How did you spend the last day of 2025?
For US’ new ambassador to Singapore, Dr Anjani Sinha, it was trying local fare for the first time at Tiong Bahru Market.
“Feeling grateful to be able to share my first hawker experience in Singapore with my family and Embassy colleagues as the year comes to a close,” he wrote in a Facebook post on the US Embassy Singapore’s page on Dec 31.
“We had a wonderful time visiting one of the city’s iconic hawker centres, tasting amazing food, meeting locals, and celebrating the holidays together.”
The post showed photos of a spread of hawker dishes, all helpfully labelled in English.
Among the dishes Dr Sinha tried were: Hainanese chicken rice, Hokkien mee, black and white carrot cake, lontong, chee cheong fun, curry rice and what appears to be fishball noodles.
Another photo showed the ambassador getting ready to tuck into a bowl of ice kacang.
He also posed for photos in front of hawker stalls.
Beyond the food, the ambassador was introduced to another aspect of Singapore’s hawker culture as tissue packets labelled ‘Chope!’ were placed on the table.
On Nov 17 last year, Dr Sinha presented his credentials to President Tharman Shanmugaratnam, officially assuming his duty as US ambassador to Singapore.
He was sworn in at the US State Department on Oct 23.
Earlier in July, the surgeon appeared to be struggling while answering questions about Singapore during a Senate confirmation hearing.
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carol.ong@asiaone.com
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