Just Saying

Where there's bak kwa smoke, there's a neighbour's ire

Neighbours will keep fighting over food-related fumes drifting into their homes. We have to find a way to live together as a diverse rojak society. Could the controversial 2011 curry dispute show us one way to do so?

I hoped it had come from the mouths of my satisfied neighbours.

Not from their, er, other end.

The lift smelled of sulphurous socks, dipped in sweet custard laced with rotten onions. It's so pungent that I couldn't tell if gut gases were in the mix.

In other words, the air smelt of durian.

These are fighting words.

KICKING UP A STINK

We hear of neighbours fighting over food-related fumes drifting into their homes.

This festive season, where there's bak kwa smoke, there's a neighbour's ire.

A Bukit Timah resident recently fumed over her neighbour barbecuing apparently more than 100kg of bak kwa in her courtyard, reported Shin Min Daily News. She said this happened whenever Chinese New Year drew near.

"There was once when she barbecued from 8am till midnight. (On Jan 21), she started at around 7am and went on till 2pm," said the resident. She added that the smoke made her elderly parents cough badly. According to the report, the police were alerted.

The neighbour explained to the Chinese newspaper that there were more than 300 members in her family, and that "bak kwa sold in shops cost a lot".

We understand why auntie wanted to save more than a few dollars. It's harder to understand why she wanted to do this at her neighbours' expense.

Doctors' consultations and medicine to treat a bad cough could "cost a lot" too.

There are people who would argue that the frying, grilling and boiling are done on their own property, so they are doing nothing wrong. They can't help it if neighbours fume over the fumes. They have no control over where the wind carries the smells to.

It's almost like they're waiting for neighbours to thank them for the fresh air the rest of the time.

Keep waiting, lah, Neighbour Of The Year.

A doodle by the writer (@sseeingthings) about neighbours in a dispute trying to find common ground. PHOTO: COURTESY OF DENISE CHONG

ONE MAN'S GARBAGE IS ANOTHER MAN'S DOUFU

Dear durian lovers, please lower your daggers. Use them to open your beloved fruit in peace.

Despite my earlier words, I don't want to fight.

I understand that one man's durian meat is another man's poison.

Here's one example: A friend said her husband would go "yum" as a garbage truck sailed past, trailing a stomach-churning stench.

I laughed at random times whenever I thought of it, gasping: "Garbage… garbage..."

People backed slowly from me.

You see, her husband went, "yum, chou doufu (stinky tofu, in Mandarin)" longingly as a rubbish truck receded into the distance.

The Chinese fermented snack smells like someone ate the contents of a sewage pipe, threw up, ate that and threw up again.

Apparently, it is yummy. No, no, you're very kind to offer me some, but I'll just take your word for it.

No matter how understanding I want to be, I hope no neighbour will try to make it at home. If you love it so much, you'll be willing to splurge on a plane ticket to eat it in another country, right?

Do that and you'll be the Neighbour Of The Decade.

CLOSE OUR WINDOWS, KEEP OUR MINDS OPEN

By the way, durian fans, before you throw spiky husks at me, hear me out. I am a fan of durians... in theory.

I prefer not to eat it, but I admire the bouquet of an unopened durian from a polite distance.

"Polite" is the key word. Distance is hard to achieve on our densely populated small island.

So first things first, if we're cooking something pungent, be decent. Try to close our windows and doors. Neighbours, try to keep an open mind.

But some aromas can't be contained.

I once smelled durian as a car drove past. Just a few seconds, and the powerful smell of the driver's loot in his boot leaked out.

Someone once told me about a concerned citizen calling the cops about a suspected corpse when the smell of belacan drifted from a neighbour's home. (This didn't happen in Singapore.) To the freaked-out resident, it reeked of a murder most foul instead of a dinner of fowl.

So what do we do if closing windows and doors does not work?

Remember when tempers flared over the 2011 curry dispute? Maybe there's a lesson to be learnt.

A newspaper here reported that a migrant family from China and a Singaporean Indian family disagreed over the smell of curry coming from the latter's home.

Out of consideration to the Chinese family, the Indian family would shut their doors and windows whenever they cooked curry.

Thank you, but...

The Chinese family still entreated their neighbours to refrain from cooking the dish.

No, thank you...

The request was met with a refusal from the Indian family.

The families went for a Community Mediation Centre (CMC) process.

Thank you...

This was how civilised people work out problems. The settlement was that the Indian family would cook curry when their Chinese neighbours were not at home.

Things went a bit haywire over the way it was reported by that newspaper. People got angry and vocal, saying the Chinese family and the mediator showed intolerance towards a particular ethnic group.

The CMC then explained that one of the families had suggested the resolution, which was accepted by the other family, according to the Singapore Infopedia website. The Government stated that the CMC mediator had neither suggested the solution nor mandated it upon both families.

We, of course, could have yelled out other solutions. Some more inflammatory than others.

No matter how much we wanted to defend our beloved curry dish, no matter how unsatisfied some of us are, no matter if the solution left a sour taste in our mouths - the key thing was that they reportedly agreed on it together.

So thank you from the bottom of our tummies for showing us one way to live together as a diverse rojak society.

You could be our Neighbours Of The Century.

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A version of this article appeared in the print edition of The Sunday Times on January 28, 2018, with the headline Where there's bak kwa smoke, there's a neighbour's ire. Subscribe