Valerie Thong Mei Xin

Food lover with 12 years of tour guiding Families

• Singapore Tourist Guide licence 6698
• Speaks English, Mandarin, Cantonese, Hokkien

I didn’t grow up learning Singapore history from textbooks. I grew up living it.

I’m a true-blue Singaporean kid. My afternoons were at the void deck playing capteh, my weekends at my Ah Ma’s flat with the smell of curry, and my dinner was always - at the hawker centre. To me, a Kopi-O isn’t just coffee. It’s the sound of the uncle pulling the sock filter at 6am.

For years, I thought that was just normal. Until I started bringing friends from overseas around, and I realized they were seeing a different Singapore. They saw Marina Bay Sands and Gardens by the Bay. I saw the spot where my grandfather told me he hid during the Japanese Occupation. They saw a hawker centre. I saw the Hainanese uncle who took over his father’s chicken rice stall in 1970s

That’s why I started doing tours.

I don’t want to show you the Singapore you see on postcards. I want to show you the Singapore I grew up in.