Hawking Truth

Life as a hawker can be tiring, physically. You start relatively early (maybe about 5am). Then its almost a rush to get the stall ready for the early birdies.The sun is not even out yet and you have drenched your tee shirt in perspiration.

You eat only during the off peak periods and not as and when you fancy, even though you work in front of food stalls.

Toilet breaks are not for quick snoozes or face checks in front of a mirror. Its fluid drainage at max efficiency. 

And efficiency will be your favourite word when you do such retails. You want max turnover of customers so you do your humane best to serve each customer, with a smile, and hope they won’t come back with complaints.

You maintain politeness even after customer have insulted you, intentionally or not. You take everything with a big stride and a huge pinch of salt.

When the sales hours are finally over, you turn around and face a mountain of dirty dishes and equipment to clean up, or face the nasty end of the stick from a government agency. After everything is sparkling again, you start getting whatever you can ready for tomorrow.

The trip home will not be how much you think you earned that day. It will be how fast you want to shower and sleep.

So when the opportunity for me to take over a stall with a 40+ years of reputation came up, I said “YES!”.

To be honest, I didn’t know that being a hawker can be such a challenge at the start. Its only when I started operations then I realise my lifestyle need a complete change. All of us do that. When we have a newborn, or when we discover a disease in our bodies, or any other major change in our lives. 

And now after 3 months (2 months technically) of sweating it out at an old neighbourhood market and food centre, I have new respect for those doing retail in the food industry. Things are better since and I guess you adapt to survive. You may not like the idea at the start but once you get the hang of it, its actually not that bad. 

I am in fact having fun observing people and discover the different kinds of people in our society from a hawker’s perspective. I have decided to digitise all my musings in relation to this venture.