Sunday, April 26, 2009 21:08
Gentle under the warmth of the sun
In Andrew Loh, Top Story • 1,102 views • 9 Comments
Andrew Loh / Deborah Choo
South Bridge Road.
The old man parks his trolley by the side of the road as traffic rushes past him. The blistering heat in the late afternoon is relentless. He steps onto the kerb, and heads for the two trash containers put out by the nearby shops. He picks up two cardboard boxes, slits the bottoms open, and folds them. Walking back to his push-cart, he stacks them on top of the rest of the cardboards. The old man returns to the trash to look for discarded soft drink cans.
“Uncle, how are you,” Deborah says to him, apprehensive at his stern demeanour. He looks at us and seems a little bewildered. “Uncle, you’re collecting cardboards?” Deborah asks in Chinese. “Yes,” he replies. Dressed in a simple yellow t-shirt and a pair of brown shorts, his fair complexion hides his year of working on the streets of Singapore. As it turns out, the old man is very soft-spoken with gentle mannerisms. “I am 60 years old,” he tells us in his native Hokkien. We move in closer to hear him amidst the cacophony of noise from the traffic. His calloused hands, thick and rough fingers, and the lines on his face perhaps evidence of a lifetime of physical toil. “I used to work as a sweeper at Tiong Bahru market,” he says. He left because a new employer had taken over. That was a year ago. Now, he collects cardboards and sells them for 2.5 cents a kati.
He is on the streets seven to eight hours everyday, starting from 4pm. “Now prices [for cardboards] aren’t that good,” he explains. “And when it rains, I cannot collect them.” Thus he also collects drink cans to supplement his income. He ends his day at 11pm and takes a taxi home. “It costs about fifteen dollars for the trip to and from my house,” he says. We guess that he takes the taxi because he has to bring his trolley along. Our curious eyes spot a bunch of keys hanging from his belt. They’re for locking up his trolley at night, we later learned. He hopes to sell it, because it is rusty and rickety, for four or five dollars and get a new one. It will make pushing it easier, he says. That would be a great help under such scorching conditions during the day.
The old man lives in a room in a rented flat. It was recommended to him by a friend. It costs him $250 a month. Why doesn’t he rent one from the Housing and Development Board (HDB) which would be much cheaper? He explains that he has tried applying for one. But his application was rejected. “I am alone. So they say I cannot rent,” he tells us. “They say you must have a family or two people at least,” he says, indicating with his two fingers. Never married and thus has no children to depend on, he couldn’t find another person to apply with. However, he disclosed that he receives about $100 to $200 from the government through public assistance but does not want to elaborate further.
He makes a little more than $10 a day. After deducting his monthly expenses, he doesn’t have much left. He is living from hand to mouth. What if he is no longer able to fend for himself? “I will just go to the old folks’ home,” he says in a rather matter-of-fact manner. “What else can I do?”
He secures the cardboards on his trolley and prepares to move to his next collection point. He inspects the plastic bag holding the drink cans one more time to make sure everything is in place. “I have to go now,” he says. We thank him for speaking to us, as the small group of tourists and locals at the traffic lights continue to stare. “Take care, Uncle,” Andrew says to him. The old man smiles and soon he dissolves into the rest of the traffic – pushing his worn-down push cart along the streams of cars in the afternoon heat.
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9 Comments
Just wondering
Rafiz Hapipi
#1) The author did mention that the choice could be due to the trolley with him. Considering the two way trip costs $15 which makes about $7.50 a trip which is more than the cost of a taxi ride from Yishun to AMK Hub. Not too near a distance isn’t it?
Good story as build up to labour day. It humbles us down to be reminded that this man’s share of the nation’s wealth may have not reached him even after 60 years.
Maybe…, he’ll need 60 more just to attain it.
tiredsingaporean
The no. of these folks are increasing here in singapore and I am wondering if the govt is aware of or that they just don’t bother to look into the issue and thinking that these folks would not be around for long anyway. It’s so heart pain to see these old folks still struggling to make ends meet.
David
I think taking taxi defeated the whole purpose of earning out of cardboard and cans. Imagine if he took taxi for a month, the sum can be quite substantial since he has to pay for his rental too. Unless there is something the old man is not sharing that he probably can make a lot of money, within a day, to warrant for a taxi ride to & fro..
gemami
As tiredsingaporean correctly pointed out, making a living out of collecting cardboard boxes is on the increase. And although I am also bewildered by the taxi rides and the amount which can be saved from them, I can only conclude that perhaps he is not able to collect cardbooard boxes within his own estate.
I have, over the years, observed from the many aunties and uncles in my own estate, how they would fight over the terrorities they have marked out for themselves. Every corner of my estate is taken up by one aunty or uncle and there is no space left for any new comers.
I have spoken with some of them and they tell me that they had to resort to protecting their turfs, if not, everyone would be attempting to eke out something from it, especially the foreign labourers, the Chinese nationals and Bangladeshis.
I think this uncle may have been late to the scene in his own estate and therefore needed to venture further, thus the taxi ride to South Bridge Road.
We should address the bigger picture, which is, why are our golden generations having to do this? They have contributed to the Singapore Goldmine in the hope that this goldmine would see them through their golden years. Apparently, the gold they have contributed are never going to come back to them, and this is very sad. This government has failed them.
Spirit-centred
They are playing their part for the protection of the environment by helping to recylcing the trash.
Sha
The place where I work, international friends have asked me,
” Why are the elderly in Singapore working so hard? Sweeping thrash, cleaning the roads etc.? The elderly in our countries, stay home and look after grandkids.”
This might be a little ‘out’ from the discussion, but yeah, There is something wrong with our environment somewhere.
Just wondering
5) gemami on April 27th, 2009 12.25 pm
> We should address the bigger picture, which is, why are our golden generations
> having to do this? They have contributed to the Singapore Goldmine in the hope
> that this goldmine would see them through their golden years. Apparently, the gold > they have contributed are never going to come back to them, and this is very sad.
> This government has failed them.
Well said. I have met several professionals from China who are now working here. They are now either PRs or citizens. They mentioned that when they first arrived here, what struck them was the sight of so many elderly people working at menial jobs or eking out a living collecting cardboard or cans from trash cans. They went on to explain that in China people worked hard when they were young and when they became old, the state was expected to provide for them. That may be the communist philosophy but I admit that it makes sense. After all, why should we spend our time and energies in nation-building when we cannot hope to reap the benefits later in life? We are told that we have to save for our retirement years because we should not expect the state to provide for us when we are old. It makes a great deal of sense therefore to build our own nest eggs and not be concerned with what happens to the rest of the country. It’s a very selfish attitude but a pragmatic one.
radlife66
Yes. This is an appropriate feature for our Labour day.
Funny we see old people picking trash in Singapore, New York, Hong Kong, capitalist free market system.
I know you don’t see them in China now…but i believe soon they will appear in maybe shanghai and the developed coastal cities as they embrace the capitalist free market system.
funny.
Last week the family were having dinner at a hawker centre in a residential estate and i saw this elderly women. She was wearing a pair of spectacles, hair neatly placed, her attire was clean and tidy with appropriate demeanour. Quite immaculate by middle class standard. She was going around the tables picking empty drink cans.
i remember when i was growing up in Singapore during the 70s, 80s, there were no such “aunties” around. What you had was the occasional vagrant, they usually had some mental problems, barefeet with tattered cloths, long unkept hair wondering in food centres, eating scraps.
Her empty cans big plastic bag was also discreetly lined with newspaper on the inside so as not to appear too obvious of the precious contents.
She must be a Singapore citizen, her mandarin gave that away. What does it mean to be a citizen? Maybe it is meaningless in this new gilded age of globalized economy. Nationals have no meaning in the traditional sense. In this borderless world you recognise and identify more with your class? Elite? Middleclass? Poor?
I felt sad, she looked a lot like my mom. Who would want their mother to do this in Singapore?
Did he say why he pays $15 for taxi fare when he makes only $10 a day?