April 14, 2025 • 55 mins
With four massive sold-out Coldplay concerts, and the Rugby 7s weekend, the new Hong Kong Kai Tai Stadium has finally opened its doors! And there is no one better at giving a full review of the events, the stadium and all the fun trivia, than our guest, comedian Garron Chiu. Garron worked on multiple ad campaigns for those events as part of his job, and he saw 2 Coldplay concerts in the same week!
Jiaoying Summers write-up on SCMP: https://shorturl.at/hFEdc
Get tickets for Backstage Comedy shows: https://linktr.ee/backstagecomedy
Subscribe to our Patreon: https://www.patreon.com/hohopod
Leave us a review: (please!) https://www.ratethispodcast.com/hohohkpod
Follow Garron Chiu on Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/iamgarron/
Follow Mohammed on Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/theothermohammed/
Follow Vivek on Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/funnyvivek/
Mark as Played
Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
(00:01):
So I reiterate here, the bill isdead.
The story of this great city is about the years before this
night. We are free.
(00:21):
Hey everybody, it's a new episode of Hong Kong.
I'm your host Mohammed Magdi, sitting here with somebody who
is not Vivek Mabobani. Vivek is still in Australia.
You might have followed his adventures.
He's been selling out shows and doing great.
Usually if he's not here, I would just be trashing him.
But I decided to be nice today because it's such a good mood in
Hong Kong. So many things happen, so many
(00:43):
things we'll get to with my guest slash Co host this week.
But before we get to him, a couple of things on our side.
We moved the RSS feed of this podcast to Spotify.
If you are listening right now and you're like, what the hell
that does that mean? That did change anything?
Nope. Because clearly you're listening
and you had no idea. What does that mean is that when
(01:06):
we eventually do the video episodes, it's also going to be
on Spotify. You can be like, the next
question would be like, what thefuck is going on with the video
episodes? You've been saying that for
months. We actually, it has been slow
for many reasons, one of the main ones being that it's a lot
of work for Rebecca myself to also get into it ourselves.
So we involved actually and I have been, I've talked to a
(01:28):
couple of like freelancers to help us do it.
And it's really difficult with the communication because even
if they're really good at what they're doing, what ends up
happening is that either there is time difference or you know,
they don't understand comedic timing and stuff like this.
So I really wanted someone basedin Hong Kong to do it.
And we finally found the right match with Monday Studio.
(01:50):
Monday Studios is run by this guy called Wilson and he is
basically a full time podcast producer.
And he agreed to help us with the cutting and editing of the
video. So the first few episodes that
maybe you have listened to, but now you can see them with our
faces. He's going to give them to us in
the next couple of weeks and they're going to be in the on
(02:11):
Spotify, YouTube, and also on our social media with clips and
stuff. So that's pretty exciting.
The other exciting thing that wehave is by the time you're
listening to this, we have Jowing summer shows.
If you're listening on Monday when this drops, Jowing summer
shows are basically pretty much all sold out.
We have a few tickets for the last show left and we have moved
(02:33):
it to Soho House. We can probably get into that on
Patreon and I can really tell you what happened.
The, the good, you know, the thewhat did happen officially is
that we we sold many tickets. So that's that's really it.
We have a lot of tickets and that's it.
So we just wanted to go to so house.
(02:54):
We're just excited like for backstage comedies, definitely
the biggest production we've been involved in and it's, it's,
it's exciting. We'll report back, whether it's
with the, you know, the crazy stories or the things that went
wrong. And I have not asked her or her
team if she wants to be on the podcast.
I decided just see the vibe whenwe meet because she's here for a
few days and maybe she would like, I'm not opening on the
(03:17):
show. I'm just the, the, the
production. So she might not be interested,
but it will be really cool to get her.
One last thing before I bring myguest in on jogging summers.
You can actually read the, the SEMP just did a really cool
write up on her and there's a lot of information I didn't know
and you know, a lot of people didn't know about how she grew
(03:37):
up in China and stuff like this.And it's a genuinely fascinating
story. It's, it's really cool to see
you know someone who grew up theway she did and without ruling
much. You can just read the article.
I'll leave it in the bio and in the description of the episode.
So this is where we are now. Let's bring in the guest slash
Co host. You probably know from the
(03:59):
title, Garen Chew is back on thepodcast.
How are you doing, man? Hi everybody, this is Vivek Mabu
Bunny. That was my Vivek impression.
Yes, it's pretty accurate. You sound like Crusty the Clown
with your with your voice. What happened to your voice?
I I I did a show on Friday. I went to Coldplay on Saturday.
I was also at Coldplay on Wednesday.
(04:21):
OK, are you like the most ball? Like do you think there's many
people who went to Coldplay twice or more than?
No, I mean, maybe the superfans,it was kind of, it was kind of
interesting. I I didn't realize there's like
there are websites to show you exactly like the set list and
what happens at a show. Oh wow.
OK. So the superfans, yeah.
So just to let you guys know, soI, I was supposed to go to watch
(04:43):
the show on Saturday. Yeah.
And. So Saturday for people who are
outside of Hong Kong was the last show.
The last show. Yeah, that's when you had the
tickets originally. That's.
When I had the tickets, yeah. OK.
My wife on Wednesday morning. Kitex Sports Park, which is a
partnership of one of our clients.
OK, work in advertising. Kathy is one of my clients.
Yeah, they wanted to thank us for a what a good job we did at
(05:06):
the Sevens, especially with the fly over with.
We will get to that because I feel like that's that's I don't
know about the good job, but I mean, all right, whatever, we'll
get to it later it. Was a job.
It was a job. It was a job.
To thank us, they gave us a box at to watch Coldplay, which was.
I've never watched a concert at a box before.
Yeah, I. Feel like I never no.
(05:28):
I feel like I can't undo it. Like it was it was just the
ultimate adult. Like Oh my back hurts but I can
sit down with. These very coffee seats, that's
basically what they say about first class, right?
Like. If you have to line up, people
are bringing you, drinks you. Never.
And that's, that's a little much.
Yeah. Oh, and by the way, they had
like a buffet. They're just like concert
snacks. And I didn't realize Asian
(05:50):
concert snacks it would fit so well for what is Asian concerts
now. Yeah.
And it's just like spring rolls and like.
Like bite sized stuff. This is the best.
That's way better than, like, hot dogs, right?
Yeah, Yeah. Because the hot dogs just bread,
then it's gonna like fill you up.
Then you can just snack like just.
Four different dipping sauces. Oh, my God.
All right, Yeah, Yeah. I think a lot of people here who
(06:10):
might be losing some listeners who couldn't relate.
So there was there was a state initially I was laughing at the
So Wednesday was the second show, Tuesday was the first
show. So clearly the Super fans know
what was happening. Yeah, I did not.
So I'm watching. We're about the middle, like
where the halfway line would be at the rugby setup.
And so, you know, I we see the entire stadium.
(06:31):
Yeah, stage was a great setup. And after Coldplay's, like, all
right, you know, Thanks, everybody.
Good night. Lights go down.
Kind of. Yeah, a lot of people start
running for the exits. And I'm like, you guys are
stupid. Have you not been to a concert?
Yeah, yeah, there is clearly an encore.
There's. Clearly an encore.
They haven't even played Fix Youyet.
Oh wow, OK, it's like that. They're encore.
(06:52):
Yeah. So, yeah, you can tell that some
people just never been to account, like they just don't
have a concert ticket. That's.
What? I thought.
And then like 10 minutes in, thelights turn on, everyone's
screaming. Yeah.
And they made a makeshift stage at the back.
Wow, where? The encore was held so cuz they
wanted to oh we want to give something to the.
Yeah, all the way. Oh, that's cool.
And that was that was really cool.
(07:13):
And then I realized, oh, those fans knew what happened.
That's why they were running to the back.
Wow, to get to the front. Row of the encore I was.
Like that's smart, OK. That's the second time I've seen
this in the last year cuz me andCassie went to the Olivia
Rodrigo concert. No, at one point she.
Is that senorita lady? No, no, no, no.
Olivia Rodrigo is like a she's she.
(07:34):
She brought punk pop back to Gen.
Z. She's a great skinny Latina girl
in the US. That's why I was like with her
name. I thought it's the which one is
that? I love you when you call me
Senorita. Camilla also legit anyway, so
so. You try Camilla kabab kabala.
Kabala. Kabala Kabab.
(07:57):
So let me really go like, she does her concert and she like,
disappears from the stage. Yeah.
And then this, like, floating thing, it's like Shape of a
moon, yeah. Comes down from the ceiling that
she's sitting on. Yeah.
Over the cheap seats. Yeah, Yeah.
And then she does like 2 songs there before she gets back and
OK. I'm just like to support the
people with the cheap. Yeah, yeah, OK.
It's just a thing that they now do.
(08:17):
Like, I don't know if you guys saw anyone saw the Regina IP.
She posted that she was on Coldplay.
Yeah, but she was sitting at like the very back row at the
very. I'm like, Regina IP couldn't get
good tickets. Yeah.
Exactly, She could have probablyhad green room access if you
wanted to. Well, no, she's not.
Is she still in the government? Yeah, she's still in the OK.
Yeah, so you could get invited to a box.
Yeah, yeah. Some company.
(08:38):
Well, yeah, in some company. I was, I was almost tempted.
I mean, obviously couldn't sell the tickets.
Yeah, I was going with my wife. Yeah, but.
I would sell it. I would sell the tickets and my
wife. Because the reviews were so
good. I mean the the concert was
pretty incredible first two dayseveryone was so hyped.
So after the Wednesday the 2nd show, yeah the resale markets
(09:00):
like tickets were going up to like $6000 for.
Tickets. Oh my God, It's like, yeah,
yeah, that's crazy. I did see a lot of posts or like
people just like desperate. Apparently there was also as
kind of AI guess controversy with the viagogo.
So people, I am on Hong Kong moms, don't ask me why, but Hong
Kong moms and I see a lot of these posts that like on the day
(09:21):
of the show, they're expecting viagogo to like give them
physical tickets. And apparently I don't know how
via Google works. Do you know?
No so viagogo is a weird. I'm pretty sure it's AI
crawling. They're a third party reseller
of tickets. But they what they do is they
try to buy tickets or find ways to buy tickets and hope you find
(09:42):
them before the actual ticketingwebsite.
So I don't know if you've noticed.
Yeah, they pay for a lot of SEO.Like they're usually quite high
up. Yeah, so people would find like,
not so much when I do it in HongKong because Via Gogo doesn't
work in Hong Kong that often. But when I tour, people would be
like, Oh yeah, we found your tickets on Via Gogo.
Like why? Yeah.
And they pay extra price and they that's.
(10:03):
Crazy. Yeah, it used.
To have, I swear it happened in Hong Kong sometimes where like
not backstage, but when it was the riff where you find like
riff tickets on viagogo. That's crazy, this.
Is strange and they basically just charge like 40 bucks more
than you guys charge. Sure, sure.
And they'll just buy from you guys.
Yes, yes. You sell with them.
Yeah. So maybe us on the back end,
they're like, oh hey, we're selling tickets, it's actually
Viagogo. But then they might get stuck
(10:24):
with it if people are not buying.
See what happens then. So.
Do they just dump it a regular price maybe?
I am. I'm not sure what they do for
something like Coldplay unless they dump it at a regular price.
The weird thing about that concert though, it was physical
tickets only. Yes, which is strange.
I guess. 925. I guess maybe it's a better way
to avoid like scams and stuff like.
(10:46):
Yeah, maybe because. People like showing phones as
way like I guess it's hot. Is it harder or easier to have
paper versus phone I? Have no idea I know like the
cops were heavily arresting resellers.
Yeah, I saw, I saw on the on. The also, there's a there's a
very, let's say industrialist homeless guy.
(11:08):
Yeah. Outside of the stadium because
the stadium, there are certain things you're not allowed to
bring inside the stadium. Yeah.
So the main thing is water bottles.
And because it was raining yesterday, you can't bring in
umbrellas, right. But they have this rack of like,
you can just leave your water bottle here, pick it up when you
leave the station. Yeah, good luck with that.
Well, I mean, I'm sure you probably could if you remember
and it's. But is it like you're like, what
(11:29):
if you bring like a nice flask? You still can't take it.
So there was this homeless guy standing there.
Yeah. And I think me and Cassie were
like, is he asking people for money?
Yeah. Or is he waiting for the concert
to start just like I'm a steal 1000 Umbrellas.
Hey, that's real funny, dude, ifyou sell like salad at $5 and
(11:50):
you. Oh, my God.
Yeah. Oh my God, yeah, that's or he's.
Just like I'm going to have all these water bottles, I'm going
to open the Hong Kong water bottle.
OK, we now know who's the next guest in this.
Podcast find that homeless guy. This guy.
He's not homeless anymore. Oh yeah, exactly like.
How, how did you open this mansion?
Umbrella saying. Yes, maybe he would be producing
(12:11):
our our next version. So you have been to the the
stadium now three times in in what, a month?
Yeah. So sevens, you win sevens almost
as as work, right? Yeah, I so I got to say, I mean
the sevens had a few kinks to it.
So here are the pros if you guyshaven't been to Kitech Stadium
so obviously. Yeah, give people all the pro
(12:33):
tips. I mean, Coldplay Sevens
back-to-back was clearly there. Let's see if the stadium's going
to work, right? One, just bathrooms everywhere.
Like there's bathrooms next to bathrooms, right?
Coldplay, I never had to line upfor bathrooms once.
Even the sevens I never had to line up for.
Bathrooms. That's crazy.
Yeah. Which, you know, if you guys
have ever been to the sevens at the old stadium, it was, I mean.
(12:55):
Yeah, it was disgusting. Wait 45 minutes and then realize
like, oh, all the stalls are overflowing.
Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. Like, I used to do this thing
that are that someone there usedto be a magazine called Hong
Kong Magazine, and readers send in their rugby sevens pro tips.
OK. And one of the things I sent in,
which unfortunately I should nothave sent in because everyone
(13:16):
learned this pro tip. Yeah.
I was like, hey, a lot of peoplenever go into the handicapped
bathroom. Yes.
I actually, I figured that's probably what it was, but yeah,
Athens. Everywhere.
The the thing at the Sevens thata lot of people got upset by was
they ran out of food, right? Yeah.
And I went to the Sevens on the Saturday late.
(13:38):
I went around 1:00 PM Thank God I.
Apparently there's no beer either.
That they also ran out of beer. So they ran, They ran out of
alcohol on Sunday at the South Stand.
Yeah. So waiting for people to refresh
it. People.
Some people waited like an hour,hour and a half just to get a
drink. Yeah, the running out of food
thing sucked because a lot of people won.
(13:58):
They don't tell you they run outof food.
Yeah, which is annoying. Like, yeah, you're waiting in
line and it's not until you get to the front of the line and
say, oh, no, we ran out of food.Yeah, yeah, OK.
Because they're like, oh, do youwant to buy a beer?
Or yes, yeah, just try to sell you some other bullshit.
Yes, yes, yes. And which sucks for a lot of
people, because if you go to thesevens, you start drinking early
and if you never get any food, you're screwed.
Yes, of course. The other thing was at a certain
(14:20):
point we were in line. Thank God it got fixed by the
time I got in front. They're like, hey, our Wi-Fi
isn't working for some reason. Like why does your Wi-Fi need to
work? Yeah, they're like it means all
our POS systems aren't working. So we're only.
Doing cash until we fix it, right?
Everyone in line was like, yeah,weird costumes.
(14:41):
Some people like I don't have pockets in this thing.
Yeah, I'm wearing a chicken. Oh my God.
But I will say the stadium neverfelt crowded like at Coldplay on
Saturday. I was on the floor.
Yeah. Never felt crowded.
Stood near the front. Everybody's like dancing.
They're moving. You never felt like crushed in.
I saw someone at a restaurant with that light bracelet that
they give the audience. I'm like you're supposed to
return that you're. Supposed to return it.
(15:02):
Also, it doesn't do anything. Outside.
Yeah. Yeah, exactly.
So what they did was very cool because I've seen those light up
bracelets and I've used them at stadiums before, Yeah.
And usually it's like, all right, we're going to hit a
button and everyone's turns green.
Yeah, Coldplay was the Is it? Run by what?
Wi-Fi. So I think it must be RFID, but
(15:23):
what they did at Coldplay was the only time I've seen it
location based. And what I mean by that is like.
So you can actually change your.So not only is like their wave
of lights, wow, it would sometimes be like, oh, if you
look at the crowd, it's like giant heart shapes.
Yes, it's a heart shape of people.
With all red. Wow, that's really cool.
I'm going to say something that I might get in trouble for, but
(15:46):
whatever, it must be so good to see.
Go there on asset if you still have that.
So. So I'm saying hypothetically if
that's legal in a place where they allow that, I'm saying that
based. On the Internet, I could have
rainbows in my brain. I would until I remembered.
The only tough part is when you leave the stadium.
(16:07):
Yeah, everyone's leaving at once.
That's a big crowd. Yes.
And I don't, I don't know if you'd want to be on any psychic
or just in that crowd like. Again, theoretically I've never
tried this like but people said a lot of goods.
But yeah, like seeing, imagine seeing those visuals.
Yeah, and they do a lot of, theydo a lot of cute things they do.
He does improv and crowd work, which I've never seen at a
concert before. I I.
(16:29):
You see, I've been to concerts like I've seen, you know,
Metallica and Rolling Stones andStevie Wonder.
Stevie Wonder was particularly funny.
And the comic at me was like, just stay in your lame, man.
So not all, not all of it was funny intentionally so.
So what Chris Martin would do. So I think it's during right
around the halfway mark. So they're setting something up
(16:49):
on the stage. Right, right.
So he's just like filling? Time to distract them.
What he does is he starts, he starts playing on his piano and
he'll tell the cameraman just find some people, right?
And he just writes songs about them.
Oh wow, that's like. Improv.
And then it's yeah, yeah. And they'll do a verse.
Yeah, OK. That's, that's legit.
That's that's really. Cool.
So yesterday. So maybe he's not trying like to
(17:10):
be funny, just. Like so on the on the Saturday a
lot of them was were funny. Yeah.
This is about a kids missing teeth.
Yeah, about someone's haircut. Oh, fun.
OK, so he really went in. He did, like, proper, like,
crowd work. Yeah, like, like, like bashing
people and stuff. That's really cool.
And and so, by the way, even give a call back because so so
every concert he brings someone on stage.
(17:31):
Like an audience member, an. Audience member who's usually
holding a sign right with a songthat's not usually played at a
Coldplay concert. Right.
So that it's like a super fan asking for like.
I'll play it and you can sing itwith me.
Yes, yes. And he brought this to people
and he's like, are you a couple of the girls?
Like No, no, not a couple, not acouple.
He's like, but, but you guys friends like yeah, friends.
He's like, okay. He did the coming thing.
(17:53):
As he's playing the song, changethe words like it's like, thank
you, Elizabeth. Thank you, Clarence.
By the way, everybody remember they're just friends.
Nice, nice. Okay, it's like that's cute.
Everybody remember to love each other unless you guys are
Stephanie and. OK, that's very funny.
This was really good. Nice.
Nice, OK, energetic show. Yeah.
I mean, I saw that like right after this stop in Hong Kong,
(18:14):
they're going to Seoul for six shows.
So obviously that's a very tightact already.
Yeah. And yeah.
I wish certain things were advertised better cuz when we
were leaving, Cassie and my wife, she didn't want to.
Like, I don't want to get in theMTR with the crowd.
I'd rather wait until the crowd goes away.
Yeah. And there's a thing called Food
Village, which is like just nextto the stadium.
(18:34):
Yeah. Which was so smart.
And I didn't know why not enoughpeople knew about it.
You go down and there's just a row of food stalls and outdoor
bars, just really chill outside the stadium.
Yeah, yeah. So if you're waiting for a cab
or if you're like just like wantto chill for a little bit until
the stay. There for like an hour and a
half. Dude that sounds awesome.
And there were a lot of places like doing so, you know,
Zeppelin hotdog, yes. So Zeppelin hotdogs doing like,
(18:57):
oh, a trial. So like a mini size of their
hotdog. Oh yeah.
Yeah, that's awesome. Yeah, that's really cool.
Yeah. OK, so going back to because
this is mainly also kind of about, you know, your work a
little bit in advertising and you know, kind of like that that
stunts that you guys sometimes do.
So the the how did the whole contact flying the plane over
(19:19):
and feel free where we don't really edit this because no one
has time. So feel free to just say I
don't, I can't talk about this and we'll move on.
No, no, it's so we were. Obviously it's the first, the
first big event for the new stadium was the rugby sevens and
we wanted to do something yeah big.
And we've had this brief for since last summer, so pretty
(19:43):
much eight months now 9. Months so brief is from cafe.
From cafe, it's like, what do wedo to make it super memorable?
Right? OK, our actual brief, and I'm
sure the team who works at HSBC have the same brief.
Yeah, the brief is basically when people leave the stadium,
they're thinking about Cathay Pacific instead of HSBC.
And I'm sure there's our my, my friends who work at a different
(20:06):
agency. Yeah, PCF client.
Yeah, yeah, they have the same thing, right?
What did HSBC do? I know the Cathay, obviously
through the plane. What did they do?
HSBC released an ad on the firstday of the Sevens that you guys
can go look up. That's really cool.
Yeah, it's it's strange because we actually had a similar idea.
But to execute. Yeah, no, because our our ad was
more targeted at people coming to Hong Kong right for the
(20:28):
sevens because Kathy. Yeah, yeah, yeah.
Plane tickets. But HSBC basically did this
thing of like all these rugby players, people around Hong
Kong, they're pulling these giant tarps and you don't know
what they're doing. And turns out they're dressing
up the skyline of Hong Kong to be in costume for like, oh,
that's cute. It's like, oh, IFC is wearing an
Elvis costume. Yes, yes, yes.
So it's very cute. So they also taps into the
(20:51):
tradition of people dressing up for the sevens.
That's really cool because yeah,if you're an outsider you might
not know that. So it's like a kind of an in
joke with the locals, right? Yeah, that's cool.
So if you got. Sorry I'm praising the idea too
much. You're like I was so.
If you guys go to Chi Tech, there's a thing called the Sky
Bridge. And the Sky Bridge is this giant
bridge that just goes to the stadium.
(21:11):
And initially they were going todo a lot of LED panels on the
ceiling of the sky bridge, something they still might do.
And what we were going to do is,oh, it's the 100th year
anniversary of when Kitek was first built, right?
First plane to leave Kitek, which I'm pretty sure back then
would have been like a military plane or something.
Well, I I saw a photo, it does look like a commercial plane,
(21:32):
but like a maybe like a propeller one or something like
a really small. But also back then, like
commercial planes were, you know, they were either for cargo
or just like for private, Yes. So it's 100th year anniversary
and obviously Cathay was they called Kai Tech home.
Yeah, a lot of people like when I first came to Hong Kong.
Did you actually fly into Kai Tech?
Yeah. Do you have memory of it?
(21:52):
Oh, I lived. I lived in Kalantong.
So what? We were I don't know how.
Old Prince I lived in Prince Edward until I was 16, but Kai
I. Knew you grew up in Kowloon, but
like, I didn't know you're like,I guess that makes sense because
you are 37. Yeah.
So yeah, yeah. OK. 36 asshole.
So we, I remember there was a mall called Catalan City Plaza,
(22:15):
which no longer really exists. But me and a lot of people in
Hong Kong, we went to the roof of the car park.
Yeah. To watch the last plane take off
from. Oh.
You did OK. But also during, when I lived in
Prince Edward, like, I would seeplanes fly over us all the time.
Yeah. In fact, even KJS where I went
to school, we'd see planes. OK, so that was just part of
(22:38):
your child. It was totally part of DID.
You see the whole maneuver, likewas it clear from land that
they're like doing a crazy maneuver or whatever?
To be honest, because we grew upwith it, I didn't know how crazy
it was until later. Like, yeah, everyone like, oh,
it's so crazy to have that turn.And I'm like, oh, I just
thought, like, planes flew low all the time.
Your city doesn't do this. Yeah, I was like, what do you
(23:00):
mean? Planes don't fly in between
buildings, right? That people just live in.
Yeah, yeah. So obviously like those iconic
photos that like the old people sell and stuff that's like,
that's real. So what we wanted to do was
initially in the sky bridge, if we had LEDs on the ceiling, one
of the things was as people werewalking towards the stadium, it
(23:21):
would look like a plane's flyingover, so it'd land.
Oh, OK. Just like it used to land in
kind of yes yes, the LEDs were going to be delayed and we're
thinking about big things we cando like oh, is there a hot air
balloon we. Can only if you had some light
bracelets to hang up there and control them.
He's like. Oh, can we do anything with a
hot air balloon? Because like one of the first
(23:41):
rugby sevens 40 years ago, they had some hot air balloon, Yeah.
And someone was just like, oh, what if we actually see the
stupid idea, which like throwingstupid.
I was like, can we just fly a plane like over a?
Kind that's so quick. That's like, what is it, Mad
Men? Well, because I remember so when
someone said that, I was like, that's not a stupid idea.
(24:02):
Because in the US people fly fighter jets over stadiums all
the time for the dumbest reasons.
And one of them, which I'm goingto explain, is I went to
WrestleMania in Orlando, I thinkabout six or seven years ago,
and they flew 4 or 4 or 5F fifteens low over the stadium,
right? It was the loudest thing I've
(24:23):
ever. Heard, of course.
And so they sang America the Beautiful.
Then they had these planes fly through.
Yeah. And everyone in the stadium just
after you heard it, including myself.
Yeah, My buddy Craig, who was there with me, would just come
in. Yeah, right.
I looked at Craig. I was like, Craig, you're
British. I don't care.
That was awesome. Yeah, OK.
(24:44):
So they know how to play on those like strings.
Yeah, I was. Like it must be possible, right?
And honestly, it was. What's your position like to
like, like to go like, hey, run with this like, are you in a
position to be like, we should look into this more?
So I am I am more the hey somebody figure out if this is
(25:06):
possible? Right, which is strategy, yes.
Yeah, and, and sometimes we havethe big ideas and what I want to
do is sell Y It's like, oh, it'snostalgia, it's hunting
anniversary. OK.
It would get a lot of press attention.
Yeah, dumb, dumb question from an outsider.
Does the person who go like maybe we should fly a plane and
then it actually happens? Do they get a raise of sort?
(25:27):
Like do they get a thing? No.
Well, we. Got or credit?
We got box seats to go to. No, but that one guy, because
obviously you have the winning idea.
So the idea the whole team gets credit.
OK, I see. I see.
There is actually a piece today about this whole campaign.
It's got my name on it, so it's cute.
I mean, I'm one of like 12. On the STMP.
(25:50):
No, like different advertising magazines.
Yeah. OK.
So one of the things is there are a lot of aviation geeks out
there. Yeah.
So there are a lot of magazines that are just about aviation,
right? And a lot of those magazines and
websites all picked it up so. Yeah, yeah, yeah.
OK. So, so that's around the world,
not just here. Yeah.
And obviously we had to send it to the marketing team and the
marketing team was like, yeah, this is a great idea.
Let's say you can do it. And obviously it it took a while
(26:12):
to figure out, you know, this above my pay grade.
It was like, does the Aviation Authority allow?
Of course, yeah. Security, yeah, all of this
stuff. Yeah.
And so the unfortunate thing wasa lot of people complained that
it flew. Too far.
Past Kai tech, yes not over Kai tech so a lot of people
especially who were at the sevens, yes, we're a little
(26:33):
disappointed like you if you areat the South stand and there's a
big glass window at the edge of the wall for the South side.
If you went to South Stand and looked through the window, yeah,
you could see it, right? Most people in the stadium could
not see it, which was not the like they did.
Rehearsal. So is it weather?
That it was, it was weather because literally we were not
even told could we do it until the morning of.
(26:55):
Wow. You know, if people remembered
it was like it was very cloudy. It was rainy.
And yeah, I, I don't know how the decision was made.
It was definitely Aviation Authority, but I'm guessing it's
hey, if it is going to rain and there's clouds, yeah, maybe not
have a plain next to a building with. 50,000 people, yes, maybe.
They'll just fly close to Yeah. So a lot of people who were in
(27:18):
Wanchai or in like outside Kai Tech or even in TST Harbor, they
could see it. And some people said it was kind
of cool. I mean, the good thing is.
I, I will tell you because I, I,I was on the waterfront here,
the central waterfront, and my friend was visiting from the UAE
and I hyped her up. Well, that's actually, I blame
you for it because you told me and actually you told me again,
(27:39):
I can cut this if you really want, but you have told me kind
of before they went like, you'relike, hey, watch out for this.
I don't know if that's. What I wasn't revealing
information. About.
OK, fine, I'll cut it. It's fine.
No, no, no. No, I got.
It honestly, because we, we actually didn't know if it was a
possibility until a month beforethe sevens.
And then obviously, so there's avideo online that not only was
(28:01):
it when they said it was feasible, they actually had,
like, pilots, OK, we're gonna get in our simulators.
See how this is going to run? Cool.
And then there's a hole behind the scenes.
Does the simulator like like getupdated with like the most
recent? Yeah, yeah.
OK, those flight simulators are crazy.
Yeah, yeah. So there's there's the training
to do it, there's the weather todo it, there's the feasibility
(28:22):
to do. It but for the rehearsals,
obviously you said like for the rehearsals they actually got
flew over the the the stadium. I don't think they actually
flew. I think rehearsal as in they
they did it in the. Simulator, so they actually
never physically flew over. But they had, if I'm, I might be
mistaken, but one of the pilots,yeah, who flew had flown that
Catholic route previously, right?
(28:44):
Right. Like obviously what did you guys
did? Like a WhatsApp call or
something? What do you mean?
Like, didn't the pilot call everybody?
Yes, yes, yes, yeah, yeah. I mean, it wasn't what's that we
had like cameras set up, but yeah.
Yeah, I think the thing that they posted online or whatever
they like. We played it in the stadium.
Yeah, yeah, that's really cool. So he was just, I didn't listen
to, but he was like, you know. Yeah, we, we.
Talking to everybody. We even recorded a fake one.
(29:05):
Yeah, like in case it didn't work, we'd have to, like, play a
fake 1. So it looks like they're on the
call. That's smart.
But yeah, so. So the two pilots, one who had
flown it before, obviously 97, so almost 30 years ago, and the
other pilot who's like dream wasto fly that route and as a pilot
who's training always heard like, oh, the best pilot.
Yeah, yeah, but they did it. I guess they do the same landing
(29:28):
then. That was the whole actually, no,
there's no where to land. You have to go.
Oh, yeah, OK, I forgot about that.
But the landing, there's no morethere.
The landing would be best. Sorry, so stupid.
I'm like oh the different just land for shits.
Obviously you're, you're gettinglow and they were, they were
below I think 8 buildings in Hong Kong.
So obviously they flew lower than IFC ICC.
(29:49):
I don't know, but actually maybethe.
Final altitude was lower than those buildings.
I see. So and by the way, my favorite
industrial thing ever, cuz this,it obviously went very viral.
A lot of people in Hong Kong were talking about it.
The only people at the Sevens complained.
Most people actually said it waspretty cool.
Yeah, well, I'll give you like aneutral opinion because I
(30:11):
thought it was kind of cool. So yeah, Backtrack, you hyped me
up for it. I knew she was visiting.
I'm like, I'm going to show you this really cool thing.
You know, you're like, look at how cool Hong Kong is.
So we go there and, you know, it's public information that
they're flying at 4:00 PM or whatever.
We're like dead central, like right by Tamar Park, and we have
like a pretty good spot and there's a lot of people standing
there with their phones. Again, public information and we
(30:33):
see the plane and it's like quite far away.
Like it's still far as in distance, not high, but they're
like here it is. And I don't know why everyone
thought it's just going to get like really close.
I wouldn't say there was like audible like disappointment, but
it was more like everyone's likehuh, OK.
And then we saw it. I think the cool part is that as
it went east and then turned towards the state, yeah, yeah.
(30:56):
So that was kind of cool. It's turning further, but it's
going lower. So I'm like, oh, it's going to
the city, like it's going to Kowloon.
So that was fun. So the best spot a lot of people
said was if you are on the other, if you're on the Kowloon.
Side yes, yes, that would make sense.
You can see it turn in, but the funny part is that her and I
just went to Instagram stories and just like just goofed around
a bit and both of us got were both from Egypt and both of us
(31:19):
got multiple responses were a friend friend back home.
They're like, bro, I see closer.Like it's basically how you grow
up. We have a similar thing.
You have been to Egypt. You know what Nasr City is?
Yeah, yeah, yeah. So Nasr City is right by the
airport. And that's exactly how it is.
Like you can just stand on your balcony and see plane.
By the way, that's still happening.
This is not unlike Kitech. You can still see planes landing
(31:42):
today in Nasr City, really close.
So all of our friends are like, you could have just come here,
just come home, especially to her because she's visiting.
They're like you idiot went to Hong Kong for this.
Honestly, so when that happened where we're editing the videos
like there are people like the plane just finished flying and
there are people editing like the video to put and we thought,
(32:03):
OK, it's not going to fly over the stadium, but most people
aren't at the stadium. Yeah, most people aren't looking
at it. So we need a video.
So it looks very fucking cool tomorrow.
The video is cool, Yes, the video is cool, yeah.
We need to make this look very cool tomorrow, Yeah.
Which it did so. Yeah, going back to the Kitex.
So I haven't been to either rugby Sevens or Coldplay.
(32:23):
I'm just like that lurker onlinedoesn't see what people say.
And one of the things that I think complained complaints from
Coldplay is that a lot of peoplekept complaining that the one of
the roof to open. Yes.
So the roof was closed. The roof was closed for all the
Coldplay concerts. The roof was closed, yes.
OK, so first of all, it's I've never been in a stadium that has
(32:45):
a roof that's already fucking cool.
That's cool. Yeah, it's really cool.
And the fact I do they did they want it to open just to see it
opening because it's cool, or was there another reason?
No, no, That was like a pretty common complaint.
So the the the roof was closed the whole time for Coldplay,
right? And I think it was because the
Coldplay concert goes past 10 and there are a lot of assholes
(33:09):
in Hong Kong who love to complain about.
Everything. Are you serious?
And that a lot of people who live around Kai Tech, yeah,
would complain to the governmentabout noise complaints.
Yeah, but then why? Like, OK, going with that logic,
they're not going to like, you know, when they do this here
with bars, they go to like Craftisimo and then an old lady
complaints and the cops show up.What the fuck are they going to
do? I.
Mean the government look, I mean.
(33:32):
Yeah, but just go with that how much they spend on.
Kite That's actually why they'venever done major concerts at the
old stadium, because the stadium's outdoors, and I mean
old stadium, it's it's even worse because Happy Valley, a
lot of rich people, there's noise at 10:30, which by the
way, I look at it a different way, I'm like, you live in
(33:52):
Kitech, you get free concerts all the time.
Yeah, yeah, exactly. You just see.
So, so one of the things that people complain about is that so
I, I believe because actually Chris Martin mentioned it in the
Wednesday show, they Coldplay iswell known for doing fireworks
during their shows. Right.
That's I think that was part of the complaint, Like where are
(34:14):
the fireworks? Because it's closed, there's no
fireworks. But how high is this the
ceiling? It's very hot.
It's very. Hot so, but you then you could
have done the fireworks anyway, you know.
Well, so apparently on the firstshow, yeah, because I was like,
yeah, we tried indoor fireworks last night and we're not doing
that again. OK, well I want to see videos of
like someone right in if you have, if you're in the first
(34:37):
night and saw the fireworks. A lot of confetti cannons and
all that stuff, so it was kind. Of cool, Yeah, balloons and
whatever. So that was that was fun.
There was like a giant balloon coming right towards.
That's right there. Yeah.
And we jumped just like hit it once and we're like.
Yeah, but going back to Happy Valley, that does actually I
would side with the residents onthat because it's so central
(34:57):
that like if you have like a made like a loud concert like
Coldplay, you're yeah, that's kind of crazy, but you know what
I mean for. Me, it's like it's ending at
10:30. It's not that.
That's actually true. Yes, yes, no, you're right.
Like I'm thinking both but I guess.
So you know what was loud and everyone and this happened at
both concerts and I didn't realize Coldplay just had crazy
(35:18):
fans. People left the concert and they
just started singing Viva La Vida and then like non-stop for
like 40 minutes. So you're you're having 50,000
people leave a stadium just which is like.
Cute cute, I guess, but also if you have just listened to two
(35:39):
hours Coldplay, you might be like, all right, we're over it.
I'm. Like, Can't Sing that.
Sing a better song. This is a different one.
Even on the on the first night Itook the MTR home, Yeah.
And people were singing on the train back, right?
And there were. 2 Just a catchy tune, right?
Two different groups of people singing and then they, like, met
up in the middle, Yeah, to find each other on the train to,
like, film a big video. And it was interesting because,
like, one group was older local peoples, probably, like, in
(36:02):
their 40s, yeah. And one group was like, Indian
teenagers. Yeah.
And I was thinking, like, what other band besides Coldplay is
going to get an audience as diverse in age?
Because that concert legit had kids.
Yeah. But also people in their like,
fifties, 60s. That's pretty cool.
Yeah, that's actually. I don't know if anyone else
because. They've been around for a while,
(36:23):
too. They've been, I mean, they've
been around since I was in high school.
Or yeah, but they look like, youknow, as opposed to like, you
know, the the stones, Well, theylook actually from the Stone
Age. They're all in their late 40s.
They all look great. I think they're all like I.
Mean clean and stuff. Well, they're all like Namaste
people, right? Yes.
It's a lot of the concert, like Chris Martin.
I didn't know if I would enjoy it or not.
(36:43):
I was OK with it. Some people I knew hated it.
Some people loved it. It's very like, believe in love,
guys. Believe in peace.
Look at how many different racesand creeds and colors and ages
are in this concert. It's not that hard.
Everybody just love each other. Yeah.
OK. Yeah, OK.
And then there was one part of the concerts, like, all right,
everybody look out. Look out.
Find someone across the stadium you don't even know.
(37:05):
Look em. Point at them and just say I
love you. Like.
All right, yeah, they get. Yeah, they get a bit preachy
sometimes. You're like, just again, just
stay in your lane. Yeah, they're like, maybe you
can make a cute, you know, comment, but like.
They're like, think about someone in your head, someone
that you might not even know or someone that you might even hate
and tell them you love them. And I just yelled out, I love
you, Carrie. Nice.
(37:28):
So yeah, I mean, do you see the stadium?
Like one thing that I also heardor seen online is that people
are saying like the stadium is very good, it's very functional
as Hong Kong goes, like in termsof efficiency, they're like,
it's not impressive to look at. Is that a fair?
It is not impressive to look at from the outside because from
the outside, I mean, it's I mean, there's been a lot of
(37:50):
jokes made about it. Like someone said, it looks like
a hemorrhoid doughnut. There's also like AAI think it's
like a butt plug brand or a sex toy brand.
OK with a logo. Just looks like the stadium.
Right, right. OK.
I mean, people will make it will, as you see it, anything
with something filthy, right? When you're in the stadium, it
looks cool. OK, Yeah.
I mean, it looks, I mean especially, you know it, it
(38:12):
looked when I got there for the sevens.
I'm like, this is a very big state-of-the-art state.
I've been to a few stadiums for sporting and stuff.
It's not something incredibly special, but it's kind of cool.
But with Coldplay, with the production, with the stage, with
how big it is, this is easily the biggest concert ever in Hong
Kong, right? Yeah, like.
(38:32):
What about like, people like JayChou?
Well, Jay Chou is coming soon, but.
This. Oh, he hasn't.
OK, just. Because we, we've never had a
venue this big, right, right. All our venues are smaller.
Even most recently like Asia World Expo with their capacity
is what 15 K, Yeah, yeah, this was they sold 50K, all four.
Nights. Four nights, yes.
So they sold 200,000 tickets? That's nuts.
(38:52):
That's not that is nuts for HongKong because have.
Nicholas Tan and Jay Chou come soon, but yeah, obviously
they'll also have the all the sporting events in the summer,
so that's going to be awesome, yeah.
And then, yeah, we'll get into that as well.
Again, don't know you can wave at me if you say how much.
We're both big Liverpool fans. How involved are you in the
whole Liverpool planning? Let's say I was pretty involved.
(39:16):
I'm a little less involved now because it was just.
Like so is it the same agency but you guys are doing different
projects? So this one so Standard
Chartered is also. Right, right.
OK. And Standard Chartered is a big
sponsor of Liverpool. Yeah.
Liverpool's other sponsor, AXA, is also a client of mine.
OK, So I was like, so I was like, I remember.
You can get box tickets twice, no?
(39:37):
Even even before they announced Liverpool was coming to Hong
Kong. Yeah, I told both clients I was
like, if Liverpool wins and you don't do anything about it,
yeah, you guys are idiots and wasting an.
Opportunity. Yes, yes, definitely.
So what can we tell people of the things?
What, what, what? What is public right now?
So I I. Or what are you guys planning?
(39:57):
I think we obviously they they want to well, one of the things
they don't want to do, yeah. The big thing is like, we can't.
Like how do we capitalize on the?
I don't know if capitalize right.
Well OK, how do we not make the same mistakes that Tattler did?
With messy messy coming over. Because obviously that was a
(40:19):
mess. Yeah, that was a complete mess,
Yeah. It's going to be a little
different since Standard Charteris a global sponsor, so they
have much more access to the players.
But also, like, how do we take advantage of what worked?
Yeah. So I mean, how many people were
wearing pink messy jerseys? Who?
I bet didn't even know Inter Miami exists.
Yes, for sure. There were a lot of football
(40:40):
fans that just or just casual, Yeah.
Hong Kong regulars who were like, oh, Bessie's coming.
I might check this. Yeah, yeah, yeah.
Story. Yes.
So obviously there is an appetite for that.
So it's like, all right, not only is Liverpool coming, but
Liverpool might be champions. Obviously we can't announce that
they're champions, but once theybecome.
You can announce now they're champions.
(41:00):
Well, they'll be no. I mean, I don't want to jinx it,
right? Of course, of course.
And you can't, obviously. Ultimate bottle.
You can't. We can't put it on an ad.
No, no, people might blame you. You like Jinx that?
Once they are, it's like, hey, Hong Kong always gets like, all
right, so Hong Kong we we didn'tget Dua Loopa, we didn't get
Taylor Swift. No Lady Gaga.
No, Lady Gaga. Yeah, into Miami came and Messi
(41:21):
didn't even play. And then so how, how are we
going to capitalize on the fact that not only is a Premier
League team coming to Hong Kong,they're the fucking champions.
Yes. And so that that was so a lot of
what my role was is like, all right, Liverpool's coming over.
How do you make it exciting? The the fun thing about my
office, I got to give them respect.
Yeah, they basically, it wasn't the usual team who runs Steiner
(41:46):
Chartered. Yeah, who's on this project?
They're basically like, who are the big football fans and more
importantly, who are the big? Liverpool.
That's really cool. Yeah, yeah.
Yeah. And like there were people by
office I didn't even know where.Liverpool fan.
Yeah, yeah, yeah, Liverpool fan.That's great.
So like that was your little like what's it called?
Like the group project from a high.
School or like there's a guy who's like he's a, he's a
Colombian guy. Wasn't even a Liverpool fan but
(42:07):
just like loves Diaz because Diaz is from Colombia.
Sure, sure. OK.
And we're just like, all right, this is how football fans
interact. And then it's it's things like,
all right, what do we do for thefootball fan, which is going to
be a lot of them, but most importantly, what do we do for
the people who aren't football fans to get them excited about
this event? So there's some things like we
can't really talk about, but it's, you know, basically are
(42:28):
are we going to do camps for children?
Are we going to do appearances? Are they going to do like, I
don't know, at a, at a concert with it, something to celebrate
the fact that they're like, you know how champions celebrate
when they, when they officially win, they do a parade in their
city. Is there something we can do
like that in Hong Kong? Oh, that's that would be really
awesome. I mean, as you said, like even
like just the casuals. And, and, and also the weird
(42:50):
thing is because the government has announced, so there's going
to be 3 matches played over the summer, yeah, there's going to
be Manchester United versus the Hong Kong All Stars, whatever
that means. By the way, just a just a shout
out because we have a lot of friends who are Manchester
United fans. I've never seen people, fans of
a team in Hong Kong less excitedthat their team's coming.
(43:13):
This has never. Happened before.
I mean, they don't have, they don't have stars.
Yeah, but usually you're like, yay, my team's coming this year,
they're like. But also what United's like what
8th, 9th now like I. Don't even know if they're that
high. And they're in the relegation.
Yeah, whereas like, but but everyone I know, yeah, like
Tottenham's arguably having as bad as the season of right
United. Yeah, but they have Sun and he's
(43:35):
obviously. And also like Tottenham's had a
lot of injuries, but like every Spurs fan and every Arsenal fan
I know is excited about that game.
So they have they have United versus the Hong Kong All Stars.
Yes, they have. Let me just.
Say, I am pretty sure everyone on the Hong Kong All Stars team
has a full time job. That is not a no.
Yeah, for sure, for sure. Like I was like, dude, that guy,
(43:55):
he's going to be marking Bruno Fernandez, Yes.
And then washing dishes on the same night.
It's like, yeah, I got the late shift at the Cha Cha.
They they got AC Milan versus Liverpool, Liverpool, and then
they have Arsenal versus Tottenham.
Yeah. And all three have different
corporate sponsors. So I see obviously Tottenham's,
(44:17):
it's going to be run by AIA because they're sponsored by
AIA. Yeah.
And so one of the other things is how do we make that different
from everyone else? And like, how do we make.
So it's when people think like, oh, Standard Charter did a great
job organizing this event and different from all the other
three versus like, oh, Tatler screwed the pooch and didn't
have in the contract that Messi needs to play.
(44:37):
Yeah, so. So how did Yeah, how are you
guys prepared for a potential like maybe, you know, people are
expecting Son or Salah or someone to play and then they
don't? Well, I think so one.
Because that's obviously the biggest lesson from the whole
messy thing. For for Salah specifically.
So for the people here who don'tfollow football, yes, yes, Salah
(44:59):
and Virgil Van Dyke, two of their best players, yeah.
Signed contracts to extend, yes,this year, literally yesterday,
yeah. They were supposed to be free
agents. So when we announced Liverpool's
coming, we couldn't use any photos of Virgil or Salah or
Trent Alexander. Who is now left?
Who? Who is leaving?
Yes, yes, yes. So one of the things we're like,
(45:21):
shit, what if, what if, what if we have a game with the three
most pop, three of the four mostpopular players, not even on
the. Team well, but people love
what's his name, The Hot. Guy Nunez.
Nunez is who's like, not great honestly.
Sorry Nunez. If you're listening, I.
Hope you score a goal tonight, right?
Exactly. But so, so we have to work out
all these contingency plans or different angles.
(45:43):
So the good thing is like that we, we do a lot of research.
We one of the things that's coolis it's the anniversary of what
they call the perfect game, so. Is that the AC Milan?
Oh, that's why this is happening.
AC Milan versus. Liverpool the Champions League
final they. Were down 3 nil, yeah.
Came back tied 33. Won it in penalties.
Yes. And it's the 30th anniversary of
(46:05):
that. So wait, what, 30?
No. Or 20th anniversary.
No, I was going to say fuck man,I don't remember watching that.
No 20th anniversary. OK, 20th.
OK, so. We we can say like, oh, this is
the 20th anniversary of the perfect game.
Are we going to get another perfect game?
I see it. I see.
OK. So those are the things you.
Can play on that. Would it be like kind of cheeky
to like like like now they're signed, but when you're doing
(46:25):
these ads that like you have like a shadow of Salah, like
plausible deniability because that's like a specific
hairstyle. Now I mean yes, with Virgil as
well. Virgil as well.
That would be like, if I was in the office, that's what I would
say. I'm like, how cheeky can we be?
Well. The thing is, like, we had to
film promo videos. Yeah.
And Liverpool, the squad was only available, I think a few
weeks ago to film. Yeah.
(46:47):
And we couldn't use Virgil or Trent or Salah just in case.
Yes, yes. So I was the cool thing.
Like, that was one of the most fun things I got to do was just
like create a chart of players of like who is priority that
we'd want in this ad. Yes, yes.
To get Hong Kong excited. And it was like, people would
just ask me why. There's a lot of a lot of even
(47:07):
our clients who aren't football fans.
Yeah. They're like, oh, why'd you pick
that guy? He's like Allison, the
goalkeeper. He's the best goalkeeper in the
world. He's great.
He's like, why that guy? He's like, Endo?
He's Japanese. We need one Asian guy.
We're like, oh, what about that guy?
Nunez is like, women think he's really, really hot, so that's
important. I guess he's hot, but I wish he
(47:28):
is less hot and better. Like like be 20% less hot and
score 20% more. Yes, please pay attention less
to your hair and more to the freaking.
I will say, 'cause you know now that bubble Bunny, everybody,
yeah. One of the best favorite things
to do is like complain about, like what Hong Kong people care
about. Yes, And one of the it's, it was
(47:49):
a short argument, thank thankfully.
And it wasn't the whole client team.
It was just like one client asked a question.
I remember we showed a mock up of this ad.
And for those of you guys who know Liverpool, their colors are
red. They're even called the Reds.
Is their nickname Standard Chartered?
Their colors are green and blue and not red.
Yeah, Red represents their rivals HSBC.
(48:13):
Oh yeah, true. And they were like, they were
looking at this poster. They're like, can you make it
less red? Yeah, yeah.
No, red are the Liverpool colors.
Yeah, but they're also called the Reds.
Like, yeah, but they'll think about HSBC's.
Like it's not my fault you guys sponsored A-Team whose colors
are red. Yeah, that's literally their
name. They're like, they're like, can
we get them to wear like the other kits?
I'm like, guys, they're kids, say Standard Chartered off them.
(48:35):
Yes, yes, exactly. People are going to be fine,
People are going to be fine. Well, AC Milan is also red,
yeah. So, but it's also like, guys,
the reason you got this sponsorship is to have your logo
everywhere. Yes, yes, yeah.
That's fine, you all have to seethe colors.
And yeah, yeah, one one thing I'm excited about before we wrap
this up is that I told you that in in in person, in private,
(48:56):
that now after Salah science, it's very, very likely that
obviously would be here. Yes, with the team.
Hopefully. I don't think I said this on
this podcast before. So Mahmoud Rizzigay is a is my
cousin, my first cousin. Well, actually he's not my
first. He's my mom's first cousin,
which is weird because he's 30 and my mom is 60.
So he came very late in life andhe basically like this part of
(49:19):
the family is actually not like doing great financially.
So and then he's like the like the young kid who just.
Came like the head played in thePremier League.
Is he still in? Turkey right now or?
Yeah, he's actually going to go back to Egypt to my team, Ali.
Oh, nice. Which is cool as well.
That's where he's started. That's where he's going to like
wants to finish his career, which is awesome.
But like that part is really cool that like he came like as
(49:39):
like kind of an accident. His dad was really old already
when he when he arrived and now he's like the richest person by
far in our family by like a big majority, right.
So when the window and. I'm sure.
I bet when he goes back he he gets like brand deals.
He's. Oh, yeah.
Yeah. Oh.
Easy advertising. Easy.
So actually in the in in the Egyptian.
Now, this is not to nerd out football too much, but like, the
(50:02):
three top guys are Muhammad Allah, Omar Mahmoud and him.
Yeah. So right after the two Premier
League top guys, it's actually him.
So it's quite high up. So when the Liverpool
announcement came, I immediatelywent to my phone and I don't
know where he is now, but so I had to go through someone to get
him a message. I'm like, get me with Salah in
the same place. I don't know how you do it.
(50:23):
So apparently the answer came back to me with they don't, they
really don't like it when someone does that at the
stadium. Yeah, like the day, just like,
not good. However, you have a much higher
chance going to the hotel. OK, Not like accidentally.
Oh, I I thought he was like, yo,I'll tell you what mosque he's
going to be putting. I mean they might be like, oh
whoa, is that Muhammad Salah? Yeah, and then he just like the
(50:46):
post, but he said like basicallyI would ask him to arrange
something so he could just go say hi to the hotel.
Cool. Which would be awesome.
And if that happens, I would come in here on this podcast and
cry about it for an hour about God I would already got.
Him as a podcast guest. 2 Mohammads.
Yes, the two more and more exactly the.
Two most famous Mohammads from Egypt.
(51:06):
Well, the two most famous Mohammads in Hong Kong for sure
at the same time. But that's pretty awesome.
We, we're really excited. Like it feels like, I know maybe
we've said that a couple of times over the last few years,
like Hong Kong's back, but it's really feels now they're like,
oh, we have, we have stuff. So so with the Sevens was a
little different because Sevens,I mean, the Sevens was great,
(51:29):
but it was also, you know, Sevens is a big tourist event.
And I had a feeling at the firstconcert on Wednesday with so
many people who are locals, Coldplay fans, like singing,
leaving the stadium. Yeah, I told you about in the
train. Yeah.
I was like, this is I haven't seen so many people in Hong Kong
have fun together in a long. Yeah, yeah.
That that that was a cool feeling.
(51:51):
Even Cassie, who's, you know, it's pretty cynical about Hong
Kong these days. She's like, this is great.
Look at all the kids who are smiling, the parents who are
smiling honestly. Yes, again as like whatever
weirdo just sitting at home watching everything online.
Yeah, I was happy for Hong Kong.It's like it's cool.
You know, I walk around here in Soho and then like people are
like coming out after the events, like the restaurants are
(52:11):
a bit like there is more late night spots now to eat yeah than
in the last like couple of. Years now I I'm worried that
Coldplay might have set the bar too high because if a band comes
in and doesn't have crazy production value like no lights,
no like yeah, confetti cannons, no crazy like crazy wristband
it's just like a band yeah like.People get there.
(52:34):
My thing on my wrist is a lighting.
Yeah, yeah, yeah. Exactly, You don't light up my
watch. That's very exciting.
Thanks for all your work on on this stuff.
Like legitimately, that's reallycool.
But so I got to say, after the experience on Wednesday, my goal
is to work extra hard for this Liverpool project, yes, so that
Standard charter gives me a box.Yes and you know how we will be
(52:55):
there with right with you That'sawesome I.
Mean if not, we'll find ways to get tickets.
Oh yeah, I know the tickets. But like, yeah, you got to aim
high. Yeah, aim high.
Yeah. But also, one thing I thought of
earlier when you were saying that, like why you are choosing
the Liverpool players? It's such a cool feeling to have
like your hobby, like the thing you're interested in, one of
your top things is also basically coincides with your
(53:17):
work. My God.
And that's like when you were like 100%, I lucked out with
this just to go like, no, no, it's Allison Endo and this guy
and explain to all the other guys you're like, no, I know.
And this also happens to be my hobby.
There's something I can't fully share, sure, but there is
something coming up at work. Yeah, that for the first time
(53:37):
since I've been working on advertising, which is a long
time. Yeah, that's stand up comedy
related. Yeah.
OK. That's pretty awesome.
Yeah, OK. I'll reveal that when it's.
Yes, yes. We'll bring you back on here to
talk about it. Gary, thank you so much for
coming on. How do people find you online?
I am Garen on Instagram, that's probably the best place to find.
Me, yeah, OK, cool. We will get into the Patreon
(53:59):
right after this patreon.com/opod very quickly,
as I said in the beginning of the podcast, you know, getting
the editing done and everything.And people who have supported us
for a while, all this equipment is actually bought with the
Patreon money, which is super cool.
So we're going to do a bonus andI'm going to talk about
something. Yeah, some some of the
scheduling issues that cannot talk about it.
They're free, like, yeah, public.
(54:20):
So we'll just do it on the Patreon.
So if you are liking the supportUS patreon.com/hohopod and find
us at a live show. Garen performs a lot all over
town and with us as well at backstage comedy that are
LinkedIn the description for thebackstage shows.
And Vivek will not be around forthe next couple of weeks, so
(54:40):
we'll have different guest hostsand stuff.
So stay tuned and thanks for listening and we will see you
next week. Music.
So I reiterate here, the bill isdead.
The story of this great city is about the years before this
night. We are free.
(00:21):
Hey everybody, it's a new episode of Hong Kong.
I'm your host Mohammed Magdi, sitting here with somebody who
is not Vivek Mabobani. Vivek is still in Australia.
You might have followed his adventures.
He's been selling out shows and doing great.
Usually if he's not here, I would just be trashing him.
But I decided to be nice today because it's such a good mood in
Hong Kong. So many things happen, so many
(00:43):
things we'll get to with my guest slash Co host this week.
But before we get to him, a couple of things on our side.
We moved the RSS feed of this podcast to Spotify.
If you are listening right now and you're like, what the hell
that does that mean? That did change anything?
Nope. Because clearly you're listening
and you had no idea. What does that mean is that when
(01:06):
we eventually do the video episodes, it's also going to be
on Spotify. You can be like, the next
question would be like, what thefuck is going on with the video
episodes? You've been saying that for
months. We actually, it has been slow
for many reasons, one of the main ones being that it's a lot
of work for Rebecca myself to also get into it ourselves.
So we involved actually and I have been, I've talked to a
(01:28):
couple of like freelancers to help us do it.
And it's really difficult with the communication because even
if they're really good at what they're doing, what ends up
happening is that either there is time difference or you know,
they don't understand comedic timing and stuff like this.
So I really wanted someone basedin Hong Kong to do it.
And we finally found the right match with Monday Studio.
(01:50):
Monday Studios is run by this guy called Wilson and he is
basically a full time podcast producer.
And he agreed to help us with the cutting and editing of the
video. So the first few episodes that
maybe you have listened to, but now you can see them with our
faces. He's going to give them to us in
the next couple of weeks and they're going to be in the on
(02:11):
Spotify, YouTube, and also on our social media with clips and
stuff. So that's pretty exciting.
The other exciting thing that wehave is by the time you're
listening to this, we have Jowing summer shows.
If you're listening on Monday when this drops, Jowing summer
shows are basically pretty much all sold out.
We have a few tickets for the last show left and we have moved
(02:33):
it to Soho House. We can probably get into that on
Patreon and I can really tell you what happened.
The, the good, you know, the thewhat did happen officially is
that we we sold many tickets. So that's that's really it.
We have a lot of tickets and that's it.
So we just wanted to go to so house.
(02:54):
We're just excited like for backstage comedies, definitely
the biggest production we've been involved in and it's, it's,
it's exciting. We'll report back, whether it's
with the, you know, the crazy stories or the things that went
wrong. And I have not asked her or her
team if she wants to be on the podcast.
I decided just see the vibe whenwe meet because she's here for a
few days and maybe she would like, I'm not opening on the
(03:17):
show. I'm just the, the, the
production. So she might not be interested,
but it will be really cool to get her.
One last thing before I bring myguest in on jogging summers.
You can actually read the, the SEMP just did a really cool
write up on her and there's a lot of information I didn't know
and you know, a lot of people didn't know about how she grew
(03:37):
up in China and stuff like this.And it's a genuinely fascinating
story. It's, it's really cool to see
you know someone who grew up theway she did and without ruling
much. You can just read the article.
I'll leave it in the bio and in the description of the episode.
So this is where we are now. Let's bring in the guest slash
Co host. You probably know from the
(03:59):
title, Garen Chew is back on thepodcast.
How are you doing, man? Hi everybody, this is Vivek Mabu
Bunny. That was my Vivek impression.
Yes, it's pretty accurate. You sound like Crusty the Clown
with your with your voice. What happened to your voice?
I I I did a show on Friday. I went to Coldplay on Saturday.
I was also at Coldplay on Wednesday.
(04:21):
OK, are you like the most ball? Like do you think there's many
people who went to Coldplay twice or more than?
No, I mean, maybe the superfans,it was kind of, it was kind of
interesting. I I didn't realize there's like
there are websites to show you exactly like the set list and
what happens at a show. Oh wow.
OK. So the superfans, yeah.
So just to let you guys know, soI, I was supposed to go to watch
(04:43):
the show on Saturday. Yeah.
And. So Saturday for people who are
outside of Hong Kong was the last show.
The last show. Yeah, that's when you had the
tickets originally. That's.
When I had the tickets, yeah. OK.
My wife on Wednesday morning. Kitex Sports Park, which is a
partnership of one of our clients.
OK, work in advertising. Kathy is one of my clients.
Yeah, they wanted to thank us for a what a good job we did at
(05:06):
the Sevens, especially with the fly over with.
We will get to that because I feel like that's that's I don't
know about the good job, but I mean, all right, whatever, we'll
get to it later it. Was a job.
It was a job. It was a job.
To thank us, they gave us a box at to watch Coldplay, which was.
I've never watched a concert at a box before.
Yeah, I. Feel like I never no.
(05:28):
I feel like I can't undo it. Like it was it was just the
ultimate adult. Like Oh my back hurts but I can
sit down with. These very coffee seats, that's
basically what they say about first class, right?
Like. If you have to line up, people
are bringing you, drinks you. Never.
And that's, that's a little much.
Yeah. Oh, and by the way, they had
like a buffet. They're just like concert
snacks. And I didn't realize Asian
(05:50):
concert snacks it would fit so well for what is Asian concerts
now. Yeah.
And it's just like spring rolls and like.
Like bite sized stuff. This is the best.
That's way better than, like, hot dogs, right?
Yeah, Yeah. Because the hot dogs just bread,
then it's gonna like fill you up.
Then you can just snack like just.
Four different dipping sauces. Oh, my God.
All right, Yeah, Yeah. I think a lot of people here who
(06:10):
might be losing some listeners who couldn't relate.
So there was there was a state initially I was laughing at the
So Wednesday was the second show, Tuesday was the first
show. So clearly the Super fans know
what was happening. Yeah, I did not.
So I'm watching. We're about the middle, like
where the halfway line would be at the rugby setup.
And so, you know, I we see the entire stadium.
(06:31):
Yeah, stage was a great setup. And after Coldplay's, like, all
right, you know, Thanks, everybody.
Good night. Lights go down.
Kind of. Yeah, a lot of people start
running for the exits. And I'm like, you guys are
stupid. Have you not been to a concert?
Yeah, yeah, there is clearly an encore.
There's. Clearly an encore.
They haven't even played Fix Youyet.
Oh wow, OK, it's like that. They're encore.
(06:52):
Yeah. So, yeah, you can tell that some
people just never been to account, like they just don't
have a concert ticket. That's.
What? I thought.
And then like 10 minutes in, thelights turn on, everyone's
screaming. Yeah.
And they made a makeshift stage at the back.
Wow, where? The encore was held so cuz they
wanted to oh we want to give something to the.
Yeah, all the way. Oh, that's cool.
And that was that was really cool.
(07:13):
And then I realized, oh, those fans knew what happened.
That's why they were running to the back.
Wow, to get to the front. Row of the encore I was.
Like that's smart, OK. That's the second time I've seen
this in the last year cuz me andCassie went to the Olivia
Rodrigo concert. No, at one point she.
Is that senorita lady? No, no, no, no.
Olivia Rodrigo is like a she's she.
(07:34):
She brought punk pop back to Gen.
Z. She's a great skinny Latina girl
in the US. That's why I was like with her
name. I thought it's the which one is
that? I love you when you call me
Senorita. Camilla also legit anyway, so
so. You try Camilla kabab kabala.
Kabala. Kabala Kabab.
(07:57):
So let me really go like, she does her concert and she like,
disappears from the stage. Yeah.
And then this, like, floating thing, it's like Shape of a
moon, yeah. Comes down from the ceiling that
she's sitting on. Yeah.
Over the cheap seats. Yeah, Yeah.
And then she does like 2 songs there before she gets back and
OK. I'm just like to support the
people with the cheap. Yeah, yeah, OK.
It's just a thing that they now do.
(08:17):
Like, I don't know if you guys saw anyone saw the Regina IP.
She posted that she was on Coldplay.
Yeah, but she was sitting at like the very back row at the
very. I'm like, Regina IP couldn't get
good tickets. Yeah.
Exactly, She could have probablyhad green room access if you
wanted to. Well, no, she's not.
Is she still in the government? Yeah, she's still in the OK.
Yeah, so you could get invited to a box.
Yeah, yeah. Some company.
(08:38):
Well, yeah, in some company. I was, I was almost tempted.
I mean, obviously couldn't sell the tickets.
Yeah, I was going with my wife. Yeah, but.
I would sell it. I would sell the tickets and my
wife. Because the reviews were so
good. I mean the the concert was
pretty incredible first two dayseveryone was so hyped.
So after the Wednesday the 2nd show, yeah the resale markets
(09:00):
like tickets were going up to like $6000 for.
Tickets. Oh my God, It's like, yeah,
yeah, that's crazy. I did see a lot of posts or like
people just like desperate. Apparently there was also as
kind of AI guess controversy with the viagogo.
So people, I am on Hong Kong moms, don't ask me why, but Hong
Kong moms and I see a lot of these posts that like on the day
(09:21):
of the show, they're expecting viagogo to like give them
physical tickets. And apparently I don't know how
via Google works. Do you know?
No so viagogo is a weird. I'm pretty sure it's AI
crawling. They're a third party reseller
of tickets. But they what they do is they
try to buy tickets or find ways to buy tickets and hope you find
(09:42):
them before the actual ticketingwebsite.
So I don't know if you've noticed.
Yeah, they pay for a lot of SEO.Like they're usually quite high
up. Yeah, so people would find like,
not so much when I do it in HongKong because Via Gogo doesn't
work in Hong Kong that often. But when I tour, people would be
like, Oh yeah, we found your tickets on Via Gogo.
Like why? Yeah.
And they pay extra price and they that's.
(10:03):
Crazy. Yeah, it used.
To have, I swear it happened in Hong Kong sometimes where like
not backstage, but when it was the riff where you find like
riff tickets on viagogo. That's crazy, this.
Is strange and they basically just charge like 40 bucks more
than you guys charge. Sure, sure.
And they'll just buy from you guys.
Yes, yes. You sell with them.
Yeah. So maybe us on the back end,
they're like, oh hey, we're selling tickets, it's actually
Viagogo. But then they might get stuck
(10:24):
with it if people are not buying.
See what happens then. So.
Do they just dump it a regular price maybe?
I am. I'm not sure what they do for
something like Coldplay unless they dump it at a regular price.
The weird thing about that concert though, it was physical
tickets only. Yes, which is strange.
I guess. 925. I guess maybe it's a better way
to avoid like scams and stuff like.
(10:46):
Yeah, maybe because. People like showing phones as
way like I guess it's hot. Is it harder or easier to have
paper versus phone I? Have no idea I know like the
cops were heavily arresting resellers.
Yeah, I saw, I saw on the on. The also, there's a there's a
very, let's say industrialist homeless guy.
(11:08):
Yeah. Outside of the stadium because
the stadium, there are certain things you're not allowed to
bring inside the stadium. Yeah.
So the main thing is water bottles.
And because it was raining yesterday, you can't bring in
umbrellas, right. But they have this rack of like,
you can just leave your water bottle here, pick it up when you
leave the station. Yeah, good luck with that.
Well, I mean, I'm sure you probably could if you remember
and it's. But is it like you're like, what
(11:29):
if you bring like a nice flask? You still can't take it.
So there was this homeless guy standing there.
Yeah. And I think me and Cassie were
like, is he asking people for money?
Yeah. Or is he waiting for the concert
to start just like I'm a steal 1000 Umbrellas.
Hey, that's real funny, dude, ifyou sell like salad at $5 and
(11:50):
you. Oh, my God.
Yeah. Oh my God, yeah, that's or he's.
Just like I'm going to have all these water bottles, I'm going
to open the Hong Kong water bottle.
OK, we now know who's the next guest in this.
Podcast find that homeless guy. This guy.
He's not homeless anymore. Oh yeah, exactly like.
How, how did you open this mansion?
Umbrella saying. Yes, maybe he would be producing
(12:11):
our our next version. So you have been to the the
stadium now three times in in what, a month?
Yeah. So sevens, you win sevens almost
as as work, right? Yeah, I so I got to say, I mean
the sevens had a few kinks to it.
So here are the pros if you guyshaven't been to Kitech Stadium
so obviously. Yeah, give people all the pro
(12:33):
tips. I mean, Coldplay Sevens
back-to-back was clearly there. Let's see if the stadium's going
to work, right? One, just bathrooms everywhere.
Like there's bathrooms next to bathrooms, right?
Coldplay, I never had to line upfor bathrooms once.
Even the sevens I never had to line up for.
Bathrooms. That's crazy.
Yeah. Which, you know, if you guys
have ever been to the sevens at the old stadium, it was, I mean.
(12:55):
Yeah, it was disgusting. Wait 45 minutes and then realize
like, oh, all the stalls are overflowing.
Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. Like, I used to do this thing
that are that someone there usedto be a magazine called Hong
Kong Magazine, and readers send in their rugby sevens pro tips.
OK. And one of the things I sent in,
which unfortunately I should nothave sent in because everyone
(13:16):
learned this pro tip. Yeah.
I was like, hey, a lot of peoplenever go into the handicapped
bathroom. Yes.
I actually, I figured that's probably what it was, but yeah,
Athens. Everywhere.
The the thing at the Sevens thata lot of people got upset by was
they ran out of food, right? Yeah.
And I went to the Sevens on the Saturday late.
(13:38):
I went around 1:00 PM Thank God I.
Apparently there's no beer either.
That they also ran out of beer. So they ran, They ran out of
alcohol on Sunday at the South Stand.
Yeah. So waiting for people to refresh
it. People.
Some people waited like an hour,hour and a half just to get a
drink. Yeah, the running out of food
thing sucked because a lot of people won.
(13:58):
They don't tell you they run outof food.
Yeah, which is annoying. Like, yeah, you're waiting in
line and it's not until you get to the front of the line and
say, oh, no, we ran out of food.Yeah, yeah, OK.
Because they're like, oh, do youwant to buy a beer?
Or yes, yeah, just try to sell you some other bullshit.
Yes, yes, yes. And which sucks for a lot of
people, because if you go to thesevens, you start drinking early
and if you never get any food, you're screwed.
Yes, of course. The other thing was at a certain
(14:20):
point we were in line. Thank God it got fixed by the
time I got in front. They're like, hey, our Wi-Fi
isn't working for some reason. Like why does your Wi-Fi need to
work? Yeah, they're like it means all
our POS systems aren't working. So we're only.
Doing cash until we fix it, right?
Everyone in line was like, yeah,weird costumes.
(14:41):
Some people like I don't have pockets in this thing.
Yeah, I'm wearing a chicken. Oh my God.
But I will say the stadium neverfelt crowded like at Coldplay on
Saturday. I was on the floor.
Yeah. Never felt crowded.
Stood near the front. Everybody's like dancing.
They're moving. You never felt like crushed in.
I saw someone at a restaurant with that light bracelet that
they give the audience. I'm like you're supposed to
return that you're. Supposed to return it.
(15:02):
Also, it doesn't do anything. Outside.
Yeah. Yeah, exactly.
So what they did was very cool because I've seen those light up
bracelets and I've used them at stadiums before, Yeah.
And usually it's like, all right, we're going to hit a
button and everyone's turns green.
Yeah, Coldplay was the Is it? Run by what?
Wi-Fi. So I think it must be RFID, but
(15:23):
what they did at Coldplay was the only time I've seen it
location based. And what I mean by that is like.
So you can actually change your.So not only is like their wave
of lights, wow, it would sometimes be like, oh, if you
look at the crowd, it's like giant heart shapes.
Yes, it's a heart shape of people.
With all red. Wow, that's really cool.
I'm going to say something that I might get in trouble for, but
(15:46):
whatever, it must be so good to see.
Go there on asset if you still have that.
So. So I'm saying hypothetically if
that's legal in a place where they allow that, I'm saying that
based. On the Internet, I could have
rainbows in my brain. I would until I remembered.
The only tough part is when you leave the stadium.
(16:07):
Yeah, everyone's leaving at once.
That's a big crowd. Yes.
And I don't, I don't know if you'd want to be on any psychic
or just in that crowd like. Again, theoretically I've never
tried this like but people said a lot of goods.
But yeah, like seeing, imagine seeing those visuals.
Yeah, and they do a lot of, theydo a lot of cute things they do.
He does improv and crowd work, which I've never seen at a
concert before. I I.
(16:29):
You see, I've been to concerts like I've seen, you know,
Metallica and Rolling Stones andStevie Wonder.
Stevie Wonder was particularly funny.
And the comic at me was like, just stay in your lame, man.
So not all, not all of it was funny intentionally so.
So what Chris Martin would do. So I think it's during right
around the halfway mark. So they're setting something up
(16:49):
on the stage. Right, right.
So he's just like filling? Time to distract them.
What he does is he starts, he starts playing on his piano and
he'll tell the cameraman just find some people, right?
And he just writes songs about them.
Oh wow, that's like. Improv.
And then it's yeah, yeah. And they'll do a verse.
Yeah, OK. That's, that's legit.
That's that's really. Cool.
So yesterday. So maybe he's not trying like to
(17:10):
be funny, just. Like so on the on the Saturday a
lot of them was were funny. Yeah.
This is about a kids missing teeth.
Yeah, about someone's haircut. Oh, fun.
OK, so he really went in. He did, like, proper, like,
crowd work. Yeah, like, like, like bashing
people and stuff. That's really cool.
And and so, by the way, even give a call back because so so
every concert he brings someone on stage.
(17:31):
Like an audience member, an. Audience member who's usually
holding a sign right with a songthat's not usually played at a
Coldplay concert. Right.
So that it's like a super fan asking for like.
I'll play it and you can sing itwith me.
Yes, yes. And he brought this to people
and he's like, are you a couple of the girls?
Like No, no, not a couple, not acouple.
He's like, but, but you guys friends like yeah, friends.
He's like, okay. He did the coming thing.
(17:53):
As he's playing the song, changethe words like it's like, thank
you, Elizabeth. Thank you, Clarence.
By the way, everybody remember they're just friends.
Nice, nice. Okay, it's like that's cute.
Everybody remember to love each other unless you guys are
Stephanie and. OK, that's very funny.
This was really good. Nice.
Nice, OK, energetic show. Yeah.
I mean, I saw that like right after this stop in Hong Kong,
(18:14):
they're going to Seoul for six shows.
So obviously that's a very tightact already.
Yeah. And yeah.
I wish certain things were advertised better cuz when we
were leaving, Cassie and my wife, she didn't want to.
Like, I don't want to get in theMTR with the crowd.
I'd rather wait until the crowd goes away.
Yeah. And there's a thing called Food
Village, which is like just nextto the stadium.
(18:34):
Yeah. Which was so smart.
And I didn't know why not enoughpeople knew about it.
You go down and there's just a row of food stalls and outdoor
bars, just really chill outside the stadium.
Yeah, yeah. So if you're waiting for a cab
or if you're like just like wantto chill for a little bit until
the stay. There for like an hour and a
half. Dude that sounds awesome.
And there were a lot of places like doing so, you know,
Zeppelin hotdog, yes. So Zeppelin hotdogs doing like,
(18:57):
oh, a trial. So like a mini size of their
hotdog. Oh yeah.
Yeah, that's awesome. Yeah, that's really cool.
Yeah. OK, so going back to because
this is mainly also kind of about, you know, your work a
little bit in advertising and you know, kind of like that that
stunts that you guys sometimes do.
So the the how did the whole contact flying the plane over
(19:19):
and feel free where we don't really edit this because no one
has time. So feel free to just say I
don't, I can't talk about this and we'll move on.
No, no, it's so we were. Obviously it's the first, the
first big event for the new stadium was the rugby sevens and
we wanted to do something yeah big.
And we've had this brief for since last summer, so pretty
(19:43):
much eight months now 9. Months so brief is from cafe.
From cafe, it's like, what do wedo to make it super memorable?
Right? OK, our actual brief, and I'm
sure the team who works at HSBC have the same brief.
Yeah, the brief is basically when people leave the stadium,
they're thinking about Cathay Pacific instead of HSBC.
And I'm sure there's our my, my friends who work at a different
(20:06):
agency. Yeah, PCF client.
Yeah, yeah, they have the same thing, right?
What did HSBC do? I know the Cathay, obviously
through the plane. What did they do?
HSBC released an ad on the firstday of the Sevens that you guys
can go look up. That's really cool.
Yeah, it's it's strange because we actually had a similar idea.
But to execute. Yeah, no, because our our ad was
more targeted at people coming to Hong Kong right for the
(20:28):
sevens because Kathy. Yeah, yeah, yeah.
Plane tickets. But HSBC basically did this
thing of like all these rugby players, people around Hong
Kong, they're pulling these giant tarps and you don't know
what they're doing. And turns out they're dressing
up the skyline of Hong Kong to be in costume for like, oh,
that's cute. It's like, oh, IFC is wearing an
Elvis costume. Yes, yes, yes.
So it's very cute. So they also taps into the
(20:51):
tradition of people dressing up for the sevens.
That's really cool because yeah,if you're an outsider you might
not know that. So it's like a kind of an in
joke with the locals, right? Yeah, that's cool.
So if you got. Sorry I'm praising the idea too
much. You're like I was so.
If you guys go to Chi Tech, there's a thing called the Sky
Bridge. And the Sky Bridge is this giant
bridge that just goes to the stadium.
(21:11):
And initially they were going todo a lot of LED panels on the
ceiling of the sky bridge, something they still might do.
And what we were going to do is,oh, it's the 100th year
anniversary of when Kitek was first built, right?
First plane to leave Kitek, which I'm pretty sure back then
would have been like a military plane or something.
Well, I I saw a photo, it does look like a commercial plane,
(21:32):
but like a maybe like a propeller one or something like
a really small. But also back then, like
commercial planes were, you know, they were either for cargo
or just like for private, Yes. So it's 100th year anniversary
and obviously Cathay was they called Kai Tech home.
Yeah, a lot of people like when I first came to Hong Kong.
Did you actually fly into Kai Tech?
Yeah. Do you have memory of it?
(21:52):
Oh, I lived. I lived in Kalantong.
So what? We were I don't know how.
Old Prince I lived in Prince Edward until I was 16, but Kai
I. Knew you grew up in Kowloon, but
like, I didn't know you're like,I guess that makes sense because
you are 37. Yeah.
So yeah, yeah. OK. 36 asshole.
So we, I remember there was a mall called Catalan City Plaza,
(22:15):
which no longer really exists. But me and a lot of people in
Hong Kong, we went to the roof of the car park.
Yeah. To watch the last plane take off
from. Oh.
You did OK. But also during, when I lived in
Prince Edward, like, I would seeplanes fly over us all the time.
Yeah. In fact, even KJS where I went
to school, we'd see planes. OK, so that was just part of
(22:38):
your child. It was totally part of DID.
You see the whole maneuver, likewas it clear from land that
they're like doing a crazy maneuver or whatever?
To be honest, because we grew upwith it, I didn't know how crazy
it was until later. Like, yeah, everyone like, oh,
it's so crazy to have that turn.And I'm like, oh, I just
thought, like, planes flew low all the time.
Your city doesn't do this. Yeah, I was like, what do you
(23:00):
mean? Planes don't fly in between
buildings, right? That people just live in.
Yeah, yeah. So obviously like those iconic
photos that like the old people sell and stuff that's like,
that's real. So what we wanted to do was
initially in the sky bridge, if we had LEDs on the ceiling, one
of the things was as people werewalking towards the stadium, it
(23:21):
would look like a plane's flyingover, so it'd land.
Oh, OK. Just like it used to land in
kind of yes yes, the LEDs were going to be delayed and we're
thinking about big things we cando like oh, is there a hot air
balloon we. Can only if you had some light
bracelets to hang up there and control them.
He's like. Oh, can we do anything with a
hot air balloon? Because like one of the first
(23:41):
rugby sevens 40 years ago, they had some hot air balloon, Yeah.
And someone was just like, oh, what if we actually see the
stupid idea, which like throwingstupid.
I was like, can we just fly a plane like over a?
Kind that's so quick. That's like, what is it, Mad
Men? Well, because I remember so when
someone said that, I was like, that's not a stupid idea.
(24:02):
Because in the US people fly fighter jets over stadiums all
the time for the dumbest reasons.
And one of them, which I'm goingto explain, is I went to
WrestleMania in Orlando, I thinkabout six or seven years ago,
and they flew 4 or 4 or 5F fifteens low over the stadium,
right? It was the loudest thing I've
(24:23):
ever. Heard, of course.
And so they sang America the Beautiful.
Then they had these planes fly through.
Yeah. And everyone in the stadium just
after you heard it, including myself.
Yeah, My buddy Craig, who was there with me, would just come
in. Yeah, right.
I looked at Craig. I was like, Craig, you're
British. I don't care.
That was awesome. Yeah, OK.
(24:44):
So they know how to play on those like strings.
Yeah, I was. Like it must be possible, right?
And honestly, it was. What's your position like to
like, like to go like, hey, run with this like, are you in a
position to be like, we should look into this more?
So I am I am more the hey somebody figure out if this is
(25:06):
possible? Right, which is strategy, yes.
Yeah, and, and sometimes we havethe big ideas and what I want to
do is sell Y It's like, oh, it'snostalgia, it's hunting
anniversary. OK.
It would get a lot of press attention.
Yeah, dumb, dumb question from an outsider.
Does the person who go like maybe we should fly a plane and
then it actually happens? Do they get a raise of sort?
(25:27):
Like do they get a thing? No.
Well, we. Got or credit?
We got box seats to go to. No, but that one guy, because
obviously you have the winning idea.
So the idea the whole team gets credit.
OK, I see. I see.
There is actually a piece today about this whole campaign.
It's got my name on it, so it's cute.
I mean, I'm one of like 12. On the STMP.
(25:50):
No, like different advertising magazines.
Yeah. OK.
So one of the things is there are a lot of aviation geeks out
there. Yeah.
So there are a lot of magazines that are just about aviation,
right? And a lot of those magazines and
websites all picked it up so. Yeah, yeah, yeah.
OK. So, so that's around the world,
not just here. Yeah.
And obviously we had to send it to the marketing team and the
marketing team was like, yeah, this is a great idea.
Let's say you can do it. And obviously it it took a while
(26:12):
to figure out, you know, this above my pay grade.
It was like, does the Aviation Authority allow?
Of course, yeah. Security, yeah, all of this
stuff. Yeah.
And so the unfortunate thing wasa lot of people complained that
it flew. Too far.
Past Kai tech, yes not over Kai tech so a lot of people
especially who were at the sevens, yes, we're a little
(26:33):
disappointed like you if you areat the South stand and there's a
big glass window at the edge of the wall for the South side.
If you went to South Stand and looked through the window, yeah,
you could see it, right? Most people in the stadium could
not see it, which was not the like they did.
Rehearsal. So is it weather?
That it was, it was weather because literally we were not
even told could we do it until the morning of.
(26:55):
Wow. You know, if people remembered
it was like it was very cloudy. It was rainy.
And yeah, I, I don't know how the decision was made.
It was definitely Aviation Authority, but I'm guessing it's
hey, if it is going to rain and there's clouds, yeah, maybe not
have a plain next to a building with. 50,000 people, yes, maybe.
They'll just fly close to Yeah. So a lot of people who were in
(27:18):
Wanchai or in like outside Kai Tech or even in TST Harbor, they
could see it. And some people said it was kind
of cool. I mean, the good thing is.
I, I will tell you because I, I,I was on the waterfront here,
the central waterfront, and my friend was visiting from the UAE
and I hyped her up. Well, that's actually, I blame
you for it because you told me and actually you told me again,
(27:39):
I can cut this if you really want, but you have told me kind
of before they went like, you'relike, hey, watch out for this.
I don't know if that's. What I wasn't revealing
information. About.
OK, fine, I'll cut it. It's fine.
No, no, no. No, I got.
It honestly, because we, we actually didn't know if it was a
possibility until a month beforethe sevens.
And then obviously, so there's avideo online that not only was
(28:01):
it when they said it was feasible, they actually had,
like, pilots, OK, we're gonna get in our simulators.
See how this is going to run? Cool.
And then there's a hole behind the scenes.
Does the simulator like like getupdated with like the most
recent? Yeah, yeah.
OK, those flight simulators are crazy.
Yeah, yeah. So there's there's the training
to do it, there's the weather todo it, there's the feasibility
(28:22):
to do. It but for the rehearsals,
obviously you said like for the rehearsals they actually got
flew over the the the stadium. I don't think they actually
flew. I think rehearsal as in they
they did it in the. Simulator, so they actually
never physically flew over. But they had, if I'm, I might be
mistaken, but one of the pilots,yeah, who flew had flown that
Catholic route previously, right?
(28:44):
Right. Like obviously what did you guys
did? Like a WhatsApp call or
something? What do you mean?
Like, didn't the pilot call everybody?
Yes, yes, yes, yeah, yeah. I mean, it wasn't what's that we
had like cameras set up, but yeah.
Yeah, I think the thing that they posted online or whatever
they like. We played it in the stadium.
Yeah, yeah, that's really cool. So he was just, I didn't listen
to, but he was like, you know. Yeah, we, we.
Talking to everybody. We even recorded a fake one.
(29:05):
Yeah, like in case it didn't work, we'd have to, like, play a
fake 1. So it looks like they're on the
call. That's smart.
But yeah, so. So the two pilots, one who had
flown it before, obviously 97, so almost 30 years ago, and the
other pilot who's like dream wasto fly that route and as a pilot
who's training always heard like, oh, the best pilot.
Yeah, yeah, but they did it. I guess they do the same landing
(29:28):
then. That was the whole actually, no,
there's no where to land. You have to go.
Oh, yeah, OK, I forgot about that.
But the landing, there's no morethere.
The landing would be best. Sorry, so stupid.
I'm like oh the different just land for shits.
Obviously you're, you're gettinglow and they were, they were
below I think 8 buildings in Hong Kong.
So obviously they flew lower than IFC ICC.
(29:49):
I don't know, but actually maybethe.
Final altitude was lower than those buildings.
I see. So and by the way, my favorite
industrial thing ever, cuz this,it obviously went very viral.
A lot of people in Hong Kong were talking about it.
The only people at the Sevens complained.
Most people actually said it waspretty cool.
Yeah, well, I'll give you like aneutral opinion because I
(30:11):
thought it was kind of cool. So yeah, Backtrack, you hyped me
up for it. I knew she was visiting.
I'm like, I'm going to show you this really cool thing.
You know, you're like, look at how cool Hong Kong is.
So we go there and, you know, it's public information that
they're flying at 4:00 PM or whatever.
We're like dead central, like right by Tamar Park, and we have
like a pretty good spot and there's a lot of people standing
there with their phones. Again, public information and we
(30:33):
see the plane and it's like quite far away.
Like it's still far as in distance, not high, but they're
like here it is. And I don't know why everyone
thought it's just going to get like really close.
I wouldn't say there was like audible like disappointment, but
it was more like everyone's likehuh, OK.
And then we saw it. I think the cool part is that as
it went east and then turned towards the state, yeah, yeah.
(30:56):
So that was kind of cool. It's turning further, but it's
going lower. So I'm like, oh, it's going to
the city, like it's going to Kowloon.
So that was fun. So the best spot a lot of people
said was if you are on the other, if you're on the Kowloon.
Side yes, yes, that would make sense.
You can see it turn in, but the funny part is that her and I
just went to Instagram stories and just like just goofed around
a bit and both of us got were both from Egypt and both of us
(31:19):
got multiple responses were a friend friend back home.
They're like, bro, I see closer.Like it's basically how you grow
up. We have a similar thing.
You have been to Egypt. You know what Nasr City is?
Yeah, yeah, yeah. So Nasr City is right by the
airport. And that's exactly how it is.
Like you can just stand on your balcony and see plane.
By the way, that's still happening.
This is not unlike Kitech. You can still see planes landing
(31:42):
today in Nasr City, really close.
So all of our friends are like, you could have just come here,
just come home, especially to her because she's visiting.
They're like you idiot went to Hong Kong for this.
Honestly, so when that happened where we're editing the videos
like there are people like the plane just finished flying and
there are people editing like the video to put and we thought,
(32:03):
OK, it's not going to fly over the stadium, but most people
aren't at the stadium. Yeah, most people aren't looking
at it. So we need a video.
So it looks very fucking cool tomorrow.
The video is cool, Yes, the video is cool, yeah.
We need to make this look very cool tomorrow, Yeah.
Which it did so. Yeah, going back to the Kitex.
So I haven't been to either rugby Sevens or Coldplay.
(32:23):
I'm just like that lurker onlinedoesn't see what people say.
And one of the things that I think complained complaints from
Coldplay is that a lot of peoplekept complaining that the one of
the roof to open. Yes.
So the roof was closed. The roof was closed for all the
Coldplay concerts. The roof was closed, yes.
OK, so first of all, it's I've never been in a stadium that has
(32:45):
a roof that's already fucking cool.
That's cool. Yeah, it's really cool.
And the fact I do they did they want it to open just to see it
opening because it's cool, or was there another reason?
No, no, That was like a pretty common complaint.
So the the the roof was closed the whole time for Coldplay,
right? And I think it was because the
Coldplay concert goes past 10 and there are a lot of assholes
(33:09):
in Hong Kong who love to complain about.
Everything. Are you serious?
And that a lot of people who live around Kai Tech, yeah,
would complain to the governmentabout noise complaints.
Yeah, but then why? Like, OK, going with that logic,
they're not going to like, you know, when they do this here
with bars, they go to like Craftisimo and then an old lady
complaints and the cops show up.What the fuck are they going to
do? I.
Mean the government look, I mean.
(33:32):
Yeah, but just go with that how much they spend on.
Kite That's actually why they'venever done major concerts at the
old stadium, because the stadium's outdoors, and I mean
old stadium, it's it's even worse because Happy Valley, a
lot of rich people, there's noise at 10:30, which by the
way, I look at it a different way, I'm like, you live in
(33:52):
Kitech, you get free concerts all the time.
Yeah, yeah, exactly. You just see.
So, so one of the things that people complain about is that so
I, I believe because actually Chris Martin mentioned it in the
Wednesday show, they Coldplay iswell known for doing fireworks
during their shows. Right.
That's I think that was part of the complaint, Like where are
(34:14):
the fireworks? Because it's closed, there's no
fireworks. But how high is this the
ceiling? It's very hot.
It's very. Hot so, but you then you could
have done the fireworks anyway, you know.
Well, so apparently on the firstshow, yeah, because I was like,
yeah, we tried indoor fireworks last night and we're not doing
that again. OK, well I want to see videos of
like someone right in if you have, if you're in the first
(34:37):
night and saw the fireworks. A lot of confetti cannons and
all that stuff, so it was kind. Of cool, Yeah, balloons and
whatever. So that was that was fun.
There was like a giant balloon coming right towards.
That's right there. Yeah.
And we jumped just like hit it once and we're like.
Yeah, but going back to Happy Valley, that does actually I
would side with the residents onthat because it's so central
(34:57):
that like if you have like a made like a loud concert like
Coldplay, you're yeah, that's kind of crazy, but you know what
I mean for. Me, it's like it's ending at
10:30. It's not that.
That's actually true. Yes, yes, no, you're right.
Like I'm thinking both but I guess.
So you know what was loud and everyone and this happened at
both concerts and I didn't realize Coldplay just had crazy
(35:18):
fans. People left the concert and they
just started singing Viva La Vida and then like non-stop for
like 40 minutes. So you're you're having 50,000
people leave a stadium just which is like.
Cute cute, I guess, but also if you have just listened to two
(35:39):
hours Coldplay, you might be like, all right, we're over it.
I'm. Like, Can't Sing that.
Sing a better song. This is a different one.
Even on the on the first night Itook the MTR home, Yeah.
And people were singing on the train back, right?
And there were. 2 Just a catchy tune, right?
Two different groups of people singing and then they, like, met
up in the middle, Yeah, to find each other on the train to,
like, film a big video. And it was interesting because,
like, one group was older local peoples, probably, like, in
(36:02):
their 40s, yeah. And one group was like, Indian
teenagers. Yeah.
And I was thinking, like, what other band besides Coldplay is
going to get an audience as diverse in age?
Because that concert legit had kids.
Yeah. But also people in their like,
fifties, 60s. That's pretty cool.
Yeah, that's actually. I don't know if anyone else
because. They've been around for a while,
(36:23):
too. They've been, I mean, they've
been around since I was in high school.
Or yeah, but they look like, youknow, as opposed to like, you
know, the the stones, Well, theylook actually from the Stone
Age. They're all in their late 40s.
They all look great. I think they're all like I.
Mean clean and stuff. Well, they're all like Namaste
people, right? Yes.
It's a lot of the concert, like Chris Martin.
I didn't know if I would enjoy it or not.
(36:43):
I was OK with it. Some people I knew hated it.
Some people loved it. It's very like, believe in love,
guys. Believe in peace.
Look at how many different racesand creeds and colors and ages
are in this concert. It's not that hard.
Everybody just love each other. Yeah.
OK. Yeah, OK.
And then there was one part of the concerts, like, all right,
everybody look out. Look out.
Find someone across the stadium you don't even know.
(37:05):
Look em. Point at them and just say I
love you. Like.
All right, yeah, they get. Yeah, they get a bit preachy
sometimes. You're like, just again, just
stay in your lane. Yeah, they're like, maybe you
can make a cute, you know, comment, but like.
They're like, think about someone in your head, someone
that you might not even know or someone that you might even hate
and tell them you love them. And I just yelled out, I love
you, Carrie. Nice.
(37:28):
So yeah, I mean, do you see the stadium?
Like one thing that I also heardor seen online is that people
are saying like the stadium is very good, it's very functional
as Hong Kong goes, like in termsof efficiency, they're like,
it's not impressive to look at. Is that a fair?
It is not impressive to look at from the outside because from
the outside, I mean, it's I mean, there's been a lot of
(37:50):
jokes made about it. Like someone said, it looks like
a hemorrhoid doughnut. There's also like AAI think it's
like a butt plug brand or a sex toy brand.
OK with a logo. Just looks like the stadium.
Right, right. OK.
I mean, people will make it will, as you see it, anything
with something filthy, right? When you're in the stadium, it
looks cool. OK, Yeah.
I mean, it looks, I mean especially, you know it, it
(38:12):
looked when I got there for the sevens.
I'm like, this is a very big state-of-the-art state.
I've been to a few stadiums for sporting and stuff.
It's not something incredibly special, but it's kind of cool.
But with Coldplay, with the production, with the stage, with
how big it is, this is easily the biggest concert ever in Hong
Kong, right? Yeah, like.
(38:32):
What about like, people like JayChou?
Well, Jay Chou is coming soon, but.
This. Oh, he hasn't.
OK, just. Because we, we've never had a
venue this big, right, right. All our venues are smaller.
Even most recently like Asia World Expo with their capacity
is what 15 K, Yeah, yeah, this was they sold 50K, all four.
Nights. Four nights, yes.
So they sold 200,000 tickets? That's nuts.
(38:52):
That's not that is nuts for HongKong because have.
Nicholas Tan and Jay Chou come soon, but yeah, obviously
they'll also have the all the sporting events in the summer,
so that's going to be awesome, yeah.
And then, yeah, we'll get into that as well.
Again, don't know you can wave at me if you say how much.
We're both big Liverpool fans. How involved are you in the
whole Liverpool planning? Let's say I was pretty involved.
(39:16):
I'm a little less involved now because it was just.
Like so is it the same agency but you guys are doing different
projects? So this one so Standard
Chartered is also. Right, right.
OK. And Standard Chartered is a big
sponsor of Liverpool. Yeah.
Liverpool's other sponsor, AXA, is also a client of mine.
OK, So I was like, so I was like, I remember.
You can get box tickets twice, no?
(39:37):
Even even before they announced Liverpool was coming to Hong
Kong. Yeah, I told both clients I was
like, if Liverpool wins and you don't do anything about it,
yeah, you guys are idiots and wasting an.
Opportunity. Yes, yes, definitely.
So what can we tell people of the things?
What, what, what? What is public right now?
So I I. Or what are you guys planning?
(39:57):
I think we obviously they they want to well, one of the things
they don't want to do, yeah. The big thing is like, we can't.
Like how do we capitalize on the?
I don't know if capitalize right.
Well OK, how do we not make the same mistakes that Tattler did?
With messy messy coming over. Because obviously that was a
(40:19):
mess. Yeah, that was a complete mess,
Yeah. It's going to be a little
different since Standard Charteris a global sponsor, so they
have much more access to the players.
But also, like, how do we take advantage of what worked?
Yeah. So I mean, how many people were
wearing pink messy jerseys? Who?
I bet didn't even know Inter Miami exists.
Yes, for sure. There were a lot of football
(40:40):
fans that just or just casual, Yeah.
Hong Kong regulars who were like, oh, Bessie's coming.
I might check this. Yeah, yeah, yeah.
Story. Yes.
So obviously there is an appetite for that.
So it's like, all right, not only is Liverpool coming, but
Liverpool might be champions. Obviously we can't announce that
they're champions, but once theybecome.
You can announce now they're champions.
(41:00):
Well, they'll be no. I mean, I don't want to jinx it,
right? Of course, of course.
And you can't, obviously. Ultimate bottle.
You can't. We can't put it on an ad.
No, no, people might blame you. You like Jinx that?
Once they are, it's like, hey, Hong Kong always gets like, all
right, so Hong Kong we we didn'tget Dua Loopa, we didn't get
Taylor Swift. No Lady Gaga.
No, Lady Gaga. Yeah, into Miami came and Messi
(41:21):
didn't even play. And then so how, how are we
going to capitalize on the fact that not only is a Premier
League team coming to Hong Kong,they're the fucking champions.
Yes. And so that that was so a lot of
what my role was is like, all right, Liverpool's coming over.
How do you make it exciting? The the fun thing about my
office, I got to give them respect.
Yeah, they basically, it wasn't the usual team who runs Steiner
(41:46):
Chartered. Yeah, who's on this project?
They're basically like, who are the big football fans and more
importantly, who are the big? Liverpool.
That's really cool. Yeah, yeah.
Yeah. And like there were people by
office I didn't even know where.Liverpool fan.
Yeah, yeah, yeah, Liverpool fan.That's great.
So like that was your little like what's it called?
Like the group project from a high.
School or like there's a guy who's like he's a, he's a
Colombian guy. Wasn't even a Liverpool fan but
(42:07):
just like loves Diaz because Diaz is from Colombia.
Sure, sure. OK.
And we're just like, all right, this is how football fans
interact. And then it's it's things like,
all right, what do we do for thefootball fan, which is going to
be a lot of them, but most importantly, what do we do for
the people who aren't football fans to get them excited about
this event? So there's some things like we
can't really talk about, but it's, you know, basically are
(42:28):
are we going to do camps for children?
Are we going to do appearances? Are they going to do like, I
don't know, at a, at a concert with it, something to celebrate
the fact that they're like, you know how champions celebrate
when they, when they officially win, they do a parade in their
city. Is there something we can do
like that in Hong Kong? Oh, that's that would be really
awesome. I mean, as you said, like even
like just the casuals. And, and, and also the weird
(42:50):
thing is because the government has announced, so there's going
to be 3 matches played over the summer, yeah, there's going to
be Manchester United versus the Hong Kong All Stars, whatever
that means. By the way, just a just a shout
out because we have a lot of friends who are Manchester
United fans. I've never seen people, fans of
a team in Hong Kong less excitedthat their team's coming.
(43:13):
This has never. Happened before.
I mean, they don't have, they don't have stars.
Yeah, but usually you're like, yay, my team's coming this year,
they're like. But also what United's like what
8th, 9th now like I. Don't even know if they're that
high. And they're in the relegation.
Yeah, whereas like, but but everyone I know, yeah, like
Tottenham's arguably having as bad as the season of right
United. Yeah, but they have Sun and he's
(43:35):
obviously. And also like Tottenham's had a
lot of injuries, but like every Spurs fan and every Arsenal fan
I know is excited about that game.
So they have they have United versus the Hong Kong All Stars.
Yes, they have. Let me just.
Say, I am pretty sure everyone on the Hong Kong All Stars team
has a full time job. That is not a no.
Yeah, for sure, for sure. Like I was like, dude, that guy,
(43:55):
he's going to be marking Bruno Fernandez, Yes.
And then washing dishes on the same night.
It's like, yeah, I got the late shift at the Cha Cha.
They they got AC Milan versus Liverpool, Liverpool, and then
they have Arsenal versus Tottenham.
Yeah. And all three have different
corporate sponsors. So I see obviously Tottenham's,
(44:17):
it's going to be run by AIA because they're sponsored by
AIA. Yeah.
And so one of the other things is how do we make that different
from everyone else? And like, how do we make.
So it's when people think like, oh, Standard Charter did a great
job organizing this event and different from all the other
three versus like, oh, Tatler screwed the pooch and didn't
have in the contract that Messi needs to play.
(44:37):
Yeah, so. So how did Yeah, how are you
guys prepared for a potential like maybe, you know, people are
expecting Son or Salah or someone to play and then they
don't? Well, I think so one.
Because that's obviously the biggest lesson from the whole
messy thing. For for Salah specifically.
So for the people here who don'tfollow football, yes, yes, Salah
(44:59):
and Virgil Van Dyke, two of their best players, yeah.
Signed contracts to extend, yes,this year, literally yesterday,
yeah. They were supposed to be free
agents. So when we announced Liverpool's
coming, we couldn't use any photos of Virgil or Salah or
Trent Alexander. Who is now left?
Who? Who is leaving?
Yes, yes, yes. So one of the things we're like,
(45:21):
shit, what if, what if, what if we have a game with the three
most pop, three of the four mostpopular players, not even on
the. Team well, but people love
what's his name, The Hot. Guy Nunez.
Nunez is who's like, not great honestly.
Sorry Nunez. If you're listening, I.
Hope you score a goal tonight, right?
Exactly. But so, so we have to work out
all these contingency plans or different angles.
(45:43):
So the good thing is like that we, we do a lot of research.
We one of the things that's coolis it's the anniversary of what
they call the perfect game, so. Is that the AC Milan?
Oh, that's why this is happening.
AC Milan versus. Liverpool the Champions League
final they. Were down 3 nil, yeah.
Came back tied 33. Won it in penalties.
Yes. And it's the 30th anniversary of
(46:05):
that. So wait, what, 30?
No. Or 20th anniversary.
No, I was going to say fuck man,I don't remember watching that.
No 20th anniversary. OK, 20th.
OK, so. We we can say like, oh, this is
the 20th anniversary of the perfect game.
Are we going to get another perfect game?
I see it. I see.
OK. So those are the things you.
Can play on that. Would it be like kind of cheeky
to like like like now they're signed, but when you're doing
(46:25):
these ads that like you have like a shadow of Salah, like
plausible deniability because that's like a specific
hairstyle. Now I mean yes, with Virgil as
well. Virgil as well.
That would be like, if I was in the office, that's what I would
say. I'm like, how cheeky can we be?
Well. The thing is, like, we had to
film promo videos. Yeah.
And Liverpool, the squad was only available, I think a few
weeks ago to film. Yeah.
(46:47):
And we couldn't use Virgil or Trent or Salah just in case.
Yes, yes. So I was the cool thing.
Like, that was one of the most fun things I got to do was just
like create a chart of players of like who is priority that
we'd want in this ad. Yes, yes.
To get Hong Kong excited. And it was like, people would
just ask me why. There's a lot of a lot of even
(47:07):
our clients who aren't football fans.
Yeah. They're like, oh, why'd you pick
that guy? He's like Allison, the
goalkeeper. He's the best goalkeeper in the
world. He's great.
He's like, why that guy? He's like, Endo?
He's Japanese. We need one Asian guy.
We're like, oh, what about that guy?
Nunez is like, women think he's really, really hot, so that's
important. I guess he's hot, but I wish he
(47:28):
is less hot and better. Like like be 20% less hot and
score 20% more. Yes, please pay attention less
to your hair and more to the freaking.
I will say, 'cause you know now that bubble Bunny, everybody,
yeah. One of the best favorite things
to do is like complain about, like what Hong Kong people care
about. Yes, And one of the it's, it was
(47:49):
a short argument, thank thankfully.
And it wasn't the whole client team.
It was just like one client asked a question.
I remember we showed a mock up of this ad.
And for those of you guys who know Liverpool, their colors are
red. They're even called the Reds.
Is their nickname Standard Chartered?
Their colors are green and blue and not red.
Yeah, Red represents their rivals HSBC.
(48:13):
Oh yeah, true. And they were like, they were
looking at this poster. They're like, can you make it
less red? Yeah, yeah.
No, red are the Liverpool colors.
Yeah, but they're also called the Reds.
Like, yeah, but they'll think about HSBC's.
Like it's not my fault you guys sponsored A-Team whose colors
are red. Yeah, that's literally their
name. They're like, they're like, can
we get them to wear like the other kits?
I'm like, guys, they're kids, say Standard Chartered off them.
(48:35):
Yes, yes, exactly. People are going to be fine,
People are going to be fine. Well, AC Milan is also red,
yeah. So, but it's also like, guys,
the reason you got this sponsorship is to have your logo
everywhere. Yes, yes, yeah.
That's fine, you all have to seethe colors.
And yeah, yeah, one one thing I'm excited about before we wrap
this up is that I told you that in in in person, in private,
(48:56):
that now after Salah science, it's very, very likely that
obviously would be here. Yes, with the team.
Hopefully. I don't think I said this on
this podcast before. So Mahmoud Rizzigay is a is my
cousin, my first cousin. Well, actually he's not my
first. He's my mom's first cousin,
which is weird because he's 30 and my mom is 60.
So he came very late in life andhe basically like this part of
(49:19):
the family is actually not like doing great financially.
So and then he's like the like the young kid who just.
Came like the head played in thePremier League.
Is he still in? Turkey right now or?
Yeah, he's actually going to go back to Egypt to my team, Ali.
Oh, nice. Which is cool as well.
That's where he's started. That's where he's going to like
wants to finish his career, which is awesome.
But like that part is really cool that like he came like as
(49:39):
like kind of an accident. His dad was really old already
when he when he arrived and now he's like the richest person by
far in our family by like a big majority, right.
So when the window and. I'm sure.
I bet when he goes back he he gets like brand deals.
He's. Oh, yeah.
Yeah. Oh.
Easy advertising. Easy.
So actually in the in in the Egyptian.
Now, this is not to nerd out football too much, but like, the
(50:02):
three top guys are Muhammad Allah, Omar Mahmoud and him.
Yeah. So right after the two Premier
League top guys, it's actually him.
So it's quite high up. So when the Liverpool
announcement came, I immediatelywent to my phone and I don't
know where he is now, but so I had to go through someone to get
him a message. I'm like, get me with Salah in
the same place. I don't know how you do it.
(50:23):
So apparently the answer came back to me with they don't, they
really don't like it when someone does that at the
stadium. Yeah, like the day, just like,
not good. However, you have a much higher
chance going to the hotel. OK, Not like accidentally.
Oh, I I thought he was like, yo,I'll tell you what mosque he's
going to be putting. I mean they might be like, oh
whoa, is that Muhammad Salah? Yeah, and then he just like the
(50:46):
post, but he said like basicallyI would ask him to arrange
something so he could just go say hi to the hotel.
Cool. Which would be awesome.
And if that happens, I would come in here on this podcast and
cry about it for an hour about God I would already got.
Him as a podcast guest. 2 Mohammads.
Yes, the two more and more exactly the.
Two most famous Mohammads from Egypt.
(51:06):
Well, the two most famous Mohammads in Hong Kong for sure
at the same time. But that's pretty awesome.
We, we're really excited. Like it feels like, I know maybe
we've said that a couple of times over the last few years,
like Hong Kong's back, but it's really feels now they're like,
oh, we have, we have stuff. So so with the Sevens was a
little different because Sevens,I mean, the Sevens was great,
(51:29):
but it was also, you know, Sevens is a big tourist event.
And I had a feeling at the firstconcert on Wednesday with so
many people who are locals, Coldplay fans, like singing,
leaving the stadium. Yeah, I told you about in the
train. Yeah.
I was like, this is I haven't seen so many people in Hong Kong
have fun together in a long. Yeah, yeah.
That that that was a cool feeling.
(51:51):
Even Cassie, who's, you know, it's pretty cynical about Hong
Kong these days. She's like, this is great.
Look at all the kids who are smiling, the parents who are
smiling honestly. Yes, again as like whatever
weirdo just sitting at home watching everything online.
Yeah, I was happy for Hong Kong.It's like it's cool.
You know, I walk around here in Soho and then like people are
like coming out after the events, like the restaurants are
(52:11):
a bit like there is more late night spots now to eat yeah than
in the last like couple of. Years now I I'm worried that
Coldplay might have set the bar too high because if a band comes
in and doesn't have crazy production value like no lights,
no like yeah, confetti cannons, no crazy like crazy wristband
it's just like a band yeah like.People get there.
(52:34):
My thing on my wrist is a lighting.
Yeah, yeah, yeah. Exactly, You don't light up my
watch. That's very exciting.
Thanks for all your work on on this stuff.
Like legitimately, that's reallycool.
But so I got to say, after the experience on Wednesday, my goal
is to work extra hard for this Liverpool project, yes, so that
Standard charter gives me a box.Yes and you know how we will be
(52:55):
there with right with you That'sawesome I.
Mean if not, we'll find ways to get tickets.
Oh yeah, I know the tickets. But like, yeah, you got to aim
high. Yeah, aim high.
Yeah. But also, one thing I thought of
earlier when you were saying that, like why you are choosing
the Liverpool players? It's such a cool feeling to have
like your hobby, like the thing you're interested in, one of
your top things is also basically coincides with your
(53:17):
work. My God.
And that's like when you were like 100%, I lucked out with
this just to go like, no, no, it's Allison Endo and this guy
and explain to all the other guys you're like, no, I know.
And this also happens to be my hobby.
There's something I can't fully share, sure, but there is
something coming up at work. Yeah, that for the first time
(53:37):
since I've been working on advertising, which is a long
time. Yeah, that's stand up comedy
related. Yeah.
OK. That's pretty awesome.
Yeah, OK. I'll reveal that when it's.
Yes, yes. We'll bring you back on here to
talk about it. Gary, thank you so much for
coming on. How do people find you online?
I am Garen on Instagram, that's probably the best place to find.
Me, yeah, OK, cool. We will get into the Patreon
(53:59):
right after this patreon.com/opod very quickly,
as I said in the beginning of the podcast, you know, getting
the editing done and everything.And people who have supported us
for a while, all this equipment is actually bought with the
Patreon money, which is super cool.
So we're going to do a bonus andI'm going to talk about
something. Yeah, some some of the
scheduling issues that cannot talk about it.
They're free, like, yeah, public.
(54:20):
So we'll just do it on the Patreon.
So if you are liking the supportUS patreon.com/hohopod and find
us at a live show. Garen performs a lot all over
town and with us as well at backstage comedy that are
LinkedIn the description for thebackstage shows.
And Vivek will not be around forthe next couple of weeks, so
(54:40):
we'll have different guest hostsand stuff.
So stay tuned and thanks for listening and we will see you
next week. Music.
Popular Podcasts
On Purpose with Jay Shetty
I’m Jay Shetty host of On Purpose the worlds #1 Mental Health podcast and I’m so grateful you found us. I started this podcast 5 years ago to invite you into conversations and workshops that are designed to help make you happier, healthier and more healed. I believe that when you (yes you) feel seen, heard and understood you’re able to deal with relationship struggles, work challenges and life’s ups and downs with more ease and grace. I interview experts, celebrities, thought leaders and athletes so that we can grow our mindset, build better habits and uncover a side of them we’ve never seen before. New episodes every Monday and Friday. Your support means the world to me and I don’t take it for granted — click the follow button and leave a review to help us spread the love with On Purpose. I can’t wait for you to listen to your first or 500th episode!
Dateline NBC
Current and classic episodes, featuring compelling true-crime mysteries, powerful documentaries and in-depth investigations. Follow now to get the latest episodes of Dateline NBC completely free, or subscribe to Dateline Premium for ad-free listening and exclusive bonus content: DatelinePremium.com
Stuff You Should Know
If you've ever wanted to know about champagne, satanism, the Stonewall Uprising, chaos theory, LSD, El Nino, true crime and Rosa Parks, then look no further. Josh and Chuck have you covered.