The love for freshly grilled pork jerky is meant to be a joyous, radiant thing, but perhaps a household in Bukit Timah took things a wee bit too far.
After all, when one goes on a 16-hour marathon barbecuing over 100 kilograms of bak kwa, it’s bound to cause trouble. Thick, smoky, fuming, problems.
Apparently, residents along Tham Soong Avenue have been choking on the bak kwa barbecue fumes for years — an affected neighbor told Shin Min Daily News that the household would hold the cookouts in their own courtyard whenever Chinese New Year draws close.
The neighbor’s antics would typically be carried out on weekends before each Lunar New Year, involving massive fumes from grilling over 100 kilograms of the savory snack that would cause elderly folks to “cough uncontrollably”.
“There was once she started barbecuing from 8am in the morning to 12am midnight,” said the affected neighbor.
It got so bad that the police were called in recently to handle the situation. On Jan 21, the grilling started as early as 7am and went on till about 2pm, noted the neighbor. This, despite the household being nicely asked to stop barbecuing.
Shin Min managed to speak to the holder of the house — a 60-year-old woman by the name of Liu. She explained that she has over 300 members in her family and that it would be way too costly to buy sufficient bak kwa from shops. Liu noted that her family prefers to prepare their own bak kwa to ensure the quality as well.
Still, that’s probably way too much jerky for one to grill in a residential estate. It’s unclear what actions the police took in response to the batty bak kwa blowouts.
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