S'pore-themed eatery in Beijing has waitresses in kebayas serving you 'Lion City throw bread'

The New Paper
Apr 19, 2022

We’ve all seen the amusing public signage in China when the English language is translated a little too literally.

Notices with “Slip Carefully” and “Beware of Safety” have long been a common sight in some parts of the country.

Now it seems a restaurant in Beijing, named “Borderless”, has adopted that trend for its Singapore-themed menu. And as you would expect, it gets almost everything – from the names of the dishes to the kebaya-inspired wait staff uniforms – horrendously wrong.

A Malaysian living in Beijing, Mr Arthur Pang, shared photos of the restaurant’s menu on Facebook on Monday (April 18), and netizens have been shaking their heads at the wild inaccuracies.

A rib dish is labelled "grasp the sand bone", our beloved prata is coined “Lion City throw bread”, and somehow, fried rice is listed as "Singapore Fried bee hoon".

It gets worse.

A sambal kangkong dish is termed “tauhu goreng” while actual tauhu goreng, which is also on the menu, is referred to as “Fried Tofu with Minced Malay Meat”.

Then there's the, ahem, quintessential Singaporean dish: Scalded Romaine Lettuce, which as pictured in the menu is really raw broccoli garnished with an ice cube.

Mr Pang also captured photos of the restaurant’s wait staff who, in perhaps another attempt to elevate the restaurant’s Singaporean vibe, are dressed in sarong kebayas, reminiscent of Singapore Airlines' flight attendants.

SIA should say something about this, seriously.