serangoon - durian fiesta

eating durian had to wait for the mp.

it was 7pm, marathon man and her galfren arrived at serangoon cc, and took a loft to the level-6, the sky level. there were already 70 people there. marathon man headed to the counter where a few big baskets of durian were lying about. one of the red-shirt grass-root leaders told him, "take a seat first, we have to wait for the mp to come before start eating."

the view from the sky-level was 180 degree, though could not see buildings from orchard road any other signature buildings from the surrouding, nevertheless, it was a goo dview of the neighborhood flats and streets.

this morning he was jogging from poh huat road, park villas rise, park villas green, park viallas terrace, jalan ariff, jalan tani, florence rd, lim ah pin rd, joo hong rd, florence rd again, simon lane, da silva lane, kang choo bin road, parry road, glasgow rd, flower road, palm grove ave, jensen rd, highland rd.... came out to kovan mrt, saw the serangoon cc durian fiesta banner. took down the number, call in, and there were still tickets left. he bot the tickets in the afternoon, $15/person, bot 1 each for him an s galfren.

at 7.30pm the mp come and sat next to marathon man table. without any speech or much ado, teh grass-root lady offered the mp 2 d24 duirans. and the durian fiesta began!

grassroot-leaders serve every table with pre-opened durians.... but every time it was the same type of furain the d24 - firmer, big seed and thick meat. pale yellow in color, only a handful seeds in a distorted petite shell.
the creamy pulp jaded the taste bud and the tasting thots, after they opened the 5th durian. then he asked teh grassroot leader, "got maoshanwang or not?"

"yes."

"can get us one?"

"ok."

then came the maoshanwang - sysmtrical in an oblong shape, slightly bigger than d24, each compartment consists of 5 or more small seeds, but each seed was wrapped with chunks of golden yellow meat, not as frim as the d24, but sweeter.

he also asked for xo, but the guy said, "717 only has maoshan and d24."

after a few rounds of chomping, the mp stood up and walked to each table to talk to the eaters. she came to marathon man's table and asked his galfren,"where are you from?"

she said, "sembawang."

"hah.... sembawang, how come you are here?"she was surprised why some outsider came to her constituency and ate her durians.

she said, "my boy fren jogged this morning and saw the banner about teh durian fiesta, and he's a durian lover... "

"oh.... come take a picture."

mp take picture with her.

like the oppo constituencies are getting lift upgrade, the not-pro pap guy like marathon man also can eat the pap mp's durian. why not? eating mp's durian is like paying gahmen taxes, you do it, whether you are in the pap or oppo ward. anyway there's no free lunch, as they said - you pay for what you eat. so eat as much as you can.

in fact, serangoon cc holds a durian fiesta every year. this year they held it in oct, because accordingly the durian is better during this month.

how about a durian eating contest? say within 10 minutes, how much durian can one eat, weighing the durian before and after the eating to find out how much is eaten. eat the normal durian in the qualifying rounds, but the maoshan in the finals. bet it will be not only be an attraction for the locals, a good way for pap to rally the people, it would be an interesting way of getting the tourists to appreciate the stinky fruit. and there wld be one for the locals and one for all natinals, the singapore open durian eating competition. germany has its oktoberfest, singapore should have its DurianOK.fest. who say beers and durian cannot mix?

while the malaysians and indons are claiming laksa is their dish, we singaporeans apart from, bak-chor-mee-mai-terkua, and meesiam-maihum as our national dishes can also claim as the number-1 durian-eating nation.