PUBLISHED ONNovember 06, 2023 7:00 AMByLim KeweiIs the man who went viral for flying from Thailand to Singapore to purchase chicken rice for a customer really a food delivery rider?
Apparently so, according to Thai YouTuber Songsak Panyatarak, who claims that he hired the delivery man.
"He's not a fake actor, it's really Grab," the customer stated in a YouTube video posted last Thursday (Nov 2).
A clip of the video has been viewed more than 10 million times on TikTok, while the full video on his YouTube channel with over two million subscribers has been viewed more than 734,000 times.
The video also carries a disclaimer stating that "it is an agreement between the rider and the orderer only", and the delivery platform had "no part in this video clip".
Songsak explained that he "really misses Singapore chicken rice" and wanted to find out if a food delivery rider there would fly cross-border to fulfil his order.
In the video, he can be seen talking to a delivery rider wearing a Grab uniform who stopped outside his property.
He then asked him if he knows any restaurants in Thailand selling Singapore chicken rice before offering the man 10,000 baht (S$380) to obtain the dish.
"No matter how far, you can go right?" Songsak questions as the rider agrees.
Shooting down the delivery rider's suggestion of going to a shopping mall in eastern Bangkok, the YouTuber then reveals he wants the man to fly to Singapore, a country which the latter said he has never been to.
The puzzled but amused delivery man then agrees, saying "my hands are shaking". He is then handled a camera on a selfie stick to record his journey.
Later on at the airport, he can be seen paying for the AirAsia airfare ticket of 6,000 baht with the 10,000 baht given by the YouTuber.
He then asks a counter staff if he can bring on board his Grab delivery bag and helmet, saying that he's heading to Singapore to buy chicken rice.
Over at Changi Airport, some curious travellers are surprised after finding out that this man in a Grab uniform just flew to Singapore to buy chicken rice.
This man then makes his way via MRT to Chinatown, where he successfully purchases five packets of Hainanese chicken rice for $20 at Chinatown Complex Food Centre before going back to the airport to catch his return flight departing at 10.10pm.
It was already past midnight when the rider arrived at Songsak's residence and passed the chicken rice packets to the gleeful customer who happily inhaled the "sweet smell" of the dish.
The delivery rider then joins their group of four to eat the chicken rice together, jokingly remarking that the delivery is "very successful, but once is enough".
It is not known how much the delivery man made in total after deducting all his expenses, although the rider agreed to go again if someone offered him 20,000 baht.
Despite the YouTuber's claims that the food delivery rider is not an actor, a Grab spokesperson previously told AsiaOne on Oct 30 that "the person starring as a delivery-partner in the video is not registered with Grab".
"We understand that the fictional video was created by a member of the public independently," said the spokesperson then, adding that the platform does not offer such a "cross-border" service.
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