Suara Hati Ayahku

Last blog I wrote something about our over reliance on the Thai cook.
I continue my writing on something about cleanliness, time management ..on that strand. Please bear with me a moment.

Cleanliness

The present generation is trained to do things neatly and cleanly at school and at home. Please don’t be surprise there are many families out there who eat outside all the time rain or shine, what come may. They think that dinner at the shops are much cheaper than preparing their own food. They are costing at all cases i.e., budget, time and energy wise. If your family is just 3 or 4 I think their mathematical thinking looks very sound. But don’t be surprise you are preparing your daughters to be ‘not a good’ cook in future. My old parents ( we come from police families) told me the biggest key to good marriage is “.. happiness in your family lies in the skill of preparing food for your own husband .. if u got that no matter where he is, .. he surely finds his way home to eat your food … and you darling.” (He..he..)

Ok lets get back to the main idea.

When you are a customer you want to eat clean food and it is served very fast. The next best thing is ‘if you can boss the helpers in the restaurant.’ Well customers are always right according to Rod Stewart. Listen to his songs? You are always right.

Mamak stalls / restaurants are those that subscribe to this principle. They served you fast , prepare you fast fried mee, fast roti canai and on top of that ‘you can boss them around’. You can ask “..mamak .. what speciality today ..? mamak? “ then this mamak boy(s) will parrot tell you all the kinds of rotis they have. If you order anything ..in the mamak shops they will serve you fast and without fuss.

Let’s see if we can get that in a malay/ English restaurant. Can you boss them around? Can you say to them that your ikan masak pedas is not so good lah. The eyes of the fish looked so old (3 months old). Ughh.. what will you get? The best is they will say ‘get LOSS’. My expreince in England 1975 – 1982 told me that they will most probably kill you.

If you are in the mamak shop , you can say anything you like and they just swallow all your complaints without showing any face. Most probably they can’t understand your malay slang language (kelantanese slang!). And one more thing , there are so many helpers in the mamak stalls. Few will busy themselves cleaning the floors and the tables. So you will see the floors of the shop so meticulously clean and fresh.

Why do we stress on cleanliness? Clean food guarantees us away from all kinds of illnesses like food poisoning etc etc. In fact all kinds of illnesses come from the state of the kitchens. Very blessed indeed are those that are able to patron the restaurant which worship cleanliness as their main ‘god’. If the food is clean, good taste and you got your food fast .. then there is big chance that the restaurants will get good mouth to mouth recommendations. So the business grow far and wide. Flourishing business?


b) time management


We do not want to wait now adays. We hate to eat our food after 1 hour waiting. Can you , my readers? He..he.. The best we can take is get the food down our stomach after 20 minutes (the maximum time) we can wait. After that , go to hell and we won’t come again.

c) apology


Sometimes a shop put all kinds of menu. After we had ordered our food, come a beautiful Thai helper and say ‘..abang , sorry , udang dah habis , yang ada only ikan bilis .. sorry yer bang”. Imagine you had waited for 20 more minutes. Melayu shops are like that. If you can’t cook Tandoori, say so please. Don’t paint the wall of your restaurants with 1001 menu but alas 10% of it .. you can hardly deliver. So down the drain , your business. Bad mouth to mouth spreading among the locals. See?

d) costing

If you take orders, make sure you have a copy. We do not want you to ask us what we have eaten so far ( after all the food is already in our tummy). How can we remember what we had ordered especially the extras ..keropok lekor, colek betik etc etc. But this sometimes happen in our malay restaurants. They will come and ask us .. ‘bang, makan apa?” O my God. Sometime they over charge you.

e) the clothes they wear as the cook and the helpers

Looking at their clothes, sometimes I just wonder how can you sink the food in your stomach. He..he.. they do not put any kind of apron/ proper attire that can be fit to be called a professional food business operator(s). They just wear what they like. Look at the wet hands. Sometime ththey are everything. They take orders and they are also the one to cook for you. Brilliant! They do everything for you except … the order slip has suddenly disappear. It might be some where in between her big boobs. (laugh). Oh what a sight?


If the readers can look after these few things, I am sure food business is one of the biggest income pullers for the economy of our country. Good eating out there mates!