An Unheard SACrifice

Psst…do you hear that? Year Ones caterwauling along the corridors, Year Sixes guffawing boisterously from their classrooms, and somewhere in the middle of all the hubbub characterising school life…the humble sizzling of pots and pans.

Trivia question: How many stalls are there in the SAC? Thirteen? Twelve? Eleven. Mister Prata & Miss Maggie, Epic Gourmet, Auntie Lim’s Café, The Bean Thing, Noodle Delight, Wantan-A-Merah, King’s Rice Bowl, Dai Jou Bu, The West Wing, Pizza/Pasta, and Oasis. Alas, Duck Rice and Kampong Delights are no more :(

Could you name all eleven SAC stalls or just two or three of them? How about their respective owners? Do you know their names or just recognize their faces? Do you know how long it takes them to cook their dishes or just how tasty said dishes are? Do you really appreciate their hearts to serve or just blindly accept their presence as yet another minutia of everyday life?

To those who claim that other schools’ canteen food is superior to that of ours, I’d love to agree with you, but unfortunately, we’d then both be wrong. You may not like our canteen food but may I suggest that the beauty of the food here lies not in its quality but in the conversations we have with the stall owners, the two extra pieces of warm popcorn chicken they give us on a rainy day, and above all the memories we forge through our interactions with them. Whether it’s their grinning faces or their waking up at 5am just to prepare that one meal uniquely customised to your taste, all the while never voicing complaints, their SACrifices truly go unappreciated.

Perhaps what SAC stall owners deserve is a day dedicated to appreciating them, just like custodians, teachers, and youths. Even if you view it as a warzone, even just occasionally paying a visit to the SAC and chatting with the stall owners can go a long way. Who knows, in doing so, you may just find someone just like you, a coffee-lover, an ardent supporter of Manchester United, a member of the AC family.

Ever wondered why countless alumni of the school keep visiting the SAC? Well, perhaps because it is family, because it is home, because it is quintessentially AC.

Psst…do you hear that? It’s the unsung legends of the SAC.

Written by: Timothy Goh (6.18)