Singaporeans played cameos in the latest episode of The Amazing Race shot here

By eddino abdul hadi

Taxi driver Sim Kay Toh has never seen an episode of award-winning American reality television series The Amazing Race.

But last Monday, he and several other Singaporeans featured in an episode of the globally televised programme aired here.

In the show, contestants travel around the world and try to out-race one another as well as attempt to compete tasks given to them.

Mr Sim, who drives a seven-seater SMRT Space cab, drove two of the contestants to several destinations including Victoria Concert Hall, the Singapore Flyer and Fu Lu Shou Complex.

The 55-year-old tells Life!: ‘I forgot all about doing the filming because it was done late last year. A friend saw me on the show on Monday and called me up to tell me that I was on television.’

Other Singaporeans who popped up in the show include boy drummers from dragon and lion dance troupe Singapore Yiwei Athletic Association.

The contestants in the race had to quickly learn how to play the complicated beats to complete the task.

Two of the boys who had to teach them were brothers, seven-year-old Jerry Tock and 11-year-old Jarell.

Drumming Lessons

Says the older brother: ‘It was difficult to teach them, I found it hard to get them to understand how to play the drums.’

Their father is one of the founders and the secretary of the Singapore Yiwei Athletic association.

The Singapore Flyer also features prominently in the episode. Two of the contestants successfully completed a risky stunt, crawling precariously between two capsules at the highest point of the 165m-tall wheel.

According to a Singapore Flyer spokesman, the producers of the show came up with the idea for the stunt.

Taxi driver Sim plans to catch the repeat telecast of the show tonight.

More than just a driver for the contestants, he also helped two of them, Michael Naylor and Louie Stravato, in a task where they had to sell ice-cream sandwiches from a cart in front of Fu Lu Shou Complex.

The pair had to sell 25 ice-cream sandwiches to complete the task, and Mr Sim bought their last 10 ice-cream sandwiches. ‘My friends were hanging around at Ibis Hotel nearby, so I bought the ice cream and gave it to them,’ he says.

Mr Sim, who has been a full-time taxi driver for four years, was waiting for passengers at the Tanjong Pagar railway station when the two contestants and their television production team boarded his taxi.

He said he spent about two hours driving them to their various destinations.

‘I left the meter running. I don’t remember how much I was paid in the end but it was less than $50 and they paid in Singapore dollars.’

His last destination with them was at Penang Road as he had to leave for another appointment.

The drummers’ father, Mr Marcus Tock, 34, says his skilful sons have been exposed to dragon and lion dance drumming early and they decided to pick up the instruments themselves.

Jarell, a Primary 5 pupil, has been drumming since he was seven, while Jerry, who is in Primary 1, started playing with the drums when he was four years old.

They are both studying in Hougang Primary School.

The Singapore Flyer spokesman says that the airing of the episode has generated a buzz and has increased interest about the tourist attraction, based on viewer responses and blogs on the Internet. Visitors might even get to do the same stunt featured in the show someday.

The spokesman adds: ‘We will be happy to consider introducing such exciting stunts and activities, should there be a build-up in interest.’

The Amazing Race episode, now in its 16th season, was the second to make a stop in Singapore. The third season of the show in 2002 also had an episode filmed here.

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Not exactly about My Toa Payoh, and I don’t follow the Amazing Race. Just that I had noted the boy drummers in my previous post and it is good that they got some publicity.

I just hope the rest of the world don’t believe all our boys are forced to learn to drum.

But then the drummer caught my eye.

If you look closely, you can see him in the middle of the picture, the little boy who is barely taller than the huge drum with his left hand on the drumhead. He looked about 10 years old. Maybe 11 or 12.

But he was drumming with excellent skill and confidence, the towering drum was his instrument and he made it boom, clack, and rumble, loudly or softly, urgently or patiently as required.

He was quite amazing.

Then I heard the steady ringing of the gong beneath the clashing of the cymbals. And almost hidden by the huge drum was an even littler boy keeping time on the gong. (He’s to the left of the drum with on hand on the gong to mute it.) He was about the same height as the drum! Maybe next year when he is taller than the drum, he will be drumming.

If you walk along that road, you may at times hear roosters crowing. They do not, it would seem, only crow at dawn or in the morning. They seem to crow for the sheer joy of crowing, or for no reasons at all.

Or maybe they’re just clearing their throats.

Anyway, one morning (it was a weekend), I woke rather early and went for a walk in the crisp cool morning air and found myself at Toa Payoh West listening to the rather persistent crowing of a white rooster. The rest of the flock were scavenging in the grass for their breakfast.

It was a rather rustic sight and sound.

Where did these chickens come from? About maybe 6 months to a year ago, a pair of chickens were first spotted around the area of the SLF complex which is the two tower blocks on top of the hill that is served by Toa Payoh West. The pair ranged from the foot of the hill at the Thomson Road side, all the way to Philips. In time the pair (which was a rooster and an hen) had a brood of chicks, and then another and then another. By now there are easily about 20 chickens roaming the hill of Toa Payoh West.

My theory is that the chickens may have come from one of the private apartments at Toa Payoh Rise, just behind the petrol station. The chickens may have escaped into the forest and wondered onto the hill. But it’s just a theory.

The chickens are wild and can fly. They can roost in the tree branches 10 or more metres above, reaching their perch by flight. People have been amazed that they can fly that high and the first time I saw one do so, I was ready to believe that it was some other bird and not a chicken. But it was.

Toa Payoh West with the forested area is a haven for wildlife. A small family of monkeys (macaques, I believe) wandered through the area some months back, stayed awhile and moved on.

I have also seen monitor lizards scavenging in the twilight hours.

And squirrels. These shy, nervous creatures are quite common, but it is always a thrill to see one. That morning I saw two, but could only capture one with my camera.

The new Thomson Circle Line MRT station will be opening in a few years time and I wonder if the chickens, the lizards and the squirrels will survive the change in the environment. Or would more people, more traffic affect their habitat and food supply.

Will we still see them in 3 years time?

They chopped down the trees yesterday (Fri, 7 nov 2008). The stately elegant trees at the corner of Lor 2 and 3, next to Kheng Cheng School were all cut down. I heard the whine of the chainsaws as I tried to nap, but did not realised it was the sound of the death of those beautiful trees. I knew some months ago when the SLA put up the board advertising the land sale that if the land were to be redeveloped, the trees would have to go. So I reminded myself to take some pictures before the cranes and the trucks came.

Well, they came and the trees went. Development has priority.

No doubt there will be new trees.

Then there is the plot of land along Lorong 1A. It’s being developed too. The trees will soon be gone too…

I think it is appropos that my first post on My Toa Payoh is about the Muffin Man. The Muffin Man runs a stall at Blk 127 Toa Payoh Lorong 1 hawker centre. The stall is Bliss Haven Restaurant and it wasn’t always a stall selling Muffins.

Bliss Haven used to be a zi char stall selling all kinds of Chinese cooked food – hor fun, pork ribs, etc at the old hawker centre (Blk 129 I think, which has since been torned down and replaced by the hawker centre at Blk 127). The stall then was run by a grumpy old couple – a skinny old man, and a plumpish (okay maybe even fat) lady with a noticeable limp. The food was very good, but the stall had seen better days with many blocks torn down and people moving away. It was not as crowded as it used to be. But the stall and the couple survived.

A friend of mine had a worrying experience when she ate there some years back. She had placed her order with the lady who then conveyed the order to her husband, the old man. The old man was in the midst of chopping some spring onions or some such veggies, and continued to complete the task instead of jumping straight to prepare the order for my friend. When the lady realised this, she started yelling at the old man to prepare the order. The old man yelled back and they continued in this fashion with the the old man chopping away furiously at the veggies who were probably standing in (in his mind perhaps) for his wife.

My friend was quite perturbed by this turn of events and wondered if she would be morally if not actually responsible if the man should decide to turn the chopper on his wife. She almost wanted to cancel her order, but was afraid this might further aggravate the situation.

Fortunately, nothing untoward happened, other than the over-stimulation of my friend’s hyperactive imagination. But she did tell us of the incident the next day. I in turn mentioned this to another friend (who also lives in Toa Payoh and she happened to be related to the couple. She explained that the couple was always bickering but that it was their way of interacting with each other. You may know couples like this. After years of marriage, their only excitement in life is arguing with each other.

Anyway, a few months (or at least some time) later, the old man passed away rather suddenly. He didn’t feel well one day, went to see a doctor, was hospitalised, and died shortly after. Some cancer if I remember correctly.

His wife became despondent and the stall was closed after that for some time.

In time, the son (a.k.a. Muffin Man) took over the stall, but had limited success replicating the attraction of his parent’s zi char business. I must say though that he gave it his best shot. In time, he experimented with muffins and that was practically an immediate success. He then switch completely to making muffins and has a steady following at the hawker centre. He’s not the first to bring muffins to the heartlands, though. There’s a stall at the shunfu hawker centre.

Anyway this is the muffin man of Toa Payoh. He was closed for 2 weeks recently when he was called for reservist and he left this rather cheeky note on the shutters of his stall. Well, I guess he needs a holiday, even if it is with the army.