tapao

alternative dabao · alternative tapau · alternative tapow

1. MalaysiaManglishSingaporeSinglishambitransitiveinvariableTo order (food) as takeaway; to pack food so it can be consumed elsewhere.

   Recently, my friend ‘tapao’ (packed) 20 packets of kolo mee before she flew back to Kuala Lumpur.

   2012 September 4, Wilfred Pilo, “Kolo-mee the signature dish of Kuching”, in The Borneo Post, Kuching, Malaysia, →OCLC, archived from the original on 19 Sep 2014

   3 more examples

   "People don't want to go eat out every day, and whenever you tapao home it's usually from a hawker centre.

   2015 September 5, Rachel Loi, quoting Stephan Zoisl, “Fine dining made easy”, in The Business Times, Singapore, →OCLC, archived from the original on 01 Jan 2017

   "My celebration begins after 11pm on the eve of CNY. After service, I tapao some yu sheng and pen cai, and try to get home before midnight.

   2017 January 28, Rachel Loi, quoting Yong Bing Ngen, “Simple Fare”, in The Business Times, Singapore, →OCLC, archived from the original on 23 Feb 2019

   “Why does it happen?”,[…]and “What the Hell should I eat now?!” were some of the questions we pondered on while driving ourselves to the nearest restaurant to (physically) tapao our food… in the rain… while it was all jammed up.

   2017 November 17, Amresh S. Jessy, “We Try To Find Out Why The Food Delivery Service In Malaysia Is So Horrible”, in Rojak Daily, Malaysia, archived from the original on 30 Apr 2018