Digital Nomad

Book Talk

Sheena Melissa Chok — Fri, 19 Sep 2008 08:48:00 GMT

Few years ago, the managing director of an independent PR agency turned me down because I hadn't read "The Fall of Advertising & The Rise of PR", and that I wasn't a regular reader of Business 2.0 magazine; albeit being a regular subscriber of Newsweek, TIME, Reader's Digest, and Wired.
I remember receiving the rejection letter 2 months after I joined Hill & Knowlton; despite already knowing I didn't get the job anyway the very moment I saw the MD's face turn 'next' after I'd honestly admitted my 'reading habits'. Of course, by then, I had already picked-up that Al Ries book.
To date, I have read many books that has anything or nothing to do with the PR 2.0 revolution. I got Naked Conversations by Robert Scoble, more Al Ries books, Keane by Roy Keane, Not For Sale by David Batstone, Socialism is Great by Lijia Zhang, Chinese Whispers by Hsiao-Hung Pai and the list goes on. Some people collect Coke memorabilia, I collect books.

And so, I'd like to introduce to you my must-read of the year: Andrew Keen's The Cult of the Amateur.

Regardless if you belong to the Google-Wikipedia-rocks generation, done-with-Silicon-Valley-veteran, or find yourself joining the "boycott Facebook because its new look sucks" group; you should pick this up.

I am still reading the book - and I can't wait to write my thoughts about it soon. Stay tuned. And go grab that book already.

"...most people join Facebook to become their own PR agency..." - RD

Sheena Melissa Chok — Fri, 07 Mar 2008 11:31:00 GMT

Before I start rolling out the subject matter's words - My personal apologies to yours truly for my months-long absence from Digital Nomad! Yes, I'm disappointed at myself for playing truancy in here... February's been a month of blessing for most of us here at the Beijing office - we had our week-long Spring Festival break, and shortly after, we jetted-off on Malaysia Airlines and headed to the beautiful Langkawi, located south of Thailand.

So - most (note the Italicization of that word) people who join Facebook sorta have intentions of being their own PR managers. I actually laughed out loud when I got to that line.

I have yet to contact Ryan Davies but I can totally relate to his afterthoughts (brilliant post) in terms of the social networking madness surrounding Facebook. Ryan, great post!

Around mid-2007, I was practically on Facebook every other hour. I was excited to meet long-lost acquaintances (note my choice of words), high-school mates, ex-colleagues, ex-ballet class dance mates, my piano teacher (I quit the 'grade' ladder at the tender grade of 4), a journalist whom I met once during my days servicing MTV Networks Asia, and the list goes on.

I was also digitally-challenged because I was so excited about my wall, I didn't have the heart to change those notification settings - everything that was happening inside my Facebook - was being delivered to my personal email.

I probably had 10 applications in my book. One of it was the map. I was dying to tell my 'friends' that I've been to Six Flags Magic Mountain but the map didn't have it. So I passed. Then I added the countries.

Today - I have few items running. My wall. An app showing my support for Manchester United which also shows the next big match - and my photo album (which I was warned to NOT take it down by my girl friend because she's been tagged on few photos and she said if I was to take it down, she will take me down).
I removed my religious views, (never filled-in the political view), my status, my interests (to show that I'm a heterosexual? Come on), and a lot of other unnecessary items because I felt I was being too personal with people I've met for 4.56 minutes once at a place that I can't even remember.

Now - I take days or weeks to reply messages (even after being notified via email that I have unread ones). I forget to reply wall messages and not feel bad about it. I do this, I don't do that.
I wonder how many general users (not just Facebook) out there that are sick of this whole social-craze? But still find themselves part of it because they some how found peace with it?

I have found peace with Facebook. I will continue to do so unless they falsify my being by sending requests to hug my New York colleagues without me knowing it.

So, do you join Facebook to become your own PR agency? Maybe, because, don't we all do?

*From my personal understanding, Ryan Davies is attached to South Manchester Reporter. Any misunderstanding is deeply regretted so please drop me a comment/email should there be any errors, I will make immediate changes to it upon clarifying it with whoever it may be.

My New Year's Resolution with mr. Mouse

Sheena Melissa Chok — Tue, 08 Jan 2008 06:09:00 GMT

Guangqumenwai Avenue (广渠门外大街) - 8th Jan 2008. -4C, Sunday, 30 December 2007. It was windy with harsh Mongolian winds blowing against my face as I made my way to the nearest Carrefour for my weekend groceries shopping. However, I had another agenda. I was on my way to get a 'mouse' for an experiment which I've been longing to work on since I lost my cell phone mid of last year.

(Coincidentally, in a couple of weeks, Chinese from all around the world will be welcoming the year of the rat! Nice timing for my 'mouse experiment')

You see. I bought this cell phone back in 2006, accompanied with a pair of the then latest Bluetooth headphones. Seven months later, I lost the phone to a thief at a subway in the heart of Kuala Lumpur. That very same day, I spent 5 hours torturing the minds of two young handsome and super patient cell phone dealers; deciding in between getting the same phone versus every other models.

My purchasing criteria which drove the dealers nuts were:

The phone exterior must be white in color
Must have Bluetooth
Must be compatible with my Bluetooth headphones
Must have expandable memory slot
Must not run SD cards
Must be at least 3.5G
Must have a wide-screen
And of course, must have a camera of not less than 2.0MP

I remember them mumbling to me on how crazy I was in Cantonese. It was hilarious.

Anyway. Errr... I ended up buying the same phone. Now let's move to the experiment, shall we!

The experiment with mr. Mouse
Location: Chaoyang, Beijing
Time: 1500hrs, 30 December 2007

Like preparing a proposal, I listed down a list of questions which I needed answered:

1) Will I be able to live without my 8-criteria cell phone?
2) Why was I too dependent on my 8-criteria cell phone?
3) What can I do to change this OCD habit?

Only after that then I went out hunting for mr. Mouse. After 75 minutes of selecting the right 'mouse', I ended up buying a simple cell phone at a discounted price at the electronics shop next to Carrefour. It was really simple:

Black color phone (this wasn't part of the experiment, any color would do)
Small-color screen, rather pixelated (they don't sell 'yellow' screens anymore)
Infrared
Radio
No music
No USB port
No memory slots
No camera
No Bluetooth

Satisfied with my catch in the trap, I headed home and plugged mr. Mouse in the socket and let it charge for the next 12 hours.

1700hrs

5...7...11..10...hours had gone by. I was twiddling my thumbs even while watching Al Pacino in 88 Minutes. I couldn't concentrate. I was so excited about mr. Mouse and the fact that I was so glad that I finally bought a device which allowed me to be able to live like how my parents lived theirs when they were in their mid-twenties - just that they had no cell phones and depended on big black telephones and snail mail. Well, fine - I just needed to prove to myself that I'm not addicted nor too dependent on my 'happening' white cell phone.

While waiting, I did my weekly household chores, wiped .15mm thick dust everywhere (very common in Beijing), surfed the net, watched Criminal Minds, popped sodas in between.

I actually set my alarm at 5am so that I can wake up and switch to my new cell phone. Talk about OCD? I'm kidding. Yes I did wake up but only to unplug the mr. Mouse - and went back to sleep.

Next morning. Monday. New Year's Eve. An early start to my resolution for 2008 hey.

Time: 0930hrs, 31 December 2007
The real experiment begins.

So, aside from switching cell phones, I was also switching brands. It wasn't as bad as trying to start writing with my left hand (I'm right-handed). However, the features and keystrokes to get from Point A to Point B left me perplexed, but I was fine. No one called me, so I called cousin back home to tell her about my mouse experiment. she said "you wouldn't last a minute." Thanks for the encouragement, Steph.

Text messages started flowing in, and in between constant frustrations, I managed to reply text messages within speeds that's slightly way below my usual par. I managed, I coped. mr. Mouse was still alive and kicking.

Then things between mr. Mouse and I began to turn sour.

1545hrs.

I couldn't trace a missed call. I felt so lost walking to the subway listening to the only English radio in Beijing (that I know of) with so many ads in Chinese which I didn't quite understand. I had to watch the 'handsfree-wire' while doing every other thing - carefully reaching into my pocket for my lipbalm so that it doesn't get 'ripped-off' from mr. Mouse's torso.

I also had to pull mr. Mouse out of my pocket in order to adjust the radio's volume. The screen's display was so 'pixelated' my eyes got teary trying to send and reply text messages. I don't get to listen to Bee Gees' Stayin' Alive whenever some body calls, let alone my usual mp3s. Whenever my cell phone rang, I get stingy looks from certain hip, young-looking Chinese couples because to them the music was either 'unbearable' or 'odd' (odd as in, 'old-school polyphonic' perhaps?).

It was either the 6th or 7th hour since mr. Mouse and I began seeing each other. I felt digitally-challenged the whole day, and it was seriously driving me up against the wall. "Come on, this can't be happening!" I gasped to myself. I was hoping that this experiment might last a couple of months, at least. Right, wishful thinking...

I started imagining how would those drivers in LA or NYC survive if their GPS system was replaced with a 70s am/pm radio and a map in their hands? Of course not everyone's a Jason Bourne. Would be cool if we could navigate around having Bourne's capabilities after a stint at Treadstone, though.

Whether it's coincidence or the fact that my star sign decided to send friendly signals to my Sagittarius cousin, she texted me the same day telling me that the joystick on her Cell 1.0 phone gave way and she can't receive nor answer calls; but she can still send text messages when the 'joystick' is 'in the mood'.

(For your kind information, my cousin is one of the many endangered species that has been surviving with a cell phone (with a 1.3MP camera, that's it) that has a broken screen. The colors' burst and she can't really see much (probably 35%'s visible) on the phone. But she can't live without her iPod though. If you're interested to see what her Cell 1.0's like, drop me an email and I'll be more than happy to send you a photo of the phone)

2330hrs. I broke the news to mr. Mouse, telling him we were experiencing irreconcilable digital differences and that I couldn't live with his digital incapabilities anymore. I didn't like the way he asked me to answer my call, I didn't like the way he was programmed which slowed me down whenever I had to send text messages swiftly and I didn't like the fact that he can't multitask.

I pulled the plug and that's it, it's so over.

14 hours - that's how long I lasted on a simple cell phone with minimal functionalities. What a defeat! I immediately texted my cousin.

"u knw what, u can hav da stupid phone. just hang in there for 5 more weeks and I'll pass it to u when I see u"

"told u u wldnt last a min"

"hey at least i'm making good use of the phone nw by not wasting it by giving it to ppl like u LOL"

"how sincere of u..."

Here are the answers to my experiment:

1) Will I be able to live without my 8-criteria cell phone?
    Apparently no. Not at all.

2) Why was I too dependent on my 8-criteria cell phone?
    Because I've grown used to it and I thought I could change for the sake of it. But I couldn't.

3) What can I do to change this OCD habit?
    I don't intend to anymore.

Toward the end of my 'mr. Mouse experiment', I've taught myself an invaluable lesson and this continues to apply to my professional life. Sheryl Crow sang "A Change Would Do You Good" back in 1996. In 1996 I remember spending after-school hours on MIRC, ICQ, and playing pool on Yahoo! Games (which I still do). So now it's 2008. What is there to adjust to in 2008? Do a search on "social media+2008" or "social networking+2008" and you will know what I mean.

What are our old habits and what can we do in order to help our clients achieve desirable, measurable results? 2008 to me is all about picking up heavier knowledge that you can no longer identify only with your clients - you need to be able to identify your knowledge with the endusers that are scattered in various age groups. we need to become one of them. Reading up on Facebook alone isn't good enough - you need to use it. Reading up on competitors isn't good enough, you still need to experience it.

When things call for a change,

Can we say, "I don't intend to, anymore"? Of course not.
can we say, "Because I've grown used to it and I thought I could..."? Of course not.

It's no longer as simple as switching brands and functionalities.

I thought I could adjust to mr. Mouse without preparing myself well - I thought it's quite a simple switch because it's so basic - it's about communication. How hard can communication get?

Well, as many industries have come to learn over the years, it is and it still is conversation - and the conversation pool in this industry is getting, well - indescribable; and we need to identify with it fast(er) and make the best out of it.

Happy New Year!

Updates: I just read this article titled "Top 10 Trends in Social Media and Business for 2008" on Response Source and found it pretty insightful. I liked the part when he challenges news credibility - opinion vs. facts.

2008's definitely going to be a very interesting year - and I am so watching out for the Chinese market since Beijing's hosting the 2008 Olympic Games. - 9th Jan 2008

Moving on Already?

Sheena Melissa Chok — Sat, 10 Nov 2007 07:44:00 GMT

I noticed that a couple of my ww-colleagues start-off their posts with a location (press release-looky) and I find it rather interesting, and I'm going to do just that!

Jianguomenwai Avenue - Nice start, but frankly speaking that's where our office is located at. And I doubt I had this thought while I was in the office though, but let's carry on anyway.

I'm writing to challenge myself regarding my journey on Facebook. Yes, Facebook. I try my best to keep myself up-to-date with posts and forums that's been exchanged and challenged on the web such as via TechCrunch among many others, but the web's is just so crowded and I'm very sure somewhere along the road I may have missed important debates or discussions about what's hot and what's not. Hence, if there's any misleading or inaccurate mentions, please do drop me a comment or an email and I'll be more that happy to make amendments and keep the conversation going.

So, back to Facebook. I remember participating in a poll-post written by Michael Arrington many months back. Michael's idea was to gauge readers' instant feedback on two happening topics: iPhone and Facebook. I can remember my response, crystal clear - enough already.

And that was before Facebook was open to the world. Now that I'm part of the Facebook clan, I find myself becoming more and more 'distant' from the community. I felt burdened whenever I signed-in and noticed a looooong list of invites to join causes (e.g. political and the what nots), drink margaritas, see how alike I am with a friend, manage my reputation, telling me to retaliate because my zombie is being attacked, and invitations to parties that's sent by a friend all the way from UC Berkeley (Simon, I'm talking about you!) asking me to attend some music festival - a friend that's usually smart enough to know that there's no way I can attend because I'm all the way here, in Beijing, China - working.

I also remember the first day receiving an invite to join Facebook from Shuk (a friend who's currently devoting her life to working full-time and traveling/conquering all Southeast Asian countries before she turns 30). Matt, a Minnesotan friend, added me, and subsequently wrote an aloha note on my wall. Without any hesitation, I promptly replied him on the 'same wall', saying thanks and asking him how's it going with Bush and when will his next visit to Asia be. Few seconds after, he replied me on my wall, saying, "dearie darling, you're not really supposed to write on your own wall!" - fueling me with a little embarrassment I must admit.

Few months passed by and like everyone else, I felt obligated to accept friends that are 'not really' friends; go through the process of adding applications only to receive nasty-sarcastic wall-posts saying "Oy, your Facebook is so crowded my browser hung trying to load it" (when I only had a garden full of flowers and sheep, two walls, 30+ eggs, 25+ plants), carefully pick and select which photos should or shouldn't be made available etc.

It almost felt like Second Life in peril - I was stressed-out online.

I even had a good friend IM-ing me all of a sudden asking for help - support him in winning a 'fight' against another friend - all on Facebook. And we haven't been talking much and I thought he wanted to catch-up - oooops.

Two weeks ago, my colleague in Kuala Lumpur, whom I've closely worked with and we sincerely regard each other as friends; suddenly disappeared from the Facebook radar. I noticed this because through the sidebar, the number of friends I have from the Hill & Knowlton network went down. The next thing I knew, I was IM-ing with other KL colleagues, and we were literally discussing what's up with her and started feeling gravely concerned over her 'disappearance' and self-removal from Facebook. Well, she's back on it now and no one ever dared to ask her why. Run along.

I don't know if I'll be moving on from Facebook anytime soon, but I can honestly say that I'm bored with its offerings and would love to try something fresh. Without any doubt, Facebook is a very powerful make-or-break social-networking platform, bringing together interests, politicians, businesses, sporting fans - you name it, it's on Facebook.

I also love the fact that I am able to interact with my ww-colleagues (I just 'met' Mattia Sorbi, a colleague based in Milan) and exchange ideas and just about everything else. I am also painfully in love with the wall (just the wall) because it's such a brilliant application, it works like a magic-wand that I never had.

But I don't know what else am I using Facebook for other than the wall, friends and my colleagues. But perhaps those are enough to keep me around. I have self-exiled from adding anymore applications, even if it means interacting with a friend through that application. Also, there's no way I'm ever going to go through the pain of importing and exporting any of my new friends on Facebook to Friendster, and similarly make them go through the same pain. I even tried integrating all my social networks in one (there is such app, i.e. Fuser, I signed-up the moment it was available but the performance wasn't impressive so I moved on within 3 sign-ins, losing patience even for beta, I guess) , but it just didn't work for me. I'm still doing research on that and I might be able to write about it soon.

While writing this post, I just joined a group called Mobile Monday Beijing on Facebook, thanks to my colleague Ivana who just joined.

So, no, despite my consumer-grunts, I'm not moving on just yet. I think I'm staying on till the credits begin to roll - if it ever does.

Email nomad

Sheena Melissa Chok — Fri, 02 Nov 2007 12:33:00 GMT

It's been five months since I gave up using one of the world's leading free email providers. It started-off with a silent bang in 2004 - 1GB storage space, 10 invites per user, labels etc. and its fame and functionality has never slowed down since. I remember holding back those invitations because I didn't want to share it with friends who won't appreciate it, so I literally screened through my 'VIP list' - yes, it was a very big deal. It wasn't about 1GB - but free? Hello?

Three years down the road, it was decidedly so that I needed a break from all the great tools it has been offering. I had come to a stage where I felt I was doing too much with my email and at times it got so crowded that I totally overlooked important emails - those that were personal to me, emails that came with spam-looking subjects (e.g. 'hi sheena' or 'hey how's it going...') but aren't spam. I usually end up with hundreds of unread emails if I don't check it over the weekend, because I took the increasing storage for granted which leads back to what I was saying: I was doing too much with my personal email account.

Next? I totally switched-off from over-multitasking with a single client - and the best way to do it was to remove myself from that one thing that actually gave me the superpowers to over-multitask.

Here are some steps which I'd voluntarily gotten myself into while switching email providers:

Turned on the vacation settings, wrote a note which began with "I'm no longer..."
Activated free POP
Removed myself from over 30 (at least) subscription/membership emails (again, I took the storage space for granted)
Filtered another 20+ and had a blast (truth: migraine) deciding which company deserves a special folder in my next mailbox (Manchester United made the first cut no doubt)
Revisited websites which I'm a 'member' of, received frequent updates from; but never actually 'been' there for the past 3 years - and unsubscribed from them.

And so I'm back to one of the earliest free email providers which I had signed-up for decades ago (my math: 1 digital year feels like/equals to 4.25 human years). Although it looks slightly more sophisticated now and went all AJAX and Web 2.0, it is pretty much the same compared to 10 years ago (well, except for its 5GB storage of course - which only came about much later).

Since the switch, I started using it to write emails to my parents, my best friend in Dubai, my relatives in LA, and even acquaintances whom I'd met through social networking sites. It just feels so different to be able to anticipate updates and write back with excitement. And that was all I was doing with my email, except for the occasional newsletters from CNet and MediaPost, among others. It's like taking a babystep back to the world of penpals (read my first post here at Collective Conversation) and snail mails but just speedier. Phone calls and IMs never dipped so low in my "Top 5 Communication Tools" list.

I'm pretty sure this will not lead to another nomadic move. This is a significant transfer and it has come to stage 3. First I got bored with simplicity, then I switched to 'enhancement' which led me to complexity; and finally here I am, talking about me switching back to simplicity.

I just wanted something that doesn't come with too much perks. But maybe this will change - who knows? I'll let you know once I make another switch. After all, nomads will always be nomads.

So what exactly are you doing with your personal email? Are you fusing too much work-related stuff with it? Are you using it to track competitor news? Do you subscribe to Marketing-Interactive with it? Maybe it's time for spring-cleaning. In my case, I did mine in Malaysia so since it's summer all year long, my 'summer-cleaning' was nothing but tedious. It's still November, so it's not too late to start reorganizing a significant part of your digital life and welcome the new year with a clean box. After all, many clients' FY08 has already begun (we just welcomed HP's two days ago), and starting with an organized mailbox (both work and personal) will definitely land you a good payback - productivity wise!

Time to head to the subway and hunt for Chinese dinner at Walmart!

Disclosure: HP's a client.

updates [15 Nov, appx 9:50pm]: a post I just read, titled "Email contacts: the natural social network" - a good read.

Fake profiles - when it happens to...

Sheena Melissa Chok — Fri, 26 Oct 2007 11:51:00 GMT

If you've heard of Eric Trosch, then you'll know what I'll be talking about next.

Two days ago, a friend IM-ed me, 'guess what, I don't know how to tell you this but just go to Friendster and search for my name - but leave out the spacings, though.'

I know her too well - from those exact words, I knew trouble brewed and I could smell its strong stench - and that it's been brewing for just a short while.

My jaw literally detached itself from my face (In this case I insist on both written and mental-form of exaggeration) upon seeing such a familiar profile: it was complete with her real name, photos of herself and her friends, housing info, and worst of all - her cell phone number - complete with country code. Written on her profile were heinous words that are not that hard to imagine what could they be. And she has more than 24 'friends', and I'm very sure more than half (or could be all) of those 'male friends' are fully aware that it's not a real profile - come on, it about due dinosaurs' time we 'graduated' from those profiles already.

I know I shouldn't be surprised at all because I have seen these things before - many, many times. I felt sorry for them (mostly celebrities, corporate figures, religious leaders and the list of influential personalities goes on) and I moved on within the next hour of my OCD-Internet browsing. But never have I ever thought that these kind of 'pranks' could be carried out by acquaintances and friends of friends whom I come to know as adults (I bet some of you had expected me to write 'could have happened to a loved one - my best friend).

"I know it's human nature to have conflicts in life but this time they had gone way too far", I said to her. I don't wish to delve into details but whatever happened between those girls and her were really 'junior high' issues. But that's life, a harsh, truth.

My advice to her was plain simple - ignore them, move on and just let them prey. Let them prey. My so-called 'advice' was solely based on my 'key learnings' from watching all those made in Hollywood movies. The more you react, the happier they'd be. The more you try to stop it, the more they'll try to 'stop' you (reminds me of Sly Stallone in First Blood).These 'pranksters' are merely trigger-happy people with simply one agenda (from the movies, most only have one agenda), to seek and destroy.

We are barely living individuals that do not have the money and spiritual strength to have this undone.

And so I wonder, what is this? Prank, or harassment? What can we, as individuals, make do with damaging comments that appears to be real? These 'pranksters' know you, they will hunt you down and they will make sure it will hurt you; all this in the name of a medium that is going through many sorts of courtroom battles - The Internet.

We live in a a digital era where issues like fake profiles and flogs continue to creep into our lives and try to stop us from progressing to the next step. And, it is not easy to accept that many straight-forward issues (for instance, this case is straight forward because it's personal, doesn't involve the mass media's attention, and has no need for a major crisis communication strategy) can't be solved with the vast variety of communication tools which we have today.

On a lighter note, however; my girl friend has taken a brave step to manage this personal crisis: she is communicating by walking away. If there's no crowd, if there's no gossip, if there's no response from the victim who has a solid chain of support from her true friends - I guess I'll leave you to craft the possible outcome.

Communication should not be complicated. In this case, she is doing the right thing - well at least she thinks it's right, that's all that matters now.

My 90s Canadian Connection

Sheena Melissa Chok — Mon, 22 Oct 2007 01:03:00 GMT

The last show I watched that had something to do with Canada was That '70s Show, where Kelso, Hyde and Fez got into trouble with the Canadian cops for, well, Fez (Fez forgot to bring along his Green Card, which was later discovered hidden inside his shoe). I'm not too sure if Eric was involved but it was definitely an episode to remember.

I have family in Vancouver (or Toronto, I admit I'm a bad, bad cousin), and I'm actually waiting for one of my cousin brothers to tie the knot so there'll be a very good excuse for me to fly halfway across the globe to catch up with them. Also, another selfish thought: I need to hunt down my Canadian penpal (I hyperlinked it to wikipedia just in case you never had one) which I have lost touch with since 1994 or even earlier.

Actually I haven't brought this up at all ever since I started blogging in 2001, and I'm glad to have this as my inaugural post here Colletive Conversations.

It all started when I was reading the Daily Express, probably when I was 9 or 10. Back then the Internet was 'what?' and we only relied on TV and newspapers as our windows to the world. It was around that time when my dad discontinued our subscription to National Geographic (after decades) because I was the only one reading it not for the content but mostly for the pictures (come on, all of us are guilty of this at some point in life), and everyone else in the family was too busy with their own things. So, there was nothing much left to do aside from the usuals – Play Doh, Barbie, Polly Pocket and some computer games such as Tetris and Dig Dug. Reader's Digest was too wordy and TV only had Mind Your Language, Macgyver, Beverly Hills 90210 and Friends came much later; among others.

In the 90s, Doulos made few calls at our harbor and while browsing for coloring books and world maps (I like geography), a crew asked me if I had a penpal. I said no, and she said I should because it's a fun thing to do and it's not too late to start making friends from all around the world. Later, I asked my mom about it and she told me to watch out for some penpal column in the Daily Express.

I remember seeing the advertisement. I wrote to them and I received a letter from some country, I think it's Finland. Inside there was a chain letter with a list of names and addresses; and I get to choose a pal to write to. There were so many names from more than 100 countries to choose from, and I picked this girl because her surname was similar to Tommy Page! Yea I know I'm a loser here...

And so I was got really excited and I started writing to her (and now I ask myself, why didn't I pick a boy?) right away. And her name? Stephanie Paige.

So what do I know about Stephanie? Well, based on my vivid memories, we are around the same age and I think she has a younger brother, and she's a ballerina. We exchanged photographs and among the few she sent me there was this one with her in a ballerina outfit, striking a sweet, angelic pose. I think she sent me that because I was also taking ballet lessons, and tap dancing too.

It's now October 2007, more than 10 years has passed since I lost touch with her. She said she was moving houses and gave me her new home address to write to, which I did. Till today I'm still not sure who was the last person who was supposed to write back. I still have those letters stashed somewhere in my closet and because of this post I am inspired to dig it out and write a letter to her during my next trip back home.

Will I write and ask for her email address and that if she syncs it with her Facebook or MySpace? Or will I ask her to reply to me via snail mail and keep the chain going? Or, even better - should I break this excitement and spam all Stephanie Paige-s I find on Facebook and perhaps on LinkedIn?

I really don't know just yet – and I am eager to find out myself soon.