So What NOW - Part 2 Hong Kong

Now if an Air Asia flight isn't delayed, there's something wrong!  So of course I waited an extra hour and half to jump on the plane to Hong Kong.

The landing at the new Airport in Hong Kong is nothing compared to the hair raising squeak in by the breadth of a cat's whisker landing at Kai Tak,  leaving nail imprints in your armrest as you wish you hadn't seen that guy in undies winking at you from his balcony on the decent that brushed by apartments left and right.

I had an evening flight so all the lights were blazing as we landed. It was breath taking to see Hong Kong in all her glory at night, my heart was pounding and my eyes were tearing up, it has been a good 18 years since I'd been home.  The funny thing was, instead of that pungent sulphuric smell that makes you want to breathe through your mouth and then realise that wasn't helping and only a gas mask would, was not present.  I sniffed the air as we disembarked, ok a bit "beach at low tide" smelling but that was it.  Hail to  the efficiency of the air port staff, I was gob smacked, the immigration officers speaking really good English (no longer Enggerrish)  and being pleasant!!!!  Double check.. this is Hong Kong right?  yup, wowsa a lot has changed.

I was told to get an octopus card by friends still living there ( though they call it the octopussy.. go figure), as their public transport is still really good, the card allows you to travel by train, bus, ferry and pay for stuff.. loving it already and also a local sim card, no worries there, the telcos took my second phone, inserted the card , booted it up, and sent me off with a little smile, am I really in Hong Kong???  Hopped on a bus and tried to recognise the landscape...

As soon as my hosts arrived to get me from the bus station I grumbled I was hungry, knowing me so well, I was hustled to a 'dai pai dong' right quick for some won ton noodles.   Ahhh this was what I was waiting for!  Sleeping that night with a belly full of noodles and dumplings didn't dampen the excitement of what was to come tomorrow.

The next morning we were off to Stanley market.   Stanley  was a popular beach destination for us whilst in school and also for most residents of Hong Kong, it also had lanes of shops with "discounted" items ranging from handbags to table linen.  Annie my school chum and bestie from school had been in communication with me from the get go,  so we decided to take the bus up for old times sake , plus it was a good scenic way to go and both Annie and I could see where we lived on the way, nostalgia was hitting hard.

Annie and I on the Bus

Den, Annie's man had never been to Hong Kong before, heh heh I almost felt sorry for him, he had no idea what the bus ride would be like.  You see the road up is a windey, narrow strip that is bordered by trees, shrubs and a sloping hillside on one side, that would tap and flick it's branches at the bus's windows upstairs and a panoramic view on the other, with lets say a full on view of the landscape below (I will not say drop, it's a safe ride.. really).  As we kept going higher and the bus swung more violently around the corners, little hysterical giggles escaped from me as I watched Annie's man  white knuckle grip the handles of the seat.  Annie and I both grinned at each other, by the time we hit Repulse Bay, we were shouting out all the names of students and friends who had lived there and around the corner forgetting the other passengers in our glee.

The View of Turtle Bay/Stanley from the fancy Scmancy Shops

When we got off at the Stanley stop, we were a bit confused , what was this place?  This didn't seem like Stanley, it had an escalator going down and loads of fancy scmancy shops, where was the market, the beach.. Smugglers Inn ?  We decided to head down the escalators and hopefully would find our way to what we recognised.  After being told to turn left and keep going by a resident who figured out we weren't escapees of a loony bin but former residents ourselves, we hit the strip of where one of the oldest restaurants in Stanley used to be, the Boathouse!  And there was the smugglers Inn right next to it and a few more that we were not familiar with.  We decided to have lunch at the Boathouse and then walked around.

The Boathouse

The market was not the same anymore, you can't bargain like you used to, it's all 'fixed price",   suddenly Annie squealed "this is where I bought my purple Reebok's from!"  as we passed the sports shop, "and where I bought my cashmere jumpers".  I looked further down the lane and there was the linen shop that my mother used to buy all her table cloths from including the special Christmas ones, which I still have till today.  I kept my hands firmly in my pockets, I was NOT gong to shop! Ok I did a little bit, but nothing to break the bank with!

Going Bonkers in Honkers

We spent about an hour going in and out of the shops, trying to bargain just to see if we could get away with it using our rusty Cantonese, and then realised, we had to leave fast as we were all meeting up for drinks in Lan Kwai Fong.  This was the first night of the whole week of plans for our School Reunion get together.   We hopped on another bus to go back down to Central, skidded to a stop in causeway bay, Annie and Den grabbed the MTR as they were staying on the Kowloon side and I did a brisk walk back to Mark and Sylvie's apartment, with their four incredibly fat cats , I'll probably get shot for saying that but honestly 'Spice Girl' their ginger cat looked like a tug boat on paws!

After a quick debriefing from my hosts and specific instructions from Sylvie to which train or bus to take, I sauntered out into the balmy night to go meet the rest of my classmates, some of whom I've not seen since I left school, lets put it this way, it was many decades ago!  Gulping down my nervousness and excitement I was whizzed away into the night .  Lan Kwai Fong here I come!

So What NOW? part 1

Ahhh this post has been a long time coming, you know , you say  "I'll do it next weekend, when I've more time to spare and in a better frame of mind', well guess what, it's not the weekend, I am in a better frame of mind and I'm no longer on air! WHY you ask, lemmie fill you in.

My partner Bel on the breakfast show, which is from 6 am to 10 am weekdays on CapitalFm, and I were sorting out our holidays, we have to schedule them so at least one of us is anchoring the show with whomever that fills in.  Bel's going before me as she's got "stuff" to do overseas, so after another intense show also due to the fact that we're still under sweeps, (sweeps are the surveys done to the radio stations to see how they are performing in all categories including against each other)  we trundle down to HR to fill out our leave application.   We bump into our Station Manager who's beginning to look like a Mexican jumping bean with all the meetings she's been hopping in and out of.

"Hey Ladies" she says, "we've got an emergency meeting this afternoon, please make sure you are there, no excuses".   Bel and I look at each other and groan, we were hoping to bugger off home right quick to decompress, both of us at the end of our tethers and ready to burn out from the grueling and intense schedule .  "Ok bawse, " I retort, " I hope it's good news".  She gives us a sheepish look and says " it's about the finances",  I give her a sharp  "I hope they arent' thinking of reducing the salaries, coz it's going to be mutiny on the bounty " .  She says " well you guys will find out at the meeting".

Forward to the meeting, we're all seated around the conference table, throwing remarks at each other, taking the mickey , it's a women's station, we can get down and dirty and no one takes offence, we're essentially sisters in the hood .  Our COO walks in and without much preamble says, "the board of directors had an emergency meeting last night and have decided to shut down the station, so as of 30th Sept, the station will run on automation"... clang goes my jaw on the table, Bel's lost it, everyone is stunned and the tears are glistening on a lot of the faces around me.  Well now, that just about gives us two weeks to pack up and go... charming.

We had worked public holidays,  worked ourselves to the bone to push the station forward to make it even more successful, worked without producers, proper budgets and publicity and now this.. whoaaa.  For those who didn't smoke or drink, this was one day when all that went out the window.

Our COO invited us all out  that evening, all the announcers drifted in eventually. Though it was a sombre night, we still managed to have a few laughs.  My COO or should I say former COO,  looks at me and says "Thanks Daph, for coming on board, and I truly appreciate all that you have done to turn the station around"  I said " I did it for you Kudsia, you inspired me to come back, you wanted to make it for women, by women and that was the hook, and I'm glad I took the time out to do so, it was quite the roller coaster ride!"  She looks at me and says "lets talk some more later ok"  sure, everyone wanted a bit of her time, she was making herself available to all the announcers to discuss what was on their mind.

For the next two and a half weeks, Bel and I had to pretend to our audience on air  all was ok, we had to ensure the show was still on point, to not slip up, it was  hard, we couldn't  tell our regular contributors why we were not having them on the show, we couldn't  accept any more invitations to interview, we were not really answering our company e mails, so when the final day came and we were given the green light to say farewell on air, it was a lump in your throat, eyes glazed with tears, trembly and wobbly lower lip emotional moment.  We had established so many regular callers, contributors, NGO's , amazing people who were pushing boundaries for women, enriching our lives as women.  Bel was leaving on the same day, and we clung to each other, "gonna miss you mate" we both said at the same time. We had created such a strong bond, I feel we'll always have that special connection.

I kept waking up at 5 am in the morning for the next few days after our final day on air,  freaking out I was late for work, only to realise I didn't have to wake up!  I sat around watching my kids, reading facebook posts, scrolling through twitter and prepping for my trip to Hong Kong.  I had  previously booked and sorted my vacation to my hometown of Hong Kong for my school reunion, on one hand I was really looking forward to it, and on the other obviously I was concerned as I was now out of a job.  I spoke to my mother that evening and she said "Go Daph, enjoy yourself, relax, be with those who know you and I'm sure you'll figure out what you're gong to do next"   I also spoke to my school chum Annie as we're still close and she said the same, my other bestie said "go bonkers in Honkers!" 

As the days got closer to the big reunion date in Hong Kong,  everyone started to post frantically on our reunion wall on Facebook, I forgot about the sting of being made redundant, .... well I told myself here's to the next adventure,  Hong Kong here I come!  (you'll have to read the next blog for that little nugget!)

On the Air

I've been spending most of my weekends catching up with sleep lately as I've been "pulled" back to radio and been lassoed into the prime time slot in the morning from 6am to 10am for the #Capitalbreakfast show on #Capitalfm_my.  This means a 4.30 am wake up call from Mondays to Fridays, so I kissed the remnants of my social life away and knuckled down to a new job, in the new year.  I am also lucky enough to have a  tremendous co host on the show, the universe is certainly showering her blessings down upon me for 2015

So far it's been a great year, yes there were some major disappointments, some setbacks , some frustration regarding The Art of Living Show, but I've got to look at the positive side of it and that is, I've done what I set out to do,which was to convert my web site into an ITV portal, tested it and tested it until we got the streaming right for all systems, and then I let go of the reigns and delegated the task of Sales and Marketing to outside parties.  How they will fare with bringing in our developers ?? I don't know but I'm hoping with all the material they've been given (as we've got so much footage and the many many links to our shows) and a history of being a successful lifestyle program, it will be a doddle for them to sign on property developers and lifestyle merchants alike.

What's the property market going to be like this year?  Well it's been slowing down to almost a grinding halt, we have a lot of high end properties that need to be pushed out, The Art of Living Show's ITV portal is the perfect platform for developers to show case their product as it gets to be seen worldwide, need I say more?

As for me and my little ventures, I've got something else up my sleeve.. oh yes, when have I ever sat still?   I had a big pow wow with the shareholders yesterday,  they believe I'm ahead of my time as most people have not grasped the context of ITV portal here  and the reception has been "lukewarm" so to speak, but overseas in the UK and US,  it's the way to go, what I've created here is a concept that has taken the market by storm, so with that information in hand, I
shall begin making my way into the second concept I'd like to launch.

Keep your eye on this blog, you never know when I'm going to post something juicy!!  Till then have a successful, joyful, happy and loving 2015!

Dx

And we're back!

One thing life has thought me over and over again is to be really patient and to have a whole lot of faith.  After two years of ups and downs due to certain circumstances we've finally steered this ship back to calmer waters.

So I can now tell you all what I've been up to.  Go grab a coffee or summink as this will take a while.

When I initially started the Art of Living show, it was to help out people with regards to their lifestyle.  We don't just say "buying a home" as there is a whole lot more to it!  We showed the videos on our website so those of you who missed the weekly show on our national Free to Air channel NTV7 could watch it but only in segments, and not the entire half hour show.   In 2010 it was expensive to stream videos as we had not developed cloud sharing technology yet.

I have always been a firm believer that the Internet is the way forward in all things visual, and did say that we were going to use broadcasting as a medium initially to get the "word" out.  Now the time has come to implement my dream of converting my web site into an Internet Television portal.  "isnt' that just like having video on demand you say?" Well not really, Instead of pulling the videos from you tube which is what we currently have on our web, our videos will be streamed directly on our site, so no lag as streaming is seamless , and in it's entirety, so you can watch the whole show now online (yippie!) It's very much like your very own television channel.  (Don't worry I'll still have segments on You tube and Vimeo !)

We have already started the conversion, it will take a couple of months give or take to ensure that we've worked out all the kinks and tweak it, but it should look amazeballs when it's ready, as our IT partner from Elitewerks  has designed an incredible landing page! (I shan't tell you more of what else they're doing as it will spoil the surprise)  In the mean time, I've finished my marketing video and will be rolling it out this week to our developers.

Here is the link to VIMEO if you'd prefer to watch the video there!   Art of Living show marketing promo on Vimeo

Biggie Ups!

Half the People

I was scrolling through my home page on FB catching up with news and saw a post from Mary J Blige  with a title that said "bring back our girls ", in it I saw a picture of 4 African women walking and moved on to other stories.  A day later I get a private message from Marina Mahatir asking me to sign the petition that says "bring back our girls ".  So I did a little reading, where I found out that :

"In Nigeria, over 200 girls were recently abducted from their boarding school by a terrorist group, Boko Haram, that may be selling them as brides for $12 each. This petition calls on the Nigerian government and all enabled international parties to immediately rescue them." 

I was driving along in the car today (where ,lets face it apart from the shower, I do a lot of thinking... go figure) and thought, hang on a minute here, we (the females of the human race) make up HALF of the people on this planet, and no one has gone in and smoked the bad guys out and gotten the girls back?

Lets put it this way, if they had been your  daughter, sister, or cousin, or niece, or granddaughter or even a friends child, would you stand there and do nothing?  If this had happened in a western schooling facility for girls, do you think it would be this quiet? (hah, I would say not on your Nelly) 

Where are the huge headlines?  Where are the women activists making noise and getting on the press band wagon?  Why has there been so little fuss globally about them?   

Is the world trying to put a different value  on human life depending on "WHERE" you come from?  Is anyone aware that 3 of the 200 are dead and "no reports " of how they died have been given, (I'm sure anyone with an iota of intelligence will know that they were obviously badly 'abused',) and WE as women, just stand here and act "HELPLESS"??!!

Through decades of arguing, cajoling, protesting, fighting and chaining ourselves for OUR FREEDOM to be WOMEN with  EQUAL RIGHTS,  to join the Army, to join the Police Force, to become Politicians, to being Astronauts,  in Intel, to being Leaders in all sectors...... and NO ONE has done anything to get these young girls (between 15 and 18) back?  
We say we're emancipated, we say we're empowered, we say we have a voice.... then don't you think it's about time we started acting like the women our Founding Mothers paved the way for?  
Pool your great intelligence together sisters and lets bring them back.
Dx

Kitch Kitchens

I have always wondered why people like to have white kitchens.... goodness I can feel every one's hackles rising and a massive debate about to start! Well before you start putting your points forward, let me give you a few of mine.

I cook almost everyday, for me it's partly a creative outlet and partly because I feel I am cooking my family a nutritious meal with love.  We try out lots of different recipes and for those  dishes that don't make the grade, well they're tossed out on their ear!  (not really, we just don't bother with them again) My kids are my biggest critiques, and I like their honesty because it helps me tweak the dish to perfection according to our palette.

Now the cooking part is always good, but the cleaning of it is a real pain in the .. bottom.   I've noticed (and here is where I put my case forth on white kitchens)  that during the cooking frenzy , splatters of sauce, chopped onions or other aromatics strewn about, some beetroot or rhubarb juice is spilled (beetroot in potato salad is yum.. uh I'll post recipe at end for the non believers.)  Anyway you can see where I'm going with this mess, cleaning it up on a stainless steel or dark marble surface is so much easier and kinder to the heart, whereas white cupboards or light counter tops become an art from in elbow grease  (you ever tried cleaning saffron stains from a white anything... good luck) Stainless steel seems to be so much more functional, is beautifully streamlined and lasts longer!  Yes white kitchens are brighter and look cleaner but in reality it takes longer to keep clean!

No stains here!  Dx

Beetroot and Potato Salad
1 x fairly large beetroot (peeled and quartered, boil the beetroot, when it's tender remove half the water, then add some vinegar to the water and let it cool)
4 x large potatoes (boiled and cubed)
1 x onion minced (up to you how much you want in , I usually use a medium sized one)
2 x boiled eggs chopped up
olive oil
vinegar
salt & pepper
mustard
mayo

Add the cooled potatoes,  drained beetroot, onion, eggs in a large bowl, add in olive oil (about 3 tbs) vinegar (3tbs as well) salt & pepper , dollop of mayo and a squirt of mustard.   Toss it well .
Chill it in the fridge and you're good to go!

Michigan Property Profile

I'm a bit pooped at the moment after being up so early to finish off the shoot,  so I'll make this a quick one.  We've started filming again for the Art of Living show.  I'm not going to say it's season 2 because we're doing something different , so you'll have to stay posted for our exciting new updates!
Here's a pic of me interviewing the Chairman of Lifes Good Property Consultants based in KL, who launched the Michigan Property Profile.  It's an exciting investment, will let you know when the segment goes online !

Dx