Busy bee

It's been a busy, busy two months! Aside from usual columns

I've notched up:

An interview with the lovely and gently funny Yvonne Lee. A dream interviewee - accommodating (no diva attitude, this girl!), takes the time to craft well-thought-out answers that ooze personality and wit.

A story about the Sun Yat Sen trail and an interview with the irrepressible founders of We Are Ultra in Going Places March 2011 issue.

http://www.weareultra.com/press/single-gallery/9097301

An interview with artisan baker Su (who turns out to be from my alma mater Tarcisian Convent!) from Delectable in Going Places April 2011.

An incredibly fun five days at MIFF 2011, a regular gig for the last few years - and surprisingly educational. The fun factor had everything to do with the fabulous team that gelled very well together (miss you Li Jin, Li Shian and Shantini!). And educational? This year, we had one of the best editors I've ever had the pleasure of working with, Matt Young. Unbelievable how he turned ho-hum cliches into verbal gold and breathed life into the limpest of sentences. Aargh, hate him! :P

Then there was this Starmag feature on women advocates Dr Evelyn Ho and Dr Ho Choon Moy,

http://bit.ly/hIYOp3, a spinoff from the mega-project I did for Malaysian Women's Weekly last year, Great Women Of Our Time awards.

Tired, typing all that out!

Will post more pictures when I have time. Time to tear my eyes off the computer screen now. Good night!

Great Women of Our Time 2010 - Malaysian Women's Weekly

If you'd told me earlier that we had such accomplished altruists amongst Malaysian women, I would have snorted with disbelief.

Well. I take back my words.

Like many people I know of, we Malaysians don't give enough credit to ourselves.

Doing this project, one of my major ones for 2010, was a huge eye-opener. For every Gloria Allred, we have our very own Dr Hartini Zainuddin; for every Carly Fiorina, there's Ng Wan Peng.

Why fixate on occidental overachieving scientists like Marie Curie when we have somebody like Datuk Choo Yuen May in our midst?

And forget Gray's Anatomy - who knew doctors looked so hot??

For most parts, these women have smashed glass ceilings with quiet dignity, paving the way for other women to stretch their limits.

Editor Elaine Kwong delivered a memorable speech about how the greatest lesson that these ladies impart to us is that inside each of us, is a heroine waiting to be unleashed.

A project of this scale and complexity is no cakewalk. It's more than just multiple photo shoots and doing justice to 18 over-achieving women and their mile-long roster of accomplishments in under 350 words.

I had a bigger problem to grapple with: after every interview, I wanted that person to win!

Decision-making tugs-of-war aside, GWOT definitely ranks as one of the most rewarding experiences in my writing career. And I mean that in a literal sense as well.

At the end of the GWOT award ceremony, which included a sizzling performance by Sheila Majid (yup, she's still got it), all of us who stayed till the end of the dinner got to cart home an Osim uMama massager :P

Drool at the eye candy :)