Summary
Highlights
Singapore is known for its hawker centers, but a persistent issue is the failure of diners to return their food trays, cutlery, and used tissues, despite various campaigns and efforts to encourage this behavior.
The host becomes a cleaner for four hours during lunchtime at a hawker center. She quickly realizes the immense effort involved in clearing and sorting trays, especially when customers do not return them, highlighting the additional burden placed on cleaners.
A public health researcher explains that unreturned food trays can carry harmful bacteria like E. coli and Salmonella, and transmit diseases, including potentially COVID-19. The discussion emphasizes the health risks to both cleaners and other diners.
A social experiment is conducted where cleaners are instructed only to sanitize tables and clear tray return stations, not tables themselves. This leads to tables piled with rubbish, frustrated customers and stall holders, and reveals the reliance on cleaners.
The experiment shows an increase in tray returns from 10% to 40%, but at a significant cost to the cleaners who faced abuse. It also highlights pressure from stall owners for quick tray returns and the general unwillingness of diners to clear their own trays.
A survey reveals that over 300 trays are unreturned in one hour across five hawker centers. To emphasize the scale of the problem, a visual artist creates a 2-meter, 100 kg 'tower of shame' using 300 used trays and crockery, incorporating concrete hand casts of cleaners.