The Unofficial Report: ASEAN Youth Leadership Development Programme 2007

Spending 1 week at Port Dickson, being the sole Singapore representative for the ASEAN Youth Leadership Development Programme was a an eye-opener for me. Nope, I wasn't new to Malaysia, its culture or even the cuisine served. Even the long bus rides throughout the country were expected of.

But I wasn't feeling very confident when I boarded the plane to KLIA. The last couple of years, I had grown accustomed to be the background worker, the nitty-gritty guy, the one who does all the unglamorous work; now being thrust back into the spotlight after years of hiding in a cave. And I was going to be all alone.

Nearly every delegate from the different ASEAN country was an official, with years of public service and political experience. And me? Well, I’m a history buff & an active volunteer & worker for the Halogen Foundation (aka Young Leaders) for years now, but I was only from an NGO. Each country official I met, was curious of my background, why there weren’t any Singapore official for this programme etc etc.. Sheesh, not the greatest of starts I tell you.

It came across my mind, to just be shy and hide away. I was after all, from the smallest country, with the least agenda. It would have been easy to blend in and remain anonymous. But I had my objectives. I was there to network and make friends. Somewhere along the way, I hoped to have a good time.

Boy! was my prayer answered.

I won’t say I had a ball of a time, cause there were instances of nuisance (such as no internet connection for the whole trip!), but for all my pre-departure objectives, it was met. Even my silent social wishes were answered in a manner that I knew clearly that God was getting personally involved.

The programme started on a SUNDAY!!! Sabbath day. I never expected to hit off with the different officials well. They were a myriad of personalities. But everyone there had a strong will and incredible insights. We all started very formally, the exchanging of name-cards and friendly banter. Even the conference layout was very formal, with microphones at each country place and the 9 ASEAN delegates being seat according to alphabetical order via formal negotiation style. The ICE was really deeply-frozen. And that became the perfect platform for me to make a variety of Singapore jokes.

By the end of the whole programme (which lasted 7 days!), most of the delegates were looking forward to see me again in Singapore when they meet for another round of formal meetings. Talk about a quick transformation! Within days, they spoke to me and we had great conversations on the different challenges our countries faced. A few delegates even teased me and challenged me to be more active in the local Singapore political scene and run for office. That was a pretty cool compliment for me.

Back in Singapore, I wondered what changed. Initially, a fellow delegate once shared with me that he kinda expected a rather bland Singaporean at the programme. Maybe they loved the fact that I was more spontaneous and as what official said, I was funnier and more insightful in my sharing than previous Singapore delegates. What a nice compliment eh?? But yeah, the most common gripe that had of me... The speed of my speeches.

Yup. I talked too fast. Even though I tried to intentionally slow down. I have to learn to put more pit-stops between each word, not just sentences anymore. So if I’m serious about running for public office, then I gotta work a lot harder on my speech and conversational presentation.

Yup, there were a lot of beautiful memories of the trip. The most beautiful were never captured on film. Cheezy uh.. I wonder if I should even blog about it..