Everyone Loves The Underdog: Big Duck's Triumphant Return to Baybeats 2021 and Creating Their Own Safe Space

Tell us about your upcoming collaboration with Baybeats!

Isaac: This year, Baybeats is working with independent promoters and organisers that they feel are pushing the scene forward. There are four days of Baybeats, and each day will feature acts curated by four different independent promoters at the Annexe stage. We’re programming the stage on the last day of Baybeats, and we’re quite excited. Our programming is called Big Duck Energy Kaleidoscopes. It’s about the celebration of diverse music that exists on the fringes of different genres of music. During the pandemic, there were a lot of interesting projects - even if there was no live music and people were struggling, people were still able to thrive creatively you know? We’re very grateful for this opportunity, and to programme the stage for Baybeats, yeah.

How does it feel to come back to the festival that sparked off Naybeats? And then now with Big Duck Energy?

Isaac: It’s hilarious man. Two years ago, we were disturbing them almost every day - spoofing their posts on Instagram. I remember we went to different bars where our friends bartended and put up the Naybeats 2019 poster. We just kept going everywhere to promote our stupid show. And people within the Baybeats circle were unhappy about it.

Chester: Like, “why are they doing this?”

Isaac: Yeah I remember someone saying that he wanted to beat me up or something. But at the end of the day, people could see the good work we did. It was nothing mean-spirited.

Chester: Nothing facetious I guess.

Isaac: Yeah, nothing was mean spirited. It was a joke. Music is inherently absurd. You can’t take it super seriously because it’s just sound going into people’s ears, even if you’re singing about your emotions. Doig Naybeats and being able to come back full circle where people understood why we did what we did, and to actually be able to programme an actual Baybeats show, it’s a bit unreal and very funny.

What sort of experience are you hoping to create for your audience?

Chester: The audience is limited to 50 people.

Isaac: Yeah we’re doing a live show for 50 people, and then there’s a livestream. So it’s very different because our curation philosophy is to pack as many people as possible into a small space - just to have a big party and everyone’s drunk. Yeah, you can’t do that now. So it’s more of curating something similar to a house show, which is a show with more of a vibey experience.

Chester: Cheesy word sia.

Isaac: Yeah but there’s a lot more thought goes into the visual element of it, to create an energy for the space itself rather than have energy coming from the audience. So things like the lighting, the performers all help in creating an atmosphere for a house show, and also making sure it looks good on camera. We’re working with a set designer whom we really respect called Rice who’s worked on music videos and stuff. We’re also working with our graphic designer, Laurent, who’s helping us with the a more focused, grungy aesthetic.

Chester: Yeah and because collaterals are directly from us, we’re very self-reliant.

Isaac: Ya la, we’re going to try as much as possible to create a very unique experience. We don’t want our show to be just another part of Baybeats. We want people to feel like they’re being transported into another world. I can’t wait for you guys to see the set design, it’s super dope.

Chester, as someone who’s had a lot of experience in the scene, what does it mean to collaborate with Baybeats this time?

Chester: I wouldn’t say I have a lot of experience… not at the the forefront-

Isaac: He’s been part of the scene for the past 15 years. So he’s seen pitfalls and some of the more toxic things that happen within the scene and these are things we’re trying to avoid.

Chester: Yes.

Isaac: So I mean, we can talk about it. Don’t say names lor.

Chester: Yeah, but my goodness, is it safe to say these things?

Isaac: Last time everyone played for free, it’s true what.

Chester: Yeah okay. In the past you used to have to pay in order to play a show. And with our shows, we try not to make that happen.

How did Isaac manage to convince you to come on board with him for Big Duck?

Chester: That’s a short story. He was like, “Eh bro. You never make it to Baybeats ah. First round only right, you never made it past that?”

Isaac: Yeah, yeah. I asked Chester specifically because of his experience.

Chester: I’ve done gigs before, and I also work audio and backline. So for our first gig, we got the venue to hold it two days after Isaac asked me to join him. We even made artist passes- like a spoof (of Baybeats) because we wanted to remember this entire thing. We were pseudo-proper, but not really-

Isaac: Chester really went above and beyond. I don’t even think of these things. He even made a wristband, and lanyards? He spent hours putting passes into the lanyards, one by one, for SHINY.

So what made you decide to continue doing shows after Naybeats?

Chester: Cause it’s damn fun. And we’re actually, how should we say this. We’re not losing money.

Isaac: We’re making money. Which is important. If we lose money, we can’t keep doing this. For the longest time, my perception of running underground shows is that you’ll definitely make a loss. But when we did Naybeats, we made a profit. It wasn’t a lot, but it was enough to breakeven. And it was such a big deal for me.

Chester: We paid the artists.

Isaac: And ourselves, and then we carried the rest forward for the next shows. So yeah, it’s fun. And two it’s like, I guess like, there were shows I wanted to see that were not happening you know? Shows that were happening that we felt could be better.

You guys mentioned that there were a lot of unhealthy things within the scene. So how are you guys trying to do things differently with Big Duck?

Isaac: First and foremost, our shows are always a safe space, and you respect everybody there. So it doesn’t matter what your political views are, doesn’t matter what your sexuality is, or your race or religion, whatever. You just come for a show and forget about that. You have a good time, you get drunk if you want to.

Chester: Yeah, spill a beer.

Isaac: I mean, you spill the bill then you clean it. Also the topic of sexual harassment is very important too. We take a very hard stance against that because in certain scene, it’s an open secret that people get a free pass to do these things at shows, or people are not comfortable talking about predators at shows. So for us, we’re very strict when it comes to safety. We make sure there are no predators at our shows, no sexual abuse, no harassment of any form at our shows. And of course, the culture of always paying our bands regardless or not if we profit or not.

Chester: So technically, no one loses.

Isaac: I mean, this is just very important. Even if artists say they’d be willing to play for free because they love us, we’ll insist to pay them because we want to start making this part of the culture. In Singapore, we feel like you can get away with not paying artists because the perception of an artist’s value isn’t very high. As independent organisers, we want to make it a point that even in the underground scene, artists are respected so when they go forward to other shows, they’ll know they have to get paid.

---

Punk Will Never Die: Frontman of Singapore's First Punk Band 'Opposition Party' on Being Different, and Staying That Way

Opposition Party was one of the pioneering punk bands in Singapore, so what does punk means to you?

Back then I didn't want to conform to what the norm of Singapore society was, which was a lot more stifling than it is now. Now, while Singapore is still very strict and the environment is still very restrictive, it’s already much better than it was in the 80s. Now if I tattoo my whole face and walk around, people might just stare at me. But back then, even if you had one tattoo on your finger, you’d be identified as a gangster because the consensus at that time was that only people in gangs had tattoos.

So to be punk was just to kick back against conformity, against society and all its norms. I felt that I didn’t belong, I didn’t fit into the rest of society so I wanted to look different. A tiny tattoo, spiking up my hair, wearing shirts with holes, torn jeans, boots, maybe a jacket with too many patches - that gave me my own identity and it was how I showed myself to the rest of Singapore. Being punk was about expressing how I felt about society back then, and how I didn’t want to be part of it.

That’s basically how punk started everywhere. It’s how it started in the U.K - they just didn’t want to be part of the larger, conforming society.

Now punk is part of normal society, it’s so different now. What was weird back then, you can just buy from H&M now.

What was the music scene like back then? Especially since punk didn’t exist before your band in Singapore.

Myself, I didn’t idolise any punk bands. That’s another part of being punk, you do not idolise the punk band - you go out there and be your own punk band. So I made my own music and it was very difficult especially when there weren’t any other punk bands that I knew of. Back then, the music scene was made up of leftover bands from the 70s because I think rock music was kind of banned or heavily restricted in the 70s, and the music scene basically died out. In the 80s, whatever was leftover were cover bands playing in pubs and lounges. So it was difficult for us because our gigs would get stopped halfway because the police would come and shut us down. I’ve played shows where the venue owners would cut off the electricity because he said we were worshipping Satan or something. There was a lot of misunderstanding because people didn’t know what to expect of our music, and like back in the 70s, heavy metal music was associated with devil worshippers and others would assume the same from our music.

What about your personal life? What did your parents, or your family think?

Parents back then, and even now, weren’t that supportive of the arts. And I get it. It's like, comb out the spikes in your hair. When are you going to take the colour out of your hair? Can we buy some normal clothes for you? I dropped out of school because I just couldn’t stand being there. I just wanted to serve National Service (NS), get out, and then do what I wanted to do. It was my dream, to live life my own way.

I felt a lot more like an outcast back then. Right now everyone is chill. You can have tattoos on your neck, your face, and it’s not that big a deal. But back then, it was quite extreme. To the point where people would ask us to step outside for a fight because they thought we looked different. We had policemen trailing us when we were walking outside because they assumed we would be up to no good. In hindsight, there were four of us in spikes and studded jacket, so maybe someone might have called the police on us. But yeah, even if it’s better now, the feeling of being an outcast has not left me. I still think I’m an outcast.

Back in the 80s, was there any stigma against being a musician?

There was definitely that thought of if you play music, you’ll have no future. Unless you were one of those cover bands I mentioned earlier, and you landed a regular gig playing popular music because when people go for a drink, they want to listen to covers of popular music. That was probably the highest you could go in terms of having a career as a musician. Also, punk rock in the 80s was so new and still wasn’t really widely accepted in parts of the world where punk rock was already thriving. For me, I was struggling to make ends meet because I didn’t want a normal job because it meant that I had to cut my hair and wear normal clothes. So I had to look for jobs that involved manual labour - being a store man, a delivery man.

I would work eight hours in the day, then forget about it and become myself at night and go for jam sessions, play gigs, plan my next release.

How different is punk culture in Singapore than it is to its Western counterparts?

The basic foundation of rebelling against society is the same everywhere and that’s where punk exists. But you cannot import the meaning of punk wholesale, it’s adapted to whatever you’re rebelling against. The punk I got into originated from the U.K - they were working class folks and their struggles with Singapore’s working class in the 80s were very different. So I mean you can import the fashion, the sound, but what we’re hitting back against and what they’re hitting back against are totally different.

Tell us more about Opposition Party, what’s up with your band name?

Right okay, we didn't talk about politics, back then, talking about politics openly was really scary. In fact, having the name ‘Opposition Party’ really gave us huge problems. Promoters just refused to print our full band name for fear of the police coming back. We had to change our band name to ‘OP’ on a lot of our gig flyers - so that’s why we’re more known as ‘OP’ than ‘Opposition Party’ because we didn’t actually use our full band name back then.

For punk, once you get into it, it becomes your way of life. I’m not sure if it’s that way for other genres, but you’ll always have punk in you, you won’t grow out of it. I can’t imagine waking up and not being able to play in Opposition Party. So that’s the fuel that’s keeping OP alive right now, three decades, on to a fourth. With a band, I make my own music, I create my own releases, (before the pandemic) I do my own tours, I go anywhere I want to play. We’re not world famous but wherever we go, whatever small town, we still draw crowds - so that itself is very satisfying to me.

What was your experience with censorship, especially with a band name like Opposition Party?

Back then, I always had to say that we were not interested in politics. Every interview we did, I had to emphasise that there was nothing political in what we were saying. Our music did touch on politics, but only in a general sense. But even then, we had to submit lyrics every time we played a gig. For me, yes, I’ll probably make a bigger splash without censorship, but what’s the point of me playing a show, getting arrested, then not being allowed to play shows anymore?

What were the things that resonated with you in punk that you wanted to express through music?

Our music was quite aggressive. Even if we were to just sing nonsense, it was already a statement back then because of all the cover bands and Blues bands, our music stood out because like woah, what is this guy doing? Is it just noise?

I don’t really focus that much on lyrics because I was selling an attitude and that attitude came from the rejection of society. And if looking different made me a bad person, then I wanted to show that, “Okay, I’ll be a bad person then.” It wasn’t like punk in the U.K because a lot of them were very political, very anti-government and anti-authority. For us it was just an emphasis on the noise we were making and creating, and how different we looked from everyone else. Lyrics never played a big part in the first version of OP.

So if I say ‘fuck’ in a song, it’s like fuck everyone, not just the government. I was more upset at normal people than the government.

Making music and earning money, how was it like?

I was definitely not earning money. Definitely wasn’t earning money.

How about the media’s portrayal of punk back then, and how has the internet and technology changed Opposition Party and yourself?

I think the media framed us as a novelty. It was a strange time, so it was very surprising that they would give us big, front-page spreads and stuff. But yeah, it was a novelty to them because we looked different. We were colourful, and I just kind of went along with the flow because we didn’t have internet back then, so I couldn’t go online and say like, “Fuck the mainstream media.”

Now with the internet, I can utilise new media and spread word about the band. In the 80s, we had to physically meet to talk as a band, gel with each other, write music together. There was no goddamn Photoshop to deal with, so there was a lot of sweat and work when it came to designing and releasing our own music on cassette. And when new music is finally released and someone actually listened to it and bought it, it’s like woah, we did this. We’re spreading the band’s name.

But now? The three of us don’t even need to meet physically. You can record music in your own house, on your phone or whatever. We just need to meet to have photos taken together - shit, that part is covered too now. The music scene now, it’s just not punk rock anymore. It’s become just another thing to play with, there’s no meaning behind it anymore.

So you feel like the essence of punk has lost itself along the way.

Yes. Although there are many old-school bands, or even new bands that choose to remain underground. So no internet presence, maybe playing underground shows and stuff. These are the true punks. But for Opposition Party, it’s been like decades, so it’s difficult to go back to exactly what we were.

Did your goals change over the years, especially with talks of being signed to a label?

Up until the early 90s, we definitely chose to remain underground. Even though we did have media coverage, we didn’t care. But then came a label called Springroll - a sub label of a major Japanese label Pony Canyon. It was in the first half of the 90s when they started to sign many underground bands, including us.

So if you want to talk about us “selling out” by being signed to a major label and such, yeah, we kind of went through that phase too.

What made you guys sign to a label then? Was there a turning point?

It was for our music to reach more people. Unlike the U.K or the U.S, or even Japan, where the underground scene is so developed - like you can just exist within the ecosystem and still make it big without committing to the mainstream. In Singapore… I realised that it was either Opposition Party dies out in a couple more years because we didn’t have much internet back then, or use this major platform, get signed, then get more people to listen to us.

It’s similar to my decision of self-censorship. It’s my form of self regulation and I looked at the situation around me decided to make the best choice for the band.

With self-censorship, and even signing to Pony Canyon, were these trade-offs worth it?

I have not regretted making those decisions. We had those articles written about us because of it, and because of the increased exposure, we were eventually able to perform at rock festivals in Korea and Taiwan. We played all these big shows in the early 2000s, it took a while, but that’s how we spread our name without the internet. So I got the coverage to reach out to more people, and it achieved what I wanted. Similar with getting picked up by the label.

As Opposition Party grew, did you have to change your music, make it more palatable?

The music itself didn’t actually change. It actually got much heavier. Mainly because the more we played, the better we got. When we started out, we were raw and basic but then our songwriting just started becoming more complex and heavier. And that was why in the 90s, we were known more as a metal band than a punk band before I decided to move the music back to punk again.

So Baybeats has become a space for people to find out more about the underground scene, aspired towards local bands. What are your feelings towards Baybeats?

I don’t recall if there are other rock festivals or huge music festivals in Singapore. And I think Baybeats is the only one that has the spirit of supporting local artists and bands to express themselves. I mean, it’s not The Substation but you know those art instalments that The Esplanade puts up all the time? I think that’s great support because this is a mainstream place and your art is getting scene by members of the public.

This written interview was edited for brevity and clarity. Due to the nature of the topics discussed, this interview will not be available as an audio recording.

---

Policed For Identity: Owner of Heckin' Unicorn, Yu Sheng, on Running a Queer Brand in Singapore and Being a Voice For His Community

Let’s start with a self-introduction!

My name is Yu Sheng. I'm a cisgender gay man, 29 turning 30 and I run Heckin’ Unicorn, a queer brand based in Singapore.

How did you get started with Heckin Unicorn?

It started around two and a half years ago as a side project while I was working full time. I’m also a designer so designing cute stuff is kind of in my blood. It started off as a fun side project designing cute pride pins. I started off having six designs - the first batch of pins. Slowly over the years, it grew into a proper queer brand. It had more pin designs, and we expanded into other products. On top of just pins, we now have notebooks and socks. Eventually it grew into a brand that pushes pushing for social change and to raise awareness on queer issues.

Tell us about your journey on social media!

Before Heckin’ Unicorn, I wasn't a very active user of social media, especially Instagram, because most people use it to post pretty photos of themselves. And there's that, “I'm living a happy life”vibe, so I used it mainly to follow dog accounts, because dogs just make me happy (laughs).

But yeah, there was a bit of a learning curve when it came to posting things that people liked; what kind of content was engaging, what engagement on social media actually looked like. The good thing was that as a designer, I take pretty photos and that’s really helpful on Instagram. So initially, that was how the brand started - with pretty product photos. There was also a phase where I was trying out different types of content to see what resonated with audiences. If you scroll all the way back on the feed, you’ll be able to see some of those posts.

I tried featuring queer books, queer characters, music that referenced queer identities or were written by queer individuals. At some point in time, comics were something I experimented on, and it turned out to be pretty successful. So I draw all the comics that we publish, and it essentially uses humour to poke fun at ridiculous situations faced by individuals who are LGBTQ+. In these situations, there’s really nothing else to do but laugh, and that’s partly why the comics became quite successful. From then, I started creating more comics and after a while, blog posts started coming in.

Writing is something that isn’t intuitive to me because I’m quite shy, but someone mentioned in the comments that I should write about queer issues because they felt like I could write well based on my Instagram captions. So I tried it once, and it worked out. Eventually, the blog became a medium for us to talk about more serious matters. It’s an in-depth look at queer issues in Singapore.

The first blog post we published was about censorship in media spaces, and I broke down different IMDA regulations and explained how queer characters are banned from TV. This is why we don’t hear discussions about them on the radio, it’s not because people aren’t interested, or that radio hosts don’t want to talk about it. It’s that anyone who does gets fined.

After that first article, I released more articles about these heavier topics. One examined all the anti-LGBTQ+ regulations in country, there was a series that looked into “conversion therapy” practices in Singapore. Our latest article explores how schools in Singapore suppress queer identities with first-hand testimonies and quotes from real people and victims.

Over the last two and a half years, a lot of running Heckin’ Unicorn was learnt on the job. I didn’t know what would work right from the start.

You mentioned that Heckin’ Unicorn started out as a side project, now it’s your full time gig?

Yeah. I quit my full-time job in March last year. Right before COVID returned to Singapore.

Whoa, did that affect Heckin’ Unicorn business wise?

Yes, it did in the beginning. There were some logistical challenges because I ship overseas as well. And as you can imagine, flights were less frequent and orders took longer to ship out. But it’s fine now, after a while, people get used to buying things online. So we weren’t that badly affected.

Maybe you can share a little bit about the setbacks or hostility you faced on the business front?

When I started Heckin’ Unicorn, obviously I wasn't exposed to the trolls and the anti-LGBTQ+ community. But after running it for two and a half years it’s quite common now, it's almost routine. Whenever there are homophobic or transphobic comments made against the LGBTQ+ community, I’ll just delete or block the user. They do exist but they don’t surprise me anymore. Especially at the beginning when we started the blog and the comics, there were a lot more anti-LGBTQ+ comments on the posts.

These situations have to be dealt with sensitively. Let’s say our Instagram post depicts a survivor’s story with conversion therapy, and in comes a comment asserting that gay people can become straight. That’s very damaging because the survivor, others with similar experiences or people within the community who are already disturbed by these practices might read the comments. Then it becomes very stressful for me because I’ll be refreshing my feed to make sure that those nasty comments are deleted within an hour or two after the post goes up.

The Heckin’ Unicorn account is a safe space for queer people, and that’s one of our driving principles. I’ll have to step in the moment it doesn’t feel safe anymore. Having questions and discussions are fine, but the moment it crosses a line and starts becoming hostile or unsafe, that’s where I have to step in. I really didn’t expect having to spend a considerable amount of time in the beginning to make sure that there were no nasty or hurtful comments.

Another setback I faced was when my Facebook Business account was suspended. Because we’re a business, I run ads on Facebook and I was suspended due to a payment issue. I was like shit, did my money run out? I checked my bank account, my business and debit cards and everything was fine - there weren’t any payment issues because everything was paid on time. So I asked for help from Facebook and the answers provided were all very, very vague.

I was made to verify my personal identity - Yu Sheng, not Heckin’ Unicorn, to Facebook, again, for very vague reasons. I was never told exactly why I had to do it. My guess was that maybe because my brand is about an issue that’s against “national interest”, or it might be a sensitive topic or whatever. But had to follow their instructions because what else could I do right? And after a few weeks, my account was unsuspended.

The annoying that was that it was during November, which is peak retail period, and my sales were heavily affected because of this suspension.

It’s frustrating because as a queer brand, we just sell pins and notebooks. If we could be classified as something that’s ‘sensitive’… then something’s wrong with society. It was a very distressing period for me because the reasons provided from Facebook were very ambiguous. I was asked to submit a copy of my Identification Card and although I wasn’t doing anything illegal, it felt like - we know who you are, if anything happens, we know who to come after.

And it's very strange because Facebook’s not a Singapore-based company.

I don't think I was specifically singled out, it could be a situation where if someone posts something deemed as controversial, then a red flag is set off and things like this happen.

So you can run a business selling women or men’s fashion products or like, handphone cases, and you probably won’t have Facebook asking for your your personal I.C. But if you run a queer brand, then somehow you’ve crossed a certain line and you’re made to do that? That doesn’t sound very fair.

In line with that, has running this queer business ever affected you or threatened your privacy?

Not to that extent, because I also have my personal Instagram handle on Heckin’ Unicorn’s Instagram bio. People always think that it’s a mega corporation like Coca Cola, but like I’m not that rich you know. It’s just to let people now that this is a real person running the business.

The relative privilege I have is that I'm out to everyone - my friends, my family, and all my colleagues from my past jobs knew, and they were all very supportive. I have no issues identifying as a gay person, I have no issues identifying myself as the person running a queer brand in Singapore. And that itself puts me in a privileged position within the queer community.

I haven't received any negative comments or attacks against myself. On the flip side, I've received DMs from people who are thankful for the brand and the things we do. On the whole, this has been an overwhelmingly positive experience even if there are frustrating things that happen.

Tell us about the proudest moment in your career!

I think there are a few but the one that comes to mind was in April last year, April or June.

Heckin’ Unicorn called out Mediacorp for homophobic portrayals in the TV series ‘My Guardian Angels’. It was a Channel 8 show and they had really problematic homophobic scenes in the show. It started out because someone sent us a DM about it and I was shocked because I wouldn’t have thought that in 2020, Mediacorp would still be making such blatant anti-LGBTQ+ stereotypes. Like for example, a gay man with STDs who is also a pedophile, like woah. I thought they only did that in the 90s.

So we called them out on Instagram Stories and eventually posted a comic about it. We demanded an apology and eventually, they did apologise. I wasn’t expecting them to apologise but I was pleasantly surprised when the actor apologised first. When Mediacorp apologised, I think it was the first time that they apologised for anti-LGBTQ+ content that they’ve been producing for decades. So that really stood out to me because like oh wow, the monopoly of local entertainment felt compelled to apologise and that was really only possible because of social media. Because who am I right? I’m just one person. A lot of people who were angry at Mediacorp were individuals like myself. Without social media, it would be highly unlikely that Mediacorp would feel pressured to say anything.

That was one moment that I felt like it wasn’t crazy to think that social media can be used to push for change or to accelerate change.

You do up comics quite quickly, do you feel pressured in any way to engage with the latest and most current news to create new content continuously?

I feel compelled to address some of those issues, but not for the sake of content because things happen, and bullshit has to be called out whenever it happens, right? For example, earlier this year where a trans student wasn’t allowed to proceed with her hormone therapy because the school tried to intervene, I didn’t put out content for the sake of putting out content. It doesn’t make sense and that’s quite a fucked up thing to do if you’re doing it just for content. It’s more like okay, this happened, what can we do as a community to respond to a situation or help someone out?

When things like this happen, a lot of these victims are individuals who aren’t super rich or super influential, they have no one to help them with their situation so most of them use social media as a last resort. As a queer brand what I want to do is to push for social change, I want to look at these situations and think about how I can use Heckin’ Unicorn to help people out.

Sometimes it gets overwhelming and stressful because there’s that element of unpredictability. Like I’m so tired but I still have to address this particular issue. But something I’ve learnt from running this business for a couple of years is that it’s important to know when you need to take a break.

Otherwise I’ll feel the need to respond to everything that crops up. The thing is, I don’t have to do that, I don’t have to do everything immediately. Taking care of your mental well being is very important, it’s not a selfish thing to do because burning out is the worst possible scenario for everyone. It’s bad for you, it’s bad for your staff, it’s also bad for your customers and the people who follow you because you can’t help them.

I’ve had to learn that because I’m quite a workaholic. It’s not easy, and it's not intuitive because taking care of yourself can feel selfish, but it’s not. If you’re down, then you can’t help people who are struggling. 

Burning out isn’t fun, but at the same time being quite an established local queer brand, how do you balance the need to be there for the community but maintain your own sanity as well?

That’s definitely a priority skill. In the month leading up to June, because of the lead up to Pride Month, I was feeling quite burnt out, and my intern was also feeling the same way.

That’s when I decided that we were going to take a week-long break. It was really overwhelming and to many people, Pride Month is in June and that’s when things start to happen. But for us running this business is 24/7, so we have to increase the energy for Pride Month. At that point I just decided to go offline. We updated our website, our socials and that’s it. Nothing happened. The world continued moving.

But of course if something really drastic happens then it’s a different story and I have to reevaluate what the priority is. But I’m innately motivated tp stop bullshit from happening. So if something drastic does happen, I will feel compelled to do something about it.

Thankfully, shitty things don’t happen that frequently.

Some people want their feed to be wholesome and nice, but there's also the ugly side with injustices all over the world. There are definitely people who decide that they’re not going to look at things like that because they want to feel good when they go on social media. What does having a healthy screen time mean to you?

I think in terms of healthy screen time, it really depends on what a person is looking for on social media. For me, on my personal Instagram, I follow mostly dog accounts, because, and that's a deliberate choice, I want to see cute dog doing inconsequential and stupid things. It makes me happy and and I don't follow a lot of humans because sometimes I feel like oh my god, they're doing so well.

But when it comes to Heckin’ Unicorn, our entire feed is all about queer issues. Because for queer folk, we’re already dealing with issues in our private lives, and for my work, I’m dealing with those issues 24/7. It’s all queer you know? Sometimes it feels a bit much, then I’ll take a break. So a healthy screen time really depends on your mental state. It depends on how well you are mentally to be able to deal with heavier issues.

What do you feel about the idea of being an online citizen - that you could be part of so many communities all over the world, including Singapore?

For Heckin’ Unicorn, being online is quite important for the brand. Many queer organisations mostly exist online because they can’t be mentioned on mainstream media platforms. That’s why many queer organisations and brands have a big online presence. A lot of information is disseminated online because there isn’t an alternative space that we can exist in. So I’m lucky that I was born into an era where the internet exists. It helps people find each other, compared to 1990s, where it was a lot more difficult for queer folks to find each other.

Now that we’re all online, it’s much easier for us to understand things we’re not familiar with, or things that weren’t taught in school. It’s much easier to find out about organisations and the services they provide and who to turn to if you need help. So the benefit of being an online citizen is that you have much more access to information and it helps people feel less lonely because they know that they’re not alone. Of course being online can’t replace a face to face interaction, there will always be drawbacks. But for now, it really helps queer people find information, find other people.

With what you mentioned about information being readily available, is there a fear of being cancelled? Or the fear that you might post something that could be construed as problematic or insensitive to some people?

My point of view is that people who tend to cry cancel culture tend to be more privileged. The reality is that they’ve said or done something questionable and they’re essentially being made accountable for it by others. Of course there’s always a line to be drawn once it gets too personal, like stop it - it’s not nice and it doesn’t help anyone.

If you think about, people in minority communities have been ‘cancelled’ in Singapore for decades but when someone says something homophobic or racist, then suddenly it becomes cancel culture? When you say something wrong and refuse to apologise or acknowledge its consequences, thats not cancel culture. You’re just refusing to admit you’ve made a mistake. And making mistakes is fine, humans always make mistakes. It’s more of how you react to your mistakes, especially in a public forum. If you’re a public personality, how you react is, I think, more important than actually making the mistake.

The whole idea of cancel culture is people who are inherently privileged refusing to take responsibility for something they’ve said that has hurt other people and their only argument is that they’ve been cancelled. Like you’re not cancelled, it’s called consequences.

I do worry about posting things that might be insensitive, or things that might be wrong. But my concern comes mostly from how it might hurt people, or if wrong information is being conveyed, because people might misconstrue wrong information as the truth. The good thing about social media is… you know the three dots? You know, tap it, delete the post or comment, it’s gone. Then just post an apology you know, it’s not difficult. I’ve done it before, posting things that might have been worded wrongly or things that are insensitive - just take it down and post a new one. If you’re fast enough and it’s a genuine mistake, take it down and post a new one. If it’s wrong and people have already seen it, take it down, post a new one and explain yourself. No one’s going to cancel you. The only people who are cancelled are the ones who refuse to admit that they were in the wrong.

It’s scary because the more well known your account is, the more people will be watching you. But like, I signed up for this, so I’d better live up to whatever standards I impose on others.

So if you could change one thing about social media, what would it be?

It’s hard to say… One of the things that has resulted from content being put out so quickly on social media is that we tend to consume it very quickly, and people tend to react quickly as well. Sometimes they overreact, so instead of asking a question, it becomes an accusation. Emotions come too quickly and I think that’s an unfortunate side effect of living with social media.

I wish people would be more aware that they’re projecting certain emotions or accusations when they’re typing stuff. Sometimes some will say they’re asking questions, but if you read it, it’s like hey… you’re making a very charged accusation. It takes a lot more to respond to that than to respond to an actual question. It doesn't happen that frequently, but it has happened before and it is very draining because we have to respond in a way that steers the accusation or comment towards a civil conversation.

So, what's next for you, do you have any projects that you're excited to start?

I’m writing and doing research about how in the 90s, the police in Singapore used to do many raids where they would round up, detain, arrest and charge gay men. They called it ‘anti gay operations’. I didn’t know about this until someone told me and I think many people our age, or younger, would not know about this. And it’s interesting because it wasn’t that long ago that this happened.

Wow. That’s so exciting - what’s the research like?

A lot of old newspapers are in the archives at the National Library but a lot of the articles that relate to queer identities or queer issues are restricted, so you can’t access them using your own computer, you have to physically go down to the library and log in with your I.C.

So I have screenshots of articles from 1930s and yeah, the National Library Board (NLB) might know who has access to these articles if they want to find out. But I’m fine with them knowing this, because I’m going to publish it anyway.

The last question, if you could tell your 24 year old self one thing what would it be?

Oof, I was probably a fresh grad at 24. What would I tell myself? Wow, I’m not sure.

I did accounting in University, but when I was 24, I already knew I wasn’t going to do accounting. I think back then, I was still trying to figure out whether being a designer would be a viable career because in the past Singaporean designers get paid terribly. It was because of the boom in tech startups that there was a sudden need for UX-design and all that.

So yeah, I guess the most important thing I would tell myself back then probably would be that there is a career to be made in design.

---

This written interview was edited for brevity and clarity. Due to the nature of the topics discussed, this interview will not be available as an audio recording.

Receipts, Boundaries & The Price of Being Authentic: Mathilda on Social Responsibility & Being an Influencer

Tell us about yourself!

Hi, my name is Mathilda. I’m 24 this year. I'm a nine to five, I do a corporate job. I also run sage.soiree (a cheeseboard and sangrias company) on the side, that's my small home business I have with my friend. Also, I teach spin virtually from time to time. Yeah, that's essentially what I do.

A little bit more about me… I guess I’m someone who likes to be outdoors, someone who's very active. I generally stand for a lot of body positivity and well-being related matters on social media. I wouldn't say I'm a social justice warrior, but more of someone who likes to advocate for better practices.

How do you find the time to juggle all of of your jobs?

I really compartmentalise a lot of it. So my nine to five are on weekdays, and it’s really just me making the time during my work to get my tasks done before lunchtime. Anything after that will just be ad hoc tasks or meetings. Aside from that, because sage.soiree operates from Fridays to Sundays, we generally handle our orders only on the weekends. It’s a made to order business so we don't open up our calendars to other calendars on the weekdays.

So yeah, I think that's how I manage my time. Aside from work, I’m someone who likes to hang out with my friends. So after-work hours are for friends, family, for my partner - and we have a designated date night too. Even my workouts I do before the sun rises or during lunchtime. That's how I segregate everything.

Wow, the discipline? Are there any drawbacks to your compartmentalisation? Is there any, for the lack of a better word, a lack of spontaneity?

That's a really good question. I do still go off the bat, because my friends are very low maintenance friendships. They’re people who will meet when they’re free, otherwise it’s not big deal, we’ll just find another day to meet. Also I moved out of my family home so now I can host my friends at my home which can fit up to seven people on a good day. And, you know, this is like a home run for my friends who just want to come over to chill.

In this sense, I wouldn't say spontaneity is removed. I can always book a spin class at 7am then just jump right out of bed into that class. Weekends are then reserved for visiting places that are further away from home. I stay quite far from my parents, so that travelling time is usually saved for the weekends. I think the other day my partner and I went for an intertidal walk. We just went to explore Singapore, as if we're not Singaporeans, right? (laughs)

There's nothing much we can do now anyway. So yeah, there's always the element of spontaneity, it’s just how you weave it into your daily life.

With so many things going for you, do you have a proudest career achievement you can tell us about?

So for my career, I graduated from Polytechnic with a diploma and then went to work without getting a University degree, it’s important to have a good mentor to always keep you in check. For me, I had a very good mentor who had his head in the right place and was really collaborative in that sense. For him to tell me ,”Hey, I think you’re on the right track, you’re gonna go far,” that was one of my biggest accomplishments in the corporate setting.

For social media, when girls come up to me and tell me, “Hey, when you talk about topics like body positivity, you’re actually normalising looking different,” it’s impactful because you’re relating to an audience that never really had a voice of their own. So my proudest moments were when people who wanted to collaborate said that they love my attitude, and they would want to work with someone like me. It takes you further I guess. I don't really care about the likes nowadays, I don't care about the haters. If my campaign gets money, what’s more important to me is the impact it has to the audience in my community.

For sage.soiree because it was a local business, it meant a lot that my friends were the first ones to support me. I think that was my proudest moment because I knew then that I had a good support system. It didn’t really didn’t matter to me then if the business was going to succeed, it just mattered that I had people who supported me especially when I always felt like I was alone in the journey. I didn’t realise that there were so many people who made up my support systems and they really made me proud, made me feel like, “Shit, I’m doing something right.”

Tell us about your journey with social media, like how you started a business on it, how you created your own brand, and how you kind of got into it?

This journey was something I just fell into.

Back in 2016, or 2015, it was barely even, a thing, to be an influencer. I remember, my first few campaigns was with ezbuy. They said, "Okay, we'll give you a cash remuneration of $25. You just have to post one post of our product." After that, it just kind of fell into place because I realised that, "Shit, you can actually earn money from posting on social media and sharing your authentic views on it." I started taking on smaller campaigns with no payouts, just taking products as is. When I was 19, I got my first bigger product - a HP laptop, and I realised that with a bigger product, it meant that I had to have a bigger impact too. This then led me to produce more content about my life, like meeting more people, getting into trouble…

I wasn’t someone I had to hype up, neither did I have to come up with an online persona. I was just myself, and the people I met also grew up with me. After graduation, I transitioned to travel content, finding and posting about lesser known spots. For example in Bali, most people would go to beach clubs, but they rarely visit places like speakeasy bars, or other beach clubs with different experiences.

Up till recently, I moved into the body positivity movement. Then in April last year, the second day of circuit breaker, my mother and I were stalked by some guy and it traumatised me so I started opening up about sexual assault. I wanted to normalise these conversations, because I felt like not many people talk about it, and many girls hide in the shadows. I wanted to be their voice and beyond that, be that person that they would feel comfortable approaching for help. I would then guide them through things like making police reports, or directing them to other resources.

Today I’m focused on transitioning into adulthood. I just moved out into my own place, and a lot of people have been asking me about the rental and buying process. t’s all very progressive. It started from me just mindlessly taking up a campaign with ezbuy to having an authentic and real perspective on adulthood by being super transparent online.

It’s very surreal to be able to talk to people online to find out things like making police reports or moving out. Do you feel that social media has enabled you to do all of this? Compared to let’s say, more traditional forms of media?

I did a collaboration with DMK shoes - a local brand that sells shoes for women. They did an activation earlier this year where they sent some influencers shoes, and they were giving away a huge percentage of their profits to Star Shelter, a shelter which helps protects women and families from domestic violence. I was involved with this campaign and after reading through the brief, I realised that this was quite a heavy topic. So I did my research and I found out that Star Shelter operates under the Singapore Council of Women’s Organisation (SCWO) and they’ll not only provide mothers and children of abusive families with a temporary home for about three months, but also teach these victims on how to re-skill or up-skill themselves to enter the workforce again.

So when I heard of Star Shelter and SCWO, I was very intrigued because I realised that I could do more (than the metrics of the original campaign) with the power of social media. So with sage.soiree, I did a similar campaign - for every cheeseboard purchased, $5 would go to Star Shelter, and we’d be able to help them by housing 30 more people or families. I would never have known about Star Shelter without social media, or without landing into a campaign that seeks to raise awareness and help victims of domestic violence in Singapore.

On the flip-side, what are the setbacks to having a career on social media?

From my own experience, it's really the cyberbullies that get to me. I'm someone that values my privacy a lot. When cyberbullies talk about my family, where they stay, or when they find my partner's profile on social media and try to stalk him in real life, that’s scary for me.

Also, the idea that you can actually get cancelled is a real thing. So the work I've done for the past six or seven years could be misconstrued and entirely canceled within a few hours or a few days. How often do social justice warriors get canceled nowadays for having too bizarre or too different a view from others? Singaporeans aren’t the most liberal and the wider audience isn’t ready for certain conversations.

Do you personally have a strategy to balance out your personal opinions and opinions that are more controversial?

Oh my god. I think you need to have receipts. Receipts are everything if you want to expose a situation or a person. Also, I recently did an interview with some students and I was asked if body positivity should be gate-kept. I asked her what she meant and she said, "If you want to speak about body positivity, you have to have a certain look or be a certain size." So I asked, "So girls who fit the Singaporean beauty standard shouldn’t speak up about body positivity?” Then she said, “Yes.”

In this situation, I'm like shit, what do I say?” So I try not to speak for or about a demographic I don't identify with.

What about the importance of being transparent and authentic? How do you balance your privacy while being true to who you are online and offline?

If you speak to me in real life, I speak like this as well. In terms of my mannerisms, this is how I act. But where do I draw the line?

For physical boundaries, I tend not to take any videos that are near my neighbourhood. But on video, I think my tone of voice and my mannerisms, are generally the same. Even for new people who meet me as well, I'm someone that encourages discussion. I am also someone who is very headstrong. If I speak to you, I’ll do whatever I can to make my point clear. Online, I’m pretty much like that too. It’s just that sometimes on social media, you only see someone’s life in snapshots of 15 seconds right? But in real life, I elaborate and go into much more detail about things that I’m talking about.

There are also things that I’ll never talk about online. For example, I’ll never talk about the Black Lives Matter movement because I’m not part of that demographic and I have no experience with politics in America, I don’t see the need to talk about it. If it’s politics or issues in Singapore, of course I’ll talk about it. As much as I want to address and raise awareness on women’s rights, I realise that this year, there’s been conversations about the rights of men as well. These are things that aren’t openly discussed in Singapore, but things that I would love to address more of online.

What about the things you choose to speak openly about? Do you police the kind of content that you put out, since opinions on women rights, politics, inequality - all these always lend themselves to controversy.

When I'm speaking to the general public, I’m always prepared for the backlash that comes along with it. Recently, I did a small exposé. I swear, you could barely even see the brand’s name in my posts. But people have been giving me shit for it.

Basically one of co-owners of this brand cyber-bullied me by using some rude terms. And I just wasn’t having it. The thing is this local brand had previously collaborated with me and it was messed up because I was like, “Yo… you guys have collaborated with me before, but now one of your staff is cyberbullying me, how is that okay?” When I called them out for it, I got mixed reviews. Some people were like, “They already said sorry, why are you still pushing it?” And some were encouraging me to expose more of them to which I said no. I wanted to reach that fine line of, “Hey okay, we’re not here to scold anyone. We’re not here to put them in the spotlight. We’re here to educate other people who hide behind their keyboards.”

There’s just no good in spreading bad vibes online. And it was also a message to other brands about the chaos that this was. The brand couldn’t even handle it properly, they even told me, “Hey, don’t be too affected by it, by the way,” even if it was their staff that came to me.

At this point, choosing content to post online really just becomes a form of risk assessment. I don’t know if you’ve watched some TikTok videos, but people always start their videos off with a disclaimer before they share their opinions. I feel that this is the direction that social media is moving towards in Singapore.

What do you think about this? Like how do you think this is going to impact us in the future with the need to have a disclaimer like, “Please don’t cancel me,” every time we share something online?

Yeah, I think people are going be afraid to say what they want to say. I believe that a lot of topics are now "locker room talk" instead, things that are only discussed behind closed doors. Generally, I think we should be educated on how we address certain situations instead of angrily bringing businesses or people down. You can’t really control who watches or reacts to your content, but the way you present your opinions is something that you can control. When people are more open to other opinions and having discussions, then we won’t have to put up anymore disclaimers.

But yeah, I just think it’s sad when someone’s intentions can be so easily misinterpreted online. It’s so easy to say, “Oh, you’re just trying to cancel them" or, “Why do you have to bully them back?” But if you have receipts that can support the situation that you were really in, you can invite people to start empathising with you instead of angrily trying to cancel you. Maybe that’s how people will put out content in the future, with receipts.

It’s sad that so many conversations, and as a result, other perspectives, can’t happen online because of the fear that people might get cancelled. There are even discussions on whether the idea of disclaimers or trigger warnings are helpful or just coddling some people who really need help.

It is, isn't it? Actually, about the whole trigger warning thing, I never noticed how it would be interpreted as coddling someone. I thought trauma should always be addressed internally first. But anyway, this makes me think that instead of social studies, we should have learnt how to consume media. Creating content is one thing, but consuming media is something we haven’t explored yet. It’s sad but maybe our education system hasn’t advanced to that level yet. I mean for god’s sake, they only just recently started teaching primary school students coding, who knows how long they’re going to address the topic of media consumption?

But I think this is something we can do within our smaller group of friends. It’s definitely easy to tell someone to get help, but some people just don’t respond well to that. They’ll be like, “Oh, why are you assuming that you know about my mental health?” And then it suddenly seems judgemental to tell someone to seek help. But yeah, wow. There really isn’t a one size fits all solution to this situation. But maybe on the individual, we can start by introducing more touchy topics into our personal group of friends, and then gradually start talking to more people about it. Sooner or later maybe more people will get educated on these conversations instead of just seeing it on social media.

On the topic of friends, do you ever feel that social media takes you away from being present with your friends or is that not a problem you have?

With my friends, I take at most one Instastory with them because my time with them is shared and we respect each other in that way. On date nights with my partner, we don’t use our phones after 6PM. I’ll take one or two stories and that’s it. We don’t talk about anything on social media or things we see online. We just talk about our lives, and you know, how our day has been.

What about your advocacy work? Some of the issues you speak about online can be quite heavy, do those ever come into conversations in real life?

I’ve always tried to be as much of a support system as I can to my friends. So I always encourage conversations about different issues. I’m not someone who’s out to shut someone else’s opinions down. It’s just the way I live, and my social media reflects that too.

But in terms of boundaries, for example the whole Black Lives Matter campaign; if my friends brought it up, I would just say that I don’t have an opinion on it. But they can teach me, educate me on it, you know.

Or earlier this year, when there that fatal car accident at Tanjong Pagar and everyone was talking about it. I started seeing a lot of stories about the accident from my own friends. I later found out that there were people I was very close to who also knew the victims, and like, oh shit, this is too close to home. So when other people started talking about the accident and about the people who had passed on, I was angry, I was so done. But I didn’t share my thoughts online because it would be me speaking out of anger and the victims and their loved ones needed to have the respect that they deserved.

Instead, I dropped in privately with people I knew who were affected by this and posting about it. Just to check if they were okay, if they wanted to talk about anything and that I was there for them. And that’s when I really just switched off social media because I hated the fact that people were questioning the victims even when they had already passed on.

That was the moment when I realised some people are straight up evil, and you can’t stop them, you can’t educate them. Because if in the face of death, these people still choose to speak about it so brazenly online - what makes you think they’ll want to listen to you?

That was the only time I ever felt like I had to draw a line when it came to social media. These things are heavy and I tend not to talk about them online.

Yeah, it’s a lot. There’s a lot of etiquette when it comes to being online, what do you wish you knew about social media before you got into it?

I wish that I knew that people are not going to like what you put out all the time, and that's okay. If you're being true and authentic, and you have a good support system and like I mentioned, receipts, it’s going to be okay. Also some people are just on social media to waste your time, they’re not there to have the same vision as you, so you can’t pick your audience. Some people try to give you feedback, but it’s not feedback, they just want to pull you down more.

I wish someone told me how to identify the intentions of other people. I also wish someone told me to really look through T&Cs (terms and conditions) to see if a brand or a company’s core values align with my own. There’s no prosperity if your views don’t align, there’s no use for a campaign there.

Finally, how to say no, to the wrong people at least, and how to negotiate.

What’s next for you?

I'm hoping to scale sage.soiree a little bit more, and to encourage more sales and revenue. It's something that my partner and I actually really enjoy working on. With social media, I’m really looking to set up a business. I don’t know what business yet. I have so many passions, I mean, I could foresee myself selling chairs and tables. I just want to start a business, or maybe my own spin studio. That’s my ten year plan but right now it’s really just to focus on what I’m doing, providing more value to my audience on adulthood and honest perspectives.

---

This written interview was edited for brevity and clarity. Due to the nature of the topics discussed, this interview will not be available as an audio recording.

Living Differently: How the Visually Handicapped and Visually Impaired Navigate a World Built for the Sighted

Tell us about yourself and the work you do at the Singapore Association for the Visually Handicapped (SAVH)!

I’m Kwek Bin and I am visually impaired myself. My eye condition is very similar to Stargardts. Mine is called Retinitis Pigmentosa, RP for short. Basically the retina deteriorates prematurely, resulting in a loss of vision

I’ve been working at SAVH for about 10 years. My main job until fairly recently was I.T training for the blind. Basically I teach people who can't see how to use computers, how to use smartphones so even if you’re blind, you can use things like email, Microsoft Word, browse the net, WhatsApp, YouTube, Facebook - all these are possible even if you can't see at all.

I also provide consultation to people who are what we call "low vision", people who can still see to some extent. This group of people will usually need something that makes their screen easier to see, or have their screen’s colour scheme simplified or require things to stand out more. I am mainly focused on things and experiences which are unique to people with vision loss.

In recent years I’ve started to do more advocacy, where I talk to external parties to help them understand more about vision loss, visual impairment, our needs, and to aid people who are interested in helping us to make the world more accessible to the visually impaired. This includes improving every day tools (e.g traffic lights, public transport systems, cyber environments) for both the blind as well as the larger society at hand. I work with people who want to make websites and apps more accessible as well as helping others understand more about the visually impaired socially. So things like how to interact with the visually impaired, what to take note of when trying to interact with them.

Actually, it's super interesting that you spoke about teaching the visually impaired how to use I.T, like that was something we talked to Nicholas (Nicht Tan) about too. Do you want to share more about it? Like what it means to use I.T as someone who's visually impaired?

When you still have quite a bit of vision, you're still trying to use the computer the way everyone else uses it just that you need to make it easier to see things, so there're softwares which you can install, there're built-in options  you can turn on from computers, to make things larger, to make it easier to find your mouse clicker, read text.

There’s also this thing where websites and apps must be coded to what we usually refer to as "accessibility guidelines". If they're coded properly, then a voice reads things out. Otherwise, the voice will not be able to read what's on the screen. They'll say, “button” or they won't say anything at all.

There are also a lot of things which you can't really operate if you can't see, for example, one of the biggest killers are those touchscreen ATM machines. You can't see anything, and there’s nothing that can read the screen out to you. So if you're blind, you can forget about using an ATM nowadays. For some reason, all ATMs are shifting to touch-screens. But having said that, there are a couple of banks, like POSB/DBS, who have incorporated a system whereby if you were to plug in an earphone into the ATM, a phone banking system would be activated within the ATM. Upon being plugged in, a voice will read out all the prompts to you, then you use the keypad to press for the option you want.

What about beyond navigating I.T?

Companies need feedback on their new projects and designs too, and that’s where I’ll gather visually impaired individuals to talk to them, try the system. With the Land Transport Authority (LTA), whenever LTA is about to finish building a new MRT station or bus interchange, we will head down and let them know which features are friendly, or unfriendly to the blind. We also speak to public transport operators, when it comes to training their frontline staff so that they know how to assist the visually impaired passengers better. Mobility training sessions for the visually impaired are called “Sighted Guide Technique” - where we train sighted people such as bus and MRT staff on how to guide the visually impaired as they move around.

Beyond service providers, we also produce public education materials to teach the general public on how to guide the blind around. We do company talks, school talks…

What about caregiving to the visually impaired?

The main question is if individuals who are visually impaired are going to benefit from an all encompassing type of care, where the caretaker is expected to take on all day to day requirements of the individual. Some caregivers don't feel safe leaving a visually impaired person at home because they have the mindset of, "The moment I leave this person alone they're going to knock their head against the wall or fall down because they can't see where they're going.”

That’s why mindset and knowledge are so important. It might help caregivers understand if they’re able to witness for themselves others who are visually impaired walking around the SAVH compound, or walking around in the community. The visually impaired and the blind are capable of being independent, and if others can see it for themselves, they could actually feel less stressed about trying to care for a blind person, or leaving someone who’s visually impaired at home.

For caregivers who might be feeling stressed, it could really be a matter of mindset and not trusting their family members with being independent. Paired with situations where the visually impaired individual doesn’t believe he or she can do anything, or they find everything so troublesome, they prefer to rely on the caregivers. So a lot of stress falls onto the shoulders of the caregiver. Another common situation is where the visually impaired person wants to be independent but his or her caregiver refuses to let him or her become independent because of trust.

From SAVH’s perspective, there is only so much we can do as we’re mainly focused on the visually handicapped rather than the caregivers. However, showing caregivers what the blind and visually impaired are capable of, showing them individuals who are happy and fully independent, or sharing knowledge on what caregivers themselves can do to help their visually impaired family members stay safe could help reduce stress and alleviate their insecurities. A healthy relationship between both caregiver and the visually impaired is two-way - the caregiver must learn to let go and trust their loved ones and the visually impaired individual must also be willing to learn and adapt as well. 

What would you like to say about how people in general treat the visually impaired and what we can do to be more inclusive to their needs?

One thing I feel is people with normal vision seem to think that the only way to do things is to do things their way. They should learn to accept that the visually handicapped need to do things in different ways. My own experience is when my family members will say, “You cannot do this la.” Just because I can’t aim my scissors at the exact spot when I’m cutting things. But the visually impaired are going to find a way to cut things by feeling around for the right spot, carefully placing the scissors against the point and moving their finger away before actually cutting something. That’s common sense, to move your finger away before you cut something. But my family members will tell me things like, “This is too dangerous, you’re going to cut yourself.” But it’s my own finger, and I have to learn how to watch out for my own finger!

They tend to assume that just because I can’t do things in the same way as how I used to, I can’t do it at all. Granted there may be a bit more risk to doing things, I just have to be more mindful and careful when I do things. The end result for many things isn’t really going to be different if I do them my way compared to if they did it.

Another thing is that the visually handicapped do things differently with outcomes that aren’t perfect. One other thing I’ve come across is that sighted people will say, “If you can’t do this perfectly, you can’t do it.” So if a visually impaired person can’t make their bed without a single crease on it, does it mean they can’t make their bed? Or if a visually impaired can’t iron their shirt such that it’s completely wrinkle-free, does it mean that they can’t iron their own clothing? Very often, it’s these standards that the sighted use expect from the visually impaired when it’s just not realistic at all given our circumstance. It’s just basically the idea that sighted people and visually impaired people do things differently, with different outcomes that aren’t detrimental to both parties.

To me, in order to allow for the visually impaired to do things their way, accommodations need to be made. For example, if someone needs to take their medication on their own, their medicine needs to be placed in fixed locations, or maybe have ways for them to distinguish between different types of medication. One example of this in real life is our traffic lights. Traffic lights have audible signals, but because the general public might sometimes complain that these signals are disruptive to them, some traffic lights have their signals lowered to an almost inaudible volume or even turned off at certain times. But that completely defeats the point because these signals are there to help the visually impaired. By changing facilities to suit the needs of the larger population, what happens is that the visually impaired are unable to roam around independently because their environment is set up against them.

So it’s basically creating a more inclusive society not for people who are sighted, but for all conditions.

There's this idea that visibility is a social concept. Somewhere in academic literature there’s a paradigm that points to disability being a concept created because of practices in society that the larger community doesn’t want changed. This in turn makes it difficult for the disabled to do things. That’s roughly what I’m saying here with the audible traffic light signals. If the larger society is willing to accommodate, people with disabilities will be allowed to be independent. Another example would be the Human Resource (HR) and Customer Relationship Management (CRM) systems. Because these systems use systems and sites that are incompatible with screen readers, visually handicapped people are unable to use them, and are therefore unable to work at jobs that require these systems. It’s not that we can’t do our jobs, it’s that the systems required for these jobs don’t allow for us to do them.

---

This written interview was edited for brevity and clarity. Listen to the audio recording here.

Five Years On... Actor Shrey Bhargava on Being Represented and 𝙏𝙝𝙖𝙩 'Ah Boys To Men 4' Saga

Tell us more about yourself!

Hi everyone! I’m Shrey, I have been acting since I was young. I’ve recently come back from the States after completing my college of four years.

For people who aren’t familiar with you and the incident that we’re about to talk about, can you share more about it?

Back in 2017, there was an open call for “Ah Boys To Men 4”. I was back for the summer holidays at that time and I went for the open call. I had a couple of friends who were already involved with the franchise so they had put in a good word for me and I auditioned. The audition was for the role of an Indian or Malay soldier, and it was scripted in Singlish. So during my audition, I did it one time through, the way I had prepped it.

After that, the first adjustment I was given by the casting director was, “Can you be more Indian?” and I was a little taken aback, I didn’t know what that meant. So I tried to clarify, I said, “Do you mean like.. A thicker accent... or more exaggerated mannerisms, hand movements, or something like that?” And the casting director said, “Yeah, just try to be a full-blown Indian man.” 

Because the script was in Singlish, so it was a bit strange to do that… unless the character wasn’t written to be local; I guess a Permanent Resident (PR) or something, my conclusion was that he wouldn’t speak colloquial Singlish? So if he was to speak Singlish, then he was probably Singaporean, so he probably doesn’t talk or behave like that (“a full-blown Indian man). Then the casting director just said, “No, but that’s what we want, so make it funny.” 

It was kind of weird but I did it and I didn’t feel good about myself doing it, but at that moment I just had to complete the audition.

And then after that… Well, when I look back at it now, I guess I was a bit naive, rushing to post about it on Facebook. I think I could have dealt with it better. Especially when it came to my friends that I could have spoken to, and told them about my experience. I’m sure they would have guided me through it and reassured me, but I think at that point I was so overwhelmed with what was going on… I didn’t expect it, especially after having come back from the States. I was in California where everything was a bit more liberal, people were more accepting of racial differences. They were a little more... mindful of these things? So I was a little taken aback and I made that post.

The post was shared amongst my own circle of friends. Initially responses were positive, so I made it public. I thought, “Oh, okay... I guess this is good,” but I honestly didn’t do it to go viral or anything. People were asking me if they could share the post so I was like, “Okay…”

I didn’t expect it to go viral the way it did! And then from that point the rest is history, I guess! A lot of people weighed in and gave their opinions… Both positive and negative. There were two polarised camps that came out of it and then Xiaxue also got involved and that’s when things kind of turned a bit ugly.

Do you want to share a bit about how that audition experience felt like for you?

Well, first of all, it was an open call so we were waiting for a long time. It was a good few hours of just waiting in line and then the heat.. I mean I was still a student, had just come back for the summer, and I was dressed in my army Number 4 and everything… It’s like, you have to understand the context. There was so much going on - you wait for a long time for like, 2 minutes in the (audition) room and you have one chance for the only adjustment to be, “Can you be more Indian?”

It just felt like I could do so much more in terms of acting, and I was just confused… How could the identity of being Indian be characterised and how was that an actionable note? How do you, “Be more Indian”? Plus, it was coming from a Chinese casting director and the optics of it just looked bad.

It felt like… I am Indian, right? Am I not Indian enough? What does that mean? I was expecting to have other notes or to have the chance to try different variations (of reading the lines). That didn’t happen, so I was left feeling... I had no idea what to make of it. I mean my friends put in a good word for me, so I thought they would have known that I was coming in, at least I would have been addressed in a respectable way. 

It wasn’t the casting director’s fault, it’s not like she was intending to be racist. I’m pretty sure there were ways she could have said what she said differently. Maybe, “Can you be a bit more exaggerated? We just need the moments to be a bit more punchier.” or, “The lines need to be delivered in a more exaggerated way”. That would have been completely fine, but I think maybe in translating the note, the casting director thought that the easiest way to put it across was, “Can you be more Indian?”

I guess that statement itself just had a lot of connotation. That opens up Pandora’s Box, you know?

“It just felt frustrating as a young actor because you only have so few roles being an Indian actor and then after trying out for the Indian role in this big movie… it was as if minorities are interchangeable… you know?.”

Like you mentioned it was about addressing the comment in a respectable way. But it’s not only that phrase “be more Indian” implies so many things. Do you want to talk a bit about that, and what that kind of implies?

When a Chinese person says, “Be more Indian”, it already means that the “Indian-ness” or whatever the concept of being Indian as a race or ethnicity is being seen through the lens of the Chinese experience. 

As a young actor trying to break into the industry, this problem becomes twofold. One is that I’m already being type-casted into a certain minority role. But on top of that, I have to play into a certain expectation of my ethnicity. And that is problematic, you know?

We see a lot of this in mainstream media, sometimes this portrayal just means speaking with a thicker accent. And the thing is, I am hesitant to talk about accents because this whole debate was never supposed to be about the accent. I was never against doing that. In fact, in my repertoire of work, I’ve done many accents and I have a skill in doing accents. I think it’s fine as long as it’s authentic to the character. 

It’s just that once Xiaxue weighed in and pulled out clips of mine, the debate became about me not wanting to do an accent. But it’s not about doing accents, it’s when an accent is not used to make things authentic, but rather to poke fun at something just because it’s funny. Or when certain mannerisms are labelled as “Indian” because that's what we see but don’t understand. For example, the “head bobble” is a language of its own. There are videos out there, explaining how Indians communicate and how the head gestures add tonality to our words. There’s a rich vocabulary to it but it gets reduced to like, “Oh it’s funny because it's so absurd,” or, “ It’s so strange!” because we don’t understand it.

The caricature of being a bit over the top, of shaking your head, of speaking with an exaggerated accent becomes jarring, it becomes defined as “Indian-ness.” And I think for me… it was that, coupled with the fact that, why do you have to say, “Be more Indian” so casually? That itself was a bit insensitive. So, that’s what I really had against the phrase.

This alludes to the importance of representation in media, do you want to share your thoughts on that? On how things are being represented?

Since then, a lot of things are becoming better. I have not encountered another audition like that at all and there have been great stories with minority characters written in a nuanced way. And of course with NSFTV, I’m so grateful for that.

The thing about representation that we must keep in mind is perspective representation. It’s not just having a brown body on screen. That’s the first step. It’s great that we have characters or stories about the minority in our media. But what perspective are we telling the story from? Is it still from a Chinese person’s perspective? That's not to say we have to have writers that are all Indian, or directors that are all Indian, or that only Indians can tell stories about Indians. I don't think that anyone has a monopoly over stories.

But we need to be mindful when we tell these stories that we are representing different perspectives appropriately and authentically. Those who are in positions of power who are in charge of these films, web series, or tv shows, need to empathise with and understand these stories and perspectives. Also, collaborating with other people to tell the stories in an authentic way. All of this takes time, but I think we’re heading there, slowly.

One of the things you mentioned was how it was a very innocent decision, to share your experience on Facebook, to your community of friends. Do you feel like you bringing it up played a role in helping to shape this narrative in moving forward?

I genuinely believe that what's meant to happen, will happen. This is a very spiritual thing but sometimes some things that you enrol in have a ripple effect in someone else’s life, and it’s meant to happen that way. Not saying that it’s predetermined or anything, but we’re all energies so we influence one another and we’re part of a bigger puzzle.

I definitely believe what happened was meant to happen, that change would show over time. There were a lot of articles written about the saga from both sides. So when you google my name, you see all of them come up. As an actor, while that’s good, I don't want to be known just for that.

I'm so much more than someone who’s just fighting for representation. Activism is not entirely all that I’m about. I want my art to speak for itself and for activism to be influenced by my art rather than me having to fight for it on the front lines. I respect those who do, it’s just not my life. I don't want that to be my life. I need my Google searches to change!

On that note, let’s talk about your career! Since then, tell me about your career, tell me about L.A, how has that been like for you?

When the incident happened, I was going to be part of Singapore’s International Festival of Arts (SIFA) 2017- which was already in place before the saga. I was going to be on K. Rajagopal’s ‘Lizard on the Wall’, which was a film about a Punjabi family, along with some taboo themes. At the same time, I was also going to be in a play with Pangdemonium for SIFA.

So when all of this happened, it was scary because I didn’t know if I was still going to be involved in these projects. Thankfully Rajagopal, Adrian (Pang), and Tracy (Pang), all of them were very generous.

Especially in the Pangdemonium play where I had to speak with a Bengali accent because I was playing a Bangladeshi construction worker, Adrian and Tracy spoke to me after one of the shows, and said, “We know what happened, but don’t worry we’ll make sure the accent is authentic, we will do the research and get someone to train you with the accent. Are you still okay with doing the play?” I was like, “Yeah, I’m okay with doing the play! I thought you guys were going to drop me!”

There are people in the industry who are generous and understand where I came from who still want to work with me and are supportive of what I said and what I did. Although, they also gave me advice on how I could have been more tactful. They are mentors, right? I think it’s good to have people like them in your life. At the same time, I think you know, no publicity is bad publicity- that’s what people say, right? At the very least, people know my name. There were times when I go for an audition, or have a project, and people say, “Oh you’re that guy ah! Who posted that thing in 2017…” It’s a conversation starter. I’m always on sets and on projects where people tend to see eye-to-eye on the issue. So career wise, it's not been a case where the incident has had any negative outcome? If anything, it’s connected me with more people.

Right now in Singapore, I’m mostly known for my Facebook post and the whole saga in 2017. My goal is to change that, hopefully I’m known more for my work than I am for this. One day we won’t have to talk about these things. Maybe it will recede into our collective memories and hopefully Singapore will be a more harmonious place to live in so we don’t have to talk about it in that way, and then my work will speak for itself. So I’m slowly working towards that, we’ll see!

What does it mean for your work to speak for itself?

Well, whether it’s stuff that I've done with NSFTV or any project that I do, people discover ‘Shrey the Person’ through ‘Shrey the Artist’.

Of course I do my best to take projects that are impactful, to tell stories that need to be told, to play characters that have something deeper, beyond the slapstick, something more meaningful. When the work speaks for itself, I don’t have to defend it and I don’t have to talk about it. The work itself makes the statement to move this conversation forward rather than me having to do the talking by writing essays on Facebook … you know?

Long Story Short was fun because you have this interracial couple and even though that video of the lecturer being disrespectful to an interracial couple only surfaced recently, I think you guys have constantly been telling and showing stories about interracial couples. Being in an interracial relationship myself, I feel there’s so much more there to explore and I think for Long Story Short, it was nice to see a script that showed that complexity.

Watch 'Long Story Short'

As video creators, we are also trying to figure out. Sometimes, it’s not just about talking about something but just having it be there... For example, even in “Monday Nights”, Devan and Sabrina, we never talked about them being an interracial couple, but just showed their relationship onscreen.

In great films, commentaries on society are never done within the story, the stories exist within the commentary. As you watch the story, the commentary unfolds in the background… For example in ‘Y tu mamá también’, it's just these two boys and they want to have a threesome with this older woman, and it's so naive and childish, and youthful. It’s that energy but it's set in the Mexican countryside, and as you watch the film, you see all the crap that's going on in the country in the background. And how the character’s privileged status makes them oblivious to all the poverty and the class issues that are happening.

For me you can read into a film and be like, “Oh my God, it’s saying so much about the privilege of people.” It’s amazing to tell a story on that level, so I would love to be part of projects where I can do justice to a character, and in doing so honour the larger story, its the themes and the social commentary. I don't have to play a character that’s finding fault... or is always super oppressed.

There are shades of nuances... Even myself, as a North Indian Singaporean man, I have privileges too. It's not that I’m Indian so I’m oppressed. There are so many nuances.

So what's next for you?

Well, I’m in a TV show called “This Land is Mine” that is coming out in August, I'm excited for that! I’m also in a short film that’s shooting this week called “It Never Rains On National Day” It will be released closer to National Day, and basically it's paying homage to the life that men in the military have lived in trying to make National Day happen and how difficult it is. It's a comedy so it's fun, and I play this young Indian captain under this older Chinese encik. I have to fight against the old ways to try to get National Day to happen without rain... It’s funny.

Can’t talk too much else about it, but it's funny... it's also touching.

Do you have any advice for younger actors who are also navigating this industry, and who might be struggling the same way that you did back then?

Don't get too caught up in the racial politics of it because first of all, as a young actor, you're going to have to do a lot of small roles. You're going to have to do roles that you may not agree with. At every stage of your career, but particularly when you're young, you may not have the choice in picking projects, you just have to do whatever comes your way and build your portfolio.

When you're on set and you think something can be represented better or some things can be changed, find diplomatic ways to bring the conversation up. Find creative, collaborative ways to make it better, rather be confrontational about it. I think it's very easy (to be confrontational) especially now as a minority and in this day and age where everything is so charged with anger or fear, you start to see everything in that through those lens.

For me personally, after that happened, I was blessed enough to have mentors and people who came to speak to me with their points of view about how I could have handled that situation better. Industry veterans came to speak to me, reached out to me. They said, “You can see things from both points of view. It doesn't mean the problem doesn't exist, but if you only choose to see it from one point of view, put on those glasses… then you will get consumed by it.”

As an artist, as a creator, you don't want to do that. You need to always keep a point of view that's critical of both sides. Otherwise you'll be in the story, and not be the storyteller.  

Do you have anything you want to say to 2017 you?

It's hard to say I mean, I can say a bunch of things.

I might say, “Let your work speak for itself! You don't have to fight this fight.” But that would mean I would never have made that post and the post has impacted many things outside of myself. Would that then be a disservice to the conversation?

I could tell past me to be more mindful of my friendships and my relationships in the industry and think a bit more before making that post. Things might have been a lot different from what it is now, but then again, would that be a disservice to everything that's happened?

I feel like we can never really tell our old selves anything without having our old selves go through everything that they have. We have to let things be, watch them from a distance and be like, “I still love you, bro”.

---

This interview was edited for brevity and clarity.

The Girl Bosses of An Açaí Empire: Isabel Lee on the Trials and Tribulations of Being A Young Business Owner

Tell us more about yourself!

I'm Isabel, I'm twenty-five this year and I graduated from Singapore Management University (SMU) two years ago. I'm the co-founder of An Açaí Affair along with my business partner, Anna, who is also my age from SMU. We started An Açaí Affair back when we were twenty, back in 2016. At that point we were both in year two of SMU when we started.

We started An Açaí Affair because we were both passionate about Açaí. Back then, we felt that not a lot of people knew about Açaí and it was really quite a pity because it's a great product. Also, we both had the same dreams and goals of running our own business one day so we just put the two together and that's how An Açaí Affair came about.

Where were you in life when you decided to set up a business? And how was that journey like for you?

I don't know about Anna, but for me, I was really very lost about what I wanted to do in life, after I graduated from schoolI felt like almost everyone else in school knew where they were going, and what direction they were heading towards, like, “Oh, I want to work in a bank, so I'm thinking about finance.” That got me thinking  about what I wanted to do. 

Personally, I've always been more inclined towards setting up my own business because my mom is also an entrepreneur, and she does F&B too. So growing up, she inspired me to want to pursue that too.  I thought that setting up a business was a good opportunity for me because I had nothing much to lose as I was still in school and I didn't really have the pressure of having to find a full-time job yet. -I thought that starting in school was the best time and when I met Anna, she also had the same ideas and dreams as myself, so we just decided to try it out together. 

I didn't really expect it to blow up and for it to become my full-time job, but I'm very thankful that it did.

How did you get to know about Açaí? Especially how it wasn’t well known back then (in 2016).

Yeah, it wasn't, it was more popular overseas, like in Bali, U.S and Australia. At that time, there were two or three Açaí players in the local market. We tried those and it wasn’t bad, but we felt the (steep) price point deterred people from trying it. People thought it was like an atas* dessert, so we wanted to make it more affordable and available to the masses, and that was the whole mission of the business.

*Atas: (Singaporean slang for something that is more luxurious)

“It was nice. A lot of our friends and family came to support and they could actually see the tangible result of the hard work that we put in. It was very reaffirming.”

- Isabel on An Açaí Affair’s opening day

Tell us about an iconic or memorable moment when An Açaí Affair opened.

I guess the point where it became real was when we really opened for business and strangers just started coming in and were interested in buying our products. I mean, even today that feels a bit surreal. It's like, wow, you actually want to buy something I created, you know? 

The point where we were really happy was when we broke even. That was a huge relief because we both took a loan - I took a loan from my dad and Anna took a loan from her boyfriend and when we paid back our loans in full, it was a huge moment for us. It was a huge relief, and a huge load off our backs.

You talked a bit in the video about the loan from your family and Anna from her boyfriend. What was that conversation like for you?

Oh. It was tough, because typical Asian parents, right? They were very skeptical, like, “Hah, you want to start your own business, are you sure? What even is Açaí?” They hadn’t heard of Açaí before, they didn’t know what it was and thought it was just another passing fad. 

To get them to believe in the product was one thing, but to get them to believe in me, that I was really serious about doing this, was another thing. It took a lot of convincing and in hindsight, that was good because it made me really think about what I was doing and it made me do the necessary preparations to convince my dad, such as coming up with a solid business proposal where I had the costs, the projections and everything else worked out.

Now that your business is off the ground, how do you feel about the idea of borrowing money from your loved ones to start your own thing?

I mean, it's a double-edged sword, right? Borrowing from them (your loved ones) is interest-free and it's an easier way to get funds. But on the flip side, it's a huge pressure because you don't want to lose all their hard-earned money. So, it kind of motivates you to work even harder to try to pay them back in the shortest time possible. When we both got loans, it really forced us to bootstrap and minimise startup costs as much as we could. We worked really, really hard to earn the money back so that we could pay it back. Borrowing money from family, or loved ones is great, but it can be really stressful.

Was there a backup plan, ever?

No, I don't think so, we were all in. I mean if our business failed, then we would have to get a normal job and try to pay them back. Back then we were both a bit foolish and naive, but I guess it all worked out.

Why would you say that you were both foolish and naive?

We kind of jumped into it. We had no suppliers, no menu, but we saw the space at Katong and we were like okay, we want this space. So we put down a deposit for it and thought about everything else after. It was a huge risk at that point, but us being 20 and young, and we just like, okay, let's just try you know. It was quite scary, thinking back, thank God we managed to succeed.

What was it like when you were 20 and in school, and also running this business?

A lot of sacrifices had to be made. The first six months was just us shuttling back and forth from school to the shop and working shifts because at that point, we were still in the process of hiring and training the first batch of staff. So, it was mostly Anna and I taking turns to work at the store. It was a lot of sacrifice in terms of sleep, our grades and our social lives. 

We both didn't go for our overseas exchange as well because we started (the business) when we were in Year 2 (of University) and exchange usually happens for six months for Year 3 students. We both couldn't leave the country for six months so we didn't go for exchange.

It’s been a few years since you opened, has there been a time where you felt disillusioned, or has anything changed for when you originally opened up shop?

At the start, our goal was definitely not to become super rich. It was really just to promote something that we loved and to make it as affordable as possible. But as the years went by we had to think about making the business sustainable and profitable. So for instance, because of COVID, the cost of ingredients really skyrocketed and we had to make the tough decision to increase some of our menu prices when… it wasn’t  something that we wanted to do. But for the business to survive and remain profitable, we had to do it.

But generally speaking over the years, I think we’ve stayed quite true to the roots of our business. 

I think we’re both lucky to have found each other.

Anna and I did have our disagreements in the first few years of operations. But it's been five years now and we are very familiar with each other's strengths and weaknesses, and therefore we have a good working relationship now. It’s good that we have different strengths that complement each other and because of that, we work well together.

- Isabel on working with a friend

What was it like starting a business at 20?

When we were 20, it was a challenge because we were very young and we were both girls. Most of the time, people didn’t take us seriously. For example, some suppliers would quote us for items at a more expensive rate because they thought that we were just blur, you know. But, of course, we had to do the extra work to ask around for different quotations and figure out the market price. So that was when being young worked against us.

On the other hand, I think it's also good because most of our employees are very young and it helps us to be able to relate to them and to speak to them on the same wavelength.

Were there any ugly things or things no one mentioned that you found out about when you were starting a business?

Definitely, I think that the biggest misconception is that starting a business is very easy and cool. That being your own boss means you can wake up at your own time, or just sit at home, shake leg and collect money.

But the reality is: it's really not like that. People only envision the glamorous side of things. Being your own business owner is actually like wearing many, many hats. You're the handyman, you clean the toilet.  You’re also the delivery man, you drive goods around. You also have to deal with difficult customers who are rude and abusive. So it's these small things that people don't see. And because it's your own business, you don't really get an off day. It’s not like you can go on holiday, turn off your phone for two weeks and just not care. Even when you’re on vacation, you still have to be there and reply to your staff and care about the business. It’s really a 24/7 role that you can't really fully take a break from. I still do think it’s worth it though.

Do you have anything you want to say to young people who are starting up their own business?

I would say go for it, especially if you're still studying and if you have the time to spare. When you’re studying, you're not pressured to secure an income or  to start a family. Even if you don't have much resources, I think it's okay, you can always start small first. You don't have to open a cafe or a huge store that requires a huge sum of money. You can- do pop-ups or start selling your products -online first.

The cost of starting those (home-based, online businesses) are close to nothing right? And through that you can kind of gauge the response of your target audience and see whether people would actually want to pay for your products. From there, you can slowly try to scale it up without incurring too much cost at the start. 

I think if you don't do it then you’ll just have to live the rest of your life with regret lor. You don't want to do that. So I would -encourage people to just go for it.

---

This interview was edited for brevity and clarity.

Actor on Actor: Yi Xuan and Rachel Yen on Playing Alicia (One Take) and Jacq (Girls, Girls, Girls) and Acting in Singapore

On watching each other in One Take and Girls, Girls, Girls.

Yi Xuan: I was from a girls' school right? So having Girls, Girls, Girls, for me was like, "Oh my gosh, I recognise that.” My friends and I, we recognised these actual lives, like, “I know that girl.” And when I watched you, your role (as Jacq) is so vulnerable. That felt so real to me and actually being from a low Social Economic Status (SES) family in a girls' school where girls are vapid and can be mean or direct. We were all struggling through puberty and it was so difficult to not hate yourself.

So when someone says they’ll book a Grab for you, that scene even though it was a small moment, it lingered in my head because you think to yourself like, "Am I supposed to feel like YES! Finally, like I've been taking the bus and MRT my whole life." or are you like, "Aw man but I have my principles too. She shouldn't have to pay for me all the time." As a kid, how do you navigate that?

I love your episode, I always tell people that is one of my favourite episodes of Girls, Girls, Girls.

Rachel: Aiyo, thank you eh. Yeah, ya lor. We've known each other for quite a long time. But I realised that we haven’t really known each other in terms of our work as actors. So I think this is very interesting that One Take was one of the first things that I saw you in terms of the work that you do as an actor. I think seeing you work made me.... My heart was so warm. You know? 

Even with One Take, there was also a thing where like, yeah, I did know someone when I was at that age who also made similar choices (as the characters).  And I really liked the episode with you and Salif (James) when you all meet as older people because One Take episodes are like snapshots or glimpses (into the characters’ lives) and I love it when you don't give the audience everything. So just the beginning and a bit of the end and they have to piece together what happened in the middle. Just seeing how much the characters grew and how much the power dynamics from the first and last episode changed with them.

“We need more diverse depictions of these roles. We need these these prescribed images we have in our heads to be dismantled.”

- Rachel on watching the scene where Alicia picks up her young son at the playground

Yi Xuan: Yeah! So when I read the Closing Time script, it's immediately apparent that she's (Alicia) still honest, and transparent, but she's more guarded. Like, she's not open to relationships. She no longer wears her heart on her sleeve I feel. She may care, she may be bothered by things., but I think, it’s that kind of thing where people are encouraging others in a way that’s like, "Oh, you don't have to explain yourself anymore." Where you feel like, “I don't have to justify my actions. I don't have to explain myself anymore.” And I think Alicia is there now. 

Is it a good thing? I don't know, because she is guarded. But then, it’s a good thing in a sense that she got to a place where she just doesn't care about what you think of her anymore. And I think that in itself is a testament of growth. She's in a very strange place where she's still very young, but has gone through so much. So, how does she relate to other people? Yeah, she struggles (with that). Oh, she struggles to relate to Jacq. I find it very interesting.

Rachel: She had to grow up faster. 

Yi Xuan: Yeah, she had to grow up faster. For people like that, it’s very strange to relate with other people who aren’t their peers and who aren’t that much younger than themselves.

Rachel: Yeah, when I read the script, I felt like it was the continuation from the episode of you and Salif. Like if we were to bring that moment next to ‘Closing Time’, I thought it was such a great continuation.

I felt Alicia’s strength and even in Episode 6 (of One Take), Alicia didn't bother to explain her situation to James. So in ‘Closing Time’ at the very beginning of the script it’s like her and these two drunk men, she’s just like, “Okay, please leave, sir, thank you very much.” It's very similar to, "I'm just doing this because it's my job. I'm supposed to tell you that we're closing, but I'm not going to bother with any of the accusations you're throwing at me. Please leave. Thank you very much." It's like this girl probably has had a million side eyes and a million people judging her so now she's like, I really don't care anymore.

Rachel: It's what you said right? Is that a good thing or a bad thing? Who are we (as viewers) to put a label on these things? For Jacq, because of the circumstances she comes from, she’s had to grow up quickly. Like she has to get a job at quite a young age. And at this job, she has to deal with people in a bar that are much older than her when she’s just 18. It's that feeling of how she’s been forced to grow up, but her character and her personality hasn’t necessarily caught up yet. She’s sort of still thinking in quite an impulsive and some might say, childish way. But the things that she has to do are necessary for her age. Earning her own income and working at a bar is probably a part time job that pays the most. So she's in this situation which requires a little bit more maturity and it's sort of not matching up to her personality and age. But it's so interesting to watch.

Yi Xuan: There’s a line Alicia says, “Shouldn't you be out making mistakes you will regret at 26?” So how do you feel about that as Rachel, the actress? 

Rachel: I was quite focused on what I wanted. So I didn’t allow myself to maybe experience some life experiences that lots of people would tell you to do, like the mistakes they tell you to go make lah. Like, I just wasn't interested in that. Maybe it's because of my personality or maybe because it's like, I wanted to stay focused or whatever. But if I were to think about mistakes, I think it is a privilege that I could experience life in this way. Being in theatre and acting, you make mistakes all the time. You just have to be open, to be stupid, and to be vulnerable to not be in control. Thinking about it, I don't regret any of these mistakes or making mistakes in the space of theatre and acting.

On Their Acting Careers

Yi Xuan: On that note, how's your journey been like as an actress so far?

Rachel: So far? I've only been doing this professionally for about three years, but I've been acting and doing theatre for a long time because I went to School Of The Arts (SOTA). I also went overseas for a bit to do actor training and stuff like that. But I think in Singapore, professionally, it's very difficult. I think it’s just that the market still needs to grow. Yeah. The rules also need to grow. But I think in general it's been very wonderful meeting other actors.

Yi Xuan: Yeah, I think I agree with what you're saying. But I guess, with the global pandemic, it is difficult but I think constantly being in the community helps, because it's a very practical thing because jobs lead to jobs. But I don't champion networking (for jobs) until it becomes a priority. I don't think that is true at all. 

I think it's more of like, you get the training, you prepare yourself well, and then you keep being in the pot. You can't blame the industry if you are not in the vicinity. I feel lah. I did my training in Lasalle which is very vocational. So it's linked to the industry and that makes a difference. In your schooling years, you are also closely interacting with the industry. So that I'm not saying to anyone reading this that if you go to Lasalle, it’ll be smooth sailing, it's not. It's more like, it's a good place to start and to be, because then you are constantly in the community.


And I think humility is important. Because we have this idea of being an actor means you act. It's true. But also when you are just starting out, I think it's important to see that you have to be humble enough to be willing to do anything and everything, like willing to help out on set. Are you willing to help out in stage production? To be a stage hand, to be a stage manager, to be a sound operator? Are you willing to be a mascot, to be a front of house? I feel like if you let humanity lead you then it really opens up a lot of doors because you’re not too proud to take jobs. It's like, "I am an actor, why should I be pressing the light cues?", but I'm just happy to be in the moment with meaningful work, and that's why I'm here to help out. 

Rachel: Is there anything you want aspiring actors and actresses to know?

Yi Xuan: I think, right, if I’ve heard this advise way before, it’s like, "Do this only if you feel like that's the only thing you can do.”

Rachel: Yeah, that was what I was going to say. 

Yi Xuan: If you have other strengths and other interests that you feel like you can pursue and let's say you're very good in accountancy, then go for that. Because you would only be miserable if you’re hammering at this (acting). And it's so tough and you're not financially stable. Only do this, if that's the only thing you can do. Because then your joy derives from your work. So even, it's very bad work, like very bad paying, you’ll still stay on because you feel like that's the only thing you can do.

Rachel: Was there a moment you knew that, “This is the only thing I can do?”

Yi Xuan: I think knowing that is kind of a privilege. Because I've heard so many people who say they go to Uni, and they’re taking general courses, because they still don't know what they want to do. And I really feel for them. Because it must be very frustrating to not know what you want to do in life. Because I knew when I was 13 that, like, I only wanted to act, and then it simplified my whole life for me. Because then my path is straight, then I don't think and I don't allow myself to be distracted by other things. 

I guess maybe your life is different from mine, like you don't have to do one thing only. I think we're in the age and era of the world where a lot of people are not just doing one thing, people are like vloggers and writers or people are like filmmakers and also business owners. They really want to open a Mookata store, but they also want to make films or whatever. Like maybe you’re just a generalist in that sense, where you are able to do many things and have many things on your plate, because who says if you can only do one thing, but in my life, I think I only can do one thing lah so that's different.

Rachel:I think it's helpful when I look at the industry as a whole. A lot of creatives or actors do other things too. A lot of them are directors or writers as well, or they have normal part time or full time jobs, and then they take leave to act. It doesn't mean that when you want to do acting that's all that you can do, especially with job market, it's hard to have acting be a financially sustainable thing. You do need other sources of income especially if you're starting out. You can find other sources of income from work that you do enjoy. 

Even for myself, even though I've wanted to act for a long time, and that's probably the creative outlet that I really enjoy. But I also write, I want to direct. I love to teach, so there are other ways in which I can sort of sustain my creative work. But still, you have to take chances, you have to sort of put yourself out there. I've done so many performances, and you have to sort of put in the time to figure these things out.

Rachel: Do you feel like this job has changed you?

Yi Xuan: I always tell people that I think this is a fantastic job to exercise my muscle of empathy. Because you literally put yourself in the shoes of someone else who isn’t you. You live your own life, right? It becomes easier and easier to think along the lines of how can my knee jerk reaction not be of judgment, but to justify. Justification doesn't mean approval. Even if a character does something that doesn’t align with your personal views, at least you understand where that person is coming from. And that stops you from judging people.

The more I work, the more I can practice empathy. And I always think it’s because this job is a human job and it helps you to grow as a person also.

Rachel: Yeah, I totally agree with that point as well. This job inevitably makes me very aware of social issues, not just in terms of the academic approach of it, but real lived experiences of systematic and social injustices and issues. I also think that media informs so much of how we think and how we view the world, especially when dealing with issues about representation, issues of diversity, inclusion.

Yi Xuan: Exactly, like NSFTV - they’ve created characters who are memorable and full. Like when you’re growing up and you watch TV shows or movies where there are interesting characters. And you reference them, you go back to them, you think about them as you grow up.

I hope the audience doesn’t think that they always have to look outside or overseas for characters that they can find endearing or stories that they can go back to. I think that kind of raw honesty that they like about international works can really be found locally as well.

And I hope they go through their lives with their friends not referencing Monica and Chandler but with Kim and Jacq, you know? Claire, James, Alicia, and Cass. Yeah. And I hope that we’ve contributed to a little of that, to make people feel less alone. 

Rachel: Yeah, I hope that people feel a bit more seen. I feel like in general, Singapore’s local content gets a bad rep. I might be a bit presumptuous in saying this, but in general, I just hope that also people can grow to be proud of Singaporean content and Singaporean work. I think that there’s such a great pool of talent in Singapore. I really hope that people will be willing and interested to watch and also to actively be part of this growing process (of Singaporean content).

---

This conversation was edited for brevity and clarity.

Singapore's Biggest Drag Queen, Becca D'Bus, on Being Big and Beautiful

Let’s talk a little bit about you first. For the uninitiated, how would you introduce yourself?

Hi, I’m Becca D’Bus, Singapore’s biggest drag queen. I’m interested in colours and improbable shapes. I studied theatre, my first job was in a queer theatre company.

What kickstarted your drag journey?

May 17 2004, the date of my commencement ceremony (not the day I started in drag). It was the year of gay marriage, and I was invited to be the bride of the Statue of Liberty in the U.S. My boss at that time was the maid of honour. He then invited me to work for him the following Monday.

My first job after college was on the streets, guerilla marketing-ish. That was how I started my show there, we did a show at The Fens (Boston) about safer sex. Those shows lasted a maximum of three minutes, or less. Our presence had to be big and known. We could be near people who were literally having sex just ten metres away. We had to come in and be like, "We're not public health and projecting our ideals on you. We get you and we're making the experience better." We had wet wipes, hand sanitisers, bug spray (during summer), food and drinks. Part of the job was also doing risk assessments with people at clubs, and we had to be sensitive to how we approached them. So my friend and I decided to try dressing in drag.

After that, I started competing in some amateur competitions, one of them was at a small bar. The manager (of the bar) subsequently gave me a chance to do my own show every 3rd Monday of the month.

Drag has a persona, not a character. Nobody can be Becca D'Bus except me.

There’s no denying that you’re a big girl. Has your size and sexuality ever been an issue for yourself in your formative years?

Hate stems from insecurity. It comes from people who are not sure who they are, not about whether they’re gay or not, but when they don’t have a strong sense of self-identity. Often when you say “Yes, I’m a sissy faggot, who are you?” They have no answer. Also because they have never been asked this question themselves. It’s all about marketing for skinny people. In return, I'll throw the question back to them, why are you so stressed with being concerned about my health or how fat I am?

When was it, if ever, that you came to yourself? Was there a trigger point?

I don't know if I "didn't give a shit" or I simply if I didn’t know what shit was.

There was never a moment of "coming out" for me because I was in Anglo Chinese School’s (ACS) drama club and people just acknowledged this as a fact. There was no intentional statement to say "I'm gay". I am culturally gay, meaning I was interested in arts, and theatre. I am part of society and I have finesse and freewill. It’s all celebrated.

I only knew what wasn’t “the norm” after secondary school, when I went to Junior College (JC) for two months and then poly (Polytechnic). In fact, I didn't know I was gay even at 16. Only eventually did I realise (I was gay).

I want my drag to be political. I have this reputation and some of my shows or works can be quite pointed. But it must first be entertaining.

Do you feel a bit out of place, as a drag queen in Singapore? Or even amongst drag queens, as a big girl? 

I think in Singapore, I've created a community or simply a world around my persona. Singapore's policy in 2020 has revealed to us that we (entertainers) are not a priority. I embrace the term “entertainer” first. Sometimes, I also use the term “artist” but in a lot of my art, entertainment is an important part of what I am working with. Entertainers and drag queens, we’re beyond non-essential, and non-necessary. The only reason I have a show now is I have to apply for the same license as a musical.

Back to the question, I've always felt out of place as a drag performer, because of what I want out of drag, and how I do drag.

With Drag Race popularising drag in mainstream media, it’s been used as a platform to raise many issues with the LGBTQ community. What do you hope to say with your drag?

I'll always say, "OMG, I'm so beautiful today.” I don't really think much of this question.

As long as it's pleasing to the eye, it's easier to do something that goes further. For example, if I can get you to look at this face for instance, then I can get you to pay attention to more details. If it's hard for you to look at my eyes, then it'll be hard for you to hear what I'm saying.

Does being Becca affect your life as Eugene, or how people see Eugene? In an ideal world, would you rather live every day as Becca, or as Eugene? Why?

There's no distinct line between the two. I think Becca is braver and more colourful. Not necessarily more outspoken. In fact, when I speak, people know it’s Eugene who is speaking or giving his thoughts. I say more things as Eugene, than Becca. Honestly, I don't telegraph Becca a lot.

Pronouns don't bother me a lot either.

In an ideal world, I wouldn't have to pick either or.

How do you see Becca, moving forward?

I'll be old, which is why I want to do drag now. I'm aware that there's a physical expiration date. Eventually, you either 1) kill it, 2) evolve it, 3) reinvent it.

On a business level, it's about expanding the things that I do. I want to be less reliant on performing, but perhaps be a producer. I want people who watch my shows to feel something, not necessarily a message.

As a drag queen - I'm not here to be judged. Period.

---

This interview was edited for brevity and clarity.