People

“I’m a full-time father of three, so I’ve lost all my hobbies. But, being a father is great! It's the best thing that’s ever happened to me. As long as I see my kids happy, I’m happy.”

In the middle of Raffles Place Park on a Friday evening, amidst the sea of human rush hour traffic and throngs of Zumba dancing folks, we spotted Sharon, bright-eyed and cradling a bottle of wine. She was dressed comfortably in a simple black skirt and tank top ensemble, but had an air of poise and confidence about her that we just couldn’t ignore.

“My weekends typically start off with a cup of coffee, as any day—weekend or weekday—would, followed by an extended period of yoga and meditation. There’s no specific type of yoga that I do. In fact, I’ve actually crafted my own permutation of it by taking bits and pieces that I enjoy most from the different courses that I’ve taken.”

“Sometimes, you meet people who work differently from you, and you have to be adaptable. Since I’m just an intern, I’m at the end of the food chain, so I must be able to work with everybody, no matter their working style. We don't learn about adaptability in school, so these soft skills that are a bit more difficult to pick up.”

“Every time my colleagues and I go out to dabao food, it’s always packed in plastic bags and plastic containers. One day, I thought, “Okay, I’ve had enough. Maybe I can try to be more sustainable.” So I started using reusable containers and cutlery, which is how I got my start in sustainability.”

“My family owns a winery called Pierre Vessigaud in Burgundy, a region famous for its wines. The name of our winery incorporates both my father’s name and my nickname. My father loves working in the vineyard, and has the patience required to make wine, but he doesn't really like the selling or business aspect of it, so my mother sells the wine.”

“My first tattoos are the ones on my fingers. I wanted to test my threshold of pain, so I got my first ones on my fingers, and my next ones on my leg, near my ankle. Back then, not many artists were willing to tattoo fingers because there are so many nerves there, so I really had to go around asking different artists and studios if they could do it for me. But now, it’s a lot more common.”

“I have three tattoos in total on different parts of my body. I got the one on my back seven years ago from a Vietnamese artist in Singapore, but the one on my belly is quite new. I got stretch marks after giving birth, so I recently decided to use a tattoo to cover them up.”

“I’m from Western Japan, and I moved to Singapore three years ago with my husband who is working here now. I love Singapore, especially the food, because everything is so good, but I still miss Japan so much. It’s my favourite place to travel to.”

“I'm a food and drink writer at Timeout Singapore, which has been a really fun experience so far. It's bringing me to a lot of places, because I basically get paid to eat and drink. I’m definitely putting my waistline on the line here, but I’m always looking forward to my next meal—I live to eat.”

“Us Japanese, we have a lot of beautiful old silk kimonos. Many people don’t wear them anymore, and I hate to see them waste such good quality silk, so I started thinking about recycling these kimonos and turning them into items that we can use today, like umbrellas, fans, bags, caps, and so on.”

“In my time working in the Esports industry, I picked up the skill of shoutcasting. It’s basically game commentary for live Esports matches, and it works the same way as sports commentaries. It’s usually done in pairs with a play-by-play caster who tells you exactly what’s going on in real-time, and a colour caster who tells you their analysis of the game itself and the plays being used.”