hunter-killer
Member
One of the things that the Singapore government is very good at is coming up with quirky terms and coining phrases. When the late Indonesian President B. J. Habibie called us “a Little Red Dot,” we proceeded to turn it into a catch phrases of sorts. Then there’s the word “hub,” which when used by Singapore’s elite often refers to the fact that we are a “hub” for everything and anything conceivable.
Singapore's most inventive contribution to the English language is in re-imagining the word “entrepreneur.” In the early 1990s, when the government tried to get Singaporeans to become more “entrepreneurial” in the technology sector, we devised the term “technopreneur,” which was essentially an entrepreneur who had set up a business that entailed some semblance of technological investment. By Singapore's definition, Silicon Valley is thus populated with “technopreneurs.”
The latest group of “preneurs” that the Singapore government is trying to breed are known as “Hawkerpreneurs.” Thanks to UNESCO, the Singapore government has suddenly realized that Singapore’s food vendors or hawkers form an invaluable part of Singapore’s cultural landscape. Hawkers have fed generations of Singaporeans and are the very reason why Singapore is described as a “food paradise.” More importantly (particularly from a government calculation of revenue from elsewhere perspective), whenever friends from abroad come and visit us, we always feel the need to bring them to a “hawker centre.”
There is, however, one tiny snag to this most Singaporean of institutions. Old Hawkers are getting too old to continue doing what they do and the kids simply don’t want to sit over a stove 24/7 to eke out a living. It’s true that many outdoor hawker centres are giving way to cooler air-conditioned food courts, but even then, the life of a hawker remains unforgiving. Long, physically demanding hours are involved day in day out. While you do hear stories of how there are hawkers who have made enough to own a Mercedes and send their kids to university, you’ll also find hawkers who have sent their kids to university for the very purpose of ensuring they shan't end up as hawkers. As Tan Tee Seng opines in the following article, being hawker was a way for the less fortunate to earn a living and not to set up a “legacy” business.
More at https://tinyurl.com/y555w9ft
Singapore's most inventive contribution to the English language is in re-imagining the word “entrepreneur.” In the early 1990s, when the government tried to get Singaporeans to become more “entrepreneurial” in the technology sector, we devised the term “technopreneur,” which was essentially an entrepreneur who had set up a business that entailed some semblance of technological investment. By Singapore's definition, Silicon Valley is thus populated with “technopreneurs.”
The latest group of “preneurs” that the Singapore government is trying to breed are known as “Hawkerpreneurs.” Thanks to UNESCO, the Singapore government has suddenly realized that Singapore’s food vendors or hawkers form an invaluable part of Singapore’s cultural landscape. Hawkers have fed generations of Singaporeans and are the very reason why Singapore is described as a “food paradise.” More importantly (particularly from a government calculation of revenue from elsewhere perspective), whenever friends from abroad come and visit us, we always feel the need to bring them to a “hawker centre.”
There is, however, one tiny snag to this most Singaporean of institutions. Old Hawkers are getting too old to continue doing what they do and the kids simply don’t want to sit over a stove 24/7 to eke out a living. It’s true that many outdoor hawker centres are giving way to cooler air-conditioned food courts, but even then, the life of a hawker remains unforgiving. Long, physically demanding hours are involved day in day out. While you do hear stories of how there are hawkers who have made enough to own a Mercedes and send their kids to university, you’ll also find hawkers who have sent their kids to university for the very purpose of ensuring they shan't end up as hawkers. As Tan Tee Seng opines in the following article, being hawker was a way for the less fortunate to earn a living and not to set up a “legacy” business.
More at https://tinyurl.com/y555w9ft