August 19, 2025 • 55 mins
Vivek Mahbubani is out of commission for a few weeks as a result of an accident (he will be fine and will make a full recovery), so Mohammed Magdi takes the liberty of picking co-hosts. This week we have strategy consultant, comedian, and one of HK's best success stories, Ben Quinlan.
Mohammed and Ben chat about mega events in Hong Kong, their love for the city they both call home, and Ben's upcoming theater show on Sep 21.
Get tickets for Ben Quinlan's Theatre Show on Sep 21: https://www.ticketflap.com/benquinlanhk
Get tickets for Hong Kong Comedy Season shows:
http://comedyseason.hk/
Get tickets for Backstage Comedy shows: https://thebackstagehk.com/
Subscribe to our Patreon: https://www.patreon.com/hohopod
Follow Mohammed on Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/theothermohammed
Follow Vivek on Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/funnyvivek
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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. Hey everybody, it's a new
(00:23):
episode of Hong Kong. I'm your host Mohammed Magdi and
moment of silence, everybody. This is sometimes we start, you
know, jokey jokey today where we're having a proper moment of
silence for Vivek's ankles. Vivek totally messed up his
(00:44):
ankles. If you have been on his
Instagram, you might see a horrific photo of his legs both
just blown out. If you, if you can identify a
bit of sound, a tingle of joy inmy voice, that's because, yes,
I'm very happy that this happened to him because as you
know, he's my mortal enemy. And now I'm getting some of his
(01:04):
gigs. So, you know, it's just a pure
win for me. And also I don't get to talk to
him for a while. I am.
No, I obviously it's very sad that all of these things that
people have to say politely so they can look good, but no, I
went over to his bed and I'm like, ha, ha, you suck.
And, you know, stop doing too much and all of these things.
(01:25):
And you know, if you play back many of our episodes and I'm
like, you're working yourself todeath, here is proof.
And I hate to say I told you so,but I fucking told you so.
Vivek, you should chill out. Actually, I will let him tell
the story when he's back on in four to six weeks,
unfortunately. It's very sad.
(01:45):
But no, he's doing fine. Oh man, I can't stop laughing at
him, he's doing fine and all of these things, good spirits, blah
blah blah. So yeah, so Vivek blown out both
his legs which means he can't even walk to the studio in his
own house to record, which meansI have the liberty of talking to
whoever the hell I want. Actually people might know that
(02:06):
I already do book the guests when we have guests on, so that
doesn't change. Except that he doesn't have to
interrupt me anymore with his random.
What do you call like when you are running off?
When I thought for like 7 to 8 minutes, no, you can talk Ben,
it's OK. People know there is a guest
because there is a title. It's called a tangent.
Tangent. That's the word.
(02:26):
Yes. Thank you.
I just had the two big pockets of falafel and I'm very, I see.
I can't even talk. What's the word when you have
too much food? Ben, this is cheese man here.
Is a translator to translate. English to English yes exactly
when you're just way too slow and hard too much food.
Also so stereotypical of me. I was just came here I'm like
(02:48):
I'm full of falafel. So anyway, I decided I'll fill
you guys in a bit. You know, while talking to Ben
as well about the the Joe Wong shows and the crazy scale that
we did the shows on and how coolit is.
But I would like to apologize because I did mention the
podcast group that Joe would be the guest.
(03:09):
And unfortunately, we just didn't have time.
Like we, you know, there was crazy rain or if you remember, I
mean, it's probably raining right now whenever you're
listening in Hong Kong. It has been raining for the last
3 1/2 fucking business years. So yeah, just because of the
rain and all of this, we just really didn't have time to get
the recording done with Joe. He was really interested.
I'm so sorry. I just couldn't make it happen.
(03:31):
And it's also because Vivek had the equipment and he couldn't
even move. Not blaming him, just saying
that there was a whole lot of logistical nightmares happening.
So today I'm talking to my buddyBen Quinlan.
Ben is Hong Kong famous, LinkedIn famous and stand up
comedy famous. A lot of titles on this guy.
He is one of the earlier guests.I think you were a guest on
(03:53):
episode. I don't remember what.
What is it? I don't know, 7100, yeah.
Yeah, one of the earlier guests on the podcast, we'll bring him
back on just to chat with him. So he is my cohost slash guest
and also we have a big announcement for Ben that we'll
do in a little bit. But Ben, how are you doing, man?
Good, never seen someone so laugh so much at someones
(04:14):
misfortune. I know that's when you know,
it's like, you know, you roast the ones you love kind of thing.
Yeah, sure, sure. I hope you don't love me anytime
soon. I'm like finally Ben got an
accident. Let me DM his wife real quick
see how she's doing. Yeah, but Vivek, all the best to
you, man. I hope you recover soon.
And I'm not laughing or smiling while I say that.
(04:35):
He was. I just muted his microphone.
He just kept waving me to not show his laugh.
But yeah man, good to good to see you as always you have been,
I want to say you've been busy, but you have always been busy
since I met you. Yeah, well, I mean, I'm juggling
quite a few things, so, you know, business is taking up a
lot of time, and it means I haven't been back on stage as
much as I want to be. Yeah, You saw me the other week,
(04:57):
which is good. Yes.
It's always nice to shake off the cobwebs and tell a few jokes
and, you know, remind myself that that's a really fun part of
my life, right? Yeah, Yeah, you should.
You know, I mean, I would say like it doesn't matter how much
money you make or whatever. It's like if you're if you're
not having fun in the process and if your fun is so limited to
just like chasing, you know, just the next fortune, whatever
(05:19):
it is, I don't I don't believe it's worth it in my opinion, not
that I even can relate to that you.
Would say that, wouldn't you? Yeah, but I just don't believe
it's, you know? In all honesty, it's very true.
I I have a lot of friends and acquaintances that are very
wealthy and not very happy. So it's the correlation between
the two is in terms of happiness.
(05:39):
Isn't that clear? Yeah.
I agree. Yeah.
So one of the things, you know, I wanted to, obviously we're,
we're, we're friends, we're chatting.
One of the things that we talkedabout recently, like when I was
when we caught up right before the Joe Wong shows and he saw me
like quite stressed and like running around and stuff.
You're like, you know, you obviously are busy.
I'm like, you know, I'm busy andthe business is doing relatively
(06:00):
well in comparison to before. So I'm busy and relatively
successful and obviously everything is relative.
And you're like, you know, I'm like, I looked at you, I'm like
you. I am new to that word.
You have been both for a very long time.
So how do you advise someone like young, like me, just a
young startup guy And you adviseobviously and you sit on boards
for like startups and stuff. How do you deal?
(06:22):
Like how do you tell young people, young entrepreneurs to
manage this kind of like, you know, when the curve is going up
and you're like, Oh my God, I'm getting overwhelmed.
I'm not overwhelmed, but I am very aware of burnout.
How do you what advice do you give young people doing that?
Good question. I actually did a podcast a few
months ago speaking specificallyabout oh, wow.
Yeah. So yeah, there's no shortcuts in
(06:44):
life in general. I understand that most
successful people, unless you'reborn into wealth or you are
extremely lucky, most people work their asses off.
And even those that are extremely lucky have put
themselves in situations where they are more likely to be lucky
than not. Right.
You can't sit at home and moan about things not going your way.
They're usually out there and doing what's required.
(07:05):
A lot of hassle, a lot of rejection, a lot of exhaustion.
But you have to find moments where you give yourself a
reprieve, recharge, reset. If you don't do that, you will
hit a burnout moment. And it's very, it's very easy to
reach burnout. I know a lot of a lot of
founders, a lot of corporate executives that are just
constantly exhausted. And it drains all your
(07:26):
happiness. And you're right, if you keep
going after the next bucket of money and then you get it that
you realize that each and every bucket of money doesn't actually
make you incrementally happier, right?
There's a thing called Maslow's hierarchy of needs.
You basically got, you know, your accommodation, your food,
the shelter, Yeah, had all of these kinds of things.
When you've got your basic necessities sorted, everything
(07:47):
else is just a little purple bonus.
And yeah, you know, I think it'simportant.
Perspective is very important. Yeah, I mentioned this on the
podcast before, but to you I'm saying that I watched the
documentary on the DJ Avicii recently.
Have you watched that? I haven't seen the dog but it's.
Very, very good. Because you know, it's, it's
basically celebrating his life more than anything else.
And you know, there is like a lot of interviews with him
(08:09):
throughout his life. And one of the things that stuck
with me is him saying my only goal was to not worry how much
the cab is anymore. And then everything else after
that didn't really matter. He was like, I just wanted to
get to from place to place and be like, you know, I don't have
to worry. So basically once I had my own
car, you know, he ended up with like a 50 million US net worth.
(08:30):
And he's like, it doesn't read. It's like it was nice.
But obviously, given his ending,it's a proof that he actually
didn't really. I agree.
I can promise you that money takes away certain aspects of
stress. Yes, things to.
Him is just getting from one place to another.
Sure, but then as soon as you get money, there's different
stresses that come as a. Result tell me about it because
(08:51):
I have no idea. Well, again, you're, you're
constantly chasing, right? You set your benchmark and human
beings naturally want to achieve.
You don't want to go down vis A vis what you did last year.
You want to be a consistently better version of yourself, more
earning power, more successful. It's it's ingrained in all of
our psyche. So it's, it's very easy to get
(09:13):
stuck in this rat race and not take a step back.
Like if I were to have spoken tomyself, say, five years ago, 10
years ago, yeah, three years agoand said, Ben, this is where you
would be in three to five years,I would be really happy to know
that I would have achieved thosethings.
I would have thought, no way. But then you're in the moment
(09:35):
and then you lose that perspective again.
So you always have to just take a step back and remind yourself
and sometimes give yourself a little pat in the back and say
you know, good job, you did it and it's very hard to sit there
and and congratulate yourself. Right, that's it.
I think that's actually that's you hit the nail on the head
there, because I think having a support system is really
important and people are like you're cheerleaders basically.
(09:57):
People are like in our culture now, there is a lot of like, you
know, TikTok motivational peopleor whatever.
They go like, you know, you are your biggest and there is
something cheesy about it, but there is also something that
actually is true. I believe you're like, you know,
you take stock of exactly what you said.
It's like, would I have imaginedmyself doing this, whatever this
(10:18):
is now three years ago, like literally like last year.
And it's like, how how come I'm not even go like, Oh my God,
this is amazing. I had a right after the Joe Wong
shows, I had our buddy Chris Musni, who's a close friend of
mine. He was sitting in the audience
and he sent me a photo of myselfperforming to a show that I
produced and basically filled the the venue with so many
(10:41):
people for Joe and for myself. And he sent me a photo of me on
stage. And it was just one message.
He goes, one year ago, we were performing to three people at
Lips, which was this terrible bar at the Grand Hyatt.
And he just reminded me three years, one year ago, three
people sitting in the audience, we're like, hello, is this
anything? And now we have like freaking
(11:02):
800 people and. Chris was one of the three so.
Yes. Oh yeah, for sure.
Yeah, there was Chris, Annie andme.
We just actually he's the three of us.
And I'm like, that's the perspective.
You're like, Oh my God, yes, you're right.
And you need people like this. And I I suppose you have friends
in the in the business as well. Do you, Is it kind of cut throat
and as as you know? Well, a lot of it has to come
(11:25):
internally. I, I will ask you a question, MO
It's, it's like, you know, a lotof people have those friends
that will come visit you in hospital when something goes
bad. You might be lucky to count five
of those people on one hands. And then I'll ask you, of those
five, how many of them can you call when something really good
happens to you? I mean it.
(11:48):
Yeah. How many would you call to say,
hey, Ben, you never would have guessed I got this thing.
I'm so happy. And that person would genuinely
be happy for you. Yeah.
Most people don't have those people in their lives.
Yeah. So it's really I.
Can think of like, as you said, like if I can think of the
people who would visit when something bad, which would be
quite a lot, you're right. The people who I would call
(12:09):
back, I'm like, guess what happened?
Yeah, to be less than, a lot less than those.
People a lot less. You'd be lucky to have one.
Yeah, really. I actually, I mean, I can, I'm
not going to mention names, but I can think of like four or five
people who I'd be like, oh, I would call and be, which I guess
again, put it in perspective, makes me lucky.
Yeah. And I'm like, there's a lot of
people who would be very happy for me or like, kind of like,
(12:31):
you know. Genuine happiness, no jealousy,
no anything. Yeah.
Just genuinely, genuinely happy for you.
And yeah, it's important to findthose people.
But look at the end of it. I still think it's really
important just to have that perspective for yourself.
Yeah, right. It's it's it's the battle that
you go through with yourself. I would say the worst friend to
(12:51):
you is your own mind. You would say.
You would talk shit about yourself all the time.
All the time. Yeah.
You would just be defeatist. Like everyone does it.
Even very successful people do it.
And we we have this lingering doubt that keeps creeping in our
heads. It's imposity.
Complex Imposter. Yes, yes.
Peter Principle like you, you name it.
Not the pedo principle, the pedo, but I mean.
(13:13):
It's the title of this episode, Pedo Principle with Ben Quinlan.
But it's, it's really important to, to remember to that everyone
goes through these similar things.
And you know, most of the time you, you're beating yourself up,
you would just consider yourselfa shit friend.
If you know the way that you spoke to yourself and treated
(13:35):
yourself, you'd be like, this isa really shit friend.
So just be a better friend to yourself.
That's that's really, really accurate.
I think I was also like, yeah, reading something about how if
you tell somebody, hey, I have afriend who keeps saying the all
of these things about me, they'dbe like, that's not a good
person. Like don't surround yourself
with this person. And that's your own mind who's
(13:57):
always, you know, you're waking up with it.
Like, you know, you suck. No one likes you.
You're a fraud. You are this and that.
And it's just, it's I think that's probably the, the hardest
battle, honestly. It's like the battle of like,
yeah, waking up and like gettingyour own, getting yourself on
board with what you're doing. And especially because we live
in the age of social media wherewe wake up, we we, we then look
(14:18):
at our phones immediately. We're spending 7-8 hours a day
on our telephones and we're looking at everyone's highlight
reel and comparing it to our lives.
Not the two of us though. We have our own little gifts
that we send each other. That does bring joy, but how,
how do you get perspective when your perspective of the world is
(14:42):
everyone else doing awesome? Yes.
It's really, really hard sometimes to to just take stock
and be like, you know, this is afiltered view of everything.
100% it's, it's a filtered view because it literally got a
filter on it. This is even what they look
like. So you, you always have to
remember that everyone goes through their own battles.
Everyone has their own demons. Not just that, to your point,
(15:04):
also there are people who I like.
Luckily I know them in person and I know that view is not just
like the opposite or whatever orexaggerated.
I'm like, I know you're depressed, but I know you're
very sad person. Not that this is good or bad.
I'm like, this is because if a stranger is looking at their
lives and all they're seeing is like traveling first class and
eating and this and that, and you're like, and everyone, of
(15:27):
course you're like, I want this person's life.
But I'm like, only if you know that this person spends like 10
hours every day just crying on their bathroom floor.
You would never want that life, right?
And everyone sees its success, but they don't see all the work
that goes into it. And you know that one of the
partners that works with me in this business, he runs our
corporate training arm, Michael Campion.
(15:48):
Brilliant, brilliant. And he always says, you know,
talent is practice in disguise, right?
So every time you see people, like if someone goes and watches
you on stage and thinks always MO lucky just now.
No, I mean, you've been doing this 10 years, 12 years, I don't
know how long, but just honing that craft day in and day out.
And usually it's the understanding that, you know,
(16:09):
people have put in so much time ever and energy behind the
scenes that is not on the highlight reels, the unglamorous
stuff. It's, you know, it's all the
things that make you that betterversion of yourself.
So it's, it's hard, but you know, that's, that's the
unfiltered version of life. I, I, I am attracted a bit to
the unfiltered version though. Like when I'm watching, you
know, stories of people coming up, like, you know, story of
(16:32):
like someone like Paris Hilton versus someone like, I don't
know who came from like nothing or whatever.
Like, I just watched that, that I remember Paris Hilton because
I watched it not long ago and itwas just like, you know, someone
was born into money. And it's like that always has
its own set of struggles and everything.
But I'm like, I just can't relate to it because I'm like,
you were given this and your struggle was to kind of maintain
(16:52):
it slash, live with it, slash, you know, have your mental
health in check. But there's a lot of people that
look up to that are just like, oh, you are.
Yeah. That's that.
You had to build all of this andalso not lose yourself or lose
your mind the meantime because some people make it really big.
I agree was Jimmy Carr had the best line.
He said the joy is not in havingstuff, it's in getting stuff.
(17:15):
Yes, I love that. It's so, so spot on to know that
you've, you know, just having things and being given to you.
You don't appreciate them. You can't appreciate the
struggle, the work or the effortthat was required to get to
where you are. But I think that level of grit,
it goes to, you know, the word. It's a very, very famous Ted
Talk done on it that differentiates founders that are
(17:36):
ultimately hyper successful versus those that are not.
And the word that they used is grit.
It's just that persistence, the tenacity to just keep going.
And no one knows just how many failures I go through all the
time, how many projects don't gothrough, how many times I lose
to a competitor. Happens all the time.
And it's just how you manage that process.
(17:58):
And what used to defeat me before, I don't know.
I give myself 30 seconds to huffand puff and then you just get
on with your day because no one's going to rescue.
You no exactly that's another thing about like especially a
city like Hong Kong where you don't really have too much of A
safety net like the government, not not to just you know,
whatever trash like not like there are other places in the
(18:20):
world where you can kind of relya little bit on like a certain
level a. Better Social Security.
Correct. And I don't believe I'm not a
citizen here. I don't know the full spectrum
of things, but I don't believe that exists here.
No big extent. No, I mean fruit money for the
pension as well, 1600 a month for old age allowance, that's
(18:41):
going to go a long way, right? Yeah, yeah, yeah, Especially if
you're like, yeah, if you don't own your house or, you know, you
have to pay rent and some place far away, that's, that's
impossible almost, which is why you see, you know, the people
collecting cardboard boxes and stuff like this.
Because literally sad. It's very sad.
It's sad and. You know, when we're now in
this, this new wave of, you know, this new generation coming
(19:05):
through Gen. Z, Gen.
Alpha, I feel for them because how are they ever going to own
their own home? You know, you think about it and
and the whole culture that's permeated is, is like in China,
there's the life flat generation, right?
It's just it's just giving up. I'm not going to be able to own
anything. Everything's too expensive.
I'm just going to try and enjoy my life.
(19:26):
You have more kids moving back into their homes with their
parents, right? It's just the realities of the
current environment make it extremely difficult for this
next Gen. and This is why all these businesses have popped up
that are giving them these instant riches kind of, you
know, dream crypto. You know, you don't have to
work, just trade, you know, 100 X your investments.
(19:47):
You know, there's a lot. Of people for scams fall for
scams because of that? Yeah.
Because they're chasing that. But when you feel so trapped and
you feel like this could be my escape route, yeah, I I can
empathize to some degree what people do it, but.
I think in the vast majority of cases, 99.9% you are dealing
with people that if you want to ultimately be successful and
(20:09):
financially secure, you, you, you have to work hard.
It doesn't matter what you're doing.
You do have to work hard, put inthe reps you.
Know which? Which gets us to today's
sponsor, The Jockey Club. No, it's not.
This is a good time. They are doing great.
Yeah, the gambling monopoly in Hong Kong.
Yeah, yeah, yeah. But, but I, I do have good
(20:30):
things to say about the Jockey Club because at least they, they
donate a huge amount of the proceeds to charity.
And yes, that for me is, is a game changer.
They're one of the best things to happen.
Yeah, to Hong Kong, the medical services, all the things that
they provide. And a lot of the theatres who
are booking are, are Jockey Clubtheatres as well.
And it's like, yeah, exactly like you're giving back.
You are, you know, yes, people are addicted to gambling and all
(20:53):
that. At least it's going bad.
Gambling is horrendous, you know, I'm from Australia, the
highest per capita gambling spent in the world, in the
world. Every time I went to Australia,
I would always buy these scratches.
You call them. They're so fun.
Yeah, yeah. You go to the newsagent, you
basically here's a lot of tickets behind you.
Yeah, Scratch this, Scratch that.
Yeah. You know this screens all
around. You bet on this horse race, you
(21:14):
can bet on ping pong in the middle of Uzbekistan, right?
Wow, there's. Everything happening that you
can just bet, bet, bet, bet, bet, bet, bet, bet.
Yeah, and I've seen how much gambling destroyed people.
Damn. Yeah, Yeah.
I mean, to be honest, I traveledin Australia quite a bit and we
would drive from Melbourne to Sydney and back.
That's quite a long drive. And you stopped by a lot of
town, like small towns. Yeah.
(21:34):
And I'm like, if you're a gambler, I get it, man.
What else would you do? It's the only tax free income in
Australia. As well, but it's also there is
absolutely nothing like how do people live here yeah exactly
you're. Going to talk to the same 3.
Trees. Let's talk a little bit about
your your opera you grew up in in Sydney.
No, I grew up in Hong Kong, bornand raised here.
You're born here, but did you spend any time properly in
(21:57):
Australia? I did so my family shipped me
there when I was 12 to go to boarding school.
And there is the word used, the word shipping.
Yeah, yes, freighted me there. So I was there from 12:00 until
26. So I did my high school, did my
uni, started my career, yeah. And then and then I came back to
Hong Kong 2009. How is it like?
(22:18):
Sydney is quite a nice city, butlike Off Record we spoke a bit
about like you find it I guess abit more dull than than Hong
Kong not. Oh yeah, yeah.
Oh yeah, yeah. Yeah.
Like are you talking about like the nightlife or just like the
general culture or? What is a life too?
The general life it's. Pleasant.
It's it's pleasant, but Sydney is not.
(22:41):
It's very cosmopolitan. It's got a great standard of
life. Yeah.
Things are now really expensive there.
Yeah. You know, I'm talking about home
ownership in particular. Tax is extremely high, 46 1/2%.
Yeah, right. And that's not just your income,
it's also after you put that money in the bank and you earn
interest, that's also tax, right?
And then your dividends and thenyour capital gains.
(23:03):
So I always say you can earn money in Australia, you just
can't keep it. So that's the one difference.
But I enjoyed my life there. It was very good for my studies.
It was good to focus. You didn't have all of the
distractions that you would in aplace like Hong Kong, right?
And I developed some wonderful friendships over the time I was
there. So whenever I go back, I
reconnect with all those friends, which is great.
I had a moment when I was sitting on a beach in Sydney
(23:26):
where it's, it's not Bondi, it'slike one of the beaches kind of
outside and. We're manly.
Sorry, Manly. Manly Beach, that's the one.
And we're sitting like kind of like higher up, kind of bit of a
hill. Yeah, I'm just looking at the
ocean. And then I saw a whale fin like
pop out. Yeah.
And I, I told my girlfriend at the time, I'm like, is that a
(23:48):
whale? And she didn't see it.
And as if the whale wanted to show itself and it just like
flapped its fin again. And I'm like, I would never see,
not just that I would never see that in Hong Kong, but it's
like. Plastic bag.
Yes, exactly. It's a freaking drunk canoe
canoer just floating around dying.
But like there is something is like, oh, I'm sitting here in
(24:09):
like a random day and I'm just seeing a whale, which is so
cool. But it's also like, yeah,
sometimes you feel like, you know, obviously the grass is
always greener. Do you?
I feel like at this moment, like, what would I would I be
like if I'm just living there just like, that's my day, just
like looking at whales and like,you know, playing with the
beach. You'll be a lot more simple
(24:30):
playing with the beach, OK? I'm playing.
With the sandcastles, there you go.
Yes, it's it's beautiful. And I think the mindset that I
had in Australia was a lot less complicated than coming back to
a place like Hong Kong where everything is go, go, go, go,
go, go. Yeah, it's very cut throat.
I enjoyed it, but for my career in what I was trying to do, it
(24:52):
wasn't a good place to build my career in my view.
So maybe someday in my life, sure I can go there.
Maybe retirement, I don't know, Maybe if there is an opportunity
to set up an office there, who knows.
But I always like Australia's got a special place in my heart.
Well, I mean, to this point as well, I think I do believe that
(25:12):
I would have never learned as much as I have just like even
just not just business, but likelife life wise if I wasn't here.
Just because of the pace of how much you're learning everyday
about even like social things about like efficiency, about
like learning to say goodbye to people about how you, you like,
(25:32):
at least for me as an expat. And you, you are basically a
local. So I think maybe the perspective
it could be a bit different for me.
And in Shanghai it was the same.But here's more because here's
it feels so transient, especially after COVID.
Yeah, which is a lot of people are like leaving and you're like
learn like who is worth investing time and energy in.
Yeah, right. And who is like how to be OK
(25:52):
with like, oh, I, you know, I made the wrong investment.
Basically, whether it's a business or work or whatever.
And as you said, like people don't see that on the outside.
They're they're seeing you LinkedIn page and how much you
are. You know how the people don't
post about their failures, right?
No, no, that's actually really interesting because I did like a
deep dive and you can probably see from my profile, I'm not
(26:13):
active at all. And I did a deep dive not just
on your profile, but like other like minded people.
And yes, there's something Instagram and Facebook and stuff
does have a side of like people are whining and they're like,
you know, everything is wrong, especially with the stand up
business. Like people now, like as we're
recording, people are in Edinburgh French.
And if I show you some of the posts, we'll just like be
(26:34):
cackling, laughing because it's just people bitching about how
there is 0 people who came to the show.
Like first, why are you bitchingabout it?
Second, why did you do it? And 3rd, are you not, are you
not a stand up? Like this is just how it works,
but as opposed to like LinkedIn is a lot of a lot of people
like, Oh my God, this is how I succeeded.
(26:55):
Here's my secrets and stuff likethis, right?
Yeah, I mean, I do have my own piss take on LinkedIn because it
is a bit of humble brag claptrapthere.
Everyone is so honoured all the time and thrilled, just honoured
and thrilled persistently to geta certificate and sewing from
the University of Nowhere, right?
There's so much of this going on.
(27:16):
I have a here's me, I'm here's me.
It's a selfie and I'm at a conference.
I'm like, are you speaking at the conference?
Did you share any insights? LinkedIn is turned into a bit
of, you know, verbal diarrhea ofpeople patting themselves on the
back. And it does.
It does actually make me roll myeyes sometimes.
But you know, each to their own.Whatever.
(27:36):
Well, you, I want to I've never spoken to somebody who is
LinkedIn popular. I suppose I'm looking at your at
your page and you know, everything counts by followers
now and you're at 30 + 30 more than 37,000 followers, which is
significant for, you know, if there is anyone, any individual
(27:59):
with 37,000 people having the potential of seeing what they
are posting or writing. That's big.
Do you feel when did it start? First of all, like you have
obviously as a business person, you've been on LinkedIn for a
while. When did you start feeling like,
you know, the inter like the people are engaging with your
the engagement is higher and they're like, oh, I'm racking up
followers. Well.
(28:19):
The nature of what I do, my company that creates a lot of
research and insights. So we post a lot of that.
It's not about here's a selfie of me doing something.
It's it's what do we have to sayto the world?
What value or knowledge contribution can we make to the
people on this platform that will make them more aware of
what's going on, have better perspective like that's
(28:40):
generally what we do. I think that a lot of the
following actually came about because I'm not very I I would
say I'm very mindful about what I posed, but I'm also not scared
to have an opinion and I don't filter an opinion to the point
that my opinion just disappears.If I have a strong opinion on
(29:03):
something, I will say it. I will try and back it up as
much as possible with objective facts and data and information,
but I think that a lot of peopleare too scared sometimes to post
their real thoughts online, especially in a corporate world,
for fear of it having negative reputation.
(29:24):
On their, on their business or on their career basically.
Correct. Yeah, but but you know, the
nature of what I do is I run a consultancy.
We're we're hired to provide an opinion, have an opinion.
I hate it when people say I'm. Cautiously opinion giver.
Well, it's just the I'm cautiously optimistic.
Well, I, you know, all of these people that come out with a view
that's not a view and I believe,but maybe.
(29:46):
And on the other hand, it's like, well, what's your actual
opinion? There's a lot of abstract, I
suppose, like opinions. It's like you can't really, you
can't really hold them down on like, what are you actually
trying to say? Exactly right.
It's just yeah, is. It like diplomacy or is it just
like people are so used to like people like walking down the
(30:09):
street, like, you know, like they're not, they're really
scared. It's very scared.
I think in corporate world, people are afraid of offending
people. They can get blacklisted, they
can get called out, you know, because a corporate reputation
may be different from a comedianreputation is very, very
different. But again, I've always said to
even my team, if we go out to market and have an opinion, say
(30:31):
what you think. Like if you read, if you've done
the homework, you've done the research, you've spoken to
people in the market. You, you have utmost conviction
about your position, put it out to market and your job is not to
please everyone. You will end up just.
Pissing everyone off or. You end up.
Yeah, exactly. Or losing yourself and.
You lose yourself. Yeah.
(30:51):
That's the most important thing.You will absolutely lose sight
of yourself and what you stand for.
Yeah. So, you know, it's this whole
idea of find your tribe, right? Not everyone needs to be a
friend. Not everyone needs to like you.
And I know there's a lot of people that may not like what I
post or my opinion. I It's OK.
Also, a lot of people don't like.
I know a lot of people who don'tlike your comedy or your person.
Yeah. So there is a lot of my.
Parents as well. You have a lot of enemies.
(31:15):
I don't know. I don't know what you do.
It's all. Good, mate.
I mean, you put yourself out there, you got to understand
you're going to have people thatdon't like your stuff.
But if you, if you take it personally, you're, you're a
fool. No, yeah.
Speaking of, I wanted to jump back to the Edinburgh thing.
I found this one of my favorite stories this year, and it's
shared by our buddy Guarantee. And the headline goes Edinburgh
(31:36):
Fringe performer in tears. This is, by the way, this is
proper like news. It's from dailyrecord.co.uk,
some sort of publication. OK, that is is not small, I
suppose. Perform tears after third of
audience walk out. OK, so first of all, this is a
new story. Second, Nicole Nadler was
performing her one woman show funny like an ironically lamed
(31:58):
exposure therapy when she says athird of her audience walked out
15 minutes early. The story goes whatever.
And then last night Nicole says 4 women told her she was a
beautiful soul and they left, which also means the third of
the audience was four people. Yeah, relativity of numbers.
(32:18):
Having come to the venue late and only standing for staying
for a total of 20 minutes, she pledged with a Fringe audience.
If you're seeing a show and you hate it, could you just stick it
out? Wow, OK, I want those four
people just late to a dinner booking.
I mean, it's, it's not the end of the world.
No, Speaking of Adam Rely, she said My biggest 2 fears were no
one comes. But obviously more than that,
(32:39):
that I'm unable to pull off thiscrazy idea of a show and that
rejection and failure also scared me from doing the show
that would happen and it did andit is gutting.
I'm handled it well at the moment and I'm really proud of
that. I'll be back on stage in a few
hours ready to pour my heart outall over again.
And this kind of story, it was aquiet show.
I had 12 people all together. It was one of the smallest
(33:00):
audiences I've ever had. We've all performed to smaller
audience or whatever. What I I think to to have the
balls to talk to the news about this and for the news on the
other hand, to think this is a story, it just screams all kinds
of wacko to me. Yeah, I mean, it's not some hate
crime. I mean, people are allowed to
leave a show. It, it is a bit peculiar.
(33:22):
I don't get it. And you, you and I know, I mean,
it's it's absolutely torture to go on the comedy stage.
We've been there and had flat sets and jokes that just, oh
gosh, you just want to seppuku yourself.
Yeah, it's awful. So I get it.
But yeah, taking it to the news is a bit weird.
(33:43):
Someone goes, they couldn't give.
She goes, they couldn't give me the decency of the next 10 or 15
minutes. If you're seeing a show and you
hate it, you just stick it out just out of kindness.
And I think also out of kindness.
You don't bully people until youknow I.
Think it's the wrong profession?Exactly.
Holding them hostage? You're sure?
Out of kindness, please let themleave.
(34:04):
But. Also out of kindness, they did.
That's probably one of the funniest things to me is like
all of them kind of picked up their stuff, looked at each
other and one of them said, you're a beautiful soul.
It's just the equivalent. You know, when you're talking to
somebody, you're like, you know,went on a date or whatever and
or meet someone at a bar and yougo, how are they doing?
Or like, how are they? You're like such a good
(34:24):
personality. This is the equivalent.
Of that in stand up, you know, imagine being on stage and then
the audience. Called a beautiful song.
So did you like my comedy again?You're a beautiful song.
It's kind of like when I finished the show.
What actually, when I finished up the last shows with you at I
was standing outside and then someone came up to one of the
(34:46):
other comics I was speaking to and was just constantly praising
them. And that's the worst feeling
when you're standing right next to a comic and you're like, you
know, I was performing too. Yes, but.
It's good. I had to watch comedian Paulo
Guetta, absolute freaking monster on stage.
He came through Shanghai years ago and I was just standing with
(35:07):
him outside. I was the opener and the person
came like some audience member goes like this was actually the
best live show I've ever seen. Like you, like you changed my
perspective on things. You're so funny.
I was crying, laughing, and she looked at me.
She's like, you're on stage. You walked up on stage too.
(35:30):
One of the best ones I had was when I did a show with Pete
Greller and then someone came upto me right after the show and
said oh you A joke about the umpire.
State Building is my favorite joke.
So your favorite joke of mine isa joke that this guy did.
You both have nothing in common at all.
You're not alike. He has hair.
(35:51):
You're young. Both of you are like younger.
I found that a real compliment. Speaking of show, we're kind of
gearing up to basically your biggest show in Hong Kong to
date. I, I will give a little bit of
back story on how this we have talked for a long time about
producing like a A1 man like a theatre show for you.
(36:14):
And one of the reasons I want todo this is also your Comedy
Central set from years ago. It did look you look like one of
the more comfortable comedians on like a stage with like
cameras and stuff. Is that because of your the
nature of your public speaking sometimes in your job that
you're that comfortable? Yeah, I don't get, I don't
really get shy, so to speak. I enjoy, I enjoy performing
(36:38):
arts, right. I really enjoy as because you,
as long as you know you're thereto entertain people and people
that there to have a good time, that's always what you have to
keep in the back of your head. So therefore you got to tell
yourself you have a good time aswell.
But if you're up there and you've got all the nerves
around, it's just again, framingwhat it is in your mind before
you step out on the stage. And yeah, I I've been doing a
(36:59):
lot of the performing arts, likesince I was a kid.
So how did that start for you? Well.
My dad's a composer, right So. He's in the music business.
And there's a lot of people that, you know, they were, I was
in a band. I used to sing and play guitar.
I did a lot of the, you know, drama shows and plays when I was
younger, TV commercials. I really enjoyed it.
(37:22):
And speaking like debating, I enjoyed doing that as well.
So you can be quite argumentative if if we get you
in the right like debate mode. Oh, it'd.
Be very fun. Yeah, it's super fun.
I remember I was like having like, you know, long nights of
just talk about absolute nonsense.
It's someone also to see kind ofwhere you stand and just take a
slightly different position justto keep you going.
(37:44):
Yeah, but now I understand. Did you go to like debate club
like that? Yeah.
Debating team at school. So it's good practice, right?
Obscure topics, yes. Take the affirmative, take the
negative. And you're like, I remember it's
like one of the debates I had asthe car has done more harm than
good. That was the topic discuss.
And I was in the affirmative andit was it was just interesting
(38:08):
to see how like, yeah, we have cars everywhere.
And now we have to take the other side of the argument.
What are they going to say? How am I going to counter this?
Any position And this is this iswhat's lost in today's age.
No one understands the nuance ofboth sides of an argument like
critical thinking, just understanding what's position A,
what's position B. And then therefore, what is my
informed opinion. And social media just makes that
(38:30):
worse. They just reinforce whatever
position you have and shove thatdown your throat non-stop such
that you were just so ingrained in a way of thinking that if
anyone says anything on the other side.
You're ready to. Attack.
Yes, yes, I actually do blame. Obviously social media is a big
one. Terrible.
Genuinely blame American pop culture and American politics on
(38:50):
that. I agree because it's like it's
so, so polarized. Yes, that like it's impossible
to like one of the comedians Bill Burr has like, kind of like
started taking this kind of middle of the road, kind of
like, you know, it's very Gray. Like it's not about the color of
the tie and all of these things.And now both sides hate him.
(39:12):
Yep. And that's when you know he's
right. Yes.
That's when you know, he's like,oh, yeah.
The every, everybody in his comments.
Now you're a fucking cock liberal piece of shit.
And the other guys are like, yousold out.
You have a black wife. How dare.
And he's like, all I'm saying isthat the real enemy is not the
other person of the on the on the other side of the aisle, of
(39:33):
course, is the billionaires and the politicians who are fucking
you over. And you're saying I am, I am a
cock. Whatever.
Yeah. I mean, politics used to be
about diplomacy. The word has no meaning anymore.
Yeah. So sitting down and listening to
people, usually if I'm in any kind of a debate or argument, I
would want the other side of a table to exhaust their point to
(39:53):
the end. Say everything you possibly can
say, let me hear it out, and then I'll respond.
Usually I'll find some good points being raised, but I'll at
least know you've given me all the ammo to come back with my
position if I start interjectingand cutting you off prior to you
actually getting your point across.
I actually don't know what you've said.
Yes, exactly. And you're, yeah, you're right.
Like you're not fully aware of what much how much ammo they
(40:15):
have left. Yes, right.
Going back to. So yeah, when we're talking
about like you being comfortableand in front of a camera and all
of that. And then we wanted to there is
only a few comedians currently in Hong Kong.
Jordan Long left a while ago, but there's only a few comedians
currently in Hong Kong who wouldhave this kind of draw as well
to, to perform a, a theatre show, a spectacle of sort.
(40:35):
And among the, the the comedianscurrently based in Hong Kong, I
have you on my track around bothdoing theatre shows basically on
the same week. So talking to you now what?
How do you envision like executing your set on the night?
You have a lot of obviously likematerial that are quote, UN
(40:56):
quote classics that you have seen you do, but at the same
time, you have quite a long period of time on stage.
And also you're kind of an executive producer of the show
as well. So you have full creative
control over what happens. We can light up the audience.
We can play fireworks. We shouldn't do that because
liability. There's a lot of stuff that we
can do. What are you?
Thinking about Yeah. It's kind of fun to play with
(41:20):
these kind of formats because, you know, when I used to work
for Live Nation, we're really restricted on like, you know,
corporate policy and stuff like this.
But now we are, we can do whatever we want.
Sure. How do you like?
Yeah. How did you try to imagine like
the set of the on the night? Genuinely.
Hand on heart, No. Yeah.
OK, well let's let's you know. I think part of it is just
(41:41):
saying, you know, how long were we doing comedy for now?
12 years. So part of it is just trusting
the instincts that things will come and you can't you, you
can't plan everything. Sometimes things will go awry.
I know there will be a bomb or two in the set.
Oh yeah. I look forward to it.
And there'll be audience interaction.
There'll be a mix of whatever just feels right.
(42:03):
I think the only thing I'll be paying attention to is is the
audience laughing and having fun.
And I will adjust the set accordingly.
If they're not having fun, I'm not going to continue to go down
a particular track which says I've just ruined your night,
Right? Yes, yes.
So that's all I do every single time I step out on stage.
What's what's resonating with this, the audience?
And then how do I just keep keepthat energy momentum going?
(42:25):
How do you, because you're one of the most successful stand ups
here in the scene. And I know you joke about like
you know, you, you being on a list and there's only like 6
comedians or whatever. But genuinely, even among the
current working comedians, you're still one of the most
successful ones. And this is obviously I wouldn't
say a hobby, but this is obviously a minor thing in the
bigger scheme of all the things you're doing.
(42:46):
How do you find the time to continue to be?
And I'm not sitting here, sitting here kissing your ass.
It's just like, I'm a producer. It's a fact that you, when I
have you on the show, I can relax.
I can actually go outside, get some water because I'm like, I'm
trusting the audience with Ben. He's not going to self.
What's the word? Sabotage.
Self sabotage. He's not going to, you know, all
(43:08):
of these things like we were talking about a comedian, I'm
not going to mention who is an absolute like risk liability on
stage. They're the funniest for the.
Yeah, the funniest for the comics, but I like I can't keep
book and I told them as much. I'm like, I can't keep booking
you because I have no idea if the audience is going to come
(43:30):
screaming at me that they paid money and this is what they saw,
right? But to you, it's for you it's
the opposite. How do you keep you don't have
time? I'm looking at your your current
as current jobs, not previous jobs.
And I'm looking at, you know, obviously your CEO and magic
partner of your own company, Quinn and Associates, but you're
also sitting on you're doing a lot of Advisory Board roles.
(43:55):
How the hell do you find the time?
You make the time. You make the time for the things
that are important. And, you know, I haven't made as
much time as I would ideally want to for comedy.
So it has taken a little bit of a backseat in past year or two,
I would say few years relative to, you know, the time I had
before. It's a natural trade off in
(44:15):
terms of focusing a little bit more on the business and these
other things. But it's such an important part
of my DNA. It's such an important part of
me. It's such a amazing thing every
single time I hit the stage and just that that feeling that you
get and seeing the joy that you bring to people.
It's it's a drug and every comedian knows that it's it's.
(44:36):
The bug. It's a bug, absolutely.
So once you get that bug, what you want to let go of it?
No, no, I think I'm just like amazed, you know, while I'm
looking at all the stuff you arecurrently doing, for example,
you sit on the Hong Kong touristboard.
I'm an ambassador, right? I don't, don't sit on them their
(44:56):
board, right? Yeah, right.
So just explain to me what does for the layman.
What does that role mean exactly?
Well, a lot of these advisory orboard positions, they're you,
you're there in a basically a more senior capacity to act as
an advocate, to provide a steer guidance, advice to either the
(45:16):
government or the firms that I work with around some strategic
decisions or directions that they need to move in.
And usually it would be a combination with advice and
advocacy. So those are the main things
that are. Are they, I'm trying not to get
you in trouble here, but I've are they listening to you, Ben?
I have no idea. No, the reason I'm asking is
(45:36):
like, I've seen you post sometimes kind of being critical
sometimes of the directions thateven we're taking in comes when
it comes to tourism, when it comes to events and stuff like
this. But I feel like because you're
an advisor, I feel like, you know, I would be frustrated if
I'm writing these things or I'm telling it to them and they're
just kind of ignoring you. Does that.
(45:57):
I look, I think it's important to again, going to what's your
position? And I think part of being a good
advisor is saying things that sometimes the clients or the
person that is getting the advice, it doesn't necessarily
make them feel comfortable, but it is the right advice.
No one likes to be critiqued. No one you don't want to be.
(46:19):
Critiqued, feel good. No, I don't.
Want to be critiqued? It doesn't feel good unless
unless you take the mindset of is this person genuinely
critiquing me because they have my best interest parts and do
they have the right motivations?Do they have the right kind of
advice? Or are they doing this for the
sake of just making my life moredifficult or making things?
Or making me feel bad about myself.
(46:39):
Or they're, yeah, they have ulterior motives, basically.
So you have to look at the motivation.
It's kind of like in comedy. What is the motivation for this
comic? Getting up and telling a really
dark joke. It's not to offend people.
Yes, that try and elicit that laughter.
Just like with my post sometimesI never try and post with an
explicit view to throw anyone under a bus.
I post with a view that especially when it pertains to
(47:00):
Hong Kong and there's no 1A morevocal who loves the city more
than me and. I think that's you have proven
that in so many ways, obviously from your public appearances and
from the jobs that you're takingas well, that you are a big
lover of the city. I love the city.
I'm a hunky through and through.This is my this is my home.
But part of it being my home means I I also need to leverage
(47:23):
my skills, my knowledge, whatever it is, to try and add
the right kind of value and, and, and contributions to either
the public sector or private sector.
And it's OK if they don't like everything.
Yeah, it's all right. You're you're sticking to what
you believe is the right thing for the city as well.
True, but again belief is a veryloose term so it's not opinion
(47:46):
versus opinion. So my opinion is always grounded
in facts and data. That's my job.
So I hate people that just come out with opinions without
substantiating them. I always try and substantiate my
my opinions and that's that. Because I know at the end of it,
my fact will always be your opinion.
Yes, of course. And vice versa.
Your fact will always be my opinion.
(48:07):
Yeah. So come armed with facts and
that's what I always try and do.Yeah, to to wrap things up also
the, the, the show that we have on Sunday, 21st of September,
basically a month from now is Ben Quinlan, the theater show.
And it's like not just that, youknow, it's one of probably the
(48:28):
biggest local productions we've had.
We're going to have for for a Hong Kong based comedian.
It's also in a place that's quite special because that whole
W Kowloon complex has been kind of like taking shape in the last
few years after COVID. And it's really beautiful.
Like the, the, you know, the stuff that they have there.
I was looking up, I think with you yesterday.
(48:48):
We're looking at the, the Chinese Museum, the the, the
Palace Museum Theater because you have a separate event there
and we're like, this is so cool.That's just the place.
Do you feel like it's something that like if you are to pick all
the venues and you don't really get to pick this one because we
just like we're bound by venue availability here, but do you
(49:10):
feel like this place kind of like speaks to how your love of
Hong Kong as well? Yeah, the venue, look, it's kind
of like high tech, right? We finally got a venue to hold
the world class events and sporting sporting events,
concerts. But again, it's not just the
venue, it's the acts that we're bringing to the venue.
I'm not saying I'm ratcheting itup a degree after Jimmy Yang and
(49:31):
all these people. Yeah, it's kind of like, let's
take it down a notch. But, but I, I do believe it's
very important to bring the right kind of entertainment into
Hong Kong and international actsand things, things that just
bring the city back to life. A lot of the vibrancy I feel has
been sucked out of the city in, in during those COVID years and
it was really a bit depressing. So whatever.
(49:52):
Was a bit of a bubble. Exactly.
So whatever you can do to, you know, entertain people here,
keep boots on the ground, right,Stop going to Guangzhou or
Shenzhen every weekend, stay in Hong Kong.
There's lots to do in Hong Kong and there's things to do here
that you can't get across the border, right So Hong Kong has
to find that DNA about what makes it special.
Hopefully comedy is such a unique form of art and it's
(50:13):
something that there's more and more local comedians coming
through and they're great. There's a good future pipeline
of talent, and I hope this can really be considered as one of
the new mainstream forms of entertainment.
I mean, the city gets. That's genuinely what what I've
I've talked about this on a fulldedicated episode about the
comedy season. And actually from I was quite
(50:35):
amazed at how much support I'm getting from people who are
really high up in the, you know,venue, like stuff like, you
know, people who can make decisions and can get stuff
done. They all went like, yeah, we
need something like this becauseI just saw a void and you know,
as you said, like there is clockand flap, there is a bigger
events, there's the rugby sevens, there is nothing like
this. All I do know how to do is
(50:56):
comedy, not just even performing, but just production,
putting stuff together. I'm like we can use something
like this. And I will also say that not
just that we don't have this in Hong Kong, we don't have this in
Asia. In Asia, yeah.
The closest we have to somethingthat like I'm trying to to do is
Abu Dhabi. That's the closest one we have.
India doesn't have its own either.
(51:17):
Not that I would like. India has a whole different
universe, but even a place as close as India doesn't have
that. Like, you know, a festival where
people fly in the, like, 1 dedicated thing, but the rest of
the world does. Almost every city in America has
that. Yeah.
And Sydney and Melbourne have it.
Obviously Edinburgh has it. Yeah, two different formats.
But like, now in the Gulf, as you would know, there is
(51:40):
actually three different major seasons of comedy.
It's Dubai, Abu Dhabi competing with each other.
And Riyadh just started. And if you're looking at Riyadh
this year, it's the same, you know, it's just how the Gulf
people do it. It's just like, who is everybody
bring them on? Yes.
And so you're looking at the Riyadh season and, you know, a
bit of a tangent, but like 10 years ago, when you're looking
(52:02):
at like, you know, the Saudi opening up and stuff, you would
not think that this year they have Whitney Cummings coming.
Like literally she is on the bill.
And Whitney is filthy and she's,you know, super funny.
But like her brand of comedy, like Whitney Cummings is
performing in Riyadh. What the fuck is going on?
But you know, I don't, I don't care about like the, you know,
(52:23):
the moralistic, whatever the culture versus whatever, it's
just like just from a pure comedy promotion point of view,
I'm like, this is great. Yes.
You know, she might not be the right fit for that market, but
it doesn't mean that the appetite is not there to scale
things up. Yeah.
And we have. Hong Kong is, I will say, and I
can get in trouble for this, Hong Kong is way cooler than
Riyadh. I've been to both places.
(52:44):
Hong Kong is way cooler. Hong Kong is Hong Kong is by far
one of the most amazing cities in the world. 100%.
It's got everything, you know, it's got the culture, the
nature, like the topography is just out of this world, the
convenience, it's got optionality.
You can get very expensive, you can get very cheap, right.
(53:05):
But it's got those those influences of the international
Western mix in what is otherwisea Chinese city.
And that's beautiful because it's so damn hard to replicate.
So I think anything that Hong Kong going to do to preserve it
and magnify that, that DNA, it'sjust going to make Hong Kong
that much more successful. Agreed.
We're super excited to have you on board, man.
(53:27):
Thank you so much for first of all agreeing to do the show and
you know, being part of the comedy season that I know these
are also what we're recording now a records for how this
started versus hopefully how it will, you know, be much, much
bigger in the future. So thanks for taking a chance on
the first one with us. September 21st Sunday is when
(53:47):
Ben Quinlan performs his one manshow, The Ben Quinlan the
Theater, the Theater Special at the Box and West Kowloon.
We'll see you guys there. The link is obviously in the
description. Ben and I are going to quickly
record a he doesn't even know that yet 15 minute Patreon where
we talk shit about everybody as we usually he's giving me a face
(54:09):
and I will try not to get him lose.
You know what if you lose 2 overyour 18 jobs, that's not that
bad right? Because of us shooting this.
As long as it's not my own business.
But Ben, thank you so much for doing this.
I obviously have to come to youroffice because I know you're a
super busy guy, so I always appreciate your time.
But guys, come see Ben on the Sunday, September 21st at the
(54:31):
Box and we'll see you next week or on the patreonpatreon.com/aho
Pod. Rest of the comedy season
schedules also in the notes downbelow.
See you guys next week.
So I reiterate here, the bill isdead.
The story of this great city is about the years before this
night. Hey everybody, it's a new
(00:23):
episode of Hong Kong. I'm your host Mohammed Magdi and
moment of silence, everybody. This is sometimes we start, you
know, jokey jokey today where we're having a proper moment of
silence for Vivek's ankles. Vivek totally messed up his
(00:44):
ankles. If you have been on his
Instagram, you might see a horrific photo of his legs both
just blown out. If you, if you can identify a
bit of sound, a tingle of joy inmy voice, that's because, yes,
I'm very happy that this happened to him because as you
know, he's my mortal enemy. And now I'm getting some of his
(01:04):
gigs. So, you know, it's just a pure
win for me. And also I don't get to talk to
him for a while. I am.
No, I obviously it's very sad that all of these things that
people have to say politely so they can look good, but no, I
went over to his bed and I'm like, ha, ha, you suck.
And, you know, stop doing too much and all of these things.
(01:25):
And you know, if you play back many of our episodes and I'm
like, you're working yourself todeath, here is proof.
And I hate to say I told you so,but I fucking told you so.
Vivek, you should chill out. Actually, I will let him tell
the story when he's back on in four to six weeks,
unfortunately. It's very sad.
(01:45):
But no, he's doing fine. Oh man, I can't stop laughing at
him, he's doing fine and all of these things, good spirits, blah
blah blah. So yeah, so Vivek blown out both
his legs which means he can't even walk to the studio in his
own house to record, which meansI have the liberty of talking to
whoever the hell I want. Actually people might know that
(02:06):
I already do book the guests when we have guests on, so that
doesn't change. Except that he doesn't have to
interrupt me anymore with his random.
What do you call like when you are running off?
When I thought for like 7 to 8 minutes, no, you can talk Ben,
it's OK. People know there is a guest
because there is a title. It's called a tangent.
Tangent. That's the word.
(02:26):
Yes. Thank you.
I just had the two big pockets of falafel and I'm very, I see.
I can't even talk. What's the word when you have
too much food? Ben, this is cheese man here.
Is a translator to translate. English to English yes exactly
when you're just way too slow and hard too much food.
Also so stereotypical of me. I was just came here I'm like
(02:48):
I'm full of falafel. So anyway, I decided I'll fill
you guys in a bit. You know, while talking to Ben
as well about the the Joe Wong shows and the crazy scale that
we did the shows on and how coolit is.
But I would like to apologize because I did mention the
podcast group that Joe would be the guest.
(03:09):
And unfortunately, we just didn't have time.
Like we, you know, there was crazy rain or if you remember, I
mean, it's probably raining right now whenever you're
listening in Hong Kong. It has been raining for the last
3 1/2 fucking business years. So yeah, just because of the
rain and all of this, we just really didn't have time to get
the recording done with Joe. He was really interested.
I'm so sorry. I just couldn't make it happen.
(03:31):
And it's also because Vivek had the equipment and he couldn't
even move. Not blaming him, just saying
that there was a whole lot of logistical nightmares happening.
So today I'm talking to my buddyBen Quinlan.
Ben is Hong Kong famous, LinkedIn famous and stand up
comedy famous. A lot of titles on this guy.
He is one of the earlier guests.I think you were a guest on
(03:53):
episode. I don't remember what.
What is it? I don't know, 7100, yeah.
Yeah, one of the earlier guests on the podcast, we'll bring him
back on just to chat with him. So he is my cohost slash guest
and also we have a big announcement for Ben that we'll
do in a little bit. But Ben, how are you doing, man?
Good, never seen someone so laugh so much at someones
(04:14):
misfortune. I know that's when you know,
it's like, you know, you roast the ones you love kind of thing.
Yeah, sure, sure. I hope you don't love me anytime
soon. I'm like finally Ben got an
accident. Let me DM his wife real quick
see how she's doing. Yeah, but Vivek, all the best to
you, man. I hope you recover soon.
And I'm not laughing or smiling while I say that.
(04:35):
He was. I just muted his microphone.
He just kept waving me to not show his laugh.
But yeah man, good to good to see you as always you have been,
I want to say you've been busy, but you have always been busy
since I met you. Yeah, well, I mean, I'm juggling
quite a few things, so, you know, business is taking up a
lot of time, and it means I haven't been back on stage as
much as I want to be. Yeah, You saw me the other week,
(04:57):
which is good. Yes.
It's always nice to shake off the cobwebs and tell a few jokes
and, you know, remind myself that that's a really fun part of
my life, right? Yeah, Yeah, you should.
You know, I mean, I would say like it doesn't matter how much
money you make or whatever. It's like if you're if you're
not having fun in the process and if your fun is so limited to
just like chasing, you know, just the next fortune, whatever
(05:19):
it is, I don't I don't believe it's worth it in my opinion, not
that I even can relate to that you.
Would say that, wouldn't you? Yeah, but I just don't believe
it's, you know? In all honesty, it's very true.
I I have a lot of friends and acquaintances that are very
wealthy and not very happy. So it's the correlation between
the two is in terms of happiness.
(05:39):
Isn't that clear? Yeah.
I agree. Yeah.
So one of the things, you know, I wanted to, obviously we're,
we're, we're friends, we're chatting.
One of the things that we talkedabout recently, like when I was
when we caught up right before the Joe Wong shows and he saw me
like quite stressed and like running around and stuff.
You're like, you know, you obviously are busy.
I'm like, you know, I'm busy andthe business is doing relatively
(06:00):
well in comparison to before. So I'm busy and relatively
successful and obviously everything is relative.
And you're like, you know, I'm like, I looked at you, I'm like
you. I am new to that word.
You have been both for a very long time.
So how do you advise someone like young, like me, just a
young startup guy And you adviseobviously and you sit on boards
for like startups and stuff. How do you deal?
(06:22):
Like how do you tell young people, young entrepreneurs to
manage this kind of like, you know, when the curve is going up
and you're like, Oh my God, I'm getting overwhelmed.
I'm not overwhelmed, but I am very aware of burnout.
How do you what advice do you give young people doing that?
Good question. I actually did a podcast a few
months ago speaking specificallyabout oh, wow.
Yeah. So yeah, there's no shortcuts in
(06:44):
life in general. I understand that most
successful people, unless you'reborn into wealth or you are
extremely lucky, most people work their asses off.
And even those that are extremely lucky have put
themselves in situations where they are more likely to be lucky
than not. Right.
You can't sit at home and moan about things not going your way.
They're usually out there and doing what's required.
(07:05):
A lot of hassle, a lot of rejection, a lot of exhaustion.
But you have to find moments where you give yourself a
reprieve, recharge, reset. If you don't do that, you will
hit a burnout moment. And it's very, it's very easy to
reach burnout. I know a lot of a lot of
founders, a lot of corporate executives that are just
constantly exhausted. And it drains all your
(07:26):
happiness. And you're right, if you keep
going after the next bucket of money and then you get it that
you realize that each and every bucket of money doesn't actually
make you incrementally happier, right?
There's a thing called Maslow's hierarchy of needs.
You basically got, you know, your accommodation, your food,
the shelter, Yeah, had all of these kinds of things.
When you've got your basic necessities sorted, everything
(07:47):
else is just a little purple bonus.
And yeah, you know, I think it'simportant.
Perspective is very important. Yeah, I mentioned this on the
podcast before, but to you I'm saying that I watched the
documentary on the DJ Avicii recently.
Have you watched that? I haven't seen the dog but it's.
Very, very good. Because you know, it's, it's
basically celebrating his life more than anything else.
And you know, there is like a lot of interviews with him
(08:09):
throughout his life. And one of the things that stuck
with me is him saying my only goal was to not worry how much
the cab is anymore. And then everything else after
that didn't really matter. He was like, I just wanted to
get to from place to place and be like, you know, I don't have
to worry. So basically once I had my own
car, you know, he ended up with like a 50 million US net worth.
(08:30):
And he's like, it doesn't read. It's like it was nice.
But obviously, given his ending,it's a proof that he actually
didn't really. I agree.
I can promise you that money takes away certain aspects of
stress. Yes, things to.
Him is just getting from one place to another.
Sure, but then as soon as you get money, there's different
stresses that come as a. Result tell me about it because
(08:51):
I have no idea. Well, again, you're, you're
constantly chasing, right? You set your benchmark and human
beings naturally want to achieve.
You don't want to go down vis A vis what you did last year.
You want to be a consistently better version of yourself, more
earning power, more successful. It's it's ingrained in all of
our psyche. So it's, it's very easy to get
(09:13):
stuck in this rat race and not take a step back.
Like if I were to have spoken tomyself, say, five years ago, 10
years ago, yeah, three years agoand said, Ben, this is where you
would be in three to five years,I would be really happy to know
that I would have achieved thosethings.
I would have thought, no way. But then you're in the moment
(09:35):
and then you lose that perspective again.
So you always have to just take a step back and remind yourself
and sometimes give yourself a little pat in the back and say
you know, good job, you did it and it's very hard to sit there
and and congratulate yourself. Right, that's it.
I think that's actually that's you hit the nail on the head
there, because I think having a support system is really
important and people are like you're cheerleaders basically.
(09:57):
People are like in our culture now, there is a lot of like, you
know, TikTok motivational peopleor whatever.
They go like, you know, you are your biggest and there is
something cheesy about it, but there is also something that
actually is true. I believe you're like, you know,
you take stock of exactly what you said.
It's like, would I have imaginedmyself doing this, whatever this
(10:18):
is now three years ago, like literally like last year.
And it's like, how how come I'm not even go like, Oh my God,
this is amazing. I had a right after the Joe Wong
shows, I had our buddy Chris Musni, who's a close friend of
mine. He was sitting in the audience
and he sent me a photo of myselfperforming to a show that I
produced and basically filled the the venue with so many
(10:41):
people for Joe and for myself. And he sent me a photo of me on
stage. And it was just one message.
He goes, one year ago, we were performing to three people at
Lips, which was this terrible bar at the Grand Hyatt.
And he just reminded me three years, one year ago, three
people sitting in the audience, we're like, hello, is this
anything? And now we have like freaking
(11:02):
800 people and. Chris was one of the three so.
Yes. Oh yeah, for sure.
Yeah, there was Chris, Annie andme.
We just actually he's the three of us.
And I'm like, that's the perspective.
You're like, Oh my God, yes, you're right.
And you need people like this. And I I suppose you have friends
in the in the business as well. Do you, Is it kind of cut throat
and as as you know? Well, a lot of it has to come
(11:25):
internally. I, I will ask you a question, MO
It's, it's like, you know, a lotof people have those friends
that will come visit you in hospital when something goes
bad. You might be lucky to count five
of those people on one hands. And then I'll ask you, of those
five, how many of them can you call when something really good
happens to you? I mean it.
(11:48):
Yeah. How many would you call to say,
hey, Ben, you never would have guessed I got this thing.
I'm so happy. And that person would genuinely
be happy for you. Yeah.
Most people don't have those people in their lives.
Yeah. So it's really I.
Can think of like, as you said, like if I can think of the
people who would visit when something bad, which would be
quite a lot, you're right. The people who I would call
(12:09):
back, I'm like, guess what happened?
Yeah, to be less than, a lot less than those.
People a lot less. You'd be lucky to have one.
Yeah, really. I actually, I mean, I can, I'm
not going to mention names, but I can think of like four or five
people who I'd be like, oh, I would call and be, which I guess
again, put it in perspective, makes me lucky.
Yeah. And I'm like, there's a lot of
people who would be very happy for me or like, kind of like,
(12:31):
you know. Genuine happiness, no jealousy,
no anything. Yeah.
Just genuinely, genuinely happy for you.
And yeah, it's important to findthose people.
But look at the end of it. I still think it's really
important just to have that perspective for yourself.
Yeah, right. It's it's it's the battle that
you go through with yourself. I would say the worst friend to
(12:51):
you is your own mind. You would say.
You would talk shit about yourself all the time.
All the time. Yeah.
You would just be defeatist. Like everyone does it.
Even very successful people do it.
And we we have this lingering doubt that keeps creeping in our
heads. It's imposity.
Complex Imposter. Yes, yes.
Peter Principle like you, you name it.
Not the pedo principle, the pedo, but I mean.
(13:13):
It's the title of this episode, Pedo Principle with Ben Quinlan.
But it's, it's really important to, to remember to that everyone
goes through these similar things.
And you know, most of the time you, you're beating yourself up,
you would just consider yourselfa shit friend.
If you know the way that you spoke to yourself and treated
(13:35):
yourself, you'd be like, this isa really shit friend.
So just be a better friend to yourself.
That's that's really, really accurate.
I think I was also like, yeah, reading something about how if
you tell somebody, hey, I have afriend who keeps saying the all
of these things about me, they'dbe like, that's not a good
person. Like don't surround yourself
with this person. And that's your own mind who's
(13:57):
always, you know, you're waking up with it.
Like, you know, you suck. No one likes you.
You're a fraud. You are this and that.
And it's just, it's I think that's probably the, the hardest
battle, honestly. It's like the battle of like,
yeah, waking up and like gettingyour own, getting yourself on
board with what you're doing. And especially because we live
in the age of social media wherewe wake up, we we, we then look
(14:18):
at our phones immediately. We're spending 7-8 hours a day
on our telephones and we're looking at everyone's highlight
reel and comparing it to our lives.
Not the two of us though. We have our own little gifts
that we send each other. That does bring joy, but how,
how do you get perspective when your perspective of the world is
(14:42):
everyone else doing awesome? Yes.
It's really, really hard sometimes to to just take stock
and be like, you know, this is afiltered view of everything.
100% it's, it's a filtered view because it literally got a
filter on it. This is even what they look
like. So you, you always have to
remember that everyone goes through their own battles.
Everyone has their own demons. Not just that, to your point,
(15:04):
also there are people who I like.
Luckily I know them in person and I know that view is not just
like the opposite or whatever orexaggerated.
I'm like, I know you're depressed, but I know you're
very sad person. Not that this is good or bad.
I'm like, this is because if a stranger is looking at their
lives and all they're seeing is like traveling first class and
eating and this and that, and you're like, and everyone, of
(15:27):
course you're like, I want this person's life.
But I'm like, only if you know that this person spends like 10
hours every day just crying on their bathroom floor.
You would never want that life, right?
And everyone sees its success, but they don't see all the work
that goes into it. And you know that one of the
partners that works with me in this business, he runs our
corporate training arm, Michael Campion.
(15:48):
Brilliant, brilliant. And he always says, you know,
talent is practice in disguise, right?
So every time you see people, like if someone goes and watches
you on stage and thinks always MO lucky just now.
No, I mean, you've been doing this 10 years, 12 years, I don't
know how long, but just honing that craft day in and day out.
And usually it's the understanding that, you know,
(16:09):
people have put in so much time ever and energy behind the
scenes that is not on the highlight reels, the unglamorous
stuff. It's, you know, it's all the
things that make you that betterversion of yourself.
So it's, it's hard, but you know, that's, that's the
unfiltered version of life. I, I, I am attracted a bit to
the unfiltered version though. Like when I'm watching, you
know, stories of people coming up, like, you know, story of
(16:32):
like someone like Paris Hilton versus someone like, I don't
know who came from like nothing or whatever.
Like, I just watched that, that I remember Paris Hilton because
I watched it not long ago and itwas just like, you know, someone
was born into money. And it's like that always has
its own set of struggles and everything.
But I'm like, I just can't relate to it because I'm like,
you were given this and your struggle was to kind of maintain
(16:52):
it slash, live with it, slash, you know, have your mental
health in check. But there's a lot of people that
look up to that are just like, oh, you are.
Yeah. That's that.
You had to build all of this andalso not lose yourself or lose
your mind the meantime because some people make it really big.
I agree was Jimmy Carr had the best line.
He said the joy is not in havingstuff, it's in getting stuff.
(17:15):
Yes, I love that. It's so, so spot on to know that
you've, you know, just having things and being given to you.
You don't appreciate them. You can't appreciate the
struggle, the work or the effortthat was required to get to
where you are. But I think that level of grit,
it goes to, you know, the word. It's a very, very famous Ted
Talk done on it that differentiates founders that are
(17:36):
ultimately hyper successful versus those that are not.
And the word that they used is grit.
It's just that persistence, the tenacity to just keep going.
And no one knows just how many failures I go through all the
time, how many projects don't gothrough, how many times I lose
to a competitor. Happens all the time.
And it's just how you manage that process.
(17:58):
And what used to defeat me before, I don't know.
I give myself 30 seconds to huffand puff and then you just get
on with your day because no one's going to rescue.
You no exactly that's another thing about like especially a
city like Hong Kong where you don't really have too much of A
safety net like the government, not not to just you know,
whatever trash like not like there are other places in the
(18:20):
world where you can kind of relya little bit on like a certain
level a. Better Social Security.
Correct. And I don't believe I'm not a
citizen here. I don't know the full spectrum
of things, but I don't believe that exists here.
No big extent. No, I mean fruit money for the
pension as well, 1600 a month for old age allowance, that's
(18:41):
going to go a long way, right? Yeah, yeah, yeah, Especially if
you're like, yeah, if you don't own your house or, you know, you
have to pay rent and some place far away, that's, that's
impossible almost, which is why you see, you know, the people
collecting cardboard boxes and stuff like this.
Because literally sad. It's very sad.
It's sad and. You know, when we're now in
this, this new wave of, you know, this new generation coming
(19:05):
through Gen. Z, Gen.
Alpha, I feel for them because how are they ever going to own
their own home? You know, you think about it and
and the whole culture that's permeated is, is like in China,
there's the life flat generation, right?
It's just it's just giving up. I'm not going to be able to own
anything. Everything's too expensive.
I'm just going to try and enjoy my life.
(19:26):
You have more kids moving back into their homes with their
parents, right? It's just the realities of the
current environment make it extremely difficult for this
next Gen. and This is why all these businesses have popped up
that are giving them these instant riches kind of, you
know, dream crypto. You know, you don't have to
work, just trade, you know, 100 X your investments.
(19:47):
You know, there's a lot. Of people for scams fall for
scams because of that? Yeah.
Because they're chasing that. But when you feel so trapped and
you feel like this could be my escape route, yeah, I I can
empathize to some degree what people do it, but.
I think in the vast majority of cases, 99.9% you are dealing
with people that if you want to ultimately be successful and
(20:09):
financially secure, you, you, you have to work hard.
It doesn't matter what you're doing.
You do have to work hard, put inthe reps you.
Know which? Which gets us to today's
sponsor, The Jockey Club. No, it's not.
This is a good time. They are doing great.
Yeah, the gambling monopoly in Hong Kong.
Yeah, yeah, yeah. But, but I, I do have good
(20:30):
things to say about the Jockey Club because at least they, they
donate a huge amount of the proceeds to charity.
And yes, that for me is, is a game changer.
They're one of the best things to happen.
Yeah, to Hong Kong, the medical services, all the things that
they provide. And a lot of the theatres who
are booking are, are Jockey Clubtheatres as well.
And it's like, yeah, exactly like you're giving back.
You are, you know, yes, people are addicted to gambling and all
(20:53):
that. At least it's going bad.
Gambling is horrendous, you know, I'm from Australia, the
highest per capita gambling spent in the world, in the
world. Every time I went to Australia,
I would always buy these scratches.
You call them. They're so fun.
Yeah, yeah. You go to the newsagent, you
basically here's a lot of tickets behind you.
Yeah, Scratch this, Scratch that.
Yeah. You know this screens all
around. You bet on this horse race, you
(21:14):
can bet on ping pong in the middle of Uzbekistan, right?
Wow, there's. Everything happening that you
can just bet, bet, bet, bet, bet, bet, bet, bet.
Yeah, and I've seen how much gambling destroyed people.
Damn. Yeah, Yeah.
I mean, to be honest, I traveledin Australia quite a bit and we
would drive from Melbourne to Sydney and back.
That's quite a long drive. And you stopped by a lot of
town, like small towns. Yeah.
(21:34):
And I'm like, if you're a gambler, I get it, man.
What else would you do? It's the only tax free income in
Australia. As well, but it's also there is
absolutely nothing like how do people live here yeah exactly
you're. Going to talk to the same 3.
Trees. Let's talk a little bit about
your your opera you grew up in in Sydney.
No, I grew up in Hong Kong, bornand raised here.
You're born here, but did you spend any time properly in
(21:57):
Australia? I did so my family shipped me
there when I was 12 to go to boarding school.
And there is the word used, the word shipping.
Yeah, yes, freighted me there. So I was there from 12:00 until
26. So I did my high school, did my
uni, started my career, yeah. And then and then I came back to
Hong Kong 2009. How is it like?
(22:18):
Sydney is quite a nice city, butlike Off Record we spoke a bit
about like you find it I guess abit more dull than than Hong
Kong not. Oh yeah, yeah.
Oh yeah, yeah. Yeah.
Like are you talking about like the nightlife or just like the
general culture or? What is a life too?
The general life it's. Pleasant.
It's it's pleasant, but Sydney is not.
(22:41):
It's very cosmopolitan. It's got a great standard of
life. Yeah.
Things are now really expensive there.
Yeah. You know, I'm talking about home
ownership in particular. Tax is extremely high, 46 1/2%.
Yeah, right. And that's not just your income,
it's also after you put that money in the bank and you earn
interest, that's also tax, right?
And then your dividends and thenyour capital gains.
(23:03):
So I always say you can earn money in Australia, you just
can't keep it. So that's the one difference.
But I enjoyed my life there. It was very good for my studies.
It was good to focus. You didn't have all of the
distractions that you would in aplace like Hong Kong, right?
And I developed some wonderful friendships over the time I was
there. So whenever I go back, I
reconnect with all those friends, which is great.
I had a moment when I was sitting on a beach in Sydney
(23:26):
where it's, it's not Bondi, it'slike one of the beaches kind of
outside and. We're manly.
Sorry, Manly. Manly Beach, that's the one.
And we're sitting like kind of like higher up, kind of bit of a
hill. Yeah, I'm just looking at the
ocean. And then I saw a whale fin like
pop out. Yeah.
And I, I told my girlfriend at the time, I'm like, is that a
(23:48):
whale? And she didn't see it.
And as if the whale wanted to show itself and it just like
flapped its fin again. And I'm like, I would never see,
not just that I would never see that in Hong Kong, but it's
like. Plastic bag.
Yes, exactly. It's a freaking drunk canoe
canoer just floating around dying.
But like there is something is like, oh, I'm sitting here in
(24:09):
like a random day and I'm just seeing a whale, which is so
cool. But it's also like, yeah,
sometimes you feel like, you know, obviously the grass is
always greener. Do you?
I feel like at this moment, like, what would I would I be
like if I'm just living there just like, that's my day, just
like looking at whales and like,you know, playing with the
beach. You'll be a lot more simple
(24:30):
playing with the beach, OK? I'm playing.
With the sandcastles, there you go.
Yes, it's it's beautiful. And I think the mindset that I
had in Australia was a lot less complicated than coming back to
a place like Hong Kong where everything is go, go, go, go,
go, go. Yeah, it's very cut throat.
I enjoyed it, but for my career in what I was trying to do, it
(24:52):
wasn't a good place to build my career in my view.
So maybe someday in my life, sure I can go there.
Maybe retirement, I don't know, Maybe if there is an opportunity
to set up an office there, who knows.
But I always like Australia's got a special place in my heart.
Well, I mean, to this point as well, I think I do believe that
(25:12):
I would have never learned as much as I have just like even
just not just business, but likelife life wise if I wasn't here.
Just because of the pace of how much you're learning everyday
about even like social things about like efficiency, about
like learning to say goodbye to people about how you, you like,
(25:32):
at least for me as an expat. And you, you are basically a
local. So I think maybe the perspective
it could be a bit different for me.
And in Shanghai it was the same.But here's more because here's
it feels so transient, especially after COVID.
Yeah, which is a lot of people are like leaving and you're like
learn like who is worth investing time and energy in.
Yeah, right. And who is like how to be OK
(25:52):
with like, oh, I, you know, I made the wrong investment.
Basically, whether it's a business or work or whatever.
And as you said, like people don't see that on the outside.
They're they're seeing you LinkedIn page and how much you
are. You know how the people don't
post about their failures, right?
No, no, that's actually really interesting because I did like a
deep dive and you can probably see from my profile, I'm not
(26:13):
active at all. And I did a deep dive not just
on your profile, but like other like minded people.
And yes, there's something Instagram and Facebook and stuff
does have a side of like people are whining and they're like,
you know, everything is wrong, especially with the stand up
business. Like people now, like as we're
recording, people are in Edinburgh French.
And if I show you some of the posts, we'll just like be
(26:34):
cackling, laughing because it's just people bitching about how
there is 0 people who came to the show.
Like first, why are you bitchingabout it?
Second, why did you do it? And 3rd, are you not, are you
not a stand up? Like this is just how it works,
but as opposed to like LinkedIn is a lot of a lot of people
like, Oh my God, this is how I succeeded.
(26:55):
Here's my secrets and stuff likethis, right?
Yeah, I mean, I do have my own piss take on LinkedIn because it
is a bit of humble brag claptrapthere.
Everyone is so honoured all the time and thrilled, just honoured
and thrilled persistently to geta certificate and sewing from
the University of Nowhere, right?
There's so much of this going on.
(27:16):
I have a here's me, I'm here's me.
It's a selfie and I'm at a conference.
I'm like, are you speaking at the conference?
Did you share any insights? LinkedIn is turned into a bit
of, you know, verbal diarrhea ofpeople patting themselves on the
back. And it does.
It does actually make me roll myeyes sometimes.
But you know, each to their own.Whatever.
(27:36):
Well, you, I want to I've never spoken to somebody who is
LinkedIn popular. I suppose I'm looking at your at
your page and you know, everything counts by followers
now and you're at 30 + 30 more than 37,000 followers, which is
significant for, you know, if there is anyone, any individual
(27:59):
with 37,000 people having the potential of seeing what they
are posting or writing. That's big.
Do you feel when did it start? First of all, like you have
obviously as a business person, you've been on LinkedIn for a
while. When did you start feeling like,
you know, the inter like the people are engaging with your
the engagement is higher and they're like, oh, I'm racking up
followers. Well.
(28:19):
The nature of what I do, my company that creates a lot of
research and insights. So we post a lot of that.
It's not about here's a selfie of me doing something.
It's it's what do we have to sayto the world?
What value or knowledge contribution can we make to the
people on this platform that will make them more aware of
what's going on, have better perspective like that's
(28:40):
generally what we do. I think that a lot of the
following actually came about because I'm not very I I would
say I'm very mindful about what I posed, but I'm also not scared
to have an opinion and I don't filter an opinion to the point
that my opinion just disappears.If I have a strong opinion on
(29:03):
something, I will say it. I will try and back it up as
much as possible with objective facts and data and information,
but I think that a lot of peopleare too scared sometimes to post
their real thoughts online, especially in a corporate world,
for fear of it having negative reputation.
(29:24):
On their, on their business or on their career basically.
Correct. Yeah, but but you know, the
nature of what I do is I run a consultancy.
We're we're hired to provide an opinion, have an opinion.
I hate it when people say I'm. Cautiously opinion giver.
Well, it's just the I'm cautiously optimistic.
Well, I, you know, all of these people that come out with a view
that's not a view and I believe,but maybe.
(29:46):
And on the other hand, it's like, well, what's your actual
opinion? There's a lot of abstract, I
suppose, like opinions. It's like you can't really, you
can't really hold them down on like, what are you actually
trying to say? Exactly right.
It's just yeah, is. It like diplomacy or is it just
like people are so used to like people like walking down the
(30:09):
street, like, you know, like they're not, they're really
scared. It's very scared.
I think in corporate world, people are afraid of offending
people. They can get blacklisted, they
can get called out, you know, because a corporate reputation
may be different from a comedianreputation is very, very
different. But again, I've always said to
even my team, if we go out to market and have an opinion, say
(30:31):
what you think. Like if you read, if you've done
the homework, you've done the research, you've spoken to
people in the market. You, you have utmost conviction
about your position, put it out to market and your job is not to
please everyone. You will end up just.
Pissing everyone off or. You end up.
Yeah, exactly. Or losing yourself and.
You lose yourself. Yeah.
(30:51):
That's the most important thing.You will absolutely lose sight
of yourself and what you stand for.
Yeah. So, you know, it's this whole
idea of find your tribe, right? Not everyone needs to be a
friend. Not everyone needs to like you.
And I know there's a lot of people that may not like what I
post or my opinion. I It's OK.
Also, a lot of people don't like.
I know a lot of people who don'tlike your comedy or your person.
Yeah. So there is a lot of my.
Parents as well. You have a lot of enemies.
(31:15):
I don't know. I don't know what you do.
It's all. Good, mate.
I mean, you put yourself out there, you got to understand
you're going to have people thatdon't like your stuff.
But if you, if you take it personally, you're, you're a
fool. No, yeah.
Speaking of, I wanted to jump back to the Edinburgh thing.
I found this one of my favorite stories this year, and it's
shared by our buddy Guarantee. And the headline goes Edinburgh
(31:36):
Fringe performer in tears. This is, by the way, this is
proper like news. It's from dailyrecord.co.uk,
some sort of publication. OK, that is is not small, I
suppose. Perform tears after third of
audience walk out. OK, so first of all, this is a
new story. Second, Nicole Nadler was
performing her one woman show funny like an ironically lamed
(31:58):
exposure therapy when she says athird of her audience walked out
15 minutes early. The story goes whatever.
And then last night Nicole says 4 women told her she was a
beautiful soul and they left, which also means the third of
the audience was four people. Yeah, relativity of numbers.
(32:18):
Having come to the venue late and only standing for staying
for a total of 20 minutes, she pledged with a Fringe audience.
If you're seeing a show and you hate it, could you just stick it
out? Wow, OK, I want those four
people just late to a dinner booking.
I mean, it's, it's not the end of the world.
No, Speaking of Adam Rely, she said My biggest 2 fears were no
one comes. But obviously more than that,
(32:39):
that I'm unable to pull off thiscrazy idea of a show and that
rejection and failure also scared me from doing the show
that would happen and it did andit is gutting.
I'm handled it well at the moment and I'm really proud of
that. I'll be back on stage in a few
hours ready to pour my heart outall over again.
And this kind of story, it was aquiet show.
I had 12 people all together. It was one of the smallest
(33:00):
audiences I've ever had. We've all performed to smaller
audience or whatever. What I I think to to have the
balls to talk to the news about this and for the news on the
other hand, to think this is a story, it just screams all kinds
of wacko to me. Yeah, I mean, it's not some hate
crime. I mean, people are allowed to
leave a show. It, it is a bit peculiar.
(33:22):
I don't get it. And you, you and I know, I mean,
it's it's absolutely torture to go on the comedy stage.
We've been there and had flat sets and jokes that just, oh
gosh, you just want to seppuku yourself.
Yeah, it's awful. So I get it.
But yeah, taking it to the news is a bit weird.
(33:43):
Someone goes, they couldn't give.
She goes, they couldn't give me the decency of the next 10 or 15
minutes. If you're seeing a show and you
hate it, you just stick it out just out of kindness.
And I think also out of kindness.
You don't bully people until youknow I.
Think it's the wrong profession?Exactly.
Holding them hostage? You're sure?
Out of kindness, please let themleave.
(34:04):
But. Also out of kindness, they did.
That's probably one of the funniest things to me is like
all of them kind of picked up their stuff, looked at each
other and one of them said, you're a beautiful soul.
It's just the equivalent. You know, when you're talking to
somebody, you're like, you know,went on a date or whatever and
or meet someone at a bar and yougo, how are they doing?
Or like, how are they? You're like such a good
(34:24):
personality. This is the equivalent.
Of that in stand up, you know, imagine being on stage and then
the audience. Called a beautiful song.
So did you like my comedy again?You're a beautiful song.
It's kind of like when I finished the show.
What actually, when I finished up the last shows with you at I
was standing outside and then someone came up to one of the
(34:46):
other comics I was speaking to and was just constantly praising
them. And that's the worst feeling
when you're standing right next to a comic and you're like, you
know, I was performing too. Yes, but.
It's good. I had to watch comedian Paulo
Guetta, absolute freaking monster on stage.
He came through Shanghai years ago and I was just standing with
(35:07):
him outside. I was the opener and the person
came like some audience member goes like this was actually the
best live show I've ever seen. Like you, like you changed my
perspective on things. You're so funny.
I was crying, laughing, and she looked at me.
She's like, you're on stage. You walked up on stage too.
(35:30):
One of the best ones I had was when I did a show with Pete
Greller and then someone came upto me right after the show and
said oh you A joke about the umpire.
State Building is my favorite joke.
So your favorite joke of mine isa joke that this guy did.
You both have nothing in common at all.
You're not alike. He has hair.
(35:51):
You're young. Both of you are like younger.
I found that a real compliment. Speaking of show, we're kind of
gearing up to basically your biggest show in Hong Kong to
date. I, I will give a little bit of
back story on how this we have talked for a long time about
producing like a A1 man like a theatre show for you.
(36:14):
And one of the reasons I want todo this is also your Comedy
Central set from years ago. It did look you look like one of
the more comfortable comedians on like a stage with like
cameras and stuff. Is that because of your the
nature of your public speaking sometimes in your job that
you're that comfortable? Yeah, I don't get, I don't
really get shy, so to speak. I enjoy, I enjoy performing
(36:38):
arts, right. I really enjoy as because you,
as long as you know you're thereto entertain people and people
that there to have a good time, that's always what you have to
keep in the back of your head. So therefore you got to tell
yourself you have a good time aswell.
But if you're up there and you've got all the nerves
around, it's just again, framingwhat it is in your mind before
you step out on the stage. And yeah, I I've been doing a
(36:59):
lot of the performing arts, likesince I was a kid.
So how did that start for you? Well.
My dad's a composer, right So. He's in the music business.
And there's a lot of people that, you know, they were, I was
in a band. I used to sing and play guitar.
I did a lot of the, you know, drama shows and plays when I was
younger, TV commercials. I really enjoyed it.
(37:22):
And speaking like debating, I enjoyed doing that as well.
So you can be quite argumentative if if we get you
in the right like debate mode. Oh, it'd.
Be very fun. Yeah, it's super fun.
I remember I was like having like, you know, long nights of
just talk about absolute nonsense.
It's someone also to see kind ofwhere you stand and just take a
slightly different position justto keep you going.
(37:44):
Yeah, but now I understand. Did you go to like debate club
like that? Yeah.
Debating team at school. So it's good practice, right?
Obscure topics, yes. Take the affirmative, take the
negative. And you're like, I remember it's
like one of the debates I had asthe car has done more harm than
good. That was the topic discuss.
And I was in the affirmative andit was it was just interesting
(38:08):
to see how like, yeah, we have cars everywhere.
And now we have to take the other side of the argument.
What are they going to say? How am I going to counter this?
Any position And this is this iswhat's lost in today's age.
No one understands the nuance ofboth sides of an argument like
critical thinking, just understanding what's position A,
what's position B. And then therefore, what is my
informed opinion. And social media just makes that
(38:30):
worse. They just reinforce whatever
position you have and shove thatdown your throat non-stop such
that you were just so ingrained in a way of thinking that if
anyone says anything on the other side.
You're ready to. Attack.
Yes, yes, I actually do blame. Obviously social media is a big
one. Terrible.
Genuinely blame American pop culture and American politics on
(38:50):
that. I agree because it's like it's
so, so polarized. Yes, that like it's impossible
to like one of the comedians Bill Burr has like, kind of like
started taking this kind of middle of the road, kind of
like, you know, it's very Gray. Like it's not about the color of
the tie and all of these things.And now both sides hate him.
(39:12):
Yep. And that's when you know he's
right. Yes.
That's when you know, he's like,oh, yeah.
The every, everybody in his comments.
Now you're a fucking cock liberal piece of shit.
And the other guys are like, yousold out.
You have a black wife. How dare.
And he's like, all I'm saying isthat the real enemy is not the
other person of the on the on the other side of the aisle, of
(39:33):
course, is the billionaires and the politicians who are fucking
you over. And you're saying I am, I am a
cock. Whatever.
Yeah. I mean, politics used to be
about diplomacy. The word has no meaning anymore.
Yeah. So sitting down and listening to
people, usually if I'm in any kind of a debate or argument, I
would want the other side of a table to exhaust their point to
(39:53):
the end. Say everything you possibly can
say, let me hear it out, and then I'll respond.
Usually I'll find some good points being raised, but I'll at
least know you've given me all the ammo to come back with my
position if I start interjectingand cutting you off prior to you
actually getting your point across.
I actually don't know what you've said.
Yes, exactly. And you're, yeah, you're right.
Like you're not fully aware of what much how much ammo they
(40:15):
have left. Yes, right.
Going back to. So yeah, when we're talking
about like you being comfortableand in front of a camera and all
of that. And then we wanted to there is
only a few comedians currently in Hong Kong.
Jordan Long left a while ago, but there's only a few comedians
currently in Hong Kong who wouldhave this kind of draw as well
to, to perform a, a theatre show, a spectacle of sort.
(40:35):
And among the, the the comedianscurrently based in Hong Kong, I
have you on my track around bothdoing theatre shows basically on
the same week. So talking to you now what?
How do you envision like executing your set on the night?
You have a lot of obviously likematerial that are quote, UN
(40:56):
quote classics that you have seen you do, but at the same
time, you have quite a long period of time on stage.
And also you're kind of an executive producer of the show
as well. So you have full creative
control over what happens. We can light up the audience.
We can play fireworks. We shouldn't do that because
liability. There's a lot of stuff that we
can do. What are you?
Thinking about Yeah. It's kind of fun to play with
(41:20):
these kind of formats because, you know, when I used to work
for Live Nation, we're really restricted on like, you know,
corporate policy and stuff like this.
But now we are, we can do whatever we want.
Sure. How do you like?
Yeah. How did you try to imagine like
the set of the on the night? Genuinely.
Hand on heart, No. Yeah.
OK, well let's let's you know. I think part of it is just
(41:41):
saying, you know, how long were we doing comedy for now?
12 years. So part of it is just trusting
the instincts that things will come and you can't you, you
can't plan everything. Sometimes things will go awry.
I know there will be a bomb or two in the set.
Oh yeah. I look forward to it.
And there'll be audience interaction.
There'll be a mix of whatever just feels right.
(42:03):
I think the only thing I'll be paying attention to is is the
audience laughing and having fun.
And I will adjust the set accordingly.
If they're not having fun, I'm not going to continue to go down
a particular track which says I've just ruined your night,
Right? Yes, yes.
So that's all I do every single time I step out on stage.
What's what's resonating with this, the audience?
And then how do I just keep keepthat energy momentum going?
(42:25):
How do you, because you're one of the most successful stand ups
here in the scene. And I know you joke about like
you know, you, you being on a list and there's only like 6
comedians or whatever. But genuinely, even among the
current working comedians, you're still one of the most
successful ones. And this is obviously I wouldn't
say a hobby, but this is obviously a minor thing in the
bigger scheme of all the things you're doing.
(42:46):
How do you find the time to continue to be?
And I'm not sitting here, sitting here kissing your ass.
It's just like, I'm a producer. It's a fact that you, when I
have you on the show, I can relax.
I can actually go outside, get some water because I'm like, I'm
trusting the audience with Ben. He's not going to self.
What's the word? Sabotage.
Self sabotage. He's not going to, you know, all
(43:08):
of these things like we were talking about a comedian, I'm
not going to mention who is an absolute like risk liability on
stage. They're the funniest for the.
Yeah, the funniest for the comics, but I like I can't keep
book and I told them as much. I'm like, I can't keep booking
you because I have no idea if the audience is going to come
(43:30):
screaming at me that they paid money and this is what they saw,
right? But to you, it's for you it's
the opposite. How do you keep you don't have
time? I'm looking at your your current
as current jobs, not previous jobs.
And I'm looking at, you know, obviously your CEO and magic
partner of your own company, Quinn and Associates, but you're
also sitting on you're doing a lot of Advisory Board roles.
(43:55):
How the hell do you find the time?
You make the time. You make the time for the things
that are important. And, you know, I haven't made as
much time as I would ideally want to for comedy.
So it has taken a little bit of a backseat in past year or two,
I would say few years relative to, you know, the time I had
before. It's a natural trade off in
(44:15):
terms of focusing a little bit more on the business and these
other things. But it's such an important part
of my DNA. It's such an important part of
me. It's such a amazing thing every
single time I hit the stage and just that that feeling that you
get and seeing the joy that you bring to people.
It's it's a drug and every comedian knows that it's it's.
(44:36):
The bug. It's a bug, absolutely.
So once you get that bug, what you want to let go of it?
No, no, I think I'm just like amazed, you know, while I'm
looking at all the stuff you arecurrently doing, for example,
you sit on the Hong Kong touristboard.
I'm an ambassador, right? I don't, don't sit on them their
(44:56):
board, right? Yeah, right.
So just explain to me what does for the layman.
What does that role mean exactly?
Well, a lot of these advisory orboard positions, they're you,
you're there in a basically a more senior capacity to act as
an advocate, to provide a steer guidance, advice to either the
(45:16):
government or the firms that I work with around some strategic
decisions or directions that they need to move in.
And usually it would be a combination with advice and
advocacy. So those are the main things
that are. Are they, I'm trying not to get
you in trouble here, but I've are they listening to you, Ben?
I have no idea. No, the reason I'm asking is
(45:36):
like, I've seen you post sometimes kind of being critical
sometimes of the directions thateven we're taking in comes when
it comes to tourism, when it comes to events and stuff like
this. But I feel like because you're
an advisor, I feel like, you know, I would be frustrated if
I'm writing these things or I'm telling it to them and they're
just kind of ignoring you. Does that.
(45:57):
I look, I think it's important to again, going to what's your
position? And I think part of being a good
advisor is saying things that sometimes the clients or the
person that is getting the advice, it doesn't necessarily
make them feel comfortable, but it is the right advice.
No one likes to be critiqued. No one you don't want to be.
(46:19):
Critiqued, feel good. No, I don't.
Want to be critiqued? It doesn't feel good unless
unless you take the mindset of is this person genuinely
critiquing me because they have my best interest parts and do
they have the right motivations?Do they have the right kind of
advice? Or are they doing this for the
sake of just making my life moredifficult or making things?
Or making me feel bad about myself.
(46:39):
Or they're, yeah, they have ulterior motives, basically.
So you have to look at the motivation.
It's kind of like in comedy. What is the motivation for this
comic? Getting up and telling a really
dark joke. It's not to offend people.
Yes, that try and elicit that laughter.
Just like with my post sometimesI never try and post with an
explicit view to throw anyone under a bus.
I post with a view that especially when it pertains to
(47:00):
Hong Kong and there's no 1A morevocal who loves the city more
than me and. I think that's you have proven
that in so many ways, obviously from your public appearances and
from the jobs that you're takingas well, that you are a big
lover of the city. I love the city.
I'm a hunky through and through.This is my this is my home.
But part of it being my home means I I also need to leverage
(47:23):
my skills, my knowledge, whatever it is, to try and add
the right kind of value and, and, and contributions to either
the public sector or private sector.
And it's OK if they don't like everything.
Yeah, it's all right. You're you're sticking to what
you believe is the right thing for the city as well.
True, but again belief is a veryloose term so it's not opinion
(47:46):
versus opinion. So my opinion is always grounded
in facts and data. That's my job.
So I hate people that just come out with opinions without
substantiating them. I always try and substantiate my
my opinions and that's that. Because I know at the end of it,
my fact will always be your opinion.
Yes, of course. And vice versa.
Your fact will always be my opinion.
(48:07):
Yeah. So come armed with facts and
that's what I always try and do.Yeah, to to wrap things up also
the, the, the show that we have on Sunday, 21st of September,
basically a month from now is Ben Quinlan, the theater show.
And it's like not just that, youknow, it's one of probably the
(48:28):
biggest local productions we've had.
We're going to have for for a Hong Kong based comedian.
It's also in a place that's quite special because that whole
W Kowloon complex has been kind of like taking shape in the last
few years after COVID. And it's really beautiful.
Like the, the, you know, the stuff that they have there.
I was looking up, I think with you yesterday.
(48:48):
We're looking at the, the Chinese Museum, the the, the
Palace Museum Theater because you have a separate event there
and we're like, this is so cool.That's just the place.
Do you feel like it's something that like if you are to pick all
the venues and you don't really get to pick this one because we
just like we're bound by venue availability here, but do you
(49:10):
feel like this place kind of like speaks to how your love of
Hong Kong as well? Yeah, the venue, look, it's kind
of like high tech, right? We finally got a venue to hold
the world class events and sporting sporting events,
concerts. But again, it's not just the
venue, it's the acts that we're bringing to the venue.
I'm not saying I'm ratcheting itup a degree after Jimmy Yang and
(49:31):
all these people. Yeah, it's kind of like, let's
take it down a notch. But, but I, I do believe it's
very important to bring the right kind of entertainment into
Hong Kong and international actsand things, things that just
bring the city back to life. A lot of the vibrancy I feel has
been sucked out of the city in, in during those COVID years and
it was really a bit depressing. So whatever.
(49:52):
Was a bit of a bubble. Exactly.
So whatever you can do to, you know, entertain people here,
keep boots on the ground, right,Stop going to Guangzhou or
Shenzhen every weekend, stay in Hong Kong.
There's lots to do in Hong Kong and there's things to do here
that you can't get across the border, right So Hong Kong has
to find that DNA about what makes it special.
Hopefully comedy is such a unique form of art and it's
(50:13):
something that there's more and more local comedians coming
through and they're great. There's a good future pipeline
of talent, and I hope this can really be considered as one of
the new mainstream forms of entertainment.
I mean, the city gets. That's genuinely what what I've
I've talked about this on a fulldedicated episode about the
comedy season. And actually from I was quite
(50:35):
amazed at how much support I'm getting from people who are
really high up in the, you know,venue, like stuff like, you
know, people who can make decisions and can get stuff
done. They all went like, yeah, we
need something like this becauseI just saw a void and you know,
as you said, like there is clockand flap, there is a bigger
events, there's the rugby sevens, there is nothing like
this. All I do know how to do is
(50:56):
comedy, not just even performing, but just production,
putting stuff together. I'm like we can use something
like this. And I will also say that not
just that we don't have this in Hong Kong, we don't have this in
Asia. In Asia, yeah.
The closest we have to somethingthat like I'm trying to to do is
Abu Dhabi. That's the closest one we have.
India doesn't have its own either.
(51:17):
Not that I would like. India has a whole different
universe, but even a place as close as India doesn't have
that. Like, you know, a festival where
people fly in the, like, 1 dedicated thing, but the rest of
the world does. Almost every city in America has
that. Yeah.
And Sydney and Melbourne have it.
Obviously Edinburgh has it. Yeah, two different formats.
But like, now in the Gulf, as you would know, there is
(51:40):
actually three different major seasons of comedy.
It's Dubai, Abu Dhabi competing with each other.
And Riyadh just started. And if you're looking at Riyadh
this year, it's the same, you know, it's just how the Gulf
people do it. It's just like, who is everybody
bring them on? Yes.
And so you're looking at the Riyadh season and, you know, a
bit of a tangent, but like 10 years ago, when you're looking
(52:02):
at like, you know, the Saudi opening up and stuff, you would
not think that this year they have Whitney Cummings coming.
Like literally she is on the bill.
And Whitney is filthy and she's,you know, super funny.
But like her brand of comedy, like Whitney Cummings is
performing in Riyadh. What the fuck is going on?
But you know, I don't, I don't care about like the, you know,
(52:23):
the moralistic, whatever the culture versus whatever, it's
just like just from a pure comedy promotion point of view,
I'm like, this is great. Yes.
You know, she might not be the right fit for that market, but
it doesn't mean that the appetite is not there to scale
things up. Yeah.
And we have. Hong Kong is, I will say, and I
can get in trouble for this, Hong Kong is way cooler than
Riyadh. I've been to both places.
(52:44):
Hong Kong is way cooler. Hong Kong is Hong Kong is by far
one of the most amazing cities in the world. 100%.
It's got everything, you know, it's got the culture, the
nature, like the topography is just out of this world, the
convenience, it's got optionality.
You can get very expensive, you can get very cheap, right.
(53:05):
But it's got those those influences of the international
Western mix in what is otherwisea Chinese city.
And that's beautiful because it's so damn hard to replicate.
So I think anything that Hong Kong going to do to preserve it
and magnify that, that DNA, it'sjust going to make Hong Kong
that much more successful. Agreed.
We're super excited to have you on board, man.
(53:27):
Thank you so much for first of all agreeing to do the show and
you know, being part of the comedy season that I know these
are also what we're recording now a records for how this
started versus hopefully how it will, you know, be much, much
bigger in the future. So thanks for taking a chance on
the first one with us. September 21st Sunday is when
(53:47):
Ben Quinlan performs his one manshow, The Ben Quinlan the
Theater, the Theater Special at the Box and West Kowloon.
We'll see you guys there. The link is obviously in the
description. Ben and I are going to quickly
record a he doesn't even know that yet 15 minute Patreon where
we talk shit about everybody as we usually he's giving me a face
(54:09):
and I will try not to get him lose.
You know what if you lose 2 overyour 18 jobs, that's not that
bad right? Because of us shooting this.
As long as it's not my own business.
But Ben, thank you so much for doing this.
I obviously have to come to youroffice because I know you're a
super busy guy, so I always appreciate your time.
But guys, come see Ben on the Sunday, September 21st at the
(54:31):
Box and we'll see you next week or on the patreonpatreon.com/aho
Pod. Rest of the comedy season
schedules also in the notes downbelow.
See you guys next week.
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