Presentations

The presentations in the past two weeks have been enjoyable. Some seemed dry to me only because the nature of the presentations were serious topics, often requiring prerequisite information to fully understand the presentation. Those presentations which stuck with me focused on the most common of topics and the most mundane happenings of everyday life. Basically things that we take for granted.

One of the more memorable ones was presented 2 fridays ago, about wet market transactions by Ghaff's group. They found that there was a noticeable trend that most wet market transactions occurred without any greeting. This comes without any surprise to me, because I guess it really is becoming part of the Singapore culture.

It so happened that I followed my mom down to Ghim Moh market last weekend. It had been a long while since I had been to a wet market, and I needed a break from practicing anyway. I walked round the stalls, rather aimlessly, and found that it really was true, that people more or less communicated very brusquely.

What caught my attention was this. At a fruit stall, all the "Singaporean aunties" were pushing around picking fruits, when the fruit seller raised his voice and said "Hello!" almost all too amiably to a caucasian lady, probably expatriate. The fruit seller started tending to her, introducing all the fruits in the stall, suggesting what was good and what was bad. I thought, maybe she is a regular customer hence the special treatment.

The conversation then turned.

"First time here? First time here maybe give you a bit of discount," said the fruit seller. Well maybe not the exact words because I wasn't taking notes, just merely eavesdropping and trying to recall now. But something along that line, you get the gist.

So... Wet market transactions normally go without greetings. I definitely agree, maybe with an added criteria: If buyer is local.

Perhaps the experience above was an exception. But I tend not to think so. Somehow I think this mentality of "foreign and white, probably better and richer" is not an uncommon perception.