I went for a cup of coffee a couple of days ago and walked past an old haunt of mine. In the late 80s, when I still worked in KL, I used to hang out at a pub near my home - Rennie’s House of Oxtail. Yes it was a pub, and yes it served the most amazing Oxtail Soup.
A quiet, dingy place, frequented by newspaper types, it was a great place for me to have a beer (RM3.10 in those days!), grab a bite (Sambal Sandwiches were really nice and spicy, and the Oxtail was heavenly), do some reading or catch up with friends.
As a young, insecure and not-especially-talented bigmouth in advertising, I used to meet up with some friends sometimes, just to blow some steam or to cry on each others’ shoulders. In those days in KL I used to be close to a couple of guys, one of whom was Yew Leong, who went on to amazing things with LeoBurnett and who of course, married Yasmin Ahmad. He is an amazing talent who deserves all the accolades he’s received and continues to receive.
Another friend I hung out with was Michael Choo who was in IT and he and I shared a passion for Macintosh computers. It was in fact the Mac that was the focus of my work at McCann-Erickson at that time.
And it was my work and the people I didn’t enjoy working with there which was often the focus of my discontent.
So on the days that I felt a mismatch - and this was a frequent occurrence - with my work environment or the world in general, I would often give these two guys a call and we’d meet at Rennie’s, have a few beers, lament the stresses and unhappiness of our lot and talk about our dream jobs. Yew Leong’s was to sell fish. I thought the life of a security guard would be better suited to me… No worries, no stress, just bliss. Or so it seemed.
When I felt a mismatch with the world, I wanted to be a security guard and Yew Leong wanted to sell fish.
To be fair, there were many days I felt all was right with the world and in those pre-mobile phone and pre-internet days, I often turned up at Rennie’s with a book in one hand and sat in the inside section where it was quieter, had my beer and whatever makan, and did some quiet reading.
Rennie’s was eponymously named after Rennie Klaassen. I didn’t know him well though we did exchange a few words every now and then. He passed on some years ago and his widow, Trudy, continued to serve up good Oxtail Stew and nice cold beers for some time. She passed away last year and we had hopes their son might continue the business…
And so as I parked the car just in front of Rennie’s on the way to the coffee place just a few doors up to meet with my old friends Debbie and Hannes, I had a close look at Rennie’s and noticed a couple of things. The sign that hung at an angle near the front door was gone. There was a ‘For Sale’ banner hung at the first floor though whether that was for the upstairs unit or not was not certain. So as Mei and I stepped onto the five foot way, I was looking for more telltale signs that would reveal if my old almost-daily haunt was still operating.
And I pulled on that door knob for the last time and peeked inside...
Some binging and banging from inside filled me with dread. The door was unlocked and I pulled on the door knob like I had done countless times in the past. The scene that met my eyes confirmed my fears - the place was gutted, the tables and chairs all gone. The signs on the walls had disappeared and 3 young chaps were poking and jabbing at the false ceiling, making it fall in pieces onto a growing pile on the floor.
Turns out they’d taken over and this was to be an Italian restaurant. ‘Come and support us, yah?’ one of them called to me as I slowly closed the door. I smiled at him but as the door shut on Rennie’s for the last time for me, my mind was silently saying ‘Hell, no.’
Not that I wished ill for their business. Being in F&B, I actually hope very much that new ventures are successful. It’s just that for me this space would forever be Rennie’s. I could not walk in and not remember the signs behind the bar, the staff who knew me by name, the same faces on many days of the week, driving home after a few hours, feeling a little refreshed or rejuvenated, with a little more hope for a better day on the morrow.
This place just has too many memories and I will forever hear the echoes of them if I sat down to a dinner of pasta and prosecco.
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| Photo from TimeOut. |
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| Photo from CiliSos. |
I’ll share some of those memories here soon, and maybe if you’ve never been a patron of the place, you’ll then have a better idea of why the closing means what it means to me.
Note: A few weeks before this, my favourite pub of my Singapore years also closed. I’ll write about that separately.
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