Missing however from LWK nowadays is Ali, the satay man. His satay was unique, even by Ipoh standards, and very delicious. The extra oomph in his satay comes from that extra lemony flavour in the meat itself. He used to proudly tell his patrons that the previous Sultan of Perak was one of his regular customers.

On Hor Hee, there used to be a few hawkers outside the then Majestic cinema selling it. I remember that they displayed the fish balls in concentric circles on flat circular baskets which were then hung up as a sort of a sign to indicate that they were selling Hor Hee. I know that the Majestic cinema has gone beyond the sun set, but are the Hor Hee stores still there?

Still on the subject of food, one scene that has certainly gone for good is that of the Wan Tan Meen (mee) man that used to ply his trade with his bamboo "tok-tok." In the 50s, when I was a little kid living in Anderson Road, the "tok-tok" sound was always a welcome one because it signalled the arrival of a popular supper. Most of the housewives would bring out their tiffin carriers to "ta-pau," but many others would just simply eat off the hawkers' crockery. Plastic containers did not exist then, and neither did plastic bags and wrappers either.

Moving on to Chee Cheong Funn, a relative of the Canning Garden store did open a "branch" in PJ at the Lim Mee Yoke coffee shop in SS2 some years back. I haven't eaten there in quite a while partly because of the "reputation" of that cofee shop; MPPJ had to close it down before because of health reasons, so I'm not sure whether the store is still there. When it was opened, the Chee Cheong Funn served was good enough to be sufficiently authentic, but not quite as good as the original in Ipoh.