A month later, new vendors moved in to sell a different fare: Mexican chicken skewers, American chicken chop, Australian fish and chip and sausages with special German sauce.

Another offered Pattaya fried rice wrapped in omelette, while further down was another selling Vietnamese beef noodle and rolls.

So what’s the big deal?

Plenty. It marks an important change in Singapore society.

It is witnessing a new breed of young savvy hawkers who are well educated and world-wise, moving into the turf that’s being vacated by an older generation fixed in their ways.

The new trend lies beyond rising unemployment, which has put 13,000 graduates out of jobs. It also reflects changing customer tastes and perceived opportunities.

Enter the graduate hawkers!

Some of them are not afraid to offer foreign dishes they had picked up when studying or travelling abroad.

Some are trying out the latest pop food from Japan; others are hitting on Korean bibimbub or Iranian shish kebab.

Almost every hawker centre in Singapore has its share of steaks and pork chops, wonton noodles and chicken rice stalls.

The newcomers are giving traditional hawkers a run for their money. And exerting pressure on both groups is a small number of permanent residents, some of them married to locals, who have introduced Japanese, Italian and French cuisines for mass eating at reasonable prices.

As a result, the word “hawker” is taking on a new meaning in Singapore.

It is a far cry from the old tick-tock man of the 40s and 50s who plied the streets with two baskets and a pole on his shoulders or on a converted rickshaw.

The economic downturn is, of course, pushing better-educated Singaporeans into the food business – and hawker centres in densely populated housing estates are the best spots.

The food scene is undergoing big changes. Last year, the government announced a plan to upgrade Singapore’s 45 centres – the backbone of cheap eating – involving 5296 stallholders.

Nineteen had been selected, some already completed; 16 others will be chosen soon.

Not every customer is looking forward to it, however. Upgrading often means a cleaner, more comfortable eating environment but higher prices.

Food is a big S$8bil business in Singapore, with each Singaporean spending some S$2000 a year at food outlets. In numbers, the hawkers overwhelm Western fast-food outlets when it comes to choice.

In the past 30 years, hawkers have helped to keep the cost of living down since workers and students have depended on them for meals.

Even today, an average meal with drinks at a hawker centre costs S$3 to S$4 – and upgrading could raise it by 50 cents or a dollar.

The same food at air-conditioned food courts in shopping malls costs a dollar or two more.

Innovative Western and other foreign cuisines sell for S$6 to S$7, still a lot cheaper than in most restaurants.

The value-added factor is crucial to meeting rising costs brought on by the march of modernisation and changing tastes – mainly better premises, higher costs of ingredients and wages.

After upgrading, rentals shoot up for old tenants (some of them had been there for 10 to 20 years) sometimes double, but because the old rates were so much below market prices there are few complaints. The improvements usually bring in more business anyway.

One stallholder at the refurbished Serangoon Gardens Hawker Centre had her rental raised from S$300 to S$650. But she is not complaining because business has jumped sharply. Newcomers who had to bid for their stalls ended up paying four or five times more.

All this is exerting pressure on nearby coffee shops, where stalls cost more and food choices are older and limited.

The competition is hitting the older hawkers who are unable to cope with higher costs or the changing tastes of younger Singaporeans. There are far too many chicken rice or noodle sellers.

Their younger competitors are more marketing savvy, offering daily or weekly discounts to pack in eaters. When people get tired of one type of food, they are quick to change the menu.

The government realises the problem.

It is offering the less viable hawkers to exit on cash terms and allow more enterprising ones to come into the upgraded centres.

Older hawkers have played a crucial role feeding Singapore on the cheap. Many have sent their children to university.

Theirs have been a tough life, having gone into it because they did not have the education for a sustaining job.

This is changing the face of many food outlets – tantamount to a second revolution.

In the 1950s, hawking was a quick way for people with little skills or capital to earn a living. Street hawkers proliferated everywhere until they reached some 250,000.

In those days, the hawkers would prowl the streets selling home-made fish balls with noodles, a dish that remains popular to this day.

They would attract customers by striking a hardwood rod against a bamboo stick, making a rhythmic “tick-tock” (thus “the tick-tock man”) sound to announce his presence.

The government began to license hawkers, putting them in stalls in newly built housing blocks. This gradually reduced the number to a few thousand hygienic, middle-class hawkers.

Today, each hawker centre has 40 to 50 stalls and licences are distributed to reflect the racial composition – 77% Chinese, 14% Malay and 7% Indian.

Cleanliness is classified by a sticker issued by health inspectors from the Environment Ministry, with grades ranging from “A” (the best) to “D”.

Those who are found to flout health laws – bacteria in the food, cockroaches or rats in the premises – earn demerit points that could mean suspension.

Not many customers have been put off by a “C” or “D” sticker. Tasty food, some say, is more important. SARS is changing some of these views, though.

o Seah Chiang Nee is a veteran journalist and editor of the information website littlespeck.com (e-mail: cnseah2000@ littlespeck.com )

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