Iberian Spring: Day 17 Singapore Home

Soundtrack: “My Island Home”, Warumpi Band

Another holiday comes to an end.

In one of the many bookshops in Spain I flicked through a Spanish edition of Sylvia Plath’s Selected Poems, and flicked to my favourite, “Dos amantes y un buscador de conchas junto al Mar Real” so it seems appropriate to finish with the opening in Spanish, “Fría y definitiva, la imaginación Cierra su famosa/legendaria casa de verano; Las vistas azules están cerradas; nuestras dulces vacaciones Se desvanecen en el reloj de arena.” (I’m relying on the internet giving me a good translation here.)

In spite of yesterday’s walking, eating, and drinking, I found myself fairly well awake before 5am. I don’t think there are many, if any, sheep in Singapore to count. Thinking about it, I don’t recall much lamb on the menu but wouldn’t be surprised if there was in Little India or around Arab Street. Surely they have lamb kebabs. And these weren’t even the thoughts floating through my head early this morning.

I was thinking about butter in coffee, and kaya toast. Last night in Swan Song the Singaporean chef I was chatting with recommended a place, not to far away from my hotel, that did old school kaya toast, and coffee with butter. He’d asked if I’d ever tried coffee with butter, and while I’ve had egg coffee, coconut coffee, ca phe sua da, Italian espresso, Turkish coffee, Irish coffee, and even starbucks “coffee”, I don’t recall ever having had butter coffee. So for better or worse, I was up for the challenge.

Kaya is coconut “jam”, assuming that something can be a jam when it’s made with coconuts, eggs, and sugar (not to be confused with “kaya/gya” the Noongar for hello). I guess “coconut spread” is more apt. At some point in the last few hundred years, Malays and others in South East Asia have been brewing up this sweet concoction, and with the arrival of bread, started making sandwiches with it. Heap Seng Leong Coffeeshop appears to be run by three quite elderly men, and they make kaya toast the way it was when they were young, assuming they had kaya toast during the Japanese occupation. Like many good Singaporean food stalls, they basically make two things: kaya toast, and kopi (four if you count they make Milo drinks and tea as well). The stall is at the back of a space, bare concrete floor filled with tables they seem to share with another woman of a similar vintage, she makes some sort of deep fried filled pastry — apologies for the lack of detail but I was focussed on the kaya and kopi, and getting to the airport on time, so wasn’t totally paying attention to all around me. I should also confess to not properly doing my research, so ended up getting my order a bit wrong. The “kitchen” setup is rudimentary, a small bench, some shelves, a big pot/bain marie of hot water, and a charcoal grill for toasting the bread. The hot water works both for the coffee and to cook the eggs, which get placed in bowls on a shelf and steamed. There’s a large sink for washing up, and that’s about it. On the bench is a block of butter that they carve small slabs from with a large knife (that was probably left behind after the Japanese occupation), these slabs get places in kaya butter sandwiches, and butter kopi. No fancy butter curls, they don’t even spread it: if you order butter they just drop a couple of slabs onto a layer of kaya. If you order butter kopi they just plonk a slab on top of the liquid. The kaya itself comes from a tin. On appearances alone, this place has as much chance of getting a Michelin star as I do of winning a travel writing award. It’s the sort of place only a Singaporean would recommend.

I got there after 11am, after the breakfast rush, and most of the tables were taken and there was a queue. I was the only white person to be seen. There were a couple of copies of the single printed page menu where folks queued. When I was my turn I dutifully ordered, and handed over a couple of two dollar notes and got some change. Here’s where I stuffed, up: they offered me eggs and I declined. As I’d queued I’d noticed few folks getting the eggs, mixing them, adding a dark liquid and then dunking their toast in this. I just thought it strange, but I should have known better, for the full kaya deal you get the eggs, add white pepper and dark soy and eat them that way, a sweet, salty, eggy, peppery experience. What I had was good: white bread toasted over charcoal and warm enough to melt the butter slabs, a layer of sweet kaya goodness that tasted as much like honey as it did of coconut. The butter kopi was exactly that, no fancy whisking, just a layer threatening to separate if I didn’t keep stirring, the butter giving the coffee a rich creaminess. I doubt I could have this as a regular thing, but for something different it was fine: I’ve had worse in the name of coffee. Next time I’ll get the eggs too, for the full package.

As the stall was tucked in a housing block with a weird one-way entry and exit, it took a while for the Grab driver to find me — I think the first one gave up or got a better offer as they seemed to go in circles before cancelling, but the second found the place fine. As I waited I had a chat with a local, who told me Heap Seng Leong would have queues out the door between 8am and 10am, so my small queue was really nothing.

My Grab driver was the chatty sort, somehow we got onto the subject of what we take for granted, and he told me how when he holidays with his family he’ll book a few days out in the suburbs so his kids could see how regular folks in these places lived, before then having time in the tourist places. It doesn’t sound like a bad way to do things.
As he chatted away he almost dropped me at Terminal 3, rather than Terminal 1, but he got me to the right place eventually. I needed have worried about having to run for my flight, as it wasn’t delayed but “re-timed” about an hour later than schedule. I only noticed this when I printed my boarding pass, later when looking at my email I found a notification, sent after I’d checked in.

After wandering around Changi, I stopped at a kopi and toast place to try the egg thing. While the kaya toast wasn’t to the same standard, with wholemeal bread that was a little older than optimum, I kind of got the idea — if anything the eggs helped with the dry bread. Went for an iced coffee this time, and not paying attention ended up with a black iced coffee, no milk (they didn’t have the butter option). Hopefully all the coffee will keep me awake through the flight, and wear off in time to go to sleep at a normal hour tonight.

For my Scoot flight home I ordered the nasi lemak meal, I don’t think it’s anyone’s uncle’s recipe. Again, chicken and rice, and it was okay. The ikan bilis could have been crunchier, and instead of a fried egg there were slices of an omelette, but I’d guess you’d need someone’s uncle leaning over a charcoal grill in the galley for that.

Otherwise the re-times flight was smooth and uneventful. At various times during the flight crew members came up and thanked me for the chocolates I gave them at the start of the flight, which was nice. It’s been a good trip, a taste of Spain and Portugal, as well as catching up with Singapore. Hopefully all will appear here again in the future. I don’t really have anywhere to add to my list of places I don’t feel the need to go back to, except maybe Faro, which is good. Now it’s home, back to work, and eating all the right things, rather than all the good things.

“Y eso es todo, es todo, es todo.”