Penang’s Fading Street Food Traditions

My wife told me about this strange cafe that she went to that made their own marshmallows. She thought that I may have wanted to film there. I went and checked it out and realized that she was right.

So I made a short documentary about not only this place but Penang’s changing food traditions. As more money pours into Asia and the cultures develop substantial middle classes and become more “internationalized,” traditions, such as the street food that Penang is known for, fade away and new traditions take their place. However, while the surface elements of these two sides of culture appear different, there is an underlaying ethic that is very much the same.

That underlaying ethic is what this short film is about.