I REALLY can't get through this week without throwing my hat into the ring about the be-good-and-clear-your-food-tray discussion.

GOOD FOR HIM: A food court customer returning his tray. Will more Singaporeans do the same? ST FILE PICTURE

This can be compared to the quest to scale Mount Everest by an unfit, untrained slob sitting in a hawker centre swallowing a platter of sambal tua tow (mussels).

But it's not an impossible task. The chap will get up there somehow - if he wants to.

Let us begin with retired NEA Public Health Commissioner Daniel Wang.

This is the man who once had the task of luring itinerant food sellers off our streets and into custom-built hawker centres.

It was, as we all know so well today, a shiny success.

But getting diners to return trays was 'one of my failed swansong projects', he regretfully murmured.

He was once able to get old kopitiam towkays to get rid of spittoons, and the smelly and unsightly pyjama shorts that many kopi boys used to wear (for something better).

I recalled that he introduced huge multi-decked tray cabinets at the then-newly revamped Zion Road and Adam Road hawker centres where folks could just slide food trays in, wash their hands and scoot.

A small stewarding team would simply take over, thank you.

Of course he knew local habits.

He put in the system 'not because I thought Singaporeans would do it, but because it had to be done, it's just good manners'.

His officers and even he personally went around to get feedback on the project.

'Some people actually said, 'Why should I clear, there are cleaners, what' or some would sheepishly say 'I shy, lah',' he said.

'These are some of the same people who will happily clear the trays in our ENV food court (at NEA's Scotts Road building) because they have that if-others-do-I-also-do mentality. Even at the cafes at Ikea, they readily clear the tray themselves.'

Then he went on about how 'many ordinary folks here have low self esteem or are not totally self-reliant - everything, government or maid must do'.

Poor Daniel.

I have been to many mass eateries in the region and elsewhere.

In Jakarta, it is basically the same situation, except nobody bitches about it and they all accept themselves for what they are.

Of course, it helps that for the price of one $800 cleaning aunty or uncle here, you can get three to four Indonesians for the job.

Their food courts in Plaza Senayan or Plaza Indonesia are exceptionally busy at mealtimes and weekends, but so are their big and spiffy team of cleaners.

Ditto for the Food Loft in Bangkok.

At the Culinary Institute of America's campus in Napa Valley in the US, where they serve up thousands of meals each day, diners simply walk up to the stewarding station where two holes confront them, one to scoop the trash into, and the other for crockery and utensils. You just pass the tray back to the chap on duty and go.

Divide & conquer

So, how should ours be? I think we are old, exposed and weathered enough for a change.

But it is not just about education.

There is still that loud minority of those eat-and-run dinosaurs that is pressuring the silent majority of gentlefolk.

Well, I say let's divide and conquer.

Here's my long-shot suggestion: Divide seats in a food court into two sections - one (the bigger section) for folks who will clear their trays and the other (perhaps a third or a quarter of the seats) for those who wish not to clear them.

There should be a surcharge for those choosing the lazy route and a penalty for those who neglect their responsibility at the I-will-clear-tray tables.

One can even reward those who clear the trays with packs of tissue paper, in lieu of the anticipated savings on manpower.

But I can imagine Daniel giving me a learned and wry laugh about that.

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