Woman hailed as 'amazing' for balancing groceries on her head in Bukit Batok
Ivan Lim
TNP
Sept 23, 2025
A video showing a woman crossing a road with a huge load of groceries finely poised on her head has gone viral, and netizens from Myanmar, the Philippines, and Indonesia are claiming she is one of theirs.
The post was made by TikTok user barbaralinalei with the subtitle, "POV: You just spotted a real-life level 100 boss balancing groceries hands-free like it's a runway show".
It shows a still shot of the woman crossing the road at a traffic light junction along Bukit Batok Avenue 8. She is balancing a large, pink plastic bag of items on her head, while a Sheng Siong plastic bag hangs from the crook of her left arm.
She is then seen walking on the other side of the road, her free arm swinging elegantly as she strides across the zebra crossing, using only her peripheral vision to check that it is safe to do so.
"Gosh~ She got my salute, she is amazing!" said the original poster, whose video had 188,400 views, 4,573 reactions and 364 comments at press time.
While many showed their amusement or applauded the woman with emojis, most of the comments were about where she was from. Any suggestion that the woman could be Singaporean was conspicuous by its absence.
"So long hair and the way she put sure Myanmar," said one.
Another gave a perspective from home: "In Myanmar, most of vandor seller such a sticky rice seller, fruit seller, snack and dessert seller and Bee Hoon seller are going along the road like this."
Other netizens insisted she was from the Philippines. "I know she's Filipina ... basic normal day in the Philippines," said one user.
Indonesians also joined in the fray. "Come to Indonesia. This is very normal," said one commenter.
One Indonesian said she could also emulate the woman - but not in Singapore: "I from indonesia in my home town we do that as well, but in singapura u never do like that, sg people will think iam so weird."
One commenter from India, while not insisting the girl was a compatriot, said: "Im Indian i can do also when i was young we carry like this full bucket of water."
