#PRU4Antarctica: Finalist Announced and How I Creeped Robert Swan in the Gents

When all hopes were thought lost for Antarctica, an unexpected email that came into my inbox that late evening somehow became the silver lining of the collapsed dream of going to the southern polar ice cap. It was an invitation to go to Robert Swan's Leadership on the Edge talk at Shangri-La Hotel Kuala Lumpur. I quickly forwarded the email to my bosses with a devil's deal of trading 2 days of my annual leaves for a 4 hour time off to attend the talk.

Knowing how I had babbling about how I was going to win the trip to Antarctica on an all expense paid trip and how gloomy I was when I learned that I was not selected, my boss agreed that I take the afternoon off to enjoy myself there at the talk. 

4th December 2013 came quickly and I was not really working that morning. All available hours was spent on coming with scheme to convince Robert Swan to take me along with him on the expedition. At 12pm, I had my PC shut down and I went downstairs wearing the #Pru4Antarctica tshirt with another raglan tshirt underneath it and a permanent marker pen, I slowly moved towards Shangri-La on my old faithful ex5. 

Upon arriving there, I quickly made my way to the Grand Ballroom at level B2. I was told that there would be food (or some light refreshment as they have put it in the email) but I was not all expecting this:

I mingled around with some familiar faces right until a hotel staff walked around the ballroom lobby ringing a bell in his hand- it was time. I felt like a suicide bomber on a one way mission.

Without the dinning tables and chairs and the buffet table at the sides of the room, the grand room seemed somewhat more spacious than what I remembered. Quickly I scanned for the perfect seat. Since I was amongst the first to walk in, centre seats was still vacant. This was the perfect spot.

Quietly I sat and scanned the room for Robert Swan. Since 99 percent of the people in the room were Asians, I was very confident that it will not be that hard to spot a 57 years old British explorer. Other participants started to flood the room from the entrance at the right side of the room. Eager, excited and unorganised, they helped themselves with a seat. I was surprise at what I say at the opposite of the room.

Semi finalists! There they were. Just a few steps away. 

They were then called onto stage for a photo session. It was when they were done, I noticed a tall well build Caucasian man sporting a hiking bag being escorted to his seat. I was really disappointed with the result of the image captured by my camera.

Clearly (ironic to use this word) I had the wrong setting on my camera at the point of time. The session began with the emcee welcoming guests and calling upon the CEO of Prudential Malaysia, Philip Seah with his opening speech who then passed the mic to Robert Swan.

All this while, I have been practising my interview speech (it was mentioned in the terms and regulation for this competition that there might an interview session with Robert, should there be more than 2 suitable candidates for the final 2) beginning with "Hi Robert Swan, truly privileged to be seated in a room with a living legend; I could not believe myself that that was actually happening. I was seating in a room looking, listening to a living legend; the first man to walk on both North and South Pole.

He started off his talk with a bit of stand up comedy with saying that he hates walking and how he thinks he has done enough of it, he hates cold weather and he hates ice in his underwears and how he hates gloomy people. I sat there listening to every word, like a grandchild listening to his grandfather about how the world was like back then.

He shared that he has always wanted to become a polar traveller ever since he was a kid, how he raised he had to raise USD 5Million at the age of 23, how 7 years later he succeed to gather the fund to buy a ship, how he and his team had to battle through the rough sea to get to Antarctica from New Zealand, how it felt like to arrive there for the first time. the difficult times the occurred throughout the long walk to the South Pole and how he learned that his ship sunk when he got back to his base and was immediately bankrupt.

He also mentioned that;
**humour is essential in a team,
**a leader should not lead all the time, he should step back, allow another person to take over and provide support,
**being truthful when working in a team allows plenty of room to avoid unwanted error,
**everyone should chase their childhood dream.

The talk ended about 50 minutes later. As the participants moved towards the buffet of French Pastries at the lobby of the ballroom, I noticed that no one made an attempt to approach Robert for a picture. Robert took his backpack and quickly walked towards the exit. He made a few occasional stops to shake hands with some prominent Prudential figures before he made his way through the lobby.

A sudden rush of adrenalin pumped through my veins as I mustered of whatever was left in my confidence jar to approach him. I widen my stride to catch up with him. That was when a random dude out of nowhere came up to him acting all important suddenly discussing something that was not all important but he acted as if was a big deal by nodding his head, making face expression that I thought was unnecessary. Who the cock was this cockblocker? He then left Robert after shaking his hand and that's when the polar traveller asked "Where's the loo?"

This was my chance. I quickly followed him and showed him the Gents when was poking his head into the hallway to the Surau and a "oh its thata way?" was his reply. He went in and I waited at the wash basin. My head ran all sorts of possible script that I could use to get him to sign my tshirt or maybe convince him to take a selfie with me.

The autograph happened but the thought of a picture was lost in the excitement.

"Thanks Mate" was what he said he left the Gents. I was not sure if he was flattered or he was creeped out.

I joined the crowd back in the lobby sporting the only Pru4Antarctica with the legendary polar walker's autograph.

Prudential has decided to add another spot for the finalist and they are:

Paul and Faisal. Helena could make it to the event. At least I was right about her making to the finals.

Got the chance to take a picture with Ramon. 

I'm still framing this shirt though it looked like he scribbled his initials.

#PRU4Antarctica: Semi Finalist Announced. Gaah!

Woke this morning to a news feed on my wall that #PRU4Antarctica has announced the lucky 12 semi finalists for the contest. They are;

• Helena Erin Dodge Wan, 20, Medical Bio-Science at Monash University
• Mohd Aswadey Samsudin, 35, businessman 
• Choo Seng Kiat, 21, Business Admin student at UNITAR
• Amir Adham, 31, medical practitioner
• Mohd Firdaus, game designer
• Yeow Boon Sim, 25, a mud logger 
• Noor Shahiwan, 26, solar technology entrepreneur
• Paul Koh, photographer
• Faisal Ariff, 31, fund manager
• Ramon Mustaufi Fadli, 31, IT freelancer
• Tan Chih Rong, 23, Mechanical Engineering student at UNITAR
• and Leong Ming Chian, 32, software QA

Ok. Seriusly, stop hitting the voe button here. Votes can be cast at the following link: http://www.pru4antarctica.com.my/vote.html

I have painfully watched all the video submissions *sobs* and I've my money on Helena and Ramon.

Or if you think that I should go instead, cast your votes here at the comment section below!

FINE!!! I'll Walk To Antarctica

Dearest Blog,

They didn't called. 

I am used of losing fights and not being a winner but this was devastating. Antarctica has never been in my bucket list but the contest has got me dreaming on daily basis. This I wanted so badly that I would imagine that the competition was so stiff and I was to attend the final interview with Sir Robert Swan himself. 

I had it all planned out. The opening speech would something like this-

"Hello, I am Awi and I am more than excited to be sitting in front of a living legend, Sir Robert Swan, the first person to walk both North and South Pole". I would definitely add in some "I love animals and penguins and sea lions and whales and my favourite band is the Arctic Monkeys". 

I have even planned my unused leaves for this trip. 

How can they not love this? 

Its got everything- the Malaysian flag, a walking stick, a retarded man sweating in a full set of climbing gears, a backpack filled with unfolded laundry and the excited face. The perfect winner. 

Sigh. Maybe James was right; the gloves was not convincing- could easily attract gangrene. Maybe Meor was right; I should added a polar bear or a penguin into the photo. 

Or maybe it was I who I jinxed it.

Yours, 

The you-know-who-who-will-be-working-when-the-lucky-2-winners-goes-to Antarctica.

#Awi4 #PRU4Antarctica: Waiting For The Call

From the moment I overheard my colleagues talking about Prudential Assurance Malaysia Berhad (PAMB) and Prudential BSN Takaful Berhad (PBTB) have set up a contest to send 2 lucky Malaysians to Antarctica for a 14 days trip lead by the living legend, the Sir Robert Swan, first person to walk on both North and South Pole; I could not stop thinking about it day and night. The contest, in a format of 2 filtering rounds, would first require participants to submit a frontal picture of themselves. 10 lucky participants will then be selected for the second round where they would be required to produce a 3 minute video.

Only 2 lucky winners will be sent to the Earth's southernmost continent.

Throughout the hot sunny day of 4th of October 2013, my mind was not really at work. It was busy orchestrating schemes on how I could land myself in the final 2 spot for the trip. It was also the day that I made alot of calls to friends, begging for them to loan me their climbing gears and I even walked up and down the office trying to find props for my photoshoot.

Being alone at home with an awful lot of free time that night this is what happened.

After much consideration, I picked this particular photo and quickly submitted.

Seriously, this picture has everything that is required for the winning photo. 

I was pleased with myself with the photo, I came to a stumble block during the submission when it had to accompanied with a tacky 50 word slogan why Prudential Malaysia should pick you for the trip. Didn't a good job with the wordings but I was very confident on the progress that I have achieved.

It was not until just now that I remembered that the final day of submission was on the 1st of November 2013 and revisited the #PRU4Antarctica official contest website to check on updates and saw this announcement:

All I need to do is pray hard that they would call me up soon.