Jun took me to Bukit Tabur East to break in my new hiking shoes (cos we’re climbing Kilimanjaro this Thursday. Erm yeahhhhh)
We fit it into a busy Saturday in between me running for Mya’s 101-birthday Christmas party and some other errands i forget now.
It was beautiful.
After some actual rock-climbing, where i was too busy trying not to fall off a rock face to take pictures, we chilled on the edge of a little cliff and observed the city on one side, and nature to our left.
My new shoes from Salomon! I never even heard of this brand because actual hiking/sports accessories are a new world to me.
They are AMAZING. I just realised i’ve been hiking all over the world in shitty old (dangerous) sneakers!
I got these Salomons upstairs at Mid Valley (around RM500 on 30% sale) and they’ve got excellent grip on natural terrain!
I’m very flexible when it comes to updating my Instagram about what i’m doing…
Despite my reputation as an online persona, i find it easy to ‘switch off’ and be absolutely okay with not having wifi.
But that depends where i am and what i’m doing.
For a city like Tokyo where things move at a million miles a minute, there is so much to do and so much happening that if i didn’t update what i ate and what i did (obviously we can see my priorities in life subconsciously lining up there), i’d forget it by the next day.
A month ago i was flown to Tokyo for the Uniqlo SS16 press preview, and had such a fun and fulfilling trip!
Some highlights from my 5-day trip:
1) Watching the sun rise on the way to the airport
2) Attending the SS16 fashion show and interviewing Uniqlo Creative Director Naoki Takizawa for the second time. He’s such a sweetheart!
3) Discovering GIANT RAINBOW POCKY EXISTS
4) Eating myself into a sashimi coma at Tsukiji fish market with Joan and Cai Mei
5) Hunted and had the best creamy chicken soba in my life at Kagari, Ginza. With eschalot butter, no less.
Just before Christmas, KinkyBlueFairy + MadHat organised an intimate lunch and dinner event for Love, Bonito. The Singaporean fashion label wanted to show their appreciation for the Malaysian media and personalities who have been supporting them since it expanded to KL in October 2015, and the purpose of the get-together was exactly that.
To get together, chat, and eat!
Our teams worked on securing the best venue that suited the event, and i must say they did a very good job after going through a few caterers and venue options.
The luncheon and dinner were held at Sitka Studio on Jalan Batai, a progression of their Test Kitchen which currently runs on Friday and Saturday evenings in Sitka Restaurant (downstairs).
We were the first to run an event there, and it’s a beautiful, warm and inviting space where guests can experience playful gastronomy created from interesting ingredients- sourced locally, and organic wherever possible.
Tablescaping that day was done by Tish, interior purveyors and artisanal advocates who have established themselves amongst leading event stylists in Malaysia.
Personalized calligraphy invitation cards were sent out in bespoke floral boxes prepared by Tish.
Inspired by the Grand Budapest Hotel, the invites were personally delivered by a butler to everyone’s office/home.
Xandria receiving hers, and Sazzy with our model butler whom we later discovered happened to be… her baby brother!
She said she was excited to be receiving her invite from a hot butler, and when she spotted it was her little brother, she was rather let down…. lollll
My blog just literally cannot keep up with my life! Maybe cos i pressure myself to write something a bit more substantial (OR SO I THINK) every time i post something. Maybe i just need to accept that it’s better i microblog rather hurriedly instead of never putting up all the things i want up!
Here’s a quick one that’s WEEKS late.
I was invited to be a panelist speaker at the Malaysia Major Events Symposium (MME) at Zouk KL on 30th November. The session i spoke on was focused on digital and content marketing trends.
“…that explore creativity, analytical thinking, and social metrics to gain maximum exposure in the major events industry. In this session, we hope event organizers find out new ways to exploit traffic, drive online visitors and convert them into participants and spectators to their events. At the same time, to ensure their digital marketing and advertising budgets realise full potential. As a digital marketing strategist and a whiz in content marketing, we hope by the end of this session, event organizers shall get the exposure on ways of creating savvy content, become a growth marketer, flexible and dynamic enough to adopt new techniques beyond current digital marketing plans.”
After agreeing to it, i was sent a document noting the other two panelists i was speaking with- MD of Google, and Growth Hacker + Strategist at Mindvalley.
What?!
These are two huge companies that have hundreds of people working there…
Urmmmm……. Pressure much? ?
Brought my Life Manager/Little Dragon along. Baby, it’s gonna be your 1-year anniversary with KBF soon!
Me next to Sajith Sivanandan, Managing Director of Google (Malaysia, Vietnam, Philippines, and New Emerging Markets).
I swear i look less duh IRL. Instead, why don’t you admire my shoes? They’re so comfortable and i wear them all the friggin time (much to my other shoes’ jealousy). From Melissa.
Ben Ibrahim (who facilitated the conversation), Sajith, me, and Gavin from Mindvalley.
I thought it might get a little too serious, but i ended up having so much fun just expressing our views and learnings in the industry from such contrasting perspectives.
We talked about how to successfully reach out to a higher statistic, and naturally the conversation touched on numbers, how to identify target influencers, how best to stream new visitors organically, how to start a database (i am so not doing that right now, i really should start), and so on and so forth- till we reached an end point about how everything is so surrounded by DIGITAL, that it was so important to keep things physical. Real.
I’ve stayed in countless hotels over the past 10 years, and there is a distinction between one that feels like a hotel you’re staying in for business, and one that you feel you can live in for a little longer because you feel that comfortable in it. Dorsett Shepherds Bush was one that is mentally placed in the latter category for me.
Located in the heart of West London, the 317-bedroom establishment is well connected to Notting Hill, Kensington, London’s West End and other major tourist spots.
The tube station is a mere hop and a skip away (which i did one morning),
the bus stop is right smack in front of the hotel entrance,
Westfield London shopping centre is ridiculously close by,
and Heathrow Airport just a 30-minute drive away.
The 8-storey hotel also has 24 Suites, three meeting rooms, Dorsett Lounge, Pictures; an all-day dining restaurant, Shikumen; a Chinese specialty restaurant, Jin; a destination bar and a spa located on the top floor overlooking the Green. It manages to retain the building’s historic facade, whilst modern architecture and design surrounds you as you step in.
When i first stepped into my hotel room, i thought, “Oh, how feminine and apt it is as my sanctuary for LFW!”
The autumn sun was setting when i arrived.
That hotel bed provided me a cosy slumber every night as i fell into it. (Fashion Week is tiring!)
The brand concept celebrates the intertwined stories of Asia and Britain hence touches of Asian culture and tradition you see deftly woven into the product and service offerings, alongside timeless British elegance of classic grandeur and modern edginess.
