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Monday, January 26, 2009

Rat in rice

Wed Dec 31 2008

The New Paper
Baby rodents fall onto patron's food at Pasir Ris coffee shop.

Singapore , December 29, 2008 - She was enjoying her lunch at the coffee shop when she suddenly shrieked - a newborn rat had fallen right into her plate of curry rice.


But that was not the end of Madam Josephine Dong's horror. Within 10 minutes, five more baby rats fell from the ceiling of the coffee shop.

The shocking incident took place at 2pm on Sunday in a coffee shop at Block 446, Pasir Ris Drive 6, Lianhe Wanbao reported.

Customers said they heard a strange noise coming from the ceiling while they were having their meals.

When they looked up, they saw something small and pink falling through a crack in the ceiling - right onto Madam Dong's plate.

Madam Dong, who declined to reveal her age, said: 'I didn't know what it was initially. When I looked closer, I realised that it was a newborn rat.

'Its eyes were closed and it wriggled slowly. I could even see its heart beating.'

Madam Dong, who is in the rag-and-bone trade, said she screamed and scrambled away from the table when she realised it was a rat.

Her screams alerted other customers. Soon, a crowd of curious onlookers had gathered at the coffee shop.

Madam Dong said that after the first rat fell on her plate, she heard something running around and making noises in the ceiling.

'In 10 minutes, five more newborn rats fell,' she added.

'I was so shocked I lost my appetite. It was so disgusting!'

When the Lianhe Wanbao reporter arrived at the coffee shop, three of the newborn rats had already been thrown into the rubbish bin, while the other three were left on the table.

A regular customer at the coffee shop, who was not named, said: 'My friends and I come drinking every night. In the last month, we realised that there had been a lot of noise coming from overhead.'

An HDB spokesman told Lianhe Wanbao that as the coffee shop is a rental unit, its management is responsible for pest control on the premises.

HDB had never received any complaints about the coffee shop, the spokesman added.

But it will be sending its officers to the coffee shop to assess the situation and advise the owners.

A supervisor at the coffee shop, who wished to be known only as Ms Tan, claimed that the shop had paid for professional pest control three times to get rid of the rats.

'It's not easy to exterminate the rats as they are hiding in the ceiling.'

NOT RATATOUILLE: Mdm Dong looks away as she shows the newborn rats on the table she was sitting at. Three more rats were thrown away before this picture was taken.

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