Struggling CBD Eatery Owners Borrow Money From Friends, Hope Dine-In Saves Biz
10-year-old Telok Ayer eatery Pho 99 has been hit by a dearth of office workers.

Husband-and-wife Lim Heng Lee, 49, and Bou Dalis, 45, have been running their Vietnamese restaurant Pho 99 at Amoy Street for the past 10 years. When the Covid-19 pandemic worsened and the Circuit Breaker kicked in last year, their business took a hard hit, when their regular office crowd started working from home.
“It was an 80 to 90 per cent drop in business,” says their daughter Lim Hui Yi, 19. “It’s the CBD area, so not many people in the residential areas know about us.”