Teochew On This

- Yip Jieying

When you step into Chinese restaurant Teochew City, you’d feel like you have entered Chen Shucheng’s home. Even though we arrived early, the veteran actor is already there, bustling around and instructing workers on some renovation measurements. “The wall here is looking a bit bare, so we are going to put some decorations up,” he tells us. Shucheng is no sleeping towkay; since opening this restaurant selling his dialect group’s “hard-to find traditional dishes”, business has been booming. Maybe it’s ’cos Shucheng — whose Teochew father hails from Swatow, China — has impeccable old-school manners and makes a charming restaurant host.“We Teochews emphasise a lot on good upbringing and family values,” he tells us. Stars like Zoe Tay, Fann Wong, Christopher Lee and Li Nanxing have turned up in droves, all to support Shucheng. “I have not opened a restaurant for so many years,” says Shucheng, who used to have a share in a defunct Chinese eatery two decades ago. “If I don’t do it well this time, it’ll be a slap to my face, and I’ll let my friends down!”