Your desk is, I believe, a good reflection of who you are. On mine, I have a giant mug that says, “Organised people are just too lazy to look for things.” Beside it is a framed photo of David Bowie, quote, “I don’t know where I’m going from here but I promise it won’t be boring.”
So, you have an idea of the kind of traveller I am. I am pretty disorganized. I hardly plan. I don’t have a “wife” to relegate this to. My BFF dog is useless when it comes to planning. And everytime I hear a startup pitching a trip planning idea or tool to make the traveller’s life easier, my mind goes into the clouds and I start imagining bows and flows of angel hair and ice cream castles in the air.
I pretty much have my head in the clouds when it comes to the influence of social media on what I should do in places. For example, I do not have any desire to go to the Lawson store to take a photo of Mount Fuji. Or dress up in flowing silk robes in Samarkand or the hanbok in Seoul.
Call me old-fashioned, but I’d rather create my own travel moments. The less I plan, the more space I leave for magic – the kind only serendipity can deliver.
Not on my must-do list: queuing to take that shot of Big Ben with that red phone booth.
A day at Cardiff Museum: Unexpected encounters
It was a rainy day in Cardiff. It usually is. I had nothing planned, thought it a good day for museums and the National Museum Cardiff is a hidden treasure. Not crowded, lots of great art to admire – you can have your fill of Monet and Matisse minus the hordes – and there’s usually a good exhibition on.
What I hadn’t counted on was that the Oasis One World Choir, a grouping made up of refugees and migrants from different corners of the world, happened to be performing that day. Imagine, enjoying your coffee and Welsh cake in the café, and hearing the voices of this diverse group of folks, who have fled tough times and persecution in their homeland, ring out and fill up the hall of the museum.
Their singing lit up the day like no amount of sunshine could.
Songs of The Skies: Priceless experience
Following the choir performance, we found out there would be a concert called “Songs of the Skies” by Sinfonia Cymru to mark World Environment Day at the Reardon Smith Theatre.
I didn’t know it at the time – Sinfonia Cymru’s mantra is “Taking Music To New Places” while WiT’s is “Take Your Mind To New Places” – but somehow I sensed this would be a concert worth catching. And I was right.
The first piece, Hope Is The Thing With Feathers (named after Emily Dickinson’s poem), was a tribute to the curlew, with a predicted extinction as a breeding species by 2033 and imagined a world when this iconic Welsh bird stops making its haunting call. “What is the sound you most want to hear and listen to?” it kept asking.
The second, a world premiere by Mark David Bowden, called Chasing Sunlight, was an audio-visual concerto, featuring violinists performing in front of video projections, honouring the Arctic tern’s 40,000-mile migration. It was beautiful and haunting, and I felt I was flying along with the tern on its long and perilous journey across the world. After the concert, Bowden went on stage to talk about the plight of the tern – that climate change had affected its migratory paths and some had stopped breeding. (An excerpt captured in the video below)
Walking out into the rain after the two-hour concert, I thanked my lucky stars I had decided to pop into the National Museum on a whim. These types of experiences are priceless and in this case, literally. The choir and concerts were free, open to anyone to enjoy and appreciate.
Onto Stockholm: My music video debut with Laleh
It was a sunny day in Stockholm. It rarely is here. I had arrived on the first day of summer. “We’ve had nothing but rain so far this year,” said my friend.
The sun was out The sky was blue. Everyone was out by the waters. And that evening, again unplanned by me, was the annual Rosendal Garden Party with acts like Kraftwerk and Chaka Khan performing. What a blast.
The annual Rosendal Garden Party with acts like Kraftwerk and Chaka Khan performing.
With the sky only turning dark around 10pm, the day was long, sunny and sweet – and walking back to my hotel, Villa Dagmar, with the moonlight shining on the water, I felt lucky to be a traveller on the loose.
“I don’t know where I’m going from here but I promise it won’t be boring.”
– David Bowie, via a framed photo on Siew Hoon’s desk
It didn’t stop there. The next day, again totally unplanned, I was roped in as an extra on a music video shoot by Laleh Pourkarim, a Swedish singer-songwriter with Iranian roots.
Wikipedia also lists her as a “record producer, guitarist, pianist, and record company manager”. I can tell you she’s a tour de force, full of charisma and energy, as she directed the shoot for her new single “Magkänsla“, which means “gut feeling”.
Laleh is a girl after my own heart. Yes, we are now on first name terms.
Laleh directing the shoot for her new single “Magkänsla”
In a world of perfectly curated itineraries and algorithm-fed recommendations, these unscripted encounters remind me why I travel. Not to tick boxes. Not to chase the next “top 10 must-sees.” But to be caught off guard by beauty I didn’t know I was seeking.
You really do get the trip you deserve. Or at least, the soundtrack.
