S’pore Millennial Sells Fish At Wet Market Despite Parents Disapproval, Expresses Love For Customers

Wah, why so stupid wet market trade dying then still want to do?

That might be your thought after reading the headlines, especially after knowing that wet market vendors are earning up to 70% less.

But, if nobody is doing it, then where do we get our fresh produce? Everybody knows stuff from the wet market is fresher. If there are no fishmongers, where do we find the rarer ingredients sometimes needed?

And so, amidst the ruins of humanity, there needs to be a superhero who stands up to the challenge and take it head-on.

Like this 23-year-old guy here:

Parents Gave Support After 2 Years

Unlike the most of us wasting time on weekends digging noses and complaining about our hard life (or is it only me?) while serving National Service, Mr Liew started fishmongering as a part-timer on weekends.

After completing NS in 2017, he decided to pursue it full time, to be met with rejections from his parents who would prefer him to go for “comfortable, high paying” jobs in the office. His parents didn’t see any future in this trade.

Mr Liew graduated from the Institute of Technical Education (ITE) electronics, computer networking and communications, and his parents wanted him to further his studies.

I don’t know what kind of comfortable, high paying job they are talking about. Because they clearly haven’t seen the GoodyFeed office.

And let’s be honest, for Asian parents, anything less than a doctor or lawyer is bad. Otherwise, they won’t be called Asians but Bsians.

But even if watching old movies like Rocky for the sake of showing off my elitist knowledge taught me nothing else, it did teach me to never give up.

Because after 2 years of fish-mongering, Mr Liew’s parents gave him their approval.

And according to Mr Liew, “Because they saw that I am doing something I like, I feel less stressed and have more free time. They even come and buy seafood from me sometimes.”

Fish-mongering has less stress and more free time. Do you hear that, people?

He wakes up at 4.30am and loves his customers

And just as I was about to turn off my laptop and tell my boss I’m going off to be a wet market vendor instead, I saw his schedule to start with waking up at 4.30 am.

B*tch, that’s what time I sleep!

He then drives his truck to Jurong Fishery Port and then delivers more than 1,000 kg of seafood to Jurong West Blk 497 wet market.

The wet market stall is set up and ready by 7 am, with his workday ending 2 pm in a typical day. Calculating work hours for my own research purposes, assuming he takes 30 minutes to get ready, 5 am to 2 pm is still about 9 hours of work.

How he keeps moving on is actually seeing regular customers and his relationship with them.

“There are more things I like about this job than the dislikes,” Mr Liew said. “I like to interact with my customers from young to old, they are all very friendly.

“One of my customers is an old lady who is more than 100 years old, but she still walks to the wet market and buys seafood from me.”

He also mentioned that he tried to appeal to the younger generations by inviting friends to help him at the stall. Only one friend came down before, who felt the experience wasn’t “as bad as he had imagined”.

Positive Response from Netizens

And to his choice of occupation, it would appear that netizens took well to that, showing their support through the comments.

Vacation and future plans

Previously, Mr Liew took a break lasting a month, tired of the early hours and carrying heavy stuff every day.

But like any superhero that disappears out of nowhere, he came back stronger.

“After thinking about it, I told myself to overcome the challenges and not to be lazy,” he said to TodayOnline. “I tell myself that it is normal not to get used to the working hours and the job at the beginning. Now, this has become a part of my life.”

How stronger? By taking the ‘enemy’ of wet markets: digital market, head on.

He hopes to save up S$50,000 to open his own stall in 4 years and build an online sales platform. Right now, he has an online delivery service “Dan Seafood Delivery” offered on Facebook.

He isn’t the only young wet market vendor…

If you look carefully, the dude above actually looks quite handsome, though I’m a dude so maybe I’m not the best judge of that. And then there’s the model fishmonger we wrote about before…

Maybe a wave of Singaporean wet market models will be what is required to revive the culture?