Tag Archives: Newton Food Centre

Seven sketchbooks later

when I crack open the eighth, run my fingers across the first white page and prepare to draw the man sipping coffee next to me I still freeze.

I recoil. I do not want the sketchbook to spoil. But the voice in my head says, start.

Start even when you are filled with hesitation and packed to the gills with self doubt.

Start because you’ve done it many, many times.

Start because once you start it’ll come to you. Start anyway.

And when I start, put pencil to paper, it’s a breeze.

Seven sketchbooks later I still wonder if it’s any good. What should I be doing?

Just keep going, says the voice. Again.

Keep going because it doesn’t matter what others think.

Now, let that thought sink.

So I pick up a crayon and colour the man’s coffee mug pink! And chuckle.

Seven sketchbooks later I still have as much fun as I did when I was drawing in my first. But can I make it last?

You want to keep having a blast? the voice is amused, perhaps at my avaricious scheme to hoard the riches of creativity.

But such riches are boundless and for anyone to grab, I yell.

Well, that’s swell, says the voice and offers the last tip – experiment, improvise, take risks and y’know, mix it up a little!

give it your best – every jot and tittle.

I use Muji sketchbooks for sketching people. They are small, lightweight, square shaped and can take water colour well. Oh and cheap too!

And that’s what I’ve been doing. I now have 7 sketchbooks filled cover to cover with sketches of people who I see around me everyday at cafes, restaurants and in the subway. It’s not a big number but it is something considering how afraid and hesitant I was when it came to drawing people an year ago. Several times, especially when the drawing didn’t go my way and was cringeworthy beyond measure, I second guessed myself and wanted to give up. I still do.

But as trite as it may sound, something kept me going, rather keeps me going. The voice in the head is real. It is born out of doggedness. Besides having fun which is primarily why I draw people and everything else, to observe and to document that on the spot, in that very moment feels like actively participating in my own life. Here’s hoping the feeling never goes away!

Below are sketches from my 7th sketchbook. The last sketch in the series is also the very last one I made in Singapore before leaving the country two months ago. Enjoy!

Tall and tattooed. Seen at Tiong Bahru Bakery, Singapore

People at Hanis Cafe, outside the National Library of Singapore, my absolute fav place to go.

Sketched the lady on the left over a bowl of rich and creamy lobster bisque at Soup Stock Tokyo in Singapore. She was waiting for her food. There was no slouching!

A lonely guy seen at Starbucks who kept looking at people very longingly, perhaps waiting for someone to fill the seat opposite him.

Lobster red French tourists on the right were sitting at the next table at Tiong Bahru Bakery (TBB) in Singapore. They were pretty amused to see me sketching them.

On the left is a Caucasian dad tending to his very cute half Caucasian-half Asian child. Also seen at TBB.

Seen at Newton Food Centre, Singapore. They were eating shrimp fried rice, I think.

Guy on the left reading Financial Times and the lady on the right in gym clothes reading a book on kindle and forgetting to eat. Both seen at TBB, Singapore

Started drawing the guy on the left because he had ordered a lot of food. I thought he’d stay put for long giving me enough time to finish drawing. But he was acutely hungry, finished everything in seconds and left!

Starbucks patrons drawn on a depressing Sunday night (because next day was Monday, duh!)

Ladies on the right – One ate voraciously and the other looked expectedly. Seen at TBB, Singapore

Couple on the right was sitting at the table of superlatives. The lady had the longest nose and the gentleman had the narrowest chin in the entire cafe. They were having coffee together at TBB.

View from my table at our neighbourhood Starbucks in Singapore. It is heartening to see kids holding actual books and reading! Such are our times.

Seen at Tiong Bahru Bakery, Singapore. The cafe was 5 kms away from our apartment. We walked there every Sunday morning for a whole year. I drew and my husband read.

The lady on the right was straight as a ramrod. Hardly get to see such perfect posture! Drawn at TBB, Singapore

Just some people eating at Newton Food Centre in Singapore. I went there often for the excellent meatball noodles.

Ladies on the left were part of the lunch crowd at Hanis Cafe near the fantastic National Library of Singapore. They were having fish and chips with Ice tea. It was a breezy afternoon, only a few days before I left the country.

Lady on the left had a remarkably colourful woven bag that I instantly coveted. The next best thing was to draw the bag and the owner. The lady on the right was dutifully photographing her food before eating because, Instagram.

Lady on the right was the last person I sketched before leaving Singapore. Seen at Tiong Bahru Bakery.

Sweet company of strangers

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may sound oxymoronic in isolation but in the context of my creative life, it is the most heartening spin-off.

Just the other day I was at Newton Food Centre, a popular hawker centre in Singapore to tend to an urgent and irrepressible desire of eating handmade meatball noodles. And to combat the heat from the red chillies floating in my gravy I ordered a glass of lime juice from San Ren Cold and Hot Dessert Stall, where in between taking orders the lady boss was brashly chopping water chestnuts with a gleaming pocket knife on the same table where I was seated.

The lady from San Ren Hot and Cold Dessert Stall chopping water chestnuts

Even though we were only a few inches apart, as far as she was concerned I was a fly on the wall. But to me she was a fine subject, one that I hoped would hold her posture long enough to warrant a quick sketch.

“Drawing me, ah?” she said to no one in particular. The words were tossed in the air for someone, mostly me because I was the only one sketching, to catch and respond. When I looked up I wondered to myself if I had ever in the past wanted someone’s tightened jaws and deeply furrowed eyebrows to relax so badly. All across the table lay freshly hacked pieces of water chestnuts.

Only the ones sealed inside transparent packets with green trimmings remained whole and even they knew what was coming and shrivelled a little in fright. Not wanting to share the fate of mutilated chestnuts I said to the lady as bravely as I could that I hoped she didn’t mind me drawing her.

But I doubt she heard me because I didn’t hear myself.

(L) A San Ren Dessert stall patron eating Cheng Tng

My mumble was cut short by another retort, not directed at me, yet again. I was still the fly on the wall. “Looks like me ah!..come, look, look” said San Ren’s lady boss and the tormenter of countless water chestnuts in an urgent tone to a uniformed elderly cleaning lady who was clearing our table.

In exchange of a short cursory nod she had pulled my sketchbook away from my hands and was coarsely flipping through the pages.

The white haired cleaning lady joined in and because we didn’t speak each other’s language instead of words she offered me the sweetest smile of approval and chuckled with glee at my most recent work. Then she summoned every stall owner within 50 feet to check out what I was doing.

An elderly cleaning lady (in uniform) at Newton Food Centre aka ‘auntie’ flipping through my sketchbook.

Meanwhile having retrieved my sketchbook I got back to work again. A patron of San Ren dessert stall was wolfing down a sweet bowl of Cheng Tng. I sketched him and then some random people waiting for their food or eating but it was becoming increasingly difficult to carry on.

When sketching people I try to be as discreet as possible, so as to not make my subjects uncomfortable in any way but this is hard when you have a conspicuous audience made up of bulky, oil stained shorts and t-shirt clad, cleaver wielding stall owners smelling of garlic, palm oil and sambal standing behind you, rather hunched over, following every mark you make on your sketchbook and immediately matching it with the subject by looking at that person directly in the face until he or she feels like a mounted taxidermy exhibit.

Lunching at Newton Food Centre

From their enthusiastic nods and thumps ups, I knew my hawker center audience meant well but any one I tried to sketch under their intense scrutiny left in a jiffy. “Sketch auntie’, ordered San Ren’s lady boss offering the elderly cleaning lady to be my next subject.

I didn’t fail to notice that the knife and the water chestnuts had been put away. Maybe she was finally warming up to me and if sketching ‘auntie’ would keep the knife under wraps I was happy to oblige. Only auntie didn’t have the luxury of posing for a portrait. Dirty plates beckoned. So we parted with a hug. When her kind eyes met mine, I think she seemed a little proud of me.

Newton Food Centre, Singapore

I went to Newton Food Centre that day to fill my belly but came back with a fuller heart. It is true of every country I visit or every place I go with my sketchbook. It does not matter if I speak the language or not, whether I look like the locals or not, just by sitting among people and drawing in their midst I’ve been accepted and spurred on by total strangers, even the ones that don’t bond so easily.

As I got up to leave, the San Ren lady spoke again.”Come back soon”. It sounded more like a grunt than an entreaty. Only this time she looked straight at me.

What’s been cookin’ ?

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Actually a lot. The innocent Antipodean summer spell I was under at the beginning of the year got quickly replaced with Hong Kong’s mendacious haze and leaking skies in March. I was there for a week and had plenty of time to wander, sketch, chat with strangers, and watch Sex and the City on a loop late into the night because Carrie Bradshaw’s social life outshone every drivel on the hotel’s cable TV. But more about Hong Kong in a different post.

Let me fast forward to Singapore, where I along with other local artists were tasked with the submission of sketches to two different books that are both going to be published before this country turns 50 in August this year. Hurray! Urban Sketchers Singapore: Volume 2, will carry our memories of places in Singapore that are special to us and the other book Let’s Draw Singapore! is about the neighbourhoods we live in and the sketches of our favourite spots in them.

Surely I didn’t go scouting for subjects to sketch on Purvis Street again? Yes I did! I am that predictable. Killiney Kopitiam along with another sketch made the cut for the first book. I have scores of good memories at this kopitiam and also wrote an anecdote to go along with the sketch, which I think is with the editor. However, here’s the sketch :

‘Killiney Kopitiam on Purvis Street’ is going to be published in Urban Sketchers Singapore: Volume 2

For the neighbourhoods book, I didn’t have to think much. Belly rumbles shot the idea straight to the brain one day. Indian Palace, a hole in the wall eatery in Newton Food Centre is on my speed dial. They are at a 10 mins (Okay, 6 minutes when I’m really hungry) walk from my home and I’ve pigged out on their aloo paratha and chicken tikka countless times. While sketching their stall, the gentle owner, his wife and daughter in matching orange T-shirts with the name of their shop printed at the back, came up to check what I was up to.

The curtain of business formality vanished as soon as they met a fellow Bengali from Kolkata. What are the chances! Within minutes, I was listening to their life story of struggle, survival and success in Singapore, while sipping lime juice and vigorously scratching lines on my sketchbook.

A favourite Indian joint near my house. I'm addicted to their better slathered aloo parathas baked in a traditional tandoor. This goes into the Let's Draw, Singapore! book.

A favourite Indian joint near my house. I’m addicted to their butter slathered aloo parathas baked in a traditional tandoor. This goes into the Let’s Draw, Singapore! book.

Indian Palace’s portly matron took it upon herself to dispense neighbourly advice to me, that ranged from shifting to a low rental apartment to becoming a Permanent Resident. “Otherwise what’s the point in moving to a foreign country?” she said. Apparently I wasn’t scrimping and saving enough to justify my life out of India.

In exchange for her tips, she implored me to find a husband for her daughter. “I don’t care if he’s poor or less educated, I want a guy who’d be willing to immigrate from India and settle here with my daughter”, she demanded as if I could furnish him from my rucksack as soon as she filled out the withdrawal slip. “We’d be giving him a better life! Think of that.” Apparently her elder daughter is happily married to ‘such’ a guy. Discomfited by the sudden matchmaking role thrust upon me, I squirmed and stuttered, while she dunked her biscuit in the tea. “Doesn’t your husband have unmarried friends back home?”

As I was about to leave, I asked her why insist on importing when you could go local. Didn’t she care about carbon footprint at all? “You know…the ones here”. I didn’t know, really. “Some of them gamble and drink and..(long pause)..have girlfriends”, she’d lowered her voice to a whisper. It was an eventful afternoon.