Saturday, April 4, 2015

Prata Nights


It's one of those humid late nights where a freshly-made onion-egg prata (or two) would be the perfect night cap for this hungry heartlander. Thus hungry heartlander left flat and walked to the nearby prata shop where the friendly prata seller recognize hungry heartlander by name. Approaching the familiar friendly prata shop, hungry heartlander began to hear curses (of the 7 powerful words of a certain dialect variety - you know, the type that cursed your maternal roots) echoed along the walkway. Hungry heartlander walked to where the verbal abuses came from and thus identified the source of those 7 most powerful dialect words. Angry man was hurling those 7 powerful words (in various order yet, colourful nonetheless) at friendly prata man. It didn't take long to find out that angry man was furious that he was being (over)charged (?) S$8 for a murtabak. Angry man even began to flick his cigarette butt to friendly prata man. But friendly prata man kept his cool. 

The hungry heartlander - well he needed to order his onion-egg prata regardless, so had no choice but to stand next to angry man while the latter continued to hurl his powerful 7 dialect colourful words. As hungry heartlander stood at the counter, he could tell that angry man have had too much alcohol - thanks to the humid night breeze that blew at hungry heartlander on the face. 

That was when angry man tried to mimic hungry heartlander as he made his order, but as they said, the dog that barks the loudest is not the most ferocious (and it's useless to get into a brawl with a man whose only vocabulary was various versions of the 7 most powerful dialect words, really), thus hungry heartlander just kept his cool. But not before hungry heartlander's hungry stared hard at alcohol-laden, angry man with the 7 most powerful dialect words. True enough, like a harmless attention-seeking puppy, angry man walked away, rambling on with his 7 most powerful dialect words.

While savouring the onion-egg prata, hungry heartlander realised the ban on public consumption of alcohol between 2230-0700 daily in Singapore began this evening (April 1, 2015). Perhaps angry man was not aware. Perhaps angry man got his fix from greedy alcohol seller. Oh, did I mention that he was also smoking? Perhaps he missed the legal memo that said smoking indoors is banned too. For the longest time, such abuses in blue-collar estates where 80% of Singapreans live are common affairs, perhaps it's great to have such alcohol ban to protect innocent friendly prata seller and hungry heartlanders. 

You're welcome.