I really can’t get by this week without throwing these few words into the boxing ring of recent discussions over the be-good-and-clear-your-food-tray-in-food-courts culture. I can see this is like a quest for Mount Everest by one of those piece of fat, unfit and untrained blob sitting in a hawker center swallowing a platter of sambal tua tow (mussels). I was once told they are actually people with excess relaxed muscles. It’s not an impossible task, the chap will get up there somehow - if he wants to.

Now who will clear these?

But it was an uphill task for retired former NEA Public Health Commissioner, Daniel Wang. This is the man that was once charged with the task of luring itinerant street food hawkers off our streets and into custom built hawker centers. It was, as we all know so well today, a shiny success. But imbuing civic mindedness and good ol’ manners in diners to return a tray was “one of my failed swansong projects” he regretfully murmurs. He was once able to get old kopitiam towkays to loose the spittoon and the smelly and unsightly pocket-less pyjamas shorts that many kopi boys used to wear in the past where they “sometimes disgustingly scratch at the crotch”. I recalled that he introduced huge multi decked tray cabinets at the then newly revamped Zion Road and Adam Road hawker centers where folks could just slide the whole food tray into the custom built shelves, wash their hands and scoot. A skeleton stewarding team would simply take over , thank you. But I could picture him shrugging and shaking his head when I asked over the phone recently, about the response, “Wah, I tell you, many times not even one tray on the cabinet!.”(head shaking as the last word faded in and out like CA-bi-NET). I sincerely thought he was going to say, perhaps, just maybe, ”1 out of 10” customers did so.

“I did so not because I think Singaporeans will do it, but because it had to be done, it’s just good manners.”, was what he offered when I pressed on about local habits. His officers and even himself, personally went on the ground to get feedback on the project. “Some people actually said “Why should I clear, there are cleaners what” or some would sheepishly provide a “I shy la” feedback. But then, he throws in this counterpoint “ these are some of the same people who will happily clear the trays in our ENV food court (at NEA’s office building Scotts Road) because they have that, if-others-do-so-I-also-do mentality. Even the cafes at Ikea, they readily clear the tray themselves”. Then he went on about this “many ordinary folks here have low self esteem and are not totally self reliant- everything, government or maid must do attitude.’ Poor Daniel.

I have been to many mass eateries in the region. In Jakarta, it is basically the same situation, except nobody bitches about it and they all accept themselves for what they are. Of course, it helps that for the price of one $800 cleaning auntie or uncle here, you can get 3 to 4 Indonesians for that same job. Their food courts in Plaza Senayan or Plaza Indonesia are exceptionally busy at mealtimes and weekends, but so are their big and spiffy team of cleaners. Ditto for the Food Loft in Bangkok, where they clear it with hands - no unsightly and smelly cleaner trolleys in tow. At the Culinary Institute of America’s campus in Napa Valley in America, where they serve up thousands of meals each day, diners simply walk up to the stewarding station where two holes confront them, one to scoop the trash in, and the other for crockery and utensils, you just pass the tray back to the chap on duty and go. So, how should ours be. I think we are old, exposed and weathered enough for a change. But it is not just about education. There is still that loud minority of those eat-and-run dinosaurs that are pressuring the silent majority of gentlefolks. Well, I say- let’s divide and conquer. Here’s my long shot suggestion:

Segregate seats in a food court into two sections- one (the bigger section) for folks who will clear the trays and two (perhaps a third of or a quarter of the seats), for those who wish not to clear it. There should be a surcharge for those choosing the lazy route and a penalty for those who renegade on their responsibility at the I-will-clear-tray tables. One can even reward them with packs of tissue paper, in lieu of the anticipated savings on stewarding manpower.

I can imagine Daniel giving me that learned and wry laugh “hahahahaha ah ah ah!