Fang Rong - the half‑tailor, half‑barber house along Bedok Road

Many in our Bedok kampong community will remember Fang Rong, at 30 Bedok Road - that modest little house which once operated as half tailor, half barber, sitting just to the right (from the orientation of this photograph) of Uncle Velu’s Indian barber shop at 34 Bedok Road.

From Jayne Krishna’s years living with her grandfather Velu in the 70’s and 80’s, we learn that the barber‑owner here was Hainanese, living on the premises with his family. Jayne also recalls that several tailors came and went over the years - a reminder of how trades in the kampong shifted with time, opportunity, and circumstance.

From our conversations with Ron Ho, a more intimate portrait of one of the earlier tailors emerges. In the late 1950s, the tailor was a man named Ah Kow, married with two young children. He was part of a tontine community - known variously as hwei (银会) in Chinese, duit kutu in Malay, or kootu in Tamil - a communal savings system that helped families manage their finances long before banks became accessible to everyone.

Ron recalls that his mother’s role was to collect the monthly contributions from each participant, and that was how their family came to know Ah Kow. Ron himself was about twelve years old, watching these small but meaningful exchanges that stitched together the social fabric of kampong life.

Today, the 1985 photograph of Fang Rong - with Mr Fang himself looking out from the doorway - reminds us that every small shop carried a story. And thanks again to Jayne Krishna for sharing this precious photograph, we can keep this memory alive for our Bedok kampong archive.