SSS in Singapore

To the surprise of passers-by, I burst out laughing in the middle of Singapore’s Orchard Road shopping area last week. The reason? A sign outside Swensen’s, a family restaurant, that read:

Student Happy Hour! Check out our special SSS treat and be happily indulged.

I’m used to the concept of frequent flyer points, hotel loyalty schemes and the like. But this has to be the first time I’ve seen promotions specifically targetted at members of the soc.sexuality.spanking newsgroup.

“Would you care to choose your waitress for the evening, sir? Here’s a little notepad and pen to keep a tally of any mistakes she might make. The canes are kept behind the front desk – just ask when you need one.” (I have no idea whatsoever what they were actually promoting – it could only have been disappointing, so I didn’t stop to enquire!)

It seems it actually stands for “Soup, Side, Sundae”. Like I want to believe that?

Talking of Singaporean restaurants, how come it was only as I sat reading a magazine at the airport waiting to leave that I discovered ‘Barracks’? This posh new dining spot is set in (yes, you guessed it) a converted army barracks, where “the over-attentive wait staff were all dressed in school unifors and looked about 15 years old”. I’m feeling quite faint at the thought of discipline being meted out to the serving girls back in the days of the colonial officers’ mess…

Meanwhile, the recently-refurbished National Museum had one particularly evocative display: an old desk and chair from the Singapore Chinese Girls’ School, together with two school reports from consecutive terms in 1936. The second stated that there was “considerable improvement shown this term” by the young lady concerned; my rotan explorations made me wonder what had led her to become more focused, and left me concerned about her “rather untidy” report for Arithmetic.