PETALING JAYA, Jan 20 — Ain’nur Syafiera Asrul Rizan only wanted to give her parents’ humble food stall some exposure when she posted about them on Twitter last weekend.
Little did she know that the story of their hardworking ways would blow up with her tweet gaining more than 32,000 retweets and 15,000 so far.
“I’m kind of sad looking at my mum and dad lately. They work so hard selling corn until they fall asleep.
“I’m not (Twitter-famous) but I hope Twitter will help things like this go viral. There’s still a lot of corn left,” she wrote, along with the address of her parents’ stall in Marang, Terengganu.
The 22-year-old told mStar that her mother, Azliza Mat Saman, gets up at the crack of dawn every day to manage the stall which sells an array of corn products, nuts, and honey.
Her father Asrul Rizan Abdul Rahim works as a lorry driver for an oil palm plantation during the day and helps out with the stall at night.
“My mother opens up the stall at 7.30 every morning. My dad drives a lorry for oil palm harvests during the day and he comes back to help my mum at the stall until 11 at night.
“A lot of palm trees have been cut down so my dad’s not earning much. To cover the costs of our education, mum has to run the stall,” she said.
Im kinda sad tengok umi dengan abah i lately. Jual jagung sampai tertido. I know im not tweetfemes but i hope twitter will help this things going viral. And jagung pun still banyak lagi. Kedai dekat kg pasir puteh merchang 21610 marang terengganu. BANGSAL JANGUNG 616 pic.twitter.com/e3GoPVlsrZ
— ؛ (@fyraphobia_) January 18, 2020
In a Twitter thread, Syafiera explained that the stall had been seeing slow business as it was newly opened and competing with other established players in the market.
However, Syafiera said that her mum keeps the prices low to appeal to customers and extends her kindness to those in need whenever she can.
“One car stopped by the stall and they bought corn and some nuts. The car was packed to the brim and the kids asked if they could buy corn in a cup.
“They gave coins and it wasn’t enough to add up to RM1, but mum gave it to them anyway.
“She said, ‘even during hard times, there are people who have it harder than us.’”
Soon after her tweet went viral, Syafiera helped her mum to set up a Facebook page for the stall as well as a marker on Google Maps to help customers find the stall easily.
Several Twitter users promised to stop by at her parents’ stall for some delicious snacks the next time they were in Terengganu, while others who had sampled the stall’s offerings gave rave reviews.
“If I was in the area, I would totally buy something. I’m a huge fan of corn,” said @yoongles1903.
“I always stop by here to buy something! It’s delicious,” wrote @yuniesyahiraa.
