Simei resident calls for a better way to deal with abandoned supermarket trolleys
Here is a Facebook post that should really get people talking.
A man who looks elderly has been seen going all over Simei, pushing abandoned supermarket trolleys back to Eastpoint Mall.
He does it daily, and sometimes struggles with the trolleys. He was even seen pushing them in a drizzle.
Inconsiderate shoppers who push their groceries home and then abandon the trolleys should spare a thought for him.
The post by Facebook user Teo Siew Lan on the My Home in Simei group’s discussion page also included a few photographs.
“My heart really goes out to this white-haired elderly man who faithfully pushes the… trolleys from all over Simei back to NTUC supermarket every day,” it said.
“These trolleys are not easy to push. They are heavy, and sometimes the wheels don’t go in the right direction. The roads and pathways in Simei are not always level or dry.”
The post made this appeal: “Have a heart fellow-residents in Simei. Please push your trolley back to the NTUC supermarket…”
And it raised questions.
“As a retiree, I often wonder about the terms and conditions for being employed as… a retiree. Are we to agree to all kinds of labour, when others are deployed only to labour in air-conditioned environments, or doing easier jobs?”
It also had a number of suggestions.
Rotate the staff doing this job. Employ younger, fitter people specifically for the job. Or make customers pay a deposit if they wish to push a trolley out of the mall’s premises, with a refund payable when it is brought back.
There was even a suggestion to use TraceTogether technology to track the trolleys.
The post asks people nicely to do the right thing. And if they don’t?
“No offence meant fellow-residents, but I sincerely hope we will not reach a stage of public shaming in order to have customers push their trolleys back to Eastpoint!”
Now that should give us more civic sense, unless of course the culprits are shameless to begin with.
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