This morning I had Tambun tau sa piah as breakfast, from Him Heang some more! I bet many of you know where is the origin!
It was from my GM who just back from his hometown (Penang) after whole week there. When he gone back for holiday, he will bought us this biscuit as 手信 (souvenirs).
I ever went to this Him Heang shop many years back, guess is 2001 ( I was pregnant with Wien @ 7 weeks then). But this shop doesn't give me a very good impression, I can say very dissappointed over their attitute towards customers. Funny thing is, according to my Penang's friends, still many customers flooded the shop during weekend. Some even dun mind to line up sooooooo long just to wait for the biscuit! *shake head*
Ok, let's tell my story now.....
Year 2001, hubby and I plan to drive to Penang for holiday during National Day. Everything was well planned, then only I realised I was pregnant. At once, I plan to cancel this trip as I worry this and that. But end up still go ahead with the plan. Hubby make few stops during the journey, so that I can feel more relax instead of just sitting in the car. Before we go, we already informed our Penang friends that we want buy few boxes of Tambun biscuit, so he booked advance for us, then we can just collect from the shop on our way back.
When come to our last day in Penang, our friend very kind, he drove us to the shop to collect biscuit. Reached there, we already saw there is a long queue there. Many had queue up till outside the shop's gate! Can u imagine that? My friend told us if no make any booking then we have to queue like them. But my hubby said if have to queue so long, he rather go to other shop and buy, although other shop's biscuit may not as good as this shop.
We proceed to counter to check our booking but the counter couldn't find the booking under my friend's name, and tell us come again 3 days later!!! At first we thought we heard wrongly! I said if 3 days, then better cancel it lor, who want to come 3 days later?? But my kind friend keep asking begging them to check properly, tell them who he make the booking from, but the counter just couldn't find it. Then the counter people told us unfriendly : or you just queue up lor, I cannot help u! My hubby was not happy with the way they talked. He told our friend, let's forget about it and we not keen on the biscuit anymore. But our friend being kind enough, still keep asking them check once again, tell them XXX had taken his order. The counter must be cannot stand our friend's long winded skill, they called up XXX ( he was on leave that day), lucky that XXX can recall the booking, then only the counter allow us to take away our 6 boxes of tau sa piah! We spent 45 min there just to take our biscuit that had been booked 2 weeks in advance! Frankly, when we make the payment, we pay with very unwillingly, so "heart pain" towards their attitute.
Now the shop still famous with their tau sa piah, still many tourist "pong chan" them, sad case! Come on lar, i can see many place in Penang selling tau sa piah too, with different brand. I ever tried one of them, found the taste not bad too!
So whenever I ate Him Heong tau sa piah, I will think of this case and I still can recall very well that day incidents!