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Some civilizations chronicle their pasts with art or books. Others pass on history orally through folklore. In Singapore, the tale of how a humble fishing village in Southeast Asia evolved into a buzzing modern metropolis often comes in spoonfuls of peppery pork rib soup or bites of fried egg noodles at its hawker centers.
Across the city-state, the ubiquitous open-air food complexes are packed with closet-sized stalls, manned by hawkers businesspeople who both cook and sell fare from Hainanese-style chicken to Peranakan
laksa (lemongrass-coconut noodles). For visitors, hawker centers might just seem like jumbo food courts: Follow your nose or the longest line, then pay a few Singapore dollars for a trayful of chow to enjoy at a shared table.