Some of my hobbies include traveling, listening to music and driving auto rickshaws—not necessarily with a licence. I drove a tuk tuk around India once, and it was fun.
I have a Battlestar Galactica tattoo. It’s my second tattoo. I don’t usually fangirl over anything, but I’m a complete fangirl over BSG.
India resonates deeply with me. I’ve been visiting it over and over again for the past ten years. I was born in Little India, my parents got married on Deepavali and I grew up convinced that I was Indian.
The craziest thing I’ve ever done was probably visiting Yemen alone in 2009. I narrowly escaped three different suicide bombs there. I had to wear a burkha, and I went around pretending to be a local as foreigners were banned from land transport. I also stayed with a local family—my host told everyone in the building that I was a descendent of the Prophet in order to stave off questions. It’s a good thing no one asked me to come around and pray with them.
I’m quite game for anything. I don’t think that there’s anything that I would never, ever do, except maybe visit a super-risky country like Somalia.
My favorite countries are Lebanon, India and Yemen—I’ve had the good luck to visit these countries before the s*** hit the fan. I also lived briefly in the UAE for about a year, and that was right before the Arab Spring took place.
Many people think I’m an extrovert, but it’s actually the other way round—I’m very introverted.
I started Culture Kitchen because I was convinced that we needed more dialogue and understanding between different ethnic groups here in Singapore, especially with Singaporeans’ strong xenophobic sentiments at that time. Food and art are great ways to get conversations started.
I wish I could be less disorganized. I’m a bit of a scatterbrain. My team members at Culture Kitchen even say that they want me to make a shirt with the slogan “The Disorganizer”.
I get annoyed when people settle for less, just because it’s easier to. People often don’t make enough decisions for themselves, or are too afraid or inert to change their lot in life.
Mediocrity scares me.
If I could be granted a superpower, I would want a special chip in my head that would let me speak every single language in the world. I’m fluent in English and Mandarin, and I get by in Thai and Hindi. I’m also learning Bahasa Indonesia now.
Biryani—I love eating it and cooking it. Someday, I want to go on a biryani tour of the world.
Alcohol is my greatest vice. I love whisky and gin, and it also doesn’t help that I’m dating a bartender.
Love is being in a healthy relationship, with room for both people to grow and inspire each other. It’s about jumping out of bed excited to do things together with the person you’ve chosen to spend the rest of your life with. And to me, it’s also one of the hardest things to find in life.
We as Singaporeans don’t give ourselves enough credit. We can actually be quite collaborative and open to change, but we don’t notice that because we’ve been immersed in our own society all our lives.
Richard Branson was right—entrepreneurs should start something even before they feel completely ready for it. Don’t overthink things too much, and trust your gut instinct.
Steve Jobs is my idol. He once said, “You can’t connect the dots looking forward; you can only connect them looking backwards. So you have to trust that the dots will somehow connect in your future.” This is something that is very important to me, and it gives me faith in the things I do.
In 10 years time, I hope to be writing novels on my yacht, or in my own hotel. I really want to open a hotel someday, perhaps in a place like Thailand. I also hope that I’ll still be working on projects I care about.
Life is like coffee. You can take it whatever way you like—sometime it’s terrible, commercial, watery and tasteless, but you can also go out of your way to make it really amazing.
