Joo Chiat Heritage - “A Swirl on a Hot Plate”

Singapore keeps changing, and the downtown core has become a hub for tourism, shopping, and iconic architecture.

Joo Chiat also keeps changing, although the shophouses themselves are protected.

There are new cafes and restaurants opening all the time, and it feels like it's speeding up.

Yeah, it is, especially these 10 years, it has gentrified a lot, I would say.

A lot of those old-timers running small, little provision shops, old-style kopitiam, they are very old already, you know? So they are retired or, you know, they give up or took over by the, the modern cafes and the restaurants.

I would say it's a evolution.

You don't have to be every one of them is the old shop.

Like, a few here and there mixed with the young people, I think it's a very good mix.

Me, I welcome that.

I don't want to say about other areas, but I would like Joo Chiat Road to keep its own eclectic feel, its own touch, its unique characteristic.

Don't be like another maybe Arab Street, Petah, I think.

It's not just the shops which open and close, is it? What actually gets lost when a street changes too fast?

You need the people who grew up there to be down there.

Just give a little bit of, like, the old feel there.

The human touch is important.

I, uh, that's what I want to say.