticks, and take back what you have not eaten to serve to the next customer.”
I stared. “Serious?”
“Yup,” my uncle added in with a very serious look. “You don’t believe, you ask other old people and see.”
“I hope this doesn’t happen to you guys,” I replied wide-eyed.
“Don’t worry, I doubt they do this now-lah,” my uncle replied, happily munching on his stick of meat. (Please save me, my mind went the wrong way for a moment)
When I was about to be bored to death, they finally called for the bill (apparently only this stall requires you to pay after you eat, while every other stall does pay-on-delivery). The old man carefully, almost daintily, picked up every licked-clean stick, even those left in unfinished soup with questionably used tissue courtesy of some people I shall not name. He then counted the sticks, made some calculations, counted them again and came up with an amount that was to be paid.
He next stacked the ‘kuah’ (peanut sauce) plates messily atop each other, and left them on the table. This time, he carefully carried the half-eaten plate of diced cucumber and the plate with the remaining sticks of meat to the side (where his stall is). The licked-clean sticks he had tucked into a pocket in his apron.
We then watched him return to serve the plate with our remaining sticks of meat (plus a few more to round it out) to another customer.
On the way out of the shop, I thought I would just casually linger around to see if the stall was receiving more orders than it could handle (because the satay were labeled half-baked items immediately by their consumers).
The stall had a steady stream of people placing orders, yes.
The stall also had a red tub of water, with its helper dumping licked-clean sticks into it as he came back from clearing the tables.
We assumed the worst.
True story. I wonder how many customers those satay sticks have been served to already. Yuck!
The plate with the uneaten sticks and the diced cucumber
For breakfast, we chose one of the ‘sa hor fun’ shops that looked relatively crowded instead of its neighbour which was literally bursting at the corners with people eating, and people waiting to eat. Hunger led us to forget one of the very basics of eating in Malaysia, and let it be known we learned this lesson well. Too well.
This ‘rice noodles with clear soup’ dish came with not-so-clear soup. Oil, oil, oil everywhere on the surface where you could skim it off and still be left with more from down under. The taste, though it was a ‘sa hor fun’ taste (thank goodness), just… wasn’t good at all. Barely fitted the mediocre category. A relative description but an objective decision by the jury. So, we decided to drown our sorrows of an unsatisfied meal wasted with empty calories by ordering satay, THE guaranteed-to-cheer-you-up-but-no-money-back-if-otherwise dish. Because, you know, ordering satay is like participating in a lucky draw. 2 out of 10 times you actually get something worth the money you paid and not some half-baked item unusable for daily living. But I digress.
As the rest of them were eating -I sadly had to forego this one true cure because it was pork, and I have not eaten pork since I watched Babe 13 years ago (not joking)- my father amiably shared with us a wondrous tale of the golden age. “You know, in the olden days, they used to count by the sticks, and take back what you have not eaten to serve to the next customer.”
I stared. “Serious?”
“Yup,” my uncle added in with a very serious look. “You don’t believe, you ask other old people and see.”
“I hope this doesn’t happen to you guys,” I replied wide-eyed.
“Don’t worry, I doubt they do this now-lah,” my uncle replied, happily munching on his stick of meat. (Please save me, my mind went the wrong way for a moment)
When I was about to be bored to death, they finally called for the bill (apparently only this stall requires you to pay after you eat, while every other stall does pay-on-delivery). The old man carefully, almost daintily, picked up every licked-clean stick, even those left in unfinished soup with questionably used tissue courtesy of some people I shall not name. He then counted the sticks, made some calculations, counted them again and came up with an amount that was to be paid.
He next stacked the ‘kuah’ (peanut sauce) plates messily atop each other, and left them on the table. This time, he carefully carried the half-eaten plate of diced cucumber and the plate with the remaining sticks of meat to the side (where his stall is). The licked-clean sticks he had tucked into a pocket in his apron.
We then watched him return to serve the plate with our remaining sticks of meat (plus a few more to round it out) to another customer.
On the way out of the shop, I thought I would just casually linger around to see if the stall was receiving more orders than it could handle (because the satay were labeled half-baked items immediately by their consumers).
The stall had a steady stream of people placing orders, yes.
The stall also had a red tub of water, with its helper dumping licked-clean sticks into it as he came back from clearing the tables.
We assumed the worst.
True story. I wonder how many customers those satay sticks have been served to already. Yuck!
The plate with the uneaten sticks and the diced cucumber