Arab Street (Chinese: 阿拉伯街; Malay: Jalan Arab) was the name of a road and neighbourhood in Singapore. There are two explanations behind the name. The first one is that the area was owned by an Arab merchant, and that it was the site of an Arab kampong, hence the name Arab Street. The Chinese referred the street as jiau a koi Javanese, in the view of the Javanese who used to be the majority inhabitants of the area. Spices, textiles, basketry items and songkoks are sold along this row of shophouses with five-foot way at Arab Street. In Tamil, Arab Street is known as pukadai sadkku (flower shops street), because of shops selling homegrown flowers, lime and other goods sold by Javanese women. In 1889, a huge fire occurred.