Kopi with Bertha: Liaisons with Lady Luck in the heartlands

by Bertha Henson

A COUPLE of decades ago, my neighbourhood hawker centre was a dead place during weekends. Few stalls would be open, and they would be the ones which sold drinks that aren’t sugar cane juice or desserts that aren’t tau huay. There would be a scattering of scruffy-looking men around the tables – they were waiting for their “numbers to open’’. Someone would be shouting them out.

Somehow these bookies and gamblers have been scrubbed off the hawker centre. They’ve been replaced by the neighbourhood gambling shop located right next to the NTUC supermarket. There are not only scruffy-looking men in the queue but housewives, retirees and the kopi kia who serves me my coffee. Plus, neighbours and long-time residents I recognise. They are not shy about standing in a queue that stretches under the staircase landing into the back alley. People nod at people they recognise.

The queues get longer when the prize gets bigger.

Now, right next to the gambling shop is the AXS station where people pay bills. It has always struck me as remarkable that people can go from paying bills to putting out money to gamble. I know another place in the heartland where the ATM machine is next to the gambling shop. People move from the ATM queue to the gambling queue. I suppose this is no different from the cash machines all in a row near the entrance of casinos here. Money within easy reach.

I don’t like gambling and can’t even bear to put down a dollar for a round of blackjack with relatives during Chinese New Year. Trusting luck is too risky a venture for me. Whenever I pass the gambling queue, I wonder who would be putting out what amounts as they finger the slips of paper in their hand. I also wonder if the two pawn shops in the neighbourhood do good business…

I sit at the coffeeshop and hear some men talk about 4D numbers that they had just “missed’’ and how somebody’s car licence plate number was a consolation prize. I know of people who “flip’’ the same four digits, like home addresses, in several ways for several years in the hope of striking it lucky. I use the word lucky instead of rich because I wonder how much they’ve spent in the past just to hit the jackpot.

Offices always have betting pools, and you look like the odd one out for not placing any odds when almost everybody else is. In fact, it’s is encouraged in the spirit of fun.

I suppose we should be happy that the proceeds of legitimate gambling go to the Singapore Totalisator Board, which dishes out money to charity and, haha, funds “problem’’ gambling activities. (Note: It’s problem gambling; not anti-gambling. I guess that’s because good gamblers are merely social gamblers, like good drinkers are social drinkers.)

Gambling has become a common and legitimate activity, far more acceptable than smoking and drinking. Access to gambling is so easy. On the other hand, it’s getting harder to find places to smoke and drinking is expensive. We’ve all sorts of strictures on smoking and drinking because of health concerns. But for gambling, we close one eye and say it’s something ingrained in the Asian culture – never mind that it probably devastates more families than smoking and drinking. So the argument is that it is better to legalise the gambling habit to prevent it from being driven underground, like cigarette smuggling.

I know I’m being a killjoy here. After all, what’s a flutter now and then? It is a small vice for the masses. But when I see the people in the queue, patiently waiting on hope, I feel quite sad. But that’s just me.

In this column, consulting editor Bertha Henson muses about life and living – and makan – through the scenes she witnesses in her neighbourhood.

 

Featured image by Natassya Diana.

If you like this article, Like the Middle Ground‘s Facebook Page as well!

For breaking news, you can talk to us via email.

The post Kopi with Bertha: Liaisons with Lady Luck in the heartlands appeared first on The Middle Ground.

- The Middle Ground