"That steely resolve and ethic behind Nam Seng": Leong Yuet Mei 梁月明, 94
Death Kopitiam Singapore's tribute to Mdm Leong Yuet Meng, founder of Nam Seng Wanton Noodles
Photo Credit: Nam Seng Wonton Noodles/FB
In a stall at a defunct hawker centre, beside the old national library at Stamford Road, Leong Yuet Meng served a humble plate of old-school char siew wanton noodles and soy sauce chicken noodles.
That was 1958. She was educated, married and 30 years young.
This nondescript stall was her family’s livelihood. The only job Mdm Leong knew and had done in her life was selling wanton noodles.
More than sixty years later, even at the advanced age of 92, she was still at it, cooking wanton noodles, serving her customers.
Photo Credit: Nam Seng Wonton Noodles/FB
To Mdm Leong, there’s no secret recipe in Nam Seng (南生). It is a “heart to learn” and a willingness to work hard.
For six decades, she wakes up at 4am each morning and is at the market by 5am. When most of us are still struggling to get out of bed, she is already at her stall, often before 7am.
She raised her family with sheer hard work and perseverance. She is an embodiment of dedication and a commitment to a single craft for the entirety of her life.
The hawker trade can, at times, be overtly romanticised. It is certainly not a bed of roses. It is hard-breaking work. There’s no short cut to success, and success is often very elusive.
Mdm Leong’s diminutive frame exudes a stubbornness, a stubborn strength. An entrepreneurial spirit, subsumed within an all-consuming bonfire in her belly, she lights up the room with her smile.
Behind her smile is a steely resolve and ethic to just keep walking, keep going and to perfect every single detail. In fact, there is joy, simple joy, at perfecting a plate of wanton noodles.
Photos Credit: Nam Seng Wonton Noodles/FB/Woon Tai Ho
To Mdm Leong, every plate of wanton noodles was not just sustenance, it was her responsibility and a promise to her customers.
Nam Seng began as her livelihood but became her life’s work.
With deft hands, a robust mind, a warm smile, and a glass of stout, her family’s livelihood became a craft, and her craft became the glue that builds and binds a community.
Mdm Leong was not a master chef or a culinary connoisseur. She was merely a hawker, dedicated to a craft. Unassuming but feisty. An affordable meal but never losing the dignity of a livelihood.
Nam Seng was also a labour of love, a promise to the love of her life, her late husband, Tang Leng Choon, who passed away in 2000, to keep the business going regardless of the circumstances.
Photo Credit: Woon Tai Ho
Nam Seng is more than a plate of wanton noodles. Nam Seng is also more than a brand.
It is a community of Singaporeans, who took the journey of life together with an unassuming but inspirational founder - an embodiment of resilience and love.
Fundamentally, Nam Seng exemplifies dignity; that a livelihood is more than just a paycheck. It is respect and an assurance to your children that all will be well.
Mdm Leong Yuet Meng and Nam Seng Wonton Noodles are, in their own right, literal and metaphorical exemplars of the strong work ethic that makes an immigrant society like Singapore work.
Her story and that of Nam Seng are, in fact, a microcosm of The Singapore Story.
Sleep well, Ah Po. We will miss you!
Photo Credit: Reuters
Photo Credit: Rice Media
Photo Credit: Rice Media
Top image: Rice Media
