This piece is about my love for noodles—noodles over rice, always. Bak chor mee, mee siam, mee hoon mamak—they consume me as much as I consume them. At the food centre, I can never decide easily, my thoughts tangling like noodles trying to be prised apart.

Noodles are not just food; they speak to me of Singapore’s food culture.  They are woven into our daily lives, a reminder of the nation’s melting pot of traditions and tastes. Curious, I asked ChatGPT how much noodles a Singaporean might eat in a lifetime. The answer: about 1.74 tonnes by dry weight, if we indulge four times a week. That figure made me pause—our lives measured in bowls, our culture stitched together through strands of noodles.

But beyond appetite, noodles tell a story of economics and survival. They are the great equaliser, enjoyed across class lines, yet also endangered by rising costs and the slow fading of hawker culture. The chewy, bouncy, springy texture I love—my “Asian al dente”—is also a metaphor for resilience, adaptability, and the way Singaporeans stretch and rebound in the face of change.

Hawker Hues III celebrates comfort, and reflects on how something as humble as noodles can hold together the contradictions of culture, memory, and identity.