Fern Chua is the award-winning founder of FERN , a Malaysian sustainable and high-end fashion label rediscovering the elegance of the ancient Asian fabric art form, Batik. Fern and I chatted earlier this year on the unexpected path that led her to Batik, the challenges building and growing her team of artisans from the ground up, and pushing the boundaries of the UNESCO listed heritage. Check out FERN’s incredible looks at fern.gallery or follow @fernbatikcollective on Instagram....
Dec 18, 2021•53 min•Season 3Ep. 4
Tina Zaman is a comedian, writer, teacher and founder of Tight5Comedy a unique platform in Sydney’s comedy scene. Tight5’s comedians of colour and allies have entertained thousands of fans, handpicked for their originality and social impact. Acts are empowered to explore both their comedic and cultural identities in careful curated venues from theatres in Sydney’s Inner West to Ethiopian restaurants in the outer suburbs of the city. Show host Udhara chatted with Tina about growing up in Los Ange...
Aug 02, 2021•52 min•Season 3Ep. 3
Matthew Chapman is an entrepreneur and investor who has mastered the art of relationship building. His company ChapmanCG finds HR leaders for the world’s leading companies. He's an investor in Bawah Reserve , a luxurious and sustainable tropical island retreat that's a Condé Nast Traveler Top 10 resort of Asia . And he's a co-founder of the 300km Snowman Race in Bhutan, one of the world's toughest ultra-marathons in the world, focused on raising awareness of climate change . He does all this whi...
Dec 09, 2020•48 min•Season 3Ep. 2
T.P. Tovenaar is a writer from London, born to Sri Lankan parents. For the last decade, she’s called Colombo home. Her book, ' Mum’s the Word ', is a collection of hilarious and heartwarming stories about the relationship between a Sri Lankan mother and her British-born daughter, both trying to live within a complex mix of cultures, customs and environment. The stories light-heartedly remind us that we’re more than our place of birth and that immigration isn’t a bad thing. Show host Udhara and T...
Aug 03, 2020•1 hr 13 min•Season 3Ep. 1
Ivy Singh-Lim founded Bollywood Veggies Organic Farm with her husband in Kranji, a northwestern suburb about 22 kilometres from the towering skyline of Singapore, showing an alternative, greener side to the country. Visitors can explore the village-like tropical farm, eat a mouth-watering, farm-to-table Nasi Lemak served on a banana leaf, and learn about the history of food and its influence on civilisation. In our Season 2 finale, hosts Vanessa Fernandez and Udhara de Silva visited her home in ...
May 04, 2019•53 min•Season 2Ep. 13
Vinod Nair used the last of his life savings to set up a website and hire an intern. Today, that website, MoneySmart.sg , is Southeast Asia’s leading personal finance portal, helping people compare loans, insurance, and credit cards. There’s been a lot of press coverage in Singapore about the big wins of his career, but show hosts Vanessa Fernandez and Udhara de Silva spent time with him in MoneySmart HQ to talk about: Scaling MoneySmart from bootstrapped to funded company The Singaporean approa...
Apr 26, 2019•55 min•Season 2Ep. 12
Rosalyn Lee , or Rozz, is a Singaporean radio DJ and TV host with an incredibly adventurous career. She has featured in Elle and Esquire magazines, hosted Singapore’s hottest radio shows , and interviewed everyone from Lana del Ray to Gene Simmons. She has not one but two travel shows. The first is Rozz Recommends , where she explores the world on her terms. Highlights include her journey exploring Iran and surviving sub-zero temperatures at the North Pole. The second is Weird Food Diaries on Si...
Mar 28, 2019•1 hr 3 min•Season 2Ep. 11
Andrew Ing creates culture for a living, whose career is based on combining the cool with the commercial. In the early 90s he promoted concerts in Hong Kong for artists likes Diana Ross, Simply Red and Public Enemy. He then moved to Singapore to turn the nightclub Zouk into one of the top 10 clubs in the world and bringing electronic music culture to South East Asia. Today, he’s the Chief Operating Office of The Lo & Behold Group , a hospitality group that owns a few of Singapore’s hottest s...
Jan 15, 2019•43 min•Season 2Ep. 10
Thomas Wee is a Singaporean fashion designer who has worked in the industry for over 4 decades. He is known for his masterful workmanship, cutting edge 3D forms and perfectly tailored suits. After building several high-end fashion labels serving South-East Asia’s elite, the “King of the Jacket” took to teaching fashion design and pattern drafting for 11 years, and eventually made a sensational comeback at the Audi Fashion Festival Singapore 2008. CNN’s Power List names Thomas as one of the 30 pe...
Dec 07, 2018•1 hr 7 min•Season 2Ep. 9
Theresa Goh is the first female Singaporean swimmer to qualify for the Paralympics . Vanessa and Udhara met the world-record breaker to talk about her childhood, how athletes compete over milliseconds to win races, being an openly gay public figure, and why accessibility should be a given in any space. Theresa Goh is an ambassador for Singapore's LGBT non-profit, Pink Dot , a group for everyone, straight and gay, who support the belief that everyone deserves the freedom to love. If you loved thi...
Nov 14, 2018•45 min•Season 2Ep. 8
Nicolas Foo has had a successful career with the Singapore Tourism Board , is a photographer whose experiences living in India inspired an exhibition, ‘For Your Approval, Please ’, and has also been the head of business development for South-East Asia’s largest tech startup and ride-hailing platform, Grab . Vanessa and Udhara met Nic at The Analog Vault , a vinyl record store hand selected by Nic. They chatted to him about: his diverse career how his time living in India shaped him Singapore’s e...
Oct 31, 2018•57 min•Season 2Ep. 7
Adrian Sim is a volunteer with Singapore’s Workers’ Party , the only opposition party to have elected members in parliament in a political system led since 1959 by the People’s Action Party . Vanessa and Udhara sat down with Adrian at an ‘HDB’ apartment complex in Lorong Ah Soo, a Workers’ Party constituency, who shared: His story growing up in a low income household in Singapore Why he chose to join the opposition rather than achieve results through the ruling party Why he believes government n...
Oct 17, 2018•42 min•Season 2Ep. 6
Ben and Saranta Gattie built The Working Capitol , a co-working space set up in a renovated former biscuit factory on Keong Saik Road. Since opening in 2015, it has become one of Asia’s leading co-working spaces. Hosts Vanessa & Udhara spoke to them at The Working Capitol about: Growing up as third culture kids Real estate in Singapore How they developed their business What ‘culture’ means at a place like The Working Capitol How the government and business work closely together to innovate T...
Oct 10, 2018•58 min•Season 2Ep. 5
Dr. Vanessa Von Auer is one of Asia’s leading child experts and founded Singapore’s one-of-a-kind Integrated International School , where students get the complete opposite of a “one-size-fits-all” education. Dr. Von Auer invited Udhara and Vanessa to her school to talk about psychology and parenting in Asia, the challenges of building your own business, and education in Singapore. Thanks for listening to A Life Less Ordinary . If you loved this episode, check out our other episodes on Apple Pod...
Oct 03, 2018•50 min•Season 2Ep. 4
Jonathan Bonsey and John Palmer have called Singapore home for the last 3 decades. Jonathan Bonsey runs Bonsey Design , a design agency which has built iconic Asian brands in entertainment, media, retail, and much more. John Palmer is a serial entrepreneur who’s built e-commerce, social media and aviation companies. Hosts Vanessa and Udhara had a chat in their office about: building companies from scratch and with millions of dollars design thinking and how design agencies work how Singapore has...
Sep 26, 2018•54 min•Season 2Ep. 3
Tan Kheng Hua is an award-winning actress and producer who has worked on projects in theatre, TV and film since the early 90s. She was the Empress Dowager on Netflix’s Marco Polo , has produced a critically acclaimed cabaret act, The Dim Sum Dollies , and most recently, played the role of Kerry Chu in the record-breaking, much loved Hollywood film, Crazy Rich Asians . Hosts Udhara and Vanessa chatted with Kheng about her career beginnings, the art of acting, and her views on everything from ente...
Sep 19, 2018•1 hr 15 min•Season 2Ep. 2
Show creator Udhara de Silva chats with co-host Vanessa Fernandez , who's been plugged into Singapore’s culture for the past 20 years. In this episode Vanessa gives us an overview on Singapore, enlightens us on its music history, talks about her career in radio, and gives us a sneak peak of our guests this season! Vanessa’s performed at music festivals such as the Gilles Peterson Worldwide Festival in France, Laneway Festival in Singapore, BIGSOUND in Australia, V-ROX in Russia, and the Concrete...
Sep 12, 2018•1 hr 21 min•Season 2Ep. 1
Outspoken. Irreverent. No bullshit. These are rare qualities in Sri Lankan society, and even rarer for Sri Lankan influencers who run their own companies. Indi Samarajiva started YAMU, the digital guide to Colombo and Sri Lanka 5 years ago, and the way the company operates says a lot about its founder. Tanya & Udhara talked to him about moving back to Sri Lanka after growing up in North America, building a content company in a country whose startup culture is in its infancy, and his views on...
Jan 07, 2018•55 min•Season 1Ep. 9
Colombo is a city with many personalities – you have personalities and then you have Personalities with a capital P. The first lot are people that everybody knows because Sri Lanka is a small island, and Colombo is somewhat of a tiny bubble within the small island. These people are related to this person or that, who know so-and-so, and who live in the most exclusive parts of the city. But then there are the second group of people. The people known for what they do and who they’ve become. Danu I...
Nov 29, 2017•1 hr 3 min•Season 1Ep. 8
This episode’s guest has a life deeply rooted in music. His grandfather was a pioneering Sri Lankan pop music entrepreneur. And today, at just 25 years old, our guest is turning the Sri Lankan music industry on its head through the creative haven he founded, The Sooriya Village. The Sooriya Village gives musicians and creatives a space to compose, record, and perform their work. All the while, the Village initiates international collaborations so that local musicians can get the global audience ...
Oct 27, 2017•1 hr 12 min•Season 1Ep. 7
Have you ever been in a conversation with someone who seems to say things just to provoke a reaction? No matter what the topic is about? Often we just go with the flow and keep our cool. But sometimes, no matter how hard we try, we react, in varying degrees of emotion. And sometimes, those provocations make us stop and think. Hosts Tanya & Udhara talked to performance artist Venuri Perera, discovering why she aims to push our buttons, the challenges of being an artist in Sri Lanka, and the d...
Oct 03, 2017•1 hr 3 min•Season 1Ep. 6
Travel opens our eyes to so many different ways of living, different perspectives, different cultures, and of course, different kinds of cuisine. You could fall so deeply in love with a country, that you dream of one day living there and adopting it as your second home. Well that’s exactly what Alice Luker did. The British photographer and blogger, who by the way has taken pictures for Conde Nast Traveler and Nat Geo traveler, used her creativity and love of exploration to build an adventurous l...
Sep 25, 2017•49 min•Season 1Ep. 5
Hosts Tanya & Udhara talk to author of ‘Serendipity’, Ashok Ferrey, about his colourful life across many continents. He’s one of Sri Lanka’s best-selling authors in English and his latest book is ‘The Ceaseless Chatter of Demons’. This episode will show you how an interest in many different things, having several callings, can be an incredible asset. Ashok Ferrey’s upbringing is as diverse as his interests: born in Colombo, raised in East Africa, educated at a Benedictine monastery in the wi...
Sep 15, 2017•1 hr 49 min•Season 1Ep. 4
Hosts Tanya & Udhara talk to Reza Akram, a Sri Lankan photographer who’s worked with the British Council, Al Jazeera, and the UN. He proves that everyone has a real chance to pursue their wildest dreams. And not just one chance, but many, many chances. But wildest dreams don’t come true overnight. It takes stamina, long-term thinking, and sacrifice. Out of his several projects, one that stands out to us are his incredible black and white photographs of Angampora fighters, which attracted the...
Sep 08, 2017•1 hr 6 min•Season 1Ep. 3
Every country has its taboos, and Sri Lanka is no different. 'Sex', 'drugs', and 'HIV' are all words that are uttered in hushed tones. To find out more, hosts Tanya & Udhara talked to Hans Billimoria from the Grassrooted Trust. He works with people living with HIV, people who use drugs, who sell sex, and people who have been marginalised due to their sexual orientation or gender identity. He also works with young people who’ve been sexually abused, cyber-stalked or bullied and conducts works...
Sep 01, 2017•1 hr 26 min•Season 1Ep. 2
When you think of a womens rights advocate and a hair-designer from the tropical isle of Sri Lanka, do you instantly jump to picture them conquering Mount Everest, one of the coldest and harshest places on earth? Well these are two people who did just that: one shines a light on gender equality, the other creates fabulous hair with acting and singing on the side, and when they’re not working – they scale a mountain or two. Jayanthi Kuru-Utumpala (@jayfemrock) is the first and only Sri Lankan to ...
Aug 23, 2017•1 hr 11 min•Season 1Ep. 1
