The Association for International Broadcastinghave just published their shortlistfor the 2020 AIB Awards– and I am blown away my quirky Mental Ideas Podcast is among 6 shortlisted entries in the Factual Podcast category! The winners will be announced at a virtual event, streamed live by Al Jazeera Nov 13. Thank you to the AIB for this incredible honor! I feel blessed and unbelievably lucky to have got this far.
Oh 2020: what a rollercoaster of highs and lows (mainly lows) you have been! If I hadn’t started the year with bipolar disorder, I’d almost certainly have developed it by now!🤣🤣🤣
Can’t believe I’m writing this… RIP Reuben M Tuck! Truly one of the funniest, whip smart, joyous, down to earth (while never quite of this earth) and loveliest people on the planet. The undisputed star of my 2015 Bipolar Express doc and someone I had known since I was 18 (and he led me astray – or it might have been the other way round). He died peacefully at home in Thailand but was only 58. Absolutely heartbroken for his wife Normandy, his family and all those who loved him. FU 2020. RIP Rueb XX
I am making a little tribute to him ‘The Mad Creative Genius of Reuben M Tuck‘ I will be posting here. But for now you can hear Reuben talking about his bipolar with his trademark charisma, candor, humor and wisdom here:
He was an absolute gift of a guest and it was down to him that the doc did so well, picking up an award fromRTHKin 2016 and being Highly Commended by theAssociation for International Broadcastingin 2015.
Brace yourself for the first episode of my humorous newaudio column,Sharp Pains, which launches onRTHK Radio 3‘s123 ShowSept 29! The series will also feature actorPhilippe Jolyvoicing the part of ‘Daddy’.
I’m also super-excited to be producing & presenting two new podcast series: Writer Unblocked & Hong Kong Marriage Stories. The former is now in production and the latter scheduled for early next year!
In a daze to learn my first (and only) poem,War of Voices, has won a place in the 2020 Proverse Poetry Prizeand will be published inProverse Publishing‘s 2021 anthology next April! Which place (last place?) will be announced at a reception in Hong Kong Nov 19!
My late grandfather, a poet, who also dabbled in banking, would be proud! I’d love to say he was an inspiration but since his legacy is all in Welsh (and it’s a sin to translate Welsh poetry into English) it’s impossible for me to tell if he’s been much of an influence or not.
Thank you, Proverse! You have made a wannabe poet with more issues than Vogue very happy.
So… a white American teacher in his mid-50s has been exposed by super-sleuth Nury Vittachi, Hong Kong’s answer to Danger Mouse, for posing as a young Chinese activist all over the world’s media, writing prolifically about his experiences as a student leader in the Hong Kong Protests for the New York Times and the Guardian, winning praise from ex-guv Chris Patten, being followed on Twitter by Joshua Wong and Nathan Law and writing several books about his experiences as a younger, better looking Chinese dude.
I myself have occasionally dabbled in the murky world of pseudonyms. My legal name is obviously Miss Adventure, but if I want to write, produce or present something that’s really sh*t, I will invariably use the pseudonym Sadie Kaye. The tragic thing is that Sadie Kaye, unlike Kong Tsung-gan, is a real person. Real as in really, really thick. It’s been 8 years and she hasn’t even noticed all the phony baloney I’ve been putting out as her. Also we both look quite similar because we were both born in a lighthouse on an artificial island 5 miles off the coast of Sai Kung, which makes my identity theft more legitimate somehow.
But this article does throw up some uncomfortable moral dilemmas. Who is the man in the profile picture? And does it count as yellow face if the picture is in black and white?
This summer I’ve been on a roll and making a lot of dough! Thanks to the amazing team effort of Ying, Moira, Chriz, Raquel, Mercy, Michelle, Emma and Amy, we were able to donate ALL THIS to Hong Kong charity Breadline! (And this was just Week 1…)
The food waste charity, founded by Daisy Tam Diers, does a cracking job of feeding the homeless, elderly, migrants and refugees living well below the breadline on the streets or in shelters. The charity usually relies on food waste donations from cafes and restaurants, but with most operating restricted hours at low capacity, Breadline and other food waste charities have been unable to keep up with demand at a time it has never been higher. So after reading an article in the HKFP, I rallied a few of the neighbors together to see if we could feasibly bake our own to help the charity continue its work during the pandemic.
For the past couple of months we have made this a weekly initiative and we’d love to have your support! If you’re based in Sai Kung/ Clearwater Bay/ Tseung Kwan O and would like to join our Baker’s Dirty Half Dozen, fill in the form below! We’re all novices so don’t let a trivial thing like experience put you off. My first loaf came out of the oven not just burnt, but on fire! It still tasted pretty good though, once I’d given it a good hose down with the fire extinguisher.
We were also able to donate at least 12 shop bought loaves to Feeding Hong Kong, who had received an anonymous tip off about my baking and decided their insurance policy didn’t cover it.
We are now exploring the possibility of setting up an online bakery, Home Kong Kitchen, where you can order home made breads, pastries, muffins and other yummy treats online and we deliver it to your home. We can’t promise it’ll be the best you’ve ever tasted but we can promise every cent we make will be donated to homeless charities. We are also collaborating with local artists to create sustainable bread boxes out of recycled waste with doodled designs and messages of solidarity to our homeless friends.
Big thanks to @SR-FilmFestNYand the judges for recognizing our film. Congratulations to the cast & crew of Lorikfor winning the category! And thanks to all of you who liked and shared my own and Mental Ideas’ posts about the festival on social media!
Crazy is a cheeky little fiesta of madness and the last episode of the first series of Mental IdeasPodcasts so DON’T MISS IT!!! The Mental Ideas Podcast will be back in 2021! You can download all the episodes from this series on RTHK‘s Podcast One platform. Stay tuned for news of spin-off Mental Monologues and the first series’ launch on BBC Sounds!
You can catch me presenting my humorous new audio column on Noreen Mir’s fantabulous 123 Show on RTHK Radio 3 from September 29, 2020! I’m also cranking into production of two new podcasts, Hong Kong Marriage Stories and Writer Unblocked. If you’re interested in taking part as a guest, get in touch!!!
A HUGE thanks to all my mental guests: Mat Ricardo, Christina Yung, Larry Feign, Florence Wong, Ruben M, Josh Walters, Dan Davies, Kiki Wong, Jackie Chan, Philippe Joly, Eugenia Kim, Raffaello Degruttola, Ifat Hyndes, as well as to Nick Samuel for composing the mental music, Angie Mann – and especially to the legendary Noreen Mir for exec producing and all her endless encouragement, guidance and support!!!
Until then amigos, if you can’t stay sane, stay crazy!
I talk dirty. Great big wads of dirty cash! You can’t use banknotes anywhere in Hong Kong since the first wave peaked. Too dirty! Toilet paper is our cleanest currency now…
There’s no show next week as it’s a public holiday in HK but the Mental Ideas Podcast will be back the following Thursday (July 2nd) @2.30pm HKT! Don’t miss Crazy!!!
As well as being the film’s world premiere, there’s a live Q&A on Zoom with the film’s director/lead actor Raffaello Degruttolaand lead actress Emilie Sofie Johannesen. Both are incredible! Transference: A Bipolar Love Storyis one of four films shortlisted in SRFF‘s Narrative Featurecategory that will stream online for 48 hours from June 26 (5pm NYT) to June 28 (5pm NYT). Click on the link below to reserve your place!
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