molonese: August 2006

For Lili & Will

Lili (London-based) and Will (Shanghai-based) may not know each other, but they surely are closely connected in Shanghai.

This is the scoop of tonight, Shanghai: I go to Big Bamboo to meet Gary Sands, Lili's friend, whom I had never met. We are supposed to go with his friends to some Hunan restaurant tonite. Instead, at the bar, I bump into Jim and Derek - Will's friends I met on my previous trips. They are also waiting for a friend, and will be going for Hunan food. "His name isnt's Gary, is it?" I ask. It is. Gary is running late.

We sit down at the bar with Jim and Derek, chat away, some friendly guy walks up, but I continue talking to Derek. After a good 15 min, I turn to the friendly man and tell him we are still waiting for a friend called Gary. "I am Gary".

Comical.

Hunan food was fantastic, the boys went on to play pool, and I could not resist to tell all about it!

2 Degrees of Separation?

My Discovery Channel Submission

OK, here goes the submission to the Discovery Channel. It's such a joke, but I had fun doing it.

Blog Submission

India, Kashmir, the Highest Hiway in the World. Our 4W driver tackles most turns with one hand. Only when it’s a 180-degree turn, he applies both. With my travel instinct, I somehow feel good in his hands. I’ve learned to spot danger when it’s real. We pass a dead cow on the road, 5 vultures on it, cleaning up the road. The road is well marked for passenger and driver's entertainment; "Use the horse power, not the rum power ", "Darling, I like you, but not so fast”. The Manali-Leh road is a Lord of the Rings, Star Wars and Jurassic Park drive-through. I feel like Alice in the Wonderland - every 30 min we enter a different room. Every hour, we are in a different world. It's the mini-Grand Canyon one moment, Gobi Dessert another, then we enter the Mongolian plains. The road ascends quickly, at 4000m I start feeling the effects; a numb headache, then I float in space. A simple arithmetic calculation becomes a major mental burden. "Eat the garlic, Magda" a girl feeds me with 3 cloves of raw garlic. She’s got 1kg of this remedy. The garlic partly relieves my headache. I feel very compromised and vulnerable in this paradise. More on India travel on http://molonese.blogspot.com/2005_09_01_molonese_archive.html.

Vlog Submission

Thanks to my sweetheart TK!

HK for Brenda & Shiraz

Molonese says: (5:04:50 PM)
it's a nice eveing for us here

Shiraz says: (5:05:00 PM)
here its grey and chilly

Shiraz says: (5:05:39 PM)
B is sleeping and i am just upgrading my mobile phone

Molonese says: (5:06:15 PM)
Lemme take a pic from my widnow and send u in a mo

Missing you guys!

10am:
steve_hsia: r u there?
molonese: aha
steve_hsia: I need a favor from you. We are having KL's kick-off FY07 mtg tomorrow morning. Everyone misses you. Can you and also maybe the HK team send us a greeting video for 1 min?
steve_hsia: The video is to say hello, have a great kick-off, market is picking up fast, a lot of excitemnt, love to work with KL team, good luck...
molonese: yeah, ok. Will try..
steve_hsia: Fun, energetic, motivational

Video 1
5pm:

Video 2

Discovery Channel 5 Takes - On the Way to Starlettedom

A month ago, I wrote to Discovery Channel why they should consider me to become Season 3 TJ (travel journalist) at 5 Takes. This is what I wrote:

When people ask me where I’m from, I have a hard time answering. Born in Poland, early childhood in Denmark, teenage years in Malaysia, now living in HK. Perhaps not having a defined home, I have no cliché views of this world. My travels are very diverse – from hiding in a yoga ashram in India for 3 weeks, helping teach English in Cambodia, to mountain biking around Bali. I travel-write and photograph, and have an eye for the small and quirky things that make people and places so different yet so similar; all documented on my blog: molonese.blogspot.com. I’m an athletic person, used to have an all-girl adventure racing team, now focusing on mountain-biking, cross-country running and yoga. As an advertising planner, it’s my second nature to be a team player, bring new, innovative and creative ideas to the table and wrap things I do with much passion and dedication.

This is what I got in my mailbox just yesterday:

Dear 5 Takes TJ hopeful

Congratulations! You've made it through the first round and are just two steps away to becoming a TJ on the new season of Discovery Travel & Living's 5 Takes! To realise your dream, you'll now need to send us a short vlog (video log) telling us more about yourself and why you think you'll make the best 5 Takes TJ. We will also require you to write us a sample blog about a specific travel experience. If we like your vlog and your blog, you'll be invited to a closed-door audition in August so we can meet you in person.

Please go to http://www.travelandlivingasia.com/join5takes/video for detailed instructions and submission details on the sample blog and vlog. You will need to submit them no later than 13 August 2006. If you have any questions, you may direct them to 5takes_asia@discovery.com.

Thanks! We look forward to seeing your submission.

From the Discovery Travel & Living Team

Oh, how fun.
I like the concept of the program. The TJs travel to a place and do 5 exciting things, film them with handycams and report each day on their travelogs. The audience is involved in choosing the next destination and the activities the TJs should cover in a given place. A great way to get the TV audience involved - from leaning backwards, to leaning forwards!

I look at the average age of the TJs from the previous episodes - 23 to 25. I'm 33, and they know it. But, I've got a camera ready for the weekend and will get a video footage of myself. Like... you never know. Now, does that sound like I'm 25 again?

MD Summit & Zhou Village

I ran a corporate marathon in China. Massive work due to the Johnson&Johnson Media Summit, finished it off with a great party on Friday nite, only to start our own MD Summit on Saturday and Sunday. I liked it this year - more on strategy, direction, competitor analysis, aligment of our services with the market needs. Refreshing compared to last year, where we had to suffer from indegestion from hours of spreadsheet analysis. I worked till 4am on Saturday (after partying with Will and Yifat) to finish off my slides, as I was the first track presenter on "New Emerging Services; Web 2.0", so covering new media formats, personal and branded blogs, podcasting, vcasting, cool tools (like blog virtual pets), working with social media and partners, AJAX applications, spotting viral opportunites (like Bus Uncle)... ufff. We had some of our clients and media partners present. J&J's global media vp came to speak too, she's an amazing and inspirational woman.

This was also the time to re-connect with my favourite colleages from KL, missed TK and Nik very much. Brainstorms and creative work have not been the same since I left KL!

On Monday, I got a preview of what an organised tour can be like. We jumped on a bus and got wisked away to ZhouZhang, or Zhou Village. They call it the Venice of China. While most people did the mainstream stuff, Nik, TK and I went exploring the back lanes. Verdict: mildly interesting.

3 on the Bund

We won OASiS Hongkong Airlines

A phonecall comes in on Tuesday from Oasis' office, looking for an agency. Thursday morning Kelly and I meet the marketing folks. They have no time to waste - get us to sign the NDA, no time to hear our credentials, but instead dive into a brief for a launch campaign. We ask a few smart questions, and they ask us if we can deliver in 8 days. We call them on Thr afternoon to confirm we have the resources to do it, we get a contract signed on Friday afternoon.

I love the speed of things in HK.

My boss was impressed and asked for the proposal. "No proposal" we say. "You selling air out there". Well, and here is the outcome: www.befirsttofly.com

A simple campaign, an effective message, which helped us double the database in just 3 days. And beyond it all: what an offer. Fly to London for HKD 1,000 (USD 125) one-way or HKD 2,000 (USD 250) return. Food, entertainment on board included.

Weekends won't be the same.

Indian Wedding Expert

A friend emailed me today:

On 10 Aug 2006, at 10:45 AM, Raphael Couzet wrote:

Hi,

Bruno is having his stag night tonight. It s veyr last minute so
rushing to prepare some stuff.

Since he is marrying an Indian girl we want to ask him some questions
about indian weddings.

Could you help me and come up with 5-10 questions about indian
weddings, very general but hard enough that he probably won't know
(then he has to drink!)

Thankks
R

My reply:

I can try...
i take it from a hindu context, if she's christian many wont apply...

Q: Soon after you get married, you will be greeted in your in-laws house with a very sweet hot milk drink that was overspilt on the stove. What does it mean?
A: wishing you a fertile marriage. Overspilling milk signifies fertility.

Q: What is a thali?
A: A golden pendent a wife wears to signify she's married. It's like a wedding ring for us.

Q: What signifies the moment of 'tying the knot' in a hindu ceremony?
A: Tying a thali on the bride's neck.

Q: What does cracking coconuts mean?
A: Letting go of one's ego, and submission to a cause.

Q: Does the bride alone get the henna tatoo done?
A: No, her brides maids too.

Q: Who is the 'best man' to the bride in a hindu wedding?
A: the bride's younger brother. If no brother, can be a cousin.

Q: how many saris does the bride get to wear on her wedding day?
A: 2. One from her parents, then a new one from her husband.

Q: what is the most common sari colour for a wedding?
A: red.

Q: how to tell a good quality of a sari?
A: you can pull the fabric thru a ring

Q: what is the language the hindu ceremony is conducted in?
A: Sanskrit

It brought back all the memories. Good and bad ones.

Learning Mandarin

I started Mandarin 3 weeks ago. I’ve procrastinated in this area very badly, but once the Patty Bunch was gone, there were no more excuses. I’ve found the whole experience very very rewarding, and will therefore spend some time blogging about it.

Firstly, how I decided on the school. After a few individual classes with a few tutors, I narrowed down the school I liked. The tutor did not want to travel to my place on Saturday mornings (as I live on the dark side), so they offered me a hybrid program of tuition + internet + self-study. When I saw the podcasts, I was sold! What better way to use my ferry time than listen to my iPod and learn Mandarin. The woman who owns the school also runs her own blog http://learningmandarinpod.blogspot.com. There is no better virtual commitment to what you do then running your own blog. This is on top of her school website. She blogs about the Chinese culture, the outings with her students, uploads stuff for us to learn more.

Secondly, learning the language explains a lot of quirky things about my Chinese friends, colleagues and all strangers. You know how they always mix up ‘she’ with the ‘he’. This is because in Chinese ‘ta’ is for both ‘he’ and ‘she’ – the gender is figured out from the context of the sentence. You know how Malaysian and Singaporean English is peppered with the ‘lah’ and ‘mah’, like “Come with me, mah.”. Well, ‘ma’ is used to form a question in Chinese. Example, in a literal translation: “You are busy ma?” means “Are you busy?”
You know how you ask your colleague “What’s the contract worth?” they say “100,000”, then “no, sorry, 1 million”, “no, wait, correct 100,000”. And you think “You suck at your job!” Well, here is the discovery: Chinese people count in 10, 100, 1000 and 10000. The last one is called ‘wan’. So 100,000 is said to be “10 wans”. I sorta knew this, but thought I should remind myself to be more forgiving to my colleagues.

Thirdly, I’ve been highly motivated for the past 3 weeks, and making some good progress. I can say “You are my very good friend” “Ni shi wode hen hau pengyou” in one breathe. My tutor, April, says I’m a quick learner. She has no idea that I cram at home every Saturday morning for hours! She does not know that I stopped partying on Friday nights to have a fresh brain on Saturday mornings.

There are many reasons I want to speak the language. There are no better ways to connect with people than speaking their own language. There is no better way to enjoy a moment. The urge to master Mandarin was further fueled by the recent Johnson&Johnson media summit presentation I had to do in Shanghai. We got scored as the best presentation material and delivery, but I did not get the same audience involvement the other agency presenter did. I know, how childish of me. Only because he threw in a few Mandarin sentences, and the audience went ‘wow’. I came back hooked on the idea of being able to have a basic conversation in Mandarin by end of this year.

And for know, zai jian to my good friends.

Amnesty International in HK

I finally went to see them. A seemingly bored white single female walks in, declares her profession and interests, states further that she has no children and no husband/s, works a lot at times, than not that much at other times, and that her NGOs friends inspire her. She then makes it clear that she’s ready to contribute in brainstorms, concepts, marketing communications or any marketing fluff that AI may need. She ends by saying she’s not interested in packing boxes, administrative tasks and raising $5 in front of MTR stations. That makes Campaigner B (it’s a title they carry) walk out. Campaigner A stays on. Says that they will soon be launching a campaign for Violence Against Women, says he needs input. Shows a poster of a Caucasian cosmetics model with a bruise on her cheek. “Is that a mock-up?” “No, he replies, “this is what we thought of doing.”

Wow. A little shock wave. Absurd. Maybe they really need help here. I tell him how effective it would be to tell real stories of real women, not models. He listens, asks me to come for a brainstorm session next month. They have no media plan, no budget, no concept. I think I can help.

The Patty Bunch Arrived!

The Patty Bunch (read: my sister + family) came and went. It’s been a rather intensive 1 month. I slept 12 hours straight on the day the left HK. I think they liked the whole experience. They got to see HK, Macao, Kuala Lumpur and the Malaysian Borneo. I was excited that we caught the Rainforest Music Festival, that they got to live in the Iban long houses, blow the pipes, get woken up by the chickens and pigs, sample local rice wine. It was a trip of many ‘firsts’ for them; trying Japanese and Vietnamese food included. They were the kind of guests any hosts wishes to have; open-minded, always ready to try new things, My sister says their horizons have expanded. And I get reminded once again, that the rest of the world does not embrace the same life as mine.