KUALA LUMPUR, Nov 23 – For more than 30 years, people have flocked to Restoran Seng Lee at Lot 8-6, Jalan Batai, to fill their tummies with goodies like char kuey teow, pork noodles, wantan noodles and curry laksa.
But by the end of December, all these veteran hawkers will be gone. “They (Selangor Properties Berhad) want to take it back as they don’t want to do a coffee shop and rent it out to someone else,” says Lim Swee Chew, 70, or Mui Cheh, as she is better known. She runs the coffee shop with her husband and two sons. She also manages the pork noodle stall with her son, Khoo Kah Hing, 40, whipping up slurpworthy noodles served with a sweet tasting pork broth – a winning formula that has won her many fans.
Mui Cheh recalls starting this coffee shop business when Khoo was just five years old. It has not been an easy life for the family, as they just manage to make ends meet with their earnings from the drinks they serve. “It is also hard for us to find workers to help us hence my sons help out,” she explains.
She supplements their income with their takings from the pork noodle stall. Long ago, she used to run the economy rice or chap fan stall in the same shop but she switched to selling pork noodles. When things get busy during lunch time, tables and chairs are placed on the five-foot walkway to cater to the neverending stream of customers.
During peak hours, It’s hard to even hold a five-minute conversation with Lee Ling, 41, who fries char kuey teow at a non-stop speed.
Since 1998, she has taken over her father, Wong Kin Soong’s spot. Father and daughter swapped places -- her father took over her stall in Taman Seri Muda, Shah Alam and she stepped in to take his place here. Every Saturday, Wong returns to the shop and the place is packed with his regulars who miss his version of char kuey teow – a wetter version than the one fried up by his daughter.
In the 1970s, when the Jalan Batai shops first opened, Wong’s stall was located at the corner coffee shop, Restoran Shangri-La. About 20 years ago, he relocated to Restoran Seng Lee.
The middle stall is helmed by the friendly sisters – Chan Lyn Tai, 54, Chan Lin Yeng, 53 and Chan Fong Lin, 45. The trio serve delicious wantan noodles and curry laksa, plus they also have an impeccable memory when it comes to their customers.
A friend recalls how they still remembered her special order of curry wantan noodles even though she had not been back there for more than 10 years! The sisters come from a large family of a dozen children, originally from Tanjung Tualang. In the old days, their grandmother used to sell lai fun or rice noodles in the small town in Perak. As the work prepping those noodles is laborious, they decided to sell wantan noodles instead, since there was a demand by many customers.
Everything is made from scratch. The char siew served with their noodles is roasted over a charcoal fire, while the braised chicken feet has to be cleaned and deep fried before it is cooked with the Chinese mushrooms. Even their wantan noodles are taken from a supplier who makes them by hand. Freshness is also the key to their delicious food. According to Fong Lin, the crunchy green chilli pickles are prepared in small batches by another sister. Bite into their silky wantan and you’ll discover aromatic flavours. Lyn Tai tells us the secret is the addition of Hong Kong dried sole, ground to a powder, which uplifts the wantan with its umami taste.
Regulars also flock here during Chinese New Year to buy the sisters’ homemade cookies; everything from the labourious kuih kapit or love letters to the milky dragon biscuits. Great care is taken with their preparations and they don’t reuse the oil used to fry the arrowroot chips, explains Fong Lin.
In this affluent area starved of hawker fare, it will be hard to say goodbye to Restoran Seng Lee. Regulars were shocked by the news of their being told to leave even though talk about the redevelopment of the area has been going around for years. One such regular is Cindy Tan, 50, who lives nearby and frequents the shops here all the time. “They give a service you cannot find anywhere else and they are like family.”
Customers are made up of nearby residents and office workers from surrounding buildings. “Not many office workers can eat exclusive food every day and this kind of food is their daily fare,” says Tan. Once they heard the news, customers have been reacting in different ways. One even drove Lyn Tai and her sisters to nearby spots to search for a new location for their stall.
All of the three hawkers hope to stay together, as they have grown close to each other. The search for a new place is currently ongoing. They all hope to move nearby to cater to their existing customers, but it may be an uphill task since the commercial values for the buildings around the area are relatively high. Mui Cheh thinks that finding another coffee shop to run may also be difficult, hence she may just set up a pork noodle stall for her son Khoo while she and her husband will call it a day. The wantan noodles sisters say they are unable to retire since their children are still young. It’s a similar story with the char kuey teow stall.
Another person affected by the move will be the Penang rojak stall operator who parks in front of Restoran Seng Lee during lunch time. Chee Ming Kong, 62, who has been in the business for about 28 years, vows to stay on to sell his rojak to his regular customers, even after Restoran Seng Lee closes at the end of December.
Next door, Restoran Ajmeer Baru has also been given notice to vacate the premises by December 31. The 40-year-old mamak restaurant is now run by Faizal bin Bira, 27. His grandfather who hailed from India first started the restaurant when the place opened. Currently he is looking for a premise nearby to relocate his business.
The two rows of shophouses belong to Selangor Properties Berhad (SPB), a public listed company on the KL Stock Exchange. In SPB’s annual report for 2012, the 40-year-old, 16 units of two-storey shops/office buildings spanning 76,518 square feet, was revalued for RM18 million as at October 31, 2012. Earlier, SPB had announced in their 2010 annual report that they had plans to develop their land bank in Damansara Heights which included a proposed 107-unit condominium project in Jalan Batai.
In an article published in The Star on October 17, 2011, the displeased Bukit Damansara House Owners Association indicated that they were going to conduct a residents’ protest against the development. No mention was made whether the protest proceeded but subsequent annual reports from SPB do not mention any more plans for the redevelopment of Jalan Batai.
In their latest annual report for 2012, the company indicated they reviewed their land bank and did a master plan for its land around Damansara Heights as a blueprint for a sustainable and intergrated future development. Nothing was elaborated on the blueprint’s details.
This October, SPB issued letters to selected tenants asking them to move. According to Joshua Wong, building manager of SPB, the place is currently undergoing a rebranding exercise. Efforts to interview them on their plans have not been successful.
We understand that the 30-year-old laundry Mister Dhobi at the front row will also be relocating. Pushpa Valli, 30, who works there, is not sure when they will be moving but they are searching nearby for a new place. She has heard that there are plans to upgrade the space into an F&B outlet.
Next door, the hair salon Hair Sculpture has placed a notice to inform their customers that they will be vacating their premises and moving just behind... to share a space with Kiddies Store. According to the hair salon, their vacated premises will be taken up by Espressolab. We understand from Kiddies Store that they will reduce their current space by half, and the hair salon will take up the other half lot.
Apparently Restoran Seng Lee and Ajmeer Baru -- or the lots which they now occupy -- will be taken over by Alexis Bistro. Coincidentally, Asianage which runs Food Foundry and Butter and Beans at Section 17, Petaling Jaya had earlier taken up a lot on the other side of Restoran Seng Lee which was occupied by a wellness group.
According to Jenifer Kuah from Asianage, they plan to open up a deli-cum-bakery known as Sitka which will be a colloboration with Aberdeen-based Moonfish Cafe’s Christian Recomio who will also be doing dinners there three times a week. This, according to Kuah, will be in the same vein as a dinner supper club.
Verbal checks with the other tenants like Hock Lee’s, florist Cheri Pink, Cheers Pub and Bistro indicate that they are staying on.
The shake-up to this leafy neighbourhood definitely has everyone worried. Even the cobbler known as Chung, 70, who has his stall in front of Allison’s Place is not sure what will happen to him. The unassuming man who has been there for 38 years tells us that despite his age, he won’t be able to call it a day as he needs to work to survive.
This story was first published in Crave in the print edition of The Malay Mail on November 22, 2013.
