Du-rian, Du-rian, Du-rian!

Usually, the people in charge of maintenance of my office premises are quite uptight about staff bringing durians and durian products into the office lifts and areas. They always say that the fragrance of the fruit would linger on in the air for a long, long time and this was not acceptable because it would send the durian-haters amongst staff and visitors running for their dear lives. No, no, no, that's not good customer service, they would harp.

And so, for years, it has been an unstated rule that no durians are allowed in the office building.

But alas, today, this 'rule' was tossed out of our office unceremoniously. *Bonk!*

The King of Fruits reined today!!

Our Staff Recreation Committee had arranged for Goodwood Park Hotel to come in for a Durian Pastry Bazaar. Staff could visit the booth set up opposite our office library (of all places!) to buy and place orders for a fascinating range of durian puffs, tarts, cakes, crepe and crumbles etc!

The durian-lovers had such a wonderful time emptying their pockets whole-heartedly for the pastries that they did not even mind standing for half-an-hour in the queue to pay money! I found their patience quite amazing, considering that these people would usually start complaining of lack of efficiency etc if they had to wait for any second more than 10 minutes to buy their lunch from hawkers at the food centre slogging wildly away at the stove to prepare their food orders!

The last I heard, the total sale came to a whopping >$6,000! Wow!! I think people here are really quite crazy over the pastries. And some probably feel so rich that they didn't mind paying obscene prices for the pastries. A single 2-inch thick slice of durian mousse cake, for example, was going for $6.95 whilst a 1.5-inch thick durian crepe cost $4.85 (all after a '20% discount').



My immediate colleague was one of the main coordinators for this Durian Pastry Bazaar. So it was difficult for me to make zero purchase - must give her face, lor. And so, even though R and I had recently agreed that in view of rising costs of living and my plan to stay home for at least a year, we should go on a Cut-Expenses-Cut-Calories (CECC) Discipline Programme, I had 'no choice' but to make a token purchase of these pastries.

Eventually, I chose to buy a 6-pc box of the perenial favourite Durian Puffs at $9.25 (after the 'discount'). And so, we will have my this 'contribution' to the tossing-out of the No-Durians Rule, for dessert after dinner tonight. Cheers!