Getting lost with Brian Thacker.
I'm just back from the Singapore Writer's Festival, which was a blast. My sessions went well, I drank quite a few Tiger beers, ate the best dumplings I've ever eaten, hung out with a great bunch of writers and editors, caught up with a friend living in Singapore and checked out a shop called Naughty Sex Toys on Orchard Road. The crowds were great and at one of my panels they even had to close the doors 10 minute before because it was a full house.
Mind you, at another event of mine they put out about 40 chairs and 10 people turned up. That event was 'Meet the Author' and it took place in Malaysia. Okay, it wasn't Malaysia, but it was at the Woodlands Library in the far north of Singapore island near the bridge to Malaysia. I'd been in contact with the head librarian and we had this big event planned with a powerpoint presentation followed by an interesting Q&A session. I arrived at the library, which was full of locals, and my room for the presentation was all set up – including a table full of cakes and food and drinks. Then at the four o'clock starting time we had… two people (well, five if you count to two librarians and Clara my personal liason girl who travelled with me from the city). We eventually rounded up a few more more punters, even though half of them were young kids and I had to quickly skip the slides about the 'SUPER PUSSY' club in Patong and the gay hotel in Bangkok. At least I didn't get lost like I did at the Ubud Writer's festival the week before.
One of my 'sessions' at the Ubud Writer's Festival was a Jalan Jalan, which was supposed to be a lovely walk out of Ubud across Campuhan ridge and ending up at a villa for breakfast. Except the two writer's festival volunteers didn't know where the villa was and we got lost. Then it started pouring with rain and we squeezed under a very narrow awning of someone's house. While one volunteer rode around in the rain on the back of a scooter trying to find the villa the other volunteer rang for a lift. We did eventually get to the very nice Villa Keliki in time for breakfast, although some of my flock were drenched through. At least my talks are exciting!
Here are some shots from the Singapore Writer's festival and a few shots I took when I checked out the very flash indeed Marina Bay Sands Hotel…
Where's Brian? The writer's wall.
There I am…
The very flash walkway between venues.
Standing room only!
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At least my fellow panelists were funny!
The Marina Bay Sands Hotel (with the an infinity pool on the roof stretching longer than the Eiffel tower laid down!)
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Not bad, eh?
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Some arty bridge near the Marina Bay Sands Hotel.
Look out for my next blog - I will running a competition to win one of three signed copies of Tell Them to Get Lost!
